Oh.” I touch my cheeks. “You licked me.” He laughs and leans over, giving a tiny tongue swipe to my hand. “You’re very lickable.” I try to hit him. He laughs harder and grabs my hands.“No fair! Mere mortal against werewolf,” I complain.“Fine.” He lets go, but first he kisses my fingers, each of them. I sigh happily.

— Carrie Jones

She is a beautiful creature, but beauty doesn't equal good and it certainly doesn't equal sane.

— Carrie Jones

She smirks." Are you attempting to stop me, little one?"" Excuse me? Did you just call me 'little one'? What are you? Like, four feet tall?" I ask.

— Carrie Jones

So, I’m a bear,” she explains, eyeing us all. “Wait? Is Issue something?”“Nope,” Issue pouts. “All human. All the time.”“The coolest human ever,” Devyn says, reaching down and ruffling her hair.

— Carrie Jones

So there’s this annual dance in a couple of weeks.”“The Winter Ball,” I interrupt. “There have been signs up everywhere.”“You want to go?” I think about it for a half second. “Will you dress up?” He nods. I move forward, so my hands are flat on the towel and my face is much closer to his face. Something inside my chest warms up like a nice kind of heartburn and I say, “And will we slow dance?” He nods again. His bottom lip turns in toward his mouth for a second, just disappears and then comes back. Stretching out my spine, so my lips are nearly touching his I say, “And will you press yourself against me, and we’ll move really close together and then your hand will stretch out across the back of my head and your fingers will wrap into my hair and then. . .” He doesn’t nod. He just tilts his head down, moves his fingers into my hair, and his lips touch mine in a forever kiss. His lips are soft and hard all at once. His breath mixes with my breath. Everything inside of me whooshes out.

— Carrie Jones

That's what people who love you do: they hold you and lie. They tell you that you're worthy, that everything will be all right, and they do that even when you both know without a doubt that this is not true, that is it nowhere near the truth.

— Carrie Jones

That's when I realize how much I don't want to be alone, how sobbing should not be a solitary sport.

— Carrie Jones

The secret of happiness is freedom, the secret of freedom is courage.

— Carrie Jones

We all line up except for this guy in a wheelchair, Devyn. He smiles at me when I line up, introduces himself. He has a movie star smile, just white teeth and charisma, big eyes, dark skin. Furthermore, he’d be perfect looking if he didn’t have such a large nose, but the truth is it looks good on him, natural and powerful. Furthermore, he winks at Issue, who blushes.“You can do it, Is,” he says. She rolls her eyes, twists her lip, and says, “As long as I don’t pass out.”“If you pass out, I’ll put you in my lap and wheel you across the finish line,” he says, and it somehow isn’t sleazy because you can tell by his eyes how much he cares about Issue. I instantly like him. She blushes worse. Her face looks like she’s already sprinted a mile.

— Carrie Jones

We kiss for a long time, a good long time. I don’t even notice that it’s cold, and I forget to be afraid because that’s just how good a kisser he is. His lips move above my lips. My lips ache for the touch of him, the softness of his skin. We keep kissing. My hands wrap themselves in his hair. His hand presses me close into him, as close as I can be against him, and he is solid, strong, amazing. My hands leave his hair and journey down to the sides of his face, still tingling.“We should keep going,” he says, voice gruff and husky again. I love when his voice sounds like that, deeper than normal. His lips puff out a little more, too. “You’re blushing.” I pull my lips in against each other like I’m still trying to taste him. I move my snowshoes off of his snowshoes. It’s tricky.“You’re a good kisser,” I say.”So are you.

— Carrie Jones