Jennifer Crusie

“I suppose you had to," Wes said when Phin went back to join him at the table."Pretty much. She seduced me.""Yeah, right," Wes said. "She said, 'Please fix the kitchen drain,' and you interpreted that--""She said, 'Fuck me.' " Phin put two balls on the table and picked up his cue. "I interpreted that to mean she wanted sex.""Oh." Wes picked up his cue. "That would have been my call, too." He squinted at the table. "Why would she have said that?""On a guess? Because she wanted sex.”

“Values aren't buses," she said shortly. "They're not supposed to get you anywhere. They're supposed to define who you are. And I'd rather be touchy-feely than morally bankrupt.”

“You want sensitive and understanding, stick with the therapist.You want great,headbanging sex, get off the fucking phone and come with me.”

“Everybody's crooked. The trick is to find out how they're bent.”

“If she'd just kept her mouth shut, she would have been perfect, but no...”

“Who was the moron on the phone?""Carl Avery," Kate said. "A long-standing client and potential felon.”

“Mitch's take on humanity had deteriorated to the point where he assumed someone was lying if her lips were moving.”

“Feel no guilt. Getting married and giving birth does not mean that you have sold your life away to perfectly healthy people who can get their own damn socks.”

“North is a powerful man, and you're still connected to him." Flo frowned. "Probably sexual memory, those Capricorns are insatiable. Well, you know. Sea Goat. And of course, you're a Fish. You'll end up back in bed with him."Andie slammed the car door. "You know what I'd like for Christmas, Flo? Boundaries. You can gift me early if you'd like.”

“I could shove this swizzle stick through his heart, Min thought. She wouldn’t do it, of course. The stick was plastic and not nearly pointed enough on the end. Also people didn’t do things like that in Southern Ohio. A sawed-off shotgun, that was the ticket.”

“You know, I'm not even sure how we ended up living together.""I am," Jake said, turning back to the lake. "Sex. It's a powerful force, my boy, and women use it.""Is that why you gave them up?" Will asked, sympathetically. "Did paranoia drive you to celibacy?”

“This is a woman you've known less than twelve hours. It took you a year to pick out a couch, but you're seriously—"“Yes,” Roger said. “She's the one.”

“Say, ‘Thank you, Phin.’ ”“Oh, please.”“Say, Thank youvery much, Phin. ”“I don’t think so.”“Say, ‘You are a great lover, Phin.’ ”“I’m out of here.”

“Sophie held the [hand]cuffs higher, hopint to instill some sense of shame, if not in him, then at least in herself. One look at him and she wanted him again. "I found them in the bed.""That makes sense," Phin said. "That's where I lost them.""I'd ask what you were doing with them," Sophie said, trying not to sound bitchy, "but I probably don't want to know, do I?""Sure you do. It was exciting and different and depraved." Phin nodded toward the stairs. "Go put them someplace we can find them, and I'll show you later.”

“You have to open up to the world and learn optimism...Contentment with the past, happiness with the present, and hope for the future. Learned optimisim.”