Screamed Quotes

Sharpe had no thought of deserting now, for now he was about to fight. If there was any one good reason to join the army, it was to fight. Not to hurry up and do nothing, but to fight the King's enemies, and this enemy had been shocked by the awful violence of the close-range volley and now they stared in horror as the redcoats screamed and ran towards them. The 33rd, released from the tight discipline of the ranks, charged eagerly. There was loot ahead. Loot and food and stunned men to slaughter and there were few men in the 33rd who did not like a good fight. Not many had joined the ranks out of patriotism; instead, like Sharpe, they had taken the King's shilling because hunger or desperation had forced them into uniform, but they were still good soldiers. They came from the gutters of Britain where a man survived by savagery rather than by cleverness. They were brawlers and bastards, alley-fighters with nothing to lose but tuppence a day. ~ Bernard Cornwell

Not if we kill them - " I began, only to cut off when a sudden rushing noise filled the air. And Ray grabbed my gun and went ballistic on something on the wall over our heads.
"Die! Die! Die!" he screamed, emptying the clip and causing spent shells to rain down all around us. And okay, maybe I'd been wrong about the calm thing. Because he was just standing there, trembling and panting and staring
At the air-conditioning vent that he'd just shot the crap out of.
" - first." I took my smoking gun out of his limp fingers and patted him on the back. "See? That's the spirit. ~ Karen Chance

She started to scream. She screamed and screamed and screamed. Her vision was numb. There was a window in front of her but it opened into a nothingness like the one yawning from her mouth. Somewhere she could hear a building sound, a wind, huge and wide, rushing out of the void, rushing toward her. The walls, the veils in her head, they tore, they ripped, they collapsed. The wind rushed over his empty voice and the Ada thought with a sudden final clarity--
She has come. She has come for me at last. ~ Akwaeke Emezi

Kill me then,' panted Harry, who felt no fear at all, but only rage and contempt. 'Kill me like you killed him, you coward-'
DON'T-' screamed Snape, and his face was suddenly demented, inhuman, as though he was in as much pain as the yelping, howling dog stuck in the house behind them- 'CALL ME A COWARD! ~ J.K. Rowling

Kaderin didn't believe, as a whole, the nymphs were more beautiful than the Valkyrie, but everything about them screamed, "Easy lay! When you don't want to work for it!" And curiously, many males found that more appealing than the Valkyrie's "Do it and die, simian". ~ Kresley Cole

I'm goin' to find out where he lives and fuckin' kill him!" Branna screamed then turned and stormed out of the kitchen. Him? What the hell? "Branna, a girl did this, not a lad," I shouted after her. Her steps paused then pattered back into the kitchen. "That Dominic kid didn't do that or cause it?" she asked, boring her eyes into mine to see if I was lying. She thought Dominic did this to me or was the cause of it? Not surprising since the only times I ever had bruises or got into trouble, he was usually involved. ~ L.A. Casey

Inari screamed and swung her stake, but her Buffy impersonation wasn't any better than mine. ~ Jim Butcher

That's it. I had enough of your abuse," Tristan said, wrapping his arm around my waist and pulling me back down on the bed. I screamed as he tackled me. We wrestled back and forth, laughing. I found his tickle spot giving me the advantage, but he was fast and kept getting the upper hand. He had me pinned with my arms above my head and his body pressing down on mine. I stopped resisting, but he didn't let go. He was panting and smiling over his victory. He stared deep into my eyes making my heart race. ~ Jessica Miller

There's definitely a lot of trash that comes with the prize of being famous. It's a nice gift, but there's a lot of wrapping and paper and junk to cut through. Back then, when a movie came out and people saw you on the street, their reaction was so supercharged that it was scary. It would frighten other people. It used to really rattle me. I mean, everybody would love to have their clothes torn off by a mob of girls, but being screamed at is different. ~ Bill Murray

Hey," she whispered to Malachi. "When are Irin considered adults?"

He was following what looked to be a quiet argument between Sari and Mala. "Full adults? Around sixty to seventy-five years. When we're finished with our training. Why?"

She flushed. Wow.

"So, you're quite the cradle robber, aren't you?"

Malachi turned to her abruptly. "What? No, I'm not."

"I'm not even thirty. That's like... a teenager to you guys."

She could see the flush crawl up his neck, even behind the beard. "You're human. You mature differently."

"But I'm not really human."

His shoulders were stiff and his posture screamed his discomfort. It was really a shame Ava found teasing him to be so amusing.

"I mean, what would your mom say if she found out you were mated-and I mean well and thoroughly mated- to what she would basically consider a kid?"

He wiped a hand over his forehead. "Heaven above, please stop talking."

"So are we going to stop fooling around now?"

He groaned. "Ava."

"I'm just yanking your chain."

"You're going to have to speak up, because the mental lecture my mother's memory is giving me right now is rather loud. ~ Elizabeth Hunter

Mama," the child exclaimed, breathless and agitated.
Phoebe looked down at him in concern. "Justin, what is it?"
"Galoshes brought me a dead mouse. She dropped it on the floor right in front of me!"
"Oh, dear." Tenderly Phoebe smoothed his dark, ruffled hair. "I'm afraid that's what cats do. She thought it was a fine gift."
"Nanny won't touch it, and the housemaid screamed, and I had a fight with Ivo."
Although Phoebe's younger brother Ivo was technically Justin's uncle, the boys were close enough in age to play together and quarrel.
"About the mouse?" Phoebe asked sympathetically.
"No, before the mouse. Ivo said there's going to be a honeymoon and I can't go because it's for grownups." The boy tilted his head back to look up at her, his lower lip quivering. "You wouldn't go to the honeymoon without me, would you, Mama?"
"Darling, we've made no plans to travel yet. There's too much to be done here, and we all need time to settle in. Perhaps in the spring - "
"Dad wouldn't want to leave me behind. I know he wouldn't!"
In the electrified silence that followed, Tom shot a glance at West, who looked blank and startled.
Slowly Phoebe lowered to the ground until her face was level with her son's. "Do you mean Uncle West?" she asked gently. "Is that what you're calling him now?"
Justin nodded. "I don't want him to be my uncle - I already have too many of those. And if I don't have a dad, I'll never learn how to tie my shoes ~ Lisa Kleypas

I had a dream I was in heaven standing at the gates. They shined so brightly ass they were gold and reflecting all the light. I could see you there just on the other side so I screamed your name. But the angels, they wouldn't let me in. They wouldn't let me have you, so I stuck dinomite to the locks and blew the gates away. I blew the angels away just so I could hold you for a single second more before hell ripped me away. ~ Kerri E. Lorenz

The eastward spurs tip backward from the sun.
Nights runs an obscure tide round cape and bay
and beats with boats of cloud up from the sea
against this sheer and limelit granite head.
Swallow the spine of range; be dark. O lonely air.
Make a cold quilt across the bone and skull
that screamed falling in flesh from the lipped cliff
and then were silent, waiting for the flies.

