J.R. Ward, Crave

"Bottom line? As much as youwanted someone to change and believed they could, they were in control of their life. Not you. And you could throw yourself against the wall of their choices until you were black-and-blue and dizzy as hell, but unless they decided to take a different road, the outcome wasn’t going to be what you wanted."

"Destiny was a machine built over time, each choice that you made in life adding another gear, another conveyor belt, another assemblyman. Where you ended up was the product that was spit out at the end—and there was no going back for a redo. You couldn‟t take a peek at what you‟d manufactured and decide, Oh, wait, I wanted to make sewing machines instead of machine guns; let me go back to the beginning and start again. One shot. That was all you got."

"Isaac Rothe, Matthias"

"husband and my family and the better half of Writer Dog. Prologue"

"All around, grown men were getting out of cars and shoving at each other like fifteen-year-olds, the bunch of juiced-up, armchair quarterbacks ready to peanut-gallery it up: The closest they were going to get to the octagon was standing on the outside of the chicken wire looking in."

"and Billy rolled in. “Thought you might like some wake-up.” Bingo,"

"Time to the face the music,"

"the only one who wanted to be free. Surprise, surprise. CHAPTER"

"He swiveled his head towards Eddie. "Tell me how to get over to the Four Lads. Do I have to die again"If he did, he had a Beretta on him and he knew what kicking the bucket from a gunshot was like. Snore."Don't bother." Adrian cracked his knuckles. "They're not going to tell you anything. They can't."What the fuck? "I thought I worked for them."You work for both sides, and they've given you all the help they can."Jim looked back and forth between the two angels. Each of them had the tight expression of a guy with a shoestring noosing up his balls."Help" he said. "Where's my goddamned help"They gave you us, asshole," Adrian snapped. "And that's all they can do--I've already gone over and asked them who's supposed to be next. I figured it would help you, you ungrateful bastard."

"But that was life: Nobody got a guided tour to their own theme park. You had to hop on the rides as they presented themselves, never knowing whether you would like the one you were in line for...or if the bastard was going to make you throw up your corn dog and your cotton candy all over the place."