What would you do if I kissed you right now?"I stared at his beautiful face and his beautiful mouth and I wanted nothing more than to taste it. "I would kiss you back.

In my rush, I hadn’t tied my shoelaces. Noah was now tying them for me. He looked up at me through his dark fringe of lashes and smiled. The expression on his face melted me completely. I knew I had the goofiest grin plastered on my lips, and didn’t care. “There,” he said as he finished tying the laces on my left shoe. “Now you won’t fall.”Too late.

Everyone's a little crazy. Some people just hide it better than others.

You are what happiness means to me. And I would rather have today with you than forever with anyone else.

Maybe sometimes we can only see the truth about ourselves if someone shows us where to look.

Wait," I said as Noah slipped a book from a shelf and headed toward the door. "Where are you going?""To read?"But I don't want you to. "But I need to go home," I said, my eyes meeting his. "My parents are going to kill me.""Taken care of. You're at Sophie's house."I loved Sophie."So I'm...staying here?""Daniel's covering for you."I loved Daniel."Where's Katie?" I asked, trying to sound casual."Eliza's house."I loved Eliza."And your parents?" I asked."Some charity thing."I loved charity."So why are you going to read when I'm right here?

You could start a fire with the heat between you two.""You're mistaking bitter animosity for heartfelt affection.

Is there any point asking what you're going to make me do on Sunday?''Not really.'Okay. 'Is there any point asking what you're going to do to me?'He grinned wickedly. 'Not really.'Fabulous. 'Does it involve the use of a safe word?''That will depend entirely on you.' Noah moved impossibly closer, just inches away. A few freckles disappeared into the scruff on his jaw. 'I'll be gentle,' Noah added. My breath caught in my throat as he looked at me from beneath those lashes, ruining me.I narrowed my eyes at him. 'You're evil.'In response, Noah smiled, and raised his finger to gently tap the tip of my nose. 'And you're mine,' he said, then walked away.

I hate you," I muttered.Noah smiled wider. "I know.

You smell good," he whispered into my neck. He was warm against me. Instinctively, I arched back into him and smiled. "Really?" "Mmm-hmm. Delicious. Like bacon.

I planted a kamikaze kiss on Jamie’s cheek.“FUCK,” he shouted, wiping it off. “What if you killed me!” He threw a Skittle at my face. It hit my forehead.“Ow!”“Taste the rainbow bitch.

Have you made any other friends since we've been here?"I gave him the death stare. "Yes, actually.""Who? I want a name.""Jamie Roth.""The Ebola kid? I heard he's a little unstable.""That was one incident.

Thinking something does not make it true. Wanting something does not make it real.

You're supposed to say, 'All I want is your happiness. I'll do whatever it takes, even if it means being without you.'""Sorry," Noah said. "I'm just not that big of a person.

I'll love you to ruins.

I read the title from the cover. ' 'The joy of... crap.' ' I read the rest of the full title of the thick, nondescript volume to myself and felt myself redden.Noah turned over on to his side and said with mock seriousness, 'I have never read 'The Joy Of Crap'. Sounds disgusting.' I blushed deeper. 'I have, however, read 'The Joy Of Sex.' ' He continued, a smile transforming his face. 'Not in a while, but I think it's one of those classics you can come back to again... and again.

Why?' He asked.'Why what?' What could I say? Noah, despite you being an asshole, or maybe because of it, I'd like to rip off your clothes and have your babies. Don't tell.

Asscrown," I muttered under my breath as I headed to my next class. I wasn't proud of swearing at a complete stranger, no. but he started it.Noah matched my pace. "Don't you mean 'assclown'?" He looked amused."No," I said, louder this time. "I mean asscrown. The crown on top of the asshat that covers the asshole of the assclown. The very zenith in the hierarchy of asses," I said, as though I was reading from a dictionary of modern profanity."I guess you nailed me then.

I was just going to say it reminds me of the symbols on a family crest.”Noah stopped mid-stride, and turned very slowly. “We’re not related.”“I know, but—”“Don’t even think it.

The two of us snuggled like quotation marks in his room full of words.

Thanks. Seriously, you must have better things to do with your life than waste it on the hopeless?''I've already learned Parseltongue. What else is there?''Elvish.