Here is the symbol, and climbing dark
a time for synthesis. Night buoys no warning
over the rocks that wait our keels; no bells
sound for the mariners. Now must we measure
our days by nights, our tropics by their poles,
love by its end and all our speech by silence.
See in the gulfs, how small the light of home.

Did we not know their blood channelled our rivers,
and the black dust our crops ate was their dust?
O all men are one man at last. We should have known
the night that tidied up the cliffs and hid them
had the same question on its tongue for us.
And there they lie that were ourselves writ strange.

Never from earth again the coolamon
or thin black children dancing like the shadows
of saplings in the wind. Night lips the harsh
scarp of the tableland and cools its granite.
Night floods us suddenly as history
that has sunk many islands in its good time. ~ Judith A. Wright

I look in the jewelry box where Joanie found the drugs. She showed me a miniature Ziploc bag filled with a clear, hard rock.

"What is this?" I said. I never did drugs, so I had no idea. Heroin? Cocaine? Crack? Ice? "What is this?" I screamed at Alex, who screamed back, "It's not like I shoot it!"

A plastic ballerina pops up and slowly twirls to a tinkling song whose sound is discordant and deformed. The pink satin liner is dirty, and other than a black pearl necklace, the box holds only rusty paper clips and rubber bands noosed with Alex's dark hair. I see a note stuck to the mirror and pick up the jewelry box and move the ballerina aside. She twirls against my finger. The note says, I wouldn't hide them in the same place twice.

I let out a short breath through my nose. Good one, Alex. I close the jewelry box and shake my head, missing her tremendously. I wish she never went back to boarding school, and I don't understand her sudden change of plans. What did they fight about? What could have been so bad? ~ Kaui Hart Hemmings

They both looked into each other's eyes for one last time and turned their back on each other and started walking in different directions. Each step they took were heavy, their souls try to hold them back, screamed and turned around trying to get torn away from their bodies and reach out each other's hand, to hug each other and never let go but they couldn't. The distance between them was infinite now. ~ Akshay Vasu

He believed that a burger joint ought to look like a join, not like a surgery, not like a nursery with pictures of clowns and funny animals on walls, not like a bamboo pavilion on a tropical island, not like a glossy plastic replica of a 1950s diner that never actually existed. If you were going to eat charred cow smothered in cheese, with a side order of potato strips made as crisp as ancient papyrus by immersion in boiling oil, and if you were going to wash it all down with either satisfying quantities of icy beer or a milkshake containing the caloric equivalent of an entire roasted pig, then this fabulous consumption ought to occur in an ambience that virtually screamed guilty pleasure, if not sin. ~ Dean Koontz

I was so furious, you see, that all around me were things that could move and bend and grow and reproduce and my son - my vital, charismatic, beautiful boy - was just this thing. Immobile, wilted, bloodied, suffering. Their beauty seemed like an obscenity. I screamed and I screamed and I swore - words I didn't know I knew - until Steven came out and stood, his hand resting on my shoulder, waiting until he could be sure that I would be silent again. He didn't understnad, you see. He hadn't worked it out yet. That Will would try again. That our lives would be spent in a state of constant vigilance, waiting for the next time, waiting to see what horror he could inflict upon himself. We would have to see the world through his eyes - the potential poisons, the sharp objects, the inventiveness with which he could finish the job that damned motorcyclist had started. Our lives had to shrink to fit around the potential for that one act. And he had the advantage - he had nothing else to think about, you see ? Two weeks later, I told Will, "Yes". Of course I did. What else could I have done ? ~ Jojo Moyes

Pink Balloons

My name is Olivia King

I am five years old

My mother bought me a balloon. I remember the day she walked through the front door with it. The curly hot pink ribbon trickling down her arm, wrapped around her wrist. She was smiling at me as she untied the ribbon and wrapped it around my hand.

"Here Livie, I bought this for you."

She called me Livie.

I was so happy. I'd never had a balloon before. I mean, I always saw balloon wrapped around other kids wrist in the parking lot of Wal-Mart, but I never dreamed I would have my very own.

My very own pink balloon.

I was excited! So ecstatic! So thrilled! I couldn't believe my mother bought me something! She'd never bought me anything before! I played with it for hours. It was full of heliu and it danced and swayed and floated as I drug it around from room to room with me, thinking of places to take it. Thinking of places the balloon had never been before. I took it in the bathroom, the closet, the laundry room, the kitchen, the living room. I wanted my new best friend to see everything I saw! I took it to my mother's bedroom!

My mothers

Bedroom?

Where I wasn't supposed to be?

With my pink

balloon...

I covered my ears as she screamed at me, wiping the evidence off her nose! She slapped me across the face as she told me how bad I was! How much I misbehaved! How I never ~ Colleen Hoover

Han made no effort to put up a brave front. Most of the time he just screamed himself hoarse, though a couple of times he amused himself by screaming Fionas's name as if he were in the throes of passion. FEEE-OHHH-NAAA! Lord Bayar made him pay for that, but afterward, Fiona didn't come down anymore, which Han appreciated. ~ Cinda Williams Chima

Agnes shut her eyes, clenched her fists, opened her mouth and screamed.

It started low. Plaster dust drifted down from the ceiling. The prisms on the chandelier chimed gently as they shook.
It rose, passing quickly through the mysterious pitch at fourteen cycles per second where the human spirit begins to feel distinctly uncomfortable about the universe and the place in it of the bowels. Small items around the Opera House vibrated off shelves and smashed on the floor.

The note climbed, rang like a bell, climbed again. In the Pit, all the violin strings snapped, one by one.
As the tone rose, the crystal prisms shook in the chandelier. In the bar, champagne corks fired a salvo. Ice jingled and shattered in its bucket. A line of wine-glasses joined in the chorus, blurred around the rims, and then exploded like hazardous thistledown with attitude.

There were harmonics and echoes that caused strange effects. In the dressing-rooms the No. 3 greasepaint melted. Mirrors cracked, filling the ballet school with a million fractured images.
Dust rose, insects fell. In the stones of the Opera House tiny particles of quartz danced briefly...

