Sinners' Playground (The Harlequin Crew, #1)

by Caroline Peckham

Big girls don't cry and all that jazz. Or maybe broken girls didn't feel. And dead girls didn't hurt.

“Penguin’s don’t fly,” he muttered and I snorted. “They do if you throw ‘em hard enough.”

“I got in a fight with a seagull over an ice cream. The gulls ‘round here have gotten real violent.”

“But I’m gonna go and do something even more fun than hanging out with you guys. Like letting that murderous seagull peck my eyes out before ramming a surfboard up my own ass. Ciao!”

“I used to spend a lot of time thinking about what I’d do if you ever came back, Rogue. And the long and short of it is, baby, that I’m never letting you get away again.”

"I liked the idea of someone having my back, even when I knew I was all alone,"

"Leave me alone, J!" I shouted. "I just need it in my mouth. Let me put the foot long in my mouth. Stop trying to sandwich block me!"

"You and me have been written in the stars for a long fucking time, Rogue. I know you used to feel it too. We're inevitable. Always have been, always will be."

"You think you really hate me that much?" he taunted, finding my hand and pushing the knife he held into my grip. I watched him in fear as he turned the blade in our combined grip and pressed it against his throat before removing his hand and just staring down at me. "So do it, then. Take your vengeance and rid the world of a monster while you're at it. My heart only beats for you anyway so if you want to carve it from my chest then you can. It's yours whatever way you want it."

And really, what I miss is who he was. Who I was. And you and the others too. I miss it being the five of us and the world seeming a whole lot brighter than it does these days."

And when life gave you lemons, you’d better not bust your ass making lemonade. You needed to squeeze the acid out into your enemies’ eyes and gut them while they were blinded.

“No worries, Ace. I’m a big girl. I gave up on being loved a long time ago and I don’t really care if I’m not liked either.”