Killer Instinct Quotes

“It's not the bad memories that tear a person apart. It's the good ones.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“When the odds are bad, you change the rules.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“Maybe, to do what you and I do, we have to have a little bit of the monster in us.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“None of us had normal childhoods," Sloane said quietly. "If we had, we wouldn't be Naturals.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“Sterling turned to Michael. I expected her to ask him something, but instead she just held out her hand. "Keys."
"Spatula," Michael replied. She narrowed her eyes at him. "We aren't just saying random nouns?" he asked archly.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“Most people built walls to protect themselves. Dean did it to protect everyone else.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“Some people said that broken bones grew back stronger. On the good days, I told myself that was true, that each time the world tried to break me, I became a little less breakable.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“Home is the people who love you most, the people who will always love you, forever and ever, no matter what.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“If you can't keep them from hitting you, you make them hit you.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“I take it you’re Michael,” she said. “The emotion reader with the attitude problem who’s continually doing stupid things for girls.” “That’s hardly a fair assessment,” Michael replied. “I do plenty of stupid things that aren’t for girls, too.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“I’d gone my whole life without romance. I didn’t need it, not the way I needed this: being part of something, caring about people in a way that I hadn’t realized I still could. Not just Michael and Dean, but Sloane and even Lia. I fit here. I hadn’t fit anywhere in a very long time.

Maybe ever.

I couldn’t screw that up.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“Lia eyed me. She eyed Michael. She eyed Dean. “Honestly,” she said, “I doubt that anyone is as happy as Cassie is at this exact moment.”

I was getting better at ignoring Lia’s suggestive little digs, but this one hit its target, dead center. Squished in between Michael and Dean, I blushed. I was not going to go there—and I wasn’t going to let Lia ruin this.

A grim expression on his face, Dean stood and marched toward Lia. For a moment, I thought he might say something to her about spoiling the moment, but he didn’t. He just picked her up and tossed her over his shoulder.

“Hey!” Lia protested.

Dean grinned and threw her onto the sofa with Michael and me and then resumed his perch on the edge of the couch like nothing had happened. Lia scowled, and Michael poked her cheek.

“Admit it,” he said again. “You’re just as happy as we are.”

Lia tossed her hair over her shoulder and stared straight ahead, refusing to look any of us in the eye. “A little girl is going home,” she said. “Because of us. Of course I’m as happy as you are.”

“Given individual differences in serotonin levels, the probability that any four people would be experiencing identical levels of happiness simultaneously is quite—”

“Sloane,” Michael said, without bothering to turn around. “If you don’t finish that sentence, there’s a cup of fresh ground coffee in your future.”

“My immediate future?” Sloane asked suspiciously. Michael had a long history of blocking her consumption of caffeine.

Without a word, Michael, Lia, and I all turned to look at Dean. He got the message, stood up, and strode toward Sloane, giving her the exact same treatment he’d given Lia. When Dean tossed Sloane gently on top of me, I giggled and almost toppled onto the floor, but Lia grabbed hold of my collar.

We did it, I thought, as Michael, Lia, Sloane, and I elbowed for room and Dean stared on from his position, just outside the fray.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“Sloane?” Lia turned to her next. Sloane stared at Lia, a blush spreading over her cheeks.

“I’m not undressing until we establish a conversion rate,” she informed us tartly, gesturing toward her mountain of chips.

“Sloane,” Michael said.

“Yes?”

“How would you feel about a second cup of coffee?”

Forty-five seconds later, Sloane was in the kitchen, and neither of the boys was wearing a shirt.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“Quite frankly, I thought that tools who lived in tool houses probably shouldn’t throw stones.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“If I’m a bad boy, you’ll take away my keys?” Michael wiggled his eyebrows in a way that was both suggestive and ridiculous. “No,” I replied without even thinking about it. “If you’re a bad boy, I’ll give your car to Dean.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“Did you know that the average life span of the hairy-nosed wombat is ten to twelve years?” Apparently, Sloane had decided that when I said I was fine, I was lying. The more coffee my roommate ingested, the lower her threshold for keeping random statistics to herself—especially if she thought someone needed a distraction.

“The longest-living wombat in captivity lived thirty-four years,” Sloane continued, propping herself up on her elbows to look at me. Given that we shared a bedroom, I probably should have objected more strenuously to cup of coffee number two. Tonight, though, I found Sloane’s high-speed statistical babbling to be strangely soothing. Profiling Sterling hadn’t kept me from thinking about Locke.

Maybe this would.

“Tell me more about wombats,” I said.

With the look of a small child awaking to a miracle on Christmas morning, Sloane beamed at me and complied.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“Beside me, Sloane looked at Lia, then at Michael, then at Dean. Then she bounced closer to me. “There’s a forty percent chance this ends with someone getting punched in the face,” she whispered.