Then there was silence, broken by the occasional thud and tinkle.
Nanny grinned.
'Ah,' she said, 'now the opera's over. ~ Terry Pratchett

But suddenly something sharp was cutting me, my throat, my wrists, my ankles. I screamed in shock, thinking he'd brought me there to hurt me more. Then fire started burning through me, and I didn't care about anything else. I begged him to kill me. When Esme and Edward came home, I begged them to kill me too. Carlise sat with me. He held my hand and said that he was so sorry, promising that it would end. He told me everything, and sometimes I listened. He told me what he was, what I was becoming. I didn't believe him. He apologized each time I screamed. Edward wasn't happy. I remember hearing them discuss me. I stopped screaming sometimes. It did no good to scream. ~ Stephenie Meyer

One whiff of him and her libido went first-grader on her: hand raised, butt dancing in the chair as her hormones screamed, "Pick me! Pick me! ~ Coreene Callahan

Burlic screamed. He threw back his head and roared a single furious word into the night: "Waeccan." The name erupted from him in a savage wail that rasped at his throat, over and over until he could shout no more.
His howls echoed along the valley. In the village, the other hunters heard and exchanged glances, shook their heads and said nothing. The women clutched their talismans, told the children to go inside. They had tried to help, but there was nothing they could do for Burlic now. ~ Mikey Campling

Gloria screamed, but nothing came out. She could feel the scream in her throat, but it was clinging there, too scared to climb out of her mouth.
Raymond might have screamed, too
he wasn't sure. His face was an exploding red ball
that was what it felt like. His heart was in the middle of his head. He couldn't see a thing. ~ Roddy Doyle

When I talk to people about what makes us human, some people say it's our tears. Because we are the only ones who weep, only we can feel true sorrow. When I hear this, I remember Isiro's face, her anguished eyes as she cried for Mikeno, how she screamed at the keepers with her teeth bared and pushed at the poles. How she dashed back to his body and dug her fingers into his chest as if the strength of her grip could bring him back. There is sorrow without tears. Of course there is. ~ Vanessa Woods

Hey Americans," he screamed furiously at the drones.
"Brothers of the wolf, sisters of the wind, children of the Sun! Send the Choctaw warrior a quick and merciful death, instead of abandoning us into slavery or shameful capture. ~ George Sorbane

Hermione's eyes lit up with a terrible light of helpfulness and something in the back of Harry's brain screamed in desperate humiliation. ~ Eliezer Yudkowsky

I faced Cole and Max. "Sorry, guys."
I lightly touched the hot poker to Max's back. he screamed and ran forward. Cole looked at him with an amused smile on his lips, then I did the same thing to Cole's back, angling it under the hem of his jacket. He lurched forward.
We ran this way for several long minutes, and eventually I didn't have to prod them as much. ~ Brodi Ashton

They fought.
They screamed.
They begged.
They died.
And he loved it. ~ Jex Lane

As dawn saw the lights of the mainland go out, I swam harder, pulling out all the stops in my swimming repertoire, even using my head to push the water aside. My tired muscles screamed at me to stop, but I took no notice and there, a few hundred yards away was what I could see was the shoreline, my pace doubled. ~ Stephen Richards

[January 1944] As to this country, I have been lecturing now for three years to the troops and their attitude is the same. They don't believe in concentration camps, they don't believe in the starved children of Greece, in the shot hostages of France, in the mass-graves of Poland; they have never heard of Lidice, Treblinka or Belzec; you can convince them for an hour, then they shake themselves, their mental self-defence begins to work and in a week the shrug of incredulity has returned like a reflex temporarily weakened by a shock.
Clearly all this is becoming a mania with me and my like. Clearly we must suffer from some morbid obsession, whereas the others are healthy and normal. But the characteristic symptom of maniacs is that they lose contact with reality and live in a phantasy world. So perhaps it is the other way around: perhaps it is we, the screamers, who react in a sound and healthy way to the reality which surrounds us, whereas you are the neurotic, who totter about in a screamed phantasy world because you lack the faculty to face the facts! Were it not so, this war would have been avoided, and those murdered within sight of your daydreaming eyes would still be alive! ~ Arthur Koestler

In the streets the children screamed. The lovers cried, and the poets dreamed ~ Don McLean

Get away from the door." she whispered. "Both of you get out of here NOW." "Miss," said Alf. "We don't mean no..." "You don't know what you're getting into." she said. "You must leave here this instant." Alf, his face worried said to Peter. "Maybe we should..." "No," sad Peter, furious. "We've come this far, and we're going to go in there, and she can't stop us." "Yes I can." said Molly, her voice dead calm. Peter and Alf both looked at her. "I can scream." she said. "You wouldn't." Peter said. "Yes I would." "You don't dare." said Peter. "You're not supposed to be here, either. You'd be in as much trouble as us." "I could say I heard a noise," she said. "I heard something fall." she pointed to the padlcok. "I came to investigate, and when I saw you I screamed." "All right miss. said Alf. "No need for that." he put a hand on Peter's shoulder. "Come on lad." "No," said Peter, shrugging off the hand, glaring at Molly. "You go if you want. She doesn't scare me." "I'm going to count," said Molly. "If you're not gone when I get to ten, I WILL scream." "You're bluffing." said Peter." said Peter. "One." said Molly. On the floor Leatherface stirred, rolling over, resumed snoring. "Little friend." whispered Alf, his tone urgent now. "I'm going." "Go then." said Peter. "Two." "Please little friend." "NO." "Three" "All right, then." said Alf, shaking his head. "Good luck, then." "Four" Alf was up the ladder and gone. "Five" "Why are you doing this?" hissed Peter. "Six. Because I have to ~ Dave Barry

With that Nox turned a knob. There was a delay, but that was how the machine worked. First it gathered information about the subject, feeling, sensing - like a fighter in a ring, circling his opponent.
Kaleb sensed it, too. It was as if a doctor palpated his flesh, pushing his skin. It tingled gently. The tingling surged through his whole body. Was this it? Kaleb thought. Visions from his past shot through his brain. His mother. Father. Zenobia. Joan and Reck. The Three Musketeers. Pleasant memories.
Then the machine found what it searched for, and it acted. Waves of pain shot through his entire body, causing him to arch his back. He screamed in agony, his screams reverberating across the canyon. Then all of his muscles constricted. He couldn't breathe, couldn't even scream. It seemed to last forever. It stopped, and his muscles relaxed, allowing him to breath. ~ Cate Campbell Beatty