For some reason I think of the first time I saw her, kicking the shit out of the vending machine that refused to release her candy. Before that day, every hour of my life had been exactly like the one before it. Relentlessly boring. Painfully monotonous. But then she walked out of my waking nightmare and into my life, a complete mystery from Second One. Her presence was a problem I needed to solve, a problem that finally interested me. And then, somehow, she made me interested in myself. Mara began as a question I needed to answer, but the longer I'd known her, the less I felt I actually knew. She was constantly surprising, infinitely complex. Unknowable. Unpredictable. I have never met anyone more fascinating in my life, and all the time in the world wouldn't be enough to ever know her.

If you fight yourself, you will lose, and fighting leaves scares.

I'd wasted so much time wishing I could be different, wishing I could change things, change myself...I thought it would be easier to be someone else than to be who I was becoming, but I didn't think that anymore

I know what I can do to a girl with a word, a look, a touch. And I want to do them all to her.

You want me as much as I want you. And all I want is you."My tongue warred with my mind. "Today," I whispered.Noah stood slowly, his body skimming mine as he rose. "Today. Tonight. Tomorrow. Forever.

My name is not Mara Dyer, but my lawyer told me I had to choose something. A pseudonym. A nom de plume, for all of us studying for the SATs. I know that having a fake name is strange, but trust me—it’s the most normal thing about my life right now. Even telling you this much probably isn’t smart. But without my big mouth, no one would know that a seventeen-year-old who likes Death Cab for Cutie was responsible for the murders. No one would know that somewhere out there is a B student with a body count. And it’s important that you know, so you’re not next.

You can’t hurt me the way you think you can. But even if you could? I would rather die with the taste of you on my tongue than live and never touch you again. I’m in love with you, Mara. I love you. No matter what you do.

Have you kissed many boys before?" he asked quietly. His question brought my mind back into focus. I raised an eyebrow. "Boys? That's an assumption." Noah laughed, the sound low and husky. "Girls, then?""No.""Not many girls? Or not many boys?""Neither," I said. Let him make of that what he would."How many?" "Why—" "I am taking away that word. You are no longer allowed to use it. How many?" My cheeks flushed, but my voice was steady as I answered. "One." At this, Noah leaned in impossibly closer, the slender muscles in his forearm flexing as he bent his elbow to bring himself nearer to me, almost touching. I was heady with the proximity of him and grew legitimately concerned that my heart might explode. Maybe Noah wasn't asking. Maybe I didn't mind. I closed my eyes and felt Noah's five o' clock graze my jaw, and the faintest whisper of his lips at my ear."He was doing it wrong.

I was going to kiss him, and I was going to regret it. But at that moment, I couldn't bring myself to care.

I was warned about you, you know."And with that half-smile that wrecked me, Noah said, "But you're here anyway.

I laughed as I twisted to face him and raised my arm to hit in one move. He caught my wrist and my laugh caught in my throat. A mischievous grin curved my mouth as I raised my other hand to hit him. He reached over me and caught that wrist too, gently pinning my arms above my head as he straddled my hips. The space between us boiled my blood.

Noah's eyes held my face. I swallowed hard. The juxtaposition of him sitting in a room full of people while staring at no one but me was overwhelming. Something shifted inside of me at the intimacy of us, eyes locked amid the scraping of twenty graphite pencils on paper.I shaded his face out of nothingness. I smudged the slope of his neck and darkened his delinquent mouth, while the lights accented the right angle of his jaw against the cloudy sky outside. I did not hear the bell. I did not hear the other students rise and leave the room. I did not even notice that Noah no longer sat at the stool.

Does anyone know how to start a fire?"Blank stares. "So we can't start a fire," [Jamie] said. "We can't fly. We can't create a force field. We are the most bullshit superheroes.

Jamie said in that voice of his, "You never saw us.""I never saw you," the driver repeated, sounding dazed. "You drove this astonishingly hot underwear model from south Texas. You wanted to lick his abs." "I wanted to lick his abs.""You're such an asshole," Stella muttered as she climbed out of the cab.

The idea was a splinter in my mind. Always there, always stinging,even when I wasn't conscious of it. Even when I wasn't thinking about it.

You’re so calm,” I said out loud. “It’s like you don’t need it.” Need me, I didn’t say. But I could tell by the way his delinquent smile softened that he knew what I meant.Noah moved forward, toward me, next to me then, the slender muscles in his arms flexing with the movement. “I’m not sure you can appreciate how much I want to lay you out before me and make you scream my name.