“Come on, Dean-o,” Lia called. “Join us.” Those words were part invitation, part challenge. Michael’s body moved to Lia’s beat, and I realized suddenly that Lia wasn’t putting on a show for my benefit—or for Michael’s. She was getting up close and personal with Michael solely to get a rise out of Dean.

Based on the mutinous expression on Dean’s face, it was working.

“You know you want to,” Lia taunted, turning as she danced so her back was up against Michael. Dean and Lia had been the program’s first recruits. For years, it had been just the two of them. Lia had told me once that she and Dean were like siblings—and right now, Dean looked every inch the overprotective big brother.
Michael likes pissing Dean off. That much went without saying. Lia lives to pull Dean off the sidelines. And Dean…

A muscle in Dean’s jaw ticked as Michael trailed a hand down Lia’s arm. Sloane was right. We were one wrong move away from a fistfight. Knowing Michael, he’d probably consider it a bonding activity.

“Come on, Dean,” I said, intervening before Lia could say something inflammatory. “You don’t have to dance. Just brood in beat to the music.”

That surprised a laugh out of Dean. I grinned. Beside me, Michael eased back, putting space between his body and Lia’s.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“When the odds are bad,” she said, removing something from one of them, “you change the rules.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“I met her. I didn’t like her. She died.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“Let’s see what Mommy and Daddy are up to, shall we?” Lia said, eyeing the TV greedily and waiting for the fireworks to commence. “Lia, I will give you one thousand dollars to never refer to Sterling and Briggs as Mommy and Daddy again.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“All right, already," Lia said, cutting me off. "Enough with the bonding, Cassie. I'll share the ice cream, but we're eating it somewhere else. I'm not in the mood to play well with others, and the next person who asks me to share something dies a slow, painful death.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“But the next person whose facial expression approaches ‘brood’ is getting punched in the nose. Unless it’s Cassie. If it’s Cassie, I punch Dean in the nose.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“It’s considered impolite to talk above seventy-five decibels,” Sloane sniffed. “I believe it’s called shouting.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“You say you care about Dean,” she told me, her voice low. “You say you want to help. This will help. I’d lie to you about a lot of things, Cassie, but helping Dean isn’t one of them. I wouldn’t do this for you, or for Michael, or even for Sloane. But I would waltz into hades and make nice with the devil himself for Dean, so either you put on the damn dress or you get the hell out of my way.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“Sloane looked on from behind a veritable mountain of Oreos. “I’ll sit this one out,” she said. “Also, I’m entertaining the idea of eating some of my poker chips. Can we agree that an Oreo missing its frosting is worth two-thirds of its normal amount?”

“Just eat the cookies,” I told her, eyeing her pile mournfully—and only partially joking. “You have plenty to spare.”

Before joining the Naturals program, Sloane had been Las Vegas born and raised. She’d been counting cards since she’d learned to count. She sat out about a third of the hands, but won every single hand she played.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“It’s not the bad memories that tear a person apart. It’s the good ones.

- Cassie”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“When I made it to the living room, I wasn’t surprised to see that the only one actually taking a practice GED was Dean. Lia was filing her nails. Sloane appeared to be constructing some kind of catapult out of pencils and rubber bands.

Lia caught sight of me first. “Good morning, sunshine,” she said. “I’m no Michael, but based on the expression on your face, I’m guessing you’ve been spending some quality time with the lovely Agent Sterling.” Lia beamed at me. “Isn’t she the best?”

The eerie thing about Lia was that she could make anything sound genuine. Lia wasn’t fond of the FBI in general, and she was the type to flout rules based on principle alone, but even knowing her enthusiasm was feigned, I couldn’t see through it.

“There’s something about that Agent Sterling that just makes me want to listen to what she has to say,” Lia continued earnestly. “I think we might be soul mates.”

Dean snorted, but didn’t look up from his practice test. Sloane set off her catapult, and I had to duck to keep from taking a pencil to the forehead.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“I have an idea,” Lia said in an overly innocent tone that I recognized immediately as trouble. “We could always take things to the next level.” She unknotted the white kerchief around her neck and tossed it to me. Her fingers played with the bottom of her tank top, raising it up just enough to make it crystal clear what the “next level” was.

“It is my understanding that the rules of strip poker specify that only the loser is required to disrobe,” Sloane interjected. “No one has lost yet, ergo—”

“Call it a show of solidarity,” Lia said, inching her shirt up farther. “Cassie’s almost out of chips. I’m just trying to even the playing field.”

“Lia.” Dean was not amused.

“Come on, Dean,” Lia said, her bottom lip jutting out in an exaggerated pout. “Loosen up. We’re all friends here.” With those words, Lia pulled off her tank top.”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct

“If it had been me in the woods, if I’d been the one to go with Briggs, if I’d been the one you saw at the exact second…” Would it have been me?”
― Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Killer Instinct