I am much less autistic now, compared to when I was young. I remember some behaviors like picking carpet fuzz and watching spinning plates for hours. I didn't want to be touched. I couldn't shut out background noise. I didn't talk until I was about 4 years old. I screamed. I hummed. But as I grew up, I improved. ~ Temple Grandin

I whirled round, and there on one of those dry gravel beds, was the biggest snake I had ever seen. He was sunning himself, after the cold night, and he must have been asleep when Antonia screamed. When I turned, he was lying in long loose waves, like a letter "W." He twitched and began to coil slowly. He was not merely a big snake, I thought-he was a circus monstrosity. His abominable muscularity, his loathsome, fluid motion, somehow made me sick. He was as thick as my leg, and looked as if millstones couldn't crush the disgusting vitality out of him. ~ Willa Cather

Cam!' screamed Asher. 'Campbell look down.'
'Aren't you supposed to tell me not to look down? ~ Wendy Wunder

The first thing he taught me was how to make love.
Before you laugh, know that I'd always hated that phrase. It sounded so corny, so old. Hippies made love. People my mom's age, though I preferred to believe I was an immaculate conception.
People my age hooked up, fucked, had sex. We didn't attach frilly ideas of oneness and eternity to a basic biological act. Most of us were from single-parent homes. Those who weren't wished they were when their parents screamed and beat the shit out of each other. We grew up sexualized, from toddler beauty pageants to the constant reminder that adults were waiting to lure us into vans with candy. The invention of MMS gave us a platform for the distribution of amateur porn.
That's a lot of conditioning to break through. ~ Leah Raeder

The man screamed, and screamed behind his mask, and the Bloody-Nine laughed, and twisted the blade. Logen might have pitied him, but Logen was far away and the Bloody-Nine had no more pity in him than the winter. Less even. He stabbed, and cut, and cut, and smiled, and the screams bubbled and died, and he let the corpse drop to the cold stones. His fingers were slick with blood and he wiped it on his clothes, on his arms, on his face - just as it should be. ~ Joe Abercrombie

Now they were upon him, their tiny legs crawling over his bare skin; he tried to get up, but he was drowning in spiders. Fat Charlie wanted to scream, but his mouth was filled with spiders. They covered his eyes, and his world went dark ... . Fat Charlie opened his eyes and saw nothing but blackness, and he screamed and he screamed and he screamed. ~ Neil Gaiman

Bryce's face crumpled as she lurched to her feet, sprinting to the Gate
She didn't care how it was possible as Danika said again, "Light it up"
Then Bryce was laughing and sobbing as she screamed, "LIGHT IT UP, DANIKA! LIGHT IT UP, LIGHT IT UP, LIGHT IT UP!"
Bryce slammed her palm onto the bronze disk of the Gate.
And soul to soul with the friend whom she had not forgotten, the friend who had not forgotten her, even in death, Bryce made the Drop ~ Sarah J. Maas

Was walking home alone from school and I was wearing a dress. A dude drove by and yelled, "Nice tits." Embarrassed and enraged, I screamed after him, "Suck my dick." Sure, it didn't make any sense, but at least I didn't hold in my anger. ~ Tina Fey

highway wildflowers swaying like the ocean. queen anne's lace like doilies for a tea party never attended. this is a conversation between two parts of yourself. the fever will break soon, but until then i'll be untangling you from the knots in my windblown hair. i smell like a wet forest, like long grass covered in sequins. i called your name but was drowned out by the thunder. i remember you murmuring, "please," while you took my shirt off. i remember you and the airy "please" when you pulled me toward you by my legs. i remember "pleeease" while i learned how to let go. i remember your divine "please." chanting it as if it'd draw a demon out of hiding. "please, please, please." and i screamed, "yes. ~ Taylor Rhodes

I pressed my head into the pillow and I screamed.
Pure sound. No words. But it all came out as your name. ~ David Levithan

I will not make you a vampire," Mr. Crepsley insisted. "You must forget about it. Go home and get on
with your life."
"No!" Steve screamed. "I won't forget!" He stumbled to his feet and pointed a shaking ringer at the tall,
ugly vampire. "I'll get you for this," he promised. "I don't care how long it takes. One day, Vur Horston,
I'll track you down and kill you for rejecting me!"
Steve jumped from the stage and ran toward the exit. "One day!" he called back over his shoulder, and I
could hear him laughing as he ran, a crazy kind of laugh. ~ Darren Shan

Did he suffer very much?" asked Pyotr Ivanovich.
"Oh, awfully! For the last moments, hours indeed, he never left off screaming. For three days and nights in succession he screamed incessantly. It was insufferable. I can't understand how I bore it; one could hear it through three closed doors. Ah, what I suffered! ~ Leo Tolstoy

It's not the dead even. They're gone. Nothing you can do about that. It's what's left behind - the echo. These woods you're walking through. There are some old timers who think a sound echoes here forever. Makes sense when you think about it. That Billingham kid. I'm sure he screamed. He screams, it echoes, just bounces back and forth, the sound getting smaller and smaller, but never entirely disappearing. Like a part of his is still calling out, even now. ~ Harlan Coben

And Hagsgate, alas, paid her no heed. She was treated politely and referred to the proper authorities, whereupon she flew into a fury and screamed that in our eagerness to make no enemies at all, we had now made two. ~ Peter S. Beagle

There is one thing I need to be sure of," said the Emperor, taking an arrow, and placing it in the bow, cocking it back, "I need to know where your loyalties lay, Miss Roberts."
"With you, Emperor," said Areli, scared, "of course, they're with you."
"Then prove it," said the Emperor, "prove your obedience to me. Prove your allegiance." He placed the crossbow in her fingers, laced her finger against the trigger, and positioned the butt of the weapon against her shoulders. "That woman there. She's a follower, Areli. She's a deceitful little tramp that had taken residence in the bed of Degendhard's. I want you to kill her for me. I want you to punish her, for her crimes against her Empire." Areli looked at him, bewildered, with eyes that screamed, you can't be serious!
"If you don't. Then I will have no other option than to assume you have been taken to Degendhard's bed as well. You will do this, Areli. You will punish her. Prove your worth." Areli took a deep breath, feeling the smoothness of the wood and the coldness of the trigger for the first time since having the harsh weapon thrust into her hand.
The Emperor, sensing her hesitation, forced himself upon her. Her lifted her arms, and steadied the weapon into her shoulder, his chest pressed up against her back, his lips rubbing against her ear. The crossbow shook. The woman's head lulled back and forth as she was stuck in a drug rendered dream-state, not knowing that her body faced impalement.
" ~ Jeffrey Johnson

Late one night, during a toss-and-turn fretful sleep, I pondered my crisis. No solutions were on the horizon. I, again, wasted my psychic energy with prayer. Nothing. No angel on a white cloud. No rainbow's pot of gold. No way to control the people I loved. As I rolled over and put the pillow over my head attempting to block all that was negative, I silently screamed for rescue. Then, in a far away and distinct part of my brain, a small voice said, "You have to do this on your own."

