“
I don’t think I’m much of a father figure, but if you want kids, we’ll have kids,” he’d told me. “Hell, if you want rabies, we’ll catch it together. Make a day of it.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
I understand your position, Dave. It’s a big story, and you worked hard to get it. But if you don’t drop me at the Europa, I’ll blow your head off. Imagine how big that story would be.
There’s no need for these histrionics. We’ll go to the Holiday Inn. You can rest, shower, debrief. You’ll be among friends.
Last chance, Dave. You can be the hero or the headline. Your call.
Let’s talk it out.
No. You talk too much.
He started a new line of argument, but before the words passed his lips his brains passed them on the way out. A dirty reddish slime painted the windshield; it covered the dashboard and console. It poured and dripped from the ceiling to the seat. The driver was covered on one side of his head and body. The mess made the crowded taxi undrivable.
-Also, someone crapped their pants.
”
”
John Payton Foden (Magenta)
“
If Célian met chivalry in a dark alley, he would beat it to death, then find its sister, generosity, and kill her too. “I
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
But falling into the wrong hands is just as bad as crashing into nothing.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
in order to learn how to love, you first need to learn how to live
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
I wanted him to swallow me whole, like a Venus flytrap—clamp his jaw and absorb every inch of me. Touch me. Fill me. Drown me in your poisonous kisses. Let me die from your venom, buried under your sinful skin.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
And this is the part they don’t tell you about losing a loved one to cancer: They’re not the only people being eaten alive. When they get it, you get it. The cancer nibbles away at your time with them, feasts on the happy moments, feeds off every second of bliss. It devours your paycheck and savings. It nourishes itself on your misery and multiplies in your chest, even if you don’t have it.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
We were both drowning, and when we were together, it felt like I was coming up for air.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
How had this guy not been assassinated yet? He was a walking, talking personal offense.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
There was only one problem with the fact that my heart was so dreadfully, unexpectedly normal. Somewhere along the way, it had stopped being mine.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Hey, Jesus? Did you send me someone to get over my obsession with Célian Laurent? “Girl, I’m not even talking to you after the last few weeks.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
I laughed bitterly. "I can't fall in love Celian. I'm broken.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Célian, do you give a fuck? Not even a half. Not even a quarter. Minus three fucks, and still counting.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
She’d kiss the tips of her fingers and press them against my heart "
"He scowled. “The fuck you doing, Brooklyn girl?”
“Kissing your pain away,” I whispered, not wondering,even for a second, how he knew where I lived, “Manhattan prince.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
All I’m saying is he’s like a half-priced facelift in an unregistered clinic in Eastern Europe. I would still do it, even knowing it’s deadly.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Organs, Jude, are like people. They need company, a backup to rely on. That’s why we have lungs, tonsils, hands, legs, fingers, toes, eyes, nostrils, teeth, and lips. Only the heart works alone. Like Atlas, it carries the weight of our existence on its shoulders quietly, only rebelling when disturbed by love.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
California, Labor Day weekend...early, with ocean fog still in the streets, outlaw motorcyclists wearing chains, shades and greasy Levis roll out from damp garages, all-night diners and cast-off one-night pads in Fricso, Hollywood, Berdoo and East Oakland, heading for the Monterey peninsula, north of Big Sur...The Menace is loose again, the Hell's Angels, the hundred-carat headline, running fast and loud on the early morning freeway, low in the saddle, nobody smiles, jamming crazy through traffic and ninety miles an hour down the center stripe, missing by inches...like Genghis Khan on an iron horse, a monster steed with a fiery anus, flat out through the eye of a beer can and up your daughter's leg with no quarter asked and non given; show the squares some class, give em a whiff of those kicks they'll never know...Ah, these righteous dudes, they love to screw it on...Little Jesus, the Gimp, Chocolate George, Buzzard, Zorro, Hambone, Clean Cut, Tiny, Terry the Tramp, Frenchy, Mouldy Marvin, Mother Miles, Dirty Ed, Chuck the Duck, Fat Freddy, Filthy Phil, Charger Charley the Child Molester, Crazy Cross, Puff, Magoo, Animal and at least a hundred more...tense for the action, long hair in the wind, beards and bandanas flapping, earrings, armpits, chain whips, swastikas and stripped-down Harleys flashing chrome as traffic on 101 moves over, nervous, to let the formation pass like a burst of dirty thunder...
”
”
Hunter S. Thompson (Hell's Angels)
“
We sewed our oats, and now it’s time to come back. To us.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
No one is as deaf as the one who refuses to listen.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Life was too short to deprive yourself of spending time with those you love, something I'd learned the hard way.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Headlines would read GREER KARAS SHANKS RIVAL WOMEN IN CAT FIGHT OVER HOLLYWOOD SEX GOD.
”
”
Meghan March (Dirty Girl (Dirty Girl Duet, #1))
“
This pussy is mine no less than it is yours.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Happiness was something you were eager to share. It was pain you wanted to keep private.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Sometimes when I get off by myself, I think about Noah from IT.” I had no idea who Noah from IT was; I just knew he was newly unemployed. I slapped her ass again, and this time bit her earlobe—not gently—for good measure. “Give me his full name,” I growled. She laughed, throwing her head back. “There’s no Noah in IT. I mean, maybe there is. But I don’t know him.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
This is going to end badly,” I murmured, not even sure if he could hear me.
