Gabrielle chuckled, her dark eyes twinkling. “So he’s been after you, has he? Poor Etta, pursued by a sun priest offering to pleasure—”

“Every nook and cranny,” Marietta interrupted dryly and Gabrielle tipped her head back with a throaty laugh.

Relax,” the woman said. “It’s just me.”

“Just you?” Hale asked with heavy irony, remembering the black leather and predator’s eyes with a stab of heat. Dangerous beauty had always been his downfall.

“I’m watching your back.”

“Sure you are,” he snorted. Beauty or not, he wasn’t stupid enough to trust. Screw, sure. Trust, no way.

She paused and saw him tense in expectation. He wouldn’t like to hear this, but better from her than one of the others. “You aren’t the only pilot I have in my service. And you aren’t the only person with a dark past, though the illegal things that you did, you were forced to do by the Core. But I will tell you what I’ve told the others. This is your last chance. You screw up with me and you get shipped up river. I don’t offer second chances—I offer last chances.”

Nope, he didn’t like it. She saw the hand not holding the bottle of beer curl into a fist.

Sin and Del, from Sunscapes Trilogy, Book 1: Last Chance

Your hair is like butterflies,” Sebastian said, giggling like a child.
“That’s nice,” Firen said impatiently. “Keep moving.”
“Fantastic. I always like my days better with a touch of insanity,” Gabriella quipped.

You know what, Michael? I think this is the beginning of a beautiful relationship of loathing.

Never let other people bring you down let Jesus be the one who brings you down, because he knows what he is doing