I thought, "Was that the best You can do?" This god, to whom I was desperately sending burnt offerings of my own humiliation, couldn't send an avenging angel or a wise man imparting wisdom? All You can give me is this feeble message of abandonment? At that moment, I quit believing in that god. ~ David W. Earle

Bryn took off running. Her thigh muscles bunched as she scrambled down the rise, breath coming in jerky gasps. The ill-fitting helmet jiggled up and down, obscuring her vision, so she yanked at the chinstrap and shoved the thing off her head. And kept running. She had to get there before the air strike. Had to save the kids. "Bryn!" Ignoring Dec's shout, she sprinted hard, fueled by adrenaline. Bouncing off rocks and boulders, she reached the road and scrambled to her feet, breath sawing in and out of her lungs in sobs. She could not let innocent children be caught up in this. "Bryn, no!" She ignored him. The children weren't stopping. She opened her mouth and screamed the Arabic word for stop. It came out in a high-pitched wail, and both children jerked around to face her in fear. "Stop! Go back!" she yelled, waving her arms in a frantic effort to get them to move. "Run! ~ Kaylea Cross

I have no respect for you pigs, but I was willing to let that slide for business. Then you come to me, late, ungrateful, and disrespectful. It hurts me." I sighed, loading six bullets into my revolver slowly. I enjoyed watching them panic while I did this. "And when I hurt, somebody else gotta feel my hurt. It's what makes my world go 'round."

Smiling, I shot at the first man in the groin. He screamed so loud I'm sure he popped a vein in his neck.

"Do you feel the world spinning?" I grinned. ~ J.J. McAvoy

O God!' I screamed, and 'O God!' again and again; for there before my eyes
pale and shaken, and half fainting, and groping before him with his hands, like a man restored from death
there stood Henry Jekyll! ~ Robert Louis Stevenson

Just sit tight. Reinforcements should be here soon. Hopefully nothing happens before-"
Lightning crackled overhead. The wind picked up with a vengeance. Worksheets flew into the Grand Canyon, and the entire bridge shuddered. Kids screamed, stumbling and grabbing the rails.
"I had to say something," Hedge grumbled. He bellowed into his megaphone: "Everyone inside! The cow says moo! Off the skywalk!"
"I thought you said this thing was stable!" Jason shouted over the wind.
"Under normal circumstances," Hedge agreed, "which these aren't. ~ Rick Riordan

Maia screamed and woke.

'Serenity?' Cala's voice, Cala's angular shape outlined against the window.

' 'Tis an ironic title, in sooth,' Maia said feebly, realizing that the entangling garments of the nightmare were merely his bedsheets. His heart was hammering, and he was clammy with sweat. ~ Katherine Addison

Bella. "Nathan Malone is dead." He caught her shoulders, shook her.
"No!" she screamed back. And she couldn't hit him. She wanted to, and she couldn't.
"look at me," he yelled. "Look at me, Bella. What happened killed the man you loved. All that is left is this. The man you see now.The name name I carry now. Anything else is no possible."
"No!" She pulled away from him, stumbled to her feet, and shook with the rage pounding through her. "The name may be dead, but you are not dead. "You weren't just a SEAL," she cried. "You weren't just a friend, or a son, or a grandson, or a brother. You weren't just a warrior." She clenched her fists, pressed to her stomach as the agony swell up through every cell of her body. "You are my husband. My lover.
It doesn't matter if your name is Nathan, Noah, or hey fucking you, you are my my lover. My soul. My heart. ~ Lora Leigh

I got incerdibly heavy boots about how relatively insignificant life is, and how, compared to the universe and compared to time, it didn't even matter if I exsited at all...
"Well I'm not talking about painting the Mona LIsa or curing limeter."
"Yeah?"
"If you hadn't done it, human history would have been one way..."
"Uh-huh?"
"But you did do it, so...?"
I stood on the bed, pointed my fingers at the fake stars, and screamed: "I changed the course of human history!"
"That's right."
"I changed the universe!"
"You did."
"I'm God!"
"You're an atheist."
"I don't exist!"
I fell back onto the bed, into his arms, and we cracked up together. ~ Jonathan Safran Foer

Another woman catches sight of Fischerle's hump on the ground and runs screaming into the street: 'Murder! Murder!' She takes the hump for a corpse. Further details - she knows none. The murderer is very thin, a poor sap, how he came to do it, you shouldn't have thought it of him. Shot may be, someone suggests. Of course, everyone heard the shot. Three streets off, the shot had been heard. Not a bit of it, that was a motor tyre. No, it was a shot! The crowd won't be done out of its shot. A threatening attitude is assumed towards the doubters. Don't let him go. An accessory. Trying to confuse the trail! Out of the building comes more news. The woman's statements are revised. The thin man has been murdered. And the corpse on the floor? It's alive. It's the murderer, he had hidden himself. He was tring to creep away between the corpse's legs when he was caught. The more recent information is more detailed. The little man is a dwarf. What do you expect, a cripple! The blow was actually struck by another. A redheaded man. Ah, those redheads. The dwarf put him up to it. Lynch him! The woman gave the alarm. Cheers for the woman! She screamed and screamed. A Woman! Doesn't know what fear is. The murderer had threatened her. The redhead. It's always the Reds. He tore her collar off. No shooting. Of course not. What did he say? Someone must have invented the shot. The dwarf. Where is he? Inside. Rush the doors! No one else can get in. It's full up. What a murder! The woman had a platef ~ Elias Canetti

A dozen cobras moved as one, shattering their bottles. Wine and glass sprayed the room. The snakes sprang for Isyllt's attacker with fangs unfolded. He screamed high and sharp as they uncoiled, long slick bodies whipping through the air. She wasn't sure if their venom could survive death and pickling, but it didn't seem to matter. After several bites, he curled on the floor, weeping and trying to bat the undead snakes away. ~ Amanda Downum

help" screamed silently in her head, as if she were begging for something: a solution, a cure, a reprieve. A reprieve from what? A cure for what? A solution for what? Her breathing had become shallow. She'd felt beads of sweat at her hairline. Then she'd seen the sign. Their lease at their Newtown apartment was up. The two-bedroom unit was in an ugly, ~ Liane Moriarty

