Quotes from Denise Hunter

He remembered the way she looked wearing his hat, remembered the warmth of her in his arms as they danced, their first kiss in the barn when he'd been rocked by the riot she'd caused inside him. There was nothing he didn't remember. Including the way she looked at him, like he hung the moon and the stars. It was the look Dylan referred to, the one that convinced his friend her feelings were real. Wade would give anything to have her here now, looking at him like that.

It's not the how, Maddy, It's the Who.

All this time he'd thought it was her feelings for Stephen that kept Meridith at arm's length. But Stephen was gone, and still she held back. He'd seen the look in her eyes. She'd been putty in his hands when he'd touched her. And then a wall had come up, shutting him out. What gave? And equally as baffling, how had Meridith, in two and a half months, gone from adversary to keeper of his heart?

His locked on hers, steady and intense. 'That was your last first kiss, Josephine Duprey,' he said softly.

PJ kicked Ryan in the backside for no apparent reason, and he threw her over his broad shoulders just because he could. She squealed and pounded his back, but he didn't set her down until they reached the table. "Brute," PJ said, giving him a playful shove. "Brat." Ryan saved lives, and PJ could feed an army, but when they got together it was like they were twelve.

He's all wrong for you," Travis said. "You're the expert? Last I checked, you resigned from that position.

He had no idea what missing was. Missing was lying in the dampness of your tears night after night. Missing was a constant hollow spot in the center of your chest. Missing was a yawning ache that was never satisfied.

It's fear that makes an act courageous.

sometimes we have to find the courage to take off our shoes and feel it all. Even the bad stuff.

Mercy, but he smelled good. All piney and musky and manly. There should be a law.

When I sit up here... I'm just blown away God even notices us...

For am I now trying to win the favor of people, or God? Or am I striving to please people?

Life is a gift, however long it lasts. It's God's to give and take away as He sees fit. We go through life thinking we're entitled to our ninety, but we're not entitled to anything. All we can do is trust that He knows what He's doing. That He has a plan for all of us, and that no pain He allows in our life will go unused.

God, what is going on? Why are You leaving me with the one man who has the power to break me?

She drew in a breath of salty sea air and let it out, mentally disconnecting with life on land even as the boat whisked her away from it. Just for today, she'd leave her worries behind and surrender to the wind's wiles.

So...what do you want to do? He didn't even have to think about it. Kiss you again.

Your identity doesn't come from your address.

That was something, wasn't it? Trust was a good place to start. Especially after the kind of betrayal she'd been through. It made him want to prove he was the kind of man she deserved. The kind of man who'd love her for better or worse. The kind who was faithful and true.

One night Shay heard the quiet murmur of his voice, punctuated by Olivia's giggles. She shuffled across the living room and listened around the corner. He was reading aloud to her, imitating each character's voice. Shay listened to his falsetto, a grin tugging her lips at the incongruity of a cowboy reading The Princess Diaries.

The soles of her feet were summer-tough, numb to the jagged shells and bits of pinecone.

Sometimes you just have to extend a little grace to people. Not because they deserve it - but because we don't deserve it either.

Sometimes family isn't the situation you're born into but the people who've chosen to love you along the way.

Love? The word streaked across the path of his thoughts like lightning across a stormy sky. He watched her now, watching Lulu, watching a moth flutter under the porch light, looking anywhere but at him, and sudden warmth flooded through him, making his knees weak. Yes, he loved her. He'd tried not to. But now here he was. On her porch, watching her watching a moth, and realizing he was the moth and she the light. It would always be this way.

Meet me back here in twenty," he called, shutting the door. " 'Kay, Dad!" He froze, the title catching him right in the gut. He watched her disappear into the barn, a smile of wonder lifting his mouth.