Drop something?" he asked, trying to suppress a smile but failing miserably at the act.
I nodded and smiled back at him sheepishly, unable to find my voice to respond in any other way.
"Interested in locks, I see," he commented.
I nodded again.
"Well, here you go," he said, and he handed the book to me.
I nodded.
Oh crap, why did I just nod? Take the book! I screamed inside my head. Take it!
I took it slowly. He kept looking at me, smiling. ~ Markelle Grabo

The first time I ever screamed at someone was in a scene, and I'd never screamed at someone in my life. ~ Neve Campbell

Something in the fog!" he screamed, and Billy shrank against me-whether because of the man's bloody nose or what he was saying, I don't know. "Something in the fog took John Lee! Something-" He staggered back against a display of lawn food stacked by the window and sat down there."Something in the fog took John Lee and I heard him screaming! ~ Stephen King

It stood calm against the suburban storm raging around it. The thunder screamed across the sky; it slapped the clouds into a heated turmoil that flew towards the south. ~ J.D. Stroube

This is from me. For all the thousands of bad guys in your life." She gave a meaningful look to Ezra. Then she smugly held up a case.

Montgomery popped the catches and opened the top.

Oh, my gosh," she said.

Inside was a single piece of sharpened wood.

MR POINTY!" she screamed in delight.

You gave Buffy's weapon...her stake...to the cheerleader," David said with a whistle. "Sheer genius. ~ Tracy Lynn

No" she jerked back, stared up at him.
Her eyes were like thunderclouds. He'd never seen them like that. Shock and fear filled them. Her face was paper white. Her body shuddering.
"Don't you leave me!" She gripped his shirt and tried to shake him, tears falling from her eyes. "Don't you leave Noah."
His head lowered. He touched her lips with his and knew this woman held the best part of him. The memories of the husband he had been, the man he had been. He couldn't destroy that. He refuse to.
He pushed her to Jordan slowly, loath to let her go. To release her. Knowing that releasing her was the only way to save the memories she held.
"Don't you leave me!" She screamed the order, eyes blazing, her lips trembling as tears fell and hysteria threatened to overwhelm her. "If you leave me, Noah Blake, if you don't come back when this is over, don't bother coming back at all.
He touched her cheek. Ran his thumb over her lips. "You are the best part of me," he whispered. "Always remember that, Sabella. The very best part of me."
Before she could grab him, hold him to her, he pulled away, grabbed one of the rifles Mike had set on the table across the room. And left."
― Lora Leigh, Wild Card ~ Lora Leigh

I AM SICK AND TIRED OF THESE MOTHERFUCKING ZOMBIES ON THIS MOTHERFUCKING . . ." She screamed at the top of her lungs. ~ John Ringo

First you fill us with dark prophetic bees! my lungs screamed at me. Now you force us to stay underwater! You are a horrible person! ~ Rick Riordan

Finally, the lock clicked and she tugged the secret door open. A rotten stench hit her like a fist. She drew away. The boy at her side recoiled, afraid. Sarah fell to her knees. Sarah could not speak, she could only quiver, her fingers covering her eyes, her nose, blocking out the smell ... She sank to her knees again and she screamed at the top of her lungs, she screamed, for her mother, for her father, screamed for Michel. ~ Tatiana De Rosnay

When I woke again, I was in darkness.
Fighting my way to awareness, I realized I'd heard sharp voices. Yells echoed back and forth, calling commands to different ridings; from the distance there came the clang and clash of steel.
It's Bran, I thought, elated and fearful. He's attacking the camp!
As if in answer, I heard his voice. "Mel! Mel!"
I rolled to my knees, fighting against invisible knives of pain. One more cry of "Mel!" at slightly more of a distance enabled me to gather my courage and stand up.
Diving through the tent flap, I screamed with all my failing strength, "BRAN!" And I clutched at the tent to keep myself from falling full-length on the muddy ground. A light mist bathed my face, making me shiver--a distant part of me acknowledged that in addition to everything else I had a pretty hot fever going.
"Meliara! Mel! Mel!" A number of voices took up the cry, and I realized that all our people must have attacked.
Again I gathered all my strength and started forward. Which was a mistake. My left foot simply refused to carry my weight.
I started to fall, felt hard hands catching one of my arms. My leg jolted--and thank goodness, that finished me. ~ Sherwood Smith

Wow,' said Zaphod Beeblebrox to the Heart of Gold. There wasn't much else he could say.
He said it again because he knew it would annoy the press. 'Wow.'
The crowd turned their faces back toward him expectantly. He winked at Trillian, who raised her eyebrows and widened her eyes at him. She knew what he was about to say and thought him a terrible show-off.
'That is really amazing.' he said. 'That really is truly amazing. That is so amazingly amazing I think I'd like to steal it.'
A marvelous presidential quote, absolutely true to form. The crowd laughed appreciativley, the newsman gleefully punched buttons on their Sub-Etha News-Matics and the President grinned.

As he grinned his heart screamed unbearably and he fingered the small Paralyso-Matic bomb that nestled quietly in his pocket.

Finally he could bear it no more. He lifted his heads up to the sky, let out a wild whoop in major thirds, threw the bomb to the ground and ran forward through the sea of suddenly frozen beaming smiles. ~ Douglas Adams

The little girl, seeing she had lost one of her pretty shoes, grew angry, and said to the Witch, "Give me back my shoe!" "I will not," retorted the Witch, "for it is now my shoe, and not yours." "You are a wicked creature!" cried Dorothy. "You have no right to take my shoe from me." "I shall keep it, just the same," said the Witch, laughing at her, "and someday I shall get the other one from you, too." This made Dorothy so very angry that she picked up the bucket of water that stood near and dashed it over the Witch, wetting her from head to foot. Instantly the wicked woman gave a loud cry of fear, and then, as Dorothy looked at her in wonder, the Witch began to shrink and fall away. "See what you have done!" she screamed. "In a minute I shall melt away. ~ L. Frank Baum

I don't want to pass through life like a smooth plane ride. All you do is get to breathe and copulate and finally die. I don't want to go with the smooth skin and the calm brow. I hope I end up a blithering idiot cursing the sun - hallucinating, screaming, giving obscene and inane lectures on street corners and public parks. People will walk by and say, "Look at that drooling idiot. What a basket case." I will turn and say to them, "It is you who are the basket case. For every moment you hated your job, cursed your wife and sold yourself to a dream that you didn't even conceive. For the times your soul screamed yes and you said no. For all of that. For your self-torture, I see the glowing eyes of the sun! The air talks to me! I am at all times!" And maybe, the passers by will drop a coin into my cup. ~ Henry Rollins

The religious leaders of the day had written the script for the Messiah. When Jesus announced he was the Messiah, the Pharisees and others screamed at him, "There is no Jesus in the Messiah script. Messiahs do not hang out with losers. Our Messiah does not break all the rules, Our Messiah does not question our leadership or threaten our religion or act so irresponsibly. Our Messiah does not disregard his reputation, befriend riffraff, or frequent the haunts of questionable people." Jesus' reply? "This Messiah does"! Do you see why Christianity is called "good news"? Christianity proclaims that it is an equal-opportunity faith, open to all, in spite of the abundance of playwrights in the church who are more than anxious to announce, "There is no place for you in Christianity if you [wear an earring/have a tattoo/drink wine/have too many questions/look weird/smoke/dance/haven't been filled with the Spirit/aren't baptized/swear/have pink hair/are in the wrong ethnic group/have a nose ring/have had an abortion/are gay or lesbian/are too conservative or too liberal]. ~ Mike Yaconelli

Then Jason felt a brief statistical curiosity over how many people died annually because they couldn't move when they should. He couldn't think as far away as his feet, and they weren't going anywhere on their own. It seemed that the internal conflict should have screamed in his head like a sold-out theater on fire, but in practice it felt stupidly bovine, like shoveling in more dull food when you were already full. ~ Jamie Mason

And motioned me toward a spot next to a middle-aged Moroi in a very formal and very designer black suit. The suit screamed, I'm sorry the queen is dead, and I'm going to look fashionable while showing my grief ~ Richelle Mead

As the carriage whipped forward, they passed the alley she had spent so many days staring at - it was there, and then gone as they careened around a corner, nearly knocking over a costermonger pushing a donkey cart piled high with new potatoes. Tessa screamed.
Will reached past her and yanked the curtain shut. "It's better if you don't look," he told her pleasantly.
"He's going to kill someone. Or get us killed."
"No, he won't. Thomas is an excellent driver."
Tessa glared at him. "Clearly the word excellent means something else on this side of the Atlantic. ~ Cassandra Clare

I hate you!" I screamed at Fang. Tucking my wings in, I aimed downward,
diving toward the ground at more than two hundred miles an hour.
"No you dooonnn't!" Fang's voice spiraled away into nothingness, far above
me.
Inside my head, almost drowned out by the roar of wind rushing by my ears, I
heard the Voice make a tsking sound. You guys are crazy about each other, it
said. ~ James Patterson

I shoved the monster into the water, held it under, screamed "Die!" or something to that effect. After a few seconds it stopped moving and black sauce oozed out of it like an oil slick. Dr. Marconi got close enough so I could finally hear him. He said, "They're trying to get into the water! Don't let them! ~ David Wong

Four years ago the clocks started turning back. I open my eyes and see nothing. I feel nothing below or above me. I feel the absence of things. The absence of my flesh, my bones, my body, my mind. All that is left is awareness. I see nothing but the absence of colour. It's not a black darkness. It's simply nothing. The interior of a black hole. I recall news of a black hole lingering along the edges of our solar system. All that time ago. Four years ago. When the clocks started turning back. I hear nothing. Until there is a something. A small thing. A voice. I listen. There are more voices. The sounds are human. How long has it been since I've heard a human? The sounds scratch along my now present attention. They carve into my hearing. They are horrid, wretched things. Voices screaming. Growing loud and desperate. How many voices? Billions. This is the birth of our species. We are born screaming. It's all we know to do. We have screamed for eternity. Within this empty space. ~ F.K. Preston

This is how you treat your mother?" she cried. And if I could of I would have broken the entire length of my life across her face, but instead I screamed back, "And this is how you treat your daughter? ~ Junot Diaz

Tara. I'm a vampire," Pearl said.
"Yeah, whatever, and I'm queen of the sea."
"Your Marine Majesty, I'm a vampire," Pearl said.
Concentrating, she slid her fangs out. "Tara. Tara!" She curled back her lips to expose the points. "See"
Tara screamed.
"I won't hurt you," Pearl said. Calm down. Sheesh."
Tara continued to scream.
Pearl considered biting her merely to shut her up. Regrettably that would be counter productive. Studying her nails, she waited for Tara to quit screaming. She noticed that Tara didn't try to exit the car, which was an interesting choice.
"You aren't running away," Pearl said.
"Duh, it's raining outside," Tara said. ~ Sarah Beth Durst

BASTARD, the voice screamed in my mind. That f*cking bastard! He knows what he did to me! He knows what he took, and he expects me to testify for him? Because of my love for Will, he's using me like I'm just a pawn in his game. My chest tightened. But this isn't about him, remember? It's about the boy you love who holds you right now. It's about protecting everything you hold sacred. I ~ Katie Ashley

Because she is dead!" She screamed the last word so loudly it burned in her throat. "Because she is dead, and I am left with my worthless life! ~ Sarah J. Maas

He had brown hair, piercing green eyes and jaw line that screamed 'I might just let you kiss me here'. ~ Fisher Amelie

Stop!" she screamed. "Don't hurt him."
"Back off!" Billy shouted.
She yanked harder on Billy's arm.
"He isn't a vampire anymore, idiot. Look! Do you see that big, yellow thing up in the sky? That's called the sun. It's shining down on him, and he isn't exploding. His fangs are gone. He's as human as we are. Case closed."
Billy stared up at the sky, his jaw slack. "Not possible."
Jack mumbled, "They don't call me Jackpot for nothing."
"What?" Billy blinked at him.
"Private joke. ~ Kasi Blake

The doors of the darkest room one had ever seen were opened
and everyone was asked to collect the pieces of themselves that they have lost with time all these years. Everyone rushed in and started searching for the pieces that would complete them but all of a sudden they saw the light in the room fading away, they turned around and saw the doors closing back again. They screamed and tried to run back but all of a sudden there were fences all around them, they lost their voice and helplessly stuck in there saw the doors closing. They lost themselves completely in the quest of searching the pieces they had lost before. ~ Akshay Vasu

Silly stuff could tickle him no end. Chris loved practical jokes, even when they weren't planned.
One day he brought home a large kudu head to keep for a friend. (Kudus are large African antelopes; this one had been shot and mounted as a trophy.) I was in the kitchen getting something out of the refrigerator. I heard a noise and looked up-there was a beast in my house!
I screamed.
Chris appeared behind the head. For a brief moment his face was tight with concern and worry.
It was a very brief moment. When he realized he'd scared me with the silly head, he began laughing so hard the house shook.
"I'm sorry," he said, gasping for air. "I didn't mean to scare you."
He laughed some more.
"Oh, I'm sorry," he said when he managed to stop momentarily. "I'm sorry."
Another five minutes of hysterical laughter. By now it was contagious, and I started laughing, too.
"I didn't mean to do it," he said finally. "But it couldn't have worked out better. ~ Taya Kyle

The surfer screamed something about bad mushrooms and paddled away from us as fast as he could. ~ Rick Riordan

Lily closed her eyes and screamed at the top of her lungs as she made the scariest fall of her life, plunging to her certain death while clinging to her rescuer who really didn't rescue her at all. ~ Missy Lyons

Somebody said they threw their copy of Dungeons and Dragons into the fire, and it screamed. It's a game! The magic spells in it are as real as the gold. Try retiring on that stuff. ~ Gary Gygax

I felt a warm hand touch mine.
"Are you okay?"
"If you mean am I injured, then the answer is no. If you mean am I 'okay' as in am-I-confident-I'm-still-sane, the answer is still no."
Ren frowned. "We have to find a way to get across the chasm."
"You're certainly welcome to give it a try." I waved him off and went back to drinking my water.
He moved to the edge and peered across, looking speculatively at the distance. Changing back to a tiger, he trotted a few paces back in the direction we had come from, turned, and ran at full speed toward the hole.
"Ren, no!" I screamed.
He leapt, clearing the hole easily, and landed lightly on his front paws. Then he trotted a short distance away and did the same thing to come back. He landed at my feet and changed back to human form.
"Kells, I have an idea."
"Oh, this I've got to hear. I just hope you don't plan on including me in this scheme of yours. Ah. Let me guess. I know. You want to tie a rope to your tail, leap across, tie it off, and then have me pull my body across the rope, right?"
He cocked his head as if considering it, and then shook his head. "No, you don't have the strength to do something like that. Plus, we have no rope and nothing to tie a rope to."
"Right. So what's the plan?"
He held my hands and explained. "What I'm proposing will be much easier. Do you trust me?"
I was going to be sick. "I trust you. It's just-" I looked into his concerned blue eyes an ~ Colleen Houck

Only the passionate were immortal, it seemed. If you fought, screwed, screamed, laughed, or otherwise experienced life intensely, for better or worse, you left a record. Those who lived a quiet, well-behaved, well-tempered life? Gone without a trace. ~ Magnus Flyte

Grabbed his neck and screamed in terror (which was not very stealthy). ~ Rick Riordan

Meanwhile we'll drink your health - queen Alice's health!' she screamed at the top of her voice, and all the guests began drinking it directly ... ~ Lewis Carroll

You bitch!" he screamed. "I'll kill you for this!" "Sure you will," I said in an easy voice. "Take a number and get in line. ~ Jennifer Estep

You will never bore me, Nelissuna. I can see that fact straight to my soul."
"But I can clearly see you being easily capable of boring me to tears," she countered archly, trying to free her trapped hand with a determined tug. He was even stronger than he looked, she thought.
"How are you feeling?" he asked, noticing her struggle and insults about the same way he would notice a passing speck of dust.
"Why can you not tell me? You are the medic, are you not?" She exhaled sharply. "Will you please let go of me?"
"No."
Legna growled in frustration at him.
"You are so obnoxious!" she accused. "I hate it when you do that!"
"Do what? Answer a question? If it disturbs you, I will ignore your questions from now on."
"You know exactly what I mean. I hate it when you lay down the word no as if it were the last letter of the law. And do not think I do not know that you are doing it on purpose just to irritate me, because I do!"
"Then you should cease giving me the opportunity to say it," he told her, his tone so matter-of-fact that she almost screamed at him. "And you should be careful of those little growls you insist on making, Neliss. They are . . . very stimulating."
Suddenly Legna forgot all about trading barbs with him and became very aware of his warmth above and below her trapped hand, the solid strength she leaned up against so cozily, and the very clear hunger that was brewing under the humor he had been using to hide it.
N ~ Jacquelyn Frank

Mr. Bingham said, "Hey, you guys are supposedly psychic. Why didn't you see that coming and warn the girl?"
Mom sighed. "Again, we don't see the future."
"Yeah. You're a bunch of frauds."
I'd had it. My frustration boiled over. I turned to Mrs. Bingham. "Do you know a Jane Sutherland?"
Confusion swept over her delicate features. "Yes, she used to be my husband's secretary before he was laid off. What about her?"
"He wasn't laid off. He was fired. The company has rules against boinking your secretary, even though your husband apparently has no qualms with the matter."
"Clarity!" Mom screamed. ~ Kim Harrington

I took the stairs two at a time, excited to have company today. When I opened the door I gasped and stood there in shock a moment before saying, "Patti, it's awesome!"

She had decorated with my school colors. Royal blue and gold streamers crisscrossed the ceiling, and balloons were everywhere. I heard her and the twins come up behind me, Patti giggling and Marna oohing. I was about to hug Patti, when a movement on the other side of the room caught my eye through the dangling balloon ribbons. I cursed my stupid body whose first reaction was to scream.

Midshriek, I realized it was my dad, but my startled system couldn't stop its initial reaction. A chain reaction started as Patti, then both the twins screamed, too.

Dad parted the balloons and slunk forward, chuckling. We all shut up and caught our breaths.

"Do you give all your guests such a warm welcome?"

Patti's hand was on her heart. "Geez, John! A little warning next time?"

"I bet you're wishing you'd never given me that key," Dad said to Patti with his most charming, frightening grin. He stared at her long enough to make her face redden and her aura sputter.

She rolled her eyes and went past him to the kitchen. "We're about to grill," she said without looking up from the food prep. "You're welcome to stay." Her aura was a strange blend of yellow and light gray annoyance.

"Can't stay long. Just wanted to see my little girl on her graduat ~ Wendy Higgins

With each word, he broke past every barrier, every wall. And Sharazad's will fought him, screamed a silent scream, while her heart welcomed the intrusion as a songbird welcomes the dawn. ~ Renee Ahdieh