We slid into the elevator, and he pushed the second floor button, smirking. “But we will have one hell of a ride.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Everything is falling into place perfectly. We have four dirty DEA agents working with a terrorist group and killing Americans on American soil. The headlines are going to write themselves and we're going to get our candidate into the White House. When that happens, we'll get the war we want. The war we can win.
”
”
Katie Reus (Edge of Danger (Deadly Ops, #4))
“
Very little makes sense when Chucks is not around. This is the part where I should say something romantic and profound—that you're my beginning, middle, and end. But I don't even know what that shit means. All I know is the very idea of moving to the other side of the country was enough to make me kidnap your ass, and not in the sweet, joking way.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
I looked down and stared at a chocolate cube slowly melting in my hand, gluing my forefinger and thumb together. “I think I wanted to marry Milton just so I’d have someone to catch me in case I fall. You know?”
He stuck his hand in my hair and leaned down to kiss my forehead. “I do. But falling into the wrong hands is just as bad as crashing into nothing.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
It’s the photos that hit me the hardest, though. A woman cradling her husband’s limp body. A crowd looking on, emotionless, as police shine a flashlight on a woman’s bloodied corpse. A couple, half on the ground and half tangled in their moped, their blank faces turned toward the camera and sprays of blood on the pavement behind their heads. Sisters gathered around their baby brother’s body lying in its small casket. A body with its head covered in a dirty cloth left in a pile of garbage on the side of the street. Grayish-green corpses stacked like firewood in an improvised morgue. There’s even a short video of grainy security cam footage in which a masked motorcyclist pulls up next to a man in an alleyway, shoots him point-blank in the side of the head, then drives away. In high definition, I see the victims’ wounds, their oddly twisted limbs, their blood and brain matter sprayed across familiar-looking streets. In every dead body, I see Jun. I want to look away. But I don’t. I need to know. I need to see it. These photographers didn’t want to water it down. They wanted the audience to confront the reality, to feel the pain that’s been numbed by a headline culture.
”
”
Randy Ribay (Patron Saints of Nothing)
“
I am progressing along the path of life in my ordinary contentedly fallen and godless condition, absorbed in a merry meeting with my friends for the morrow or a bit of work that tickles my vanity today, a holiday or a new book, when suddenly a stab of abdominal pain that threatens serious disease, or a headline in the newspapers that threatens us all with destruction, sends this whole pack of cards tumbling down. At first I am overwhelmed, and all my little happinesses look like broken toys. Then, slowly and reluctantly, bit by bit, I try to bring myself into the frame of mind that I should be in at all times. I remind myself that all these toys were never intended to possess my heart, that my true good is in another world and my only real treasure is Christ. And perhaps, by God’s grace, I succeed, and for a day or two become a creature consciously dependent on God and drawing its strength from the right sources. But the moment the threat is withdrawn, my whole nature leaps back to the toys: I am even anxious, God forgive me, to banish from my mind the only thing that supported me under the threat because it is now associated with the misery of those few days. Thus the terrible necessity of tribulation is only too clear. God has had me for but forty-eight hours and then only by dint of taking everything else away from me. Let Him but sheathe that sword for a moment and I behave like a puppy when the hated bath is over—I shake myself as dry as I can and race off to reacquire my comfortable dirtiness, if not in the nearest manure heap, at least in the nearest flower bed. And that is why tribulations cannot cease until God either sees us remade or sees that our remaking is now hopeless.
”
”
C.S. Lewis (The Business of Heaven: Daily Readings)
“
You’re going to hell for this,” Jesus said inside my head. “And if you think I’ll claim your ass when you get there, you obviously weren’t paying attention in bible class.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
retirement party, and
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Habit’s gonna get you broke, girl.” Kate picked a chocolate-glazed one, greeting me by bumping her thigh against my shoulder. “That’s like threatening a nun with a crucifix. I already am.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
John Lennon started his music career as a choir boy. I never said it before, because it terrified me to admit it, but you’re my church (although I plan to be inside you way more than just on Sundays).—Célian
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Hang on to this anger, Chucks. I’ll be happy to work your crazy ass up in bed and fuck every doubt and complaint out of your tight pussy.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Eight o’clock. A cab will be waiting downstairs. You will wear the same dress, and no bra or panties. You will be mine for the evening. You will not talk back to me, just let me fuck you the way I want to—not because I paid for your shit, but because we both need a distraction. For every sass you give me, I will slap your pussy. For every no I hear, I will deny you an orgasm. Am I clear?
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
He scoffed. “I can charm the panties off of a nun.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
it makes me so hard I’m pretty sure the rest my body turns anemic.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
He held her shoulders and took a step back, giving her a frosty onceover,
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
If he and my father could’ve killed each other without legal consequences, I’d have two less headaches to worry about.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
I can’t fall in love, Célian. I’m broken.” “Good. Let’s be broken together, then.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
You're brave, sexy, and beautiful, and there's not one woman on this earth who can push my buttons like you.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Defeat sells headlines while success sells sponsorships.
”
”
Lauren Asher (Redeemed (Dirty Air, #4))
“
My heart was a lonely hunter. Tonight, I’d let it feast.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Judith.'
The commanding tone found its way straight to my core, making my stomach swirl with delicious heat. Jesus Christ, what was he doing here?
Jesus: Didn’t you say something a while back about hitting Sunday Mass sometime in the next decade? Maybe you could take your foul-mouthed, engaged boss with you.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Judith: Did you know Célian Laurent is engaged?
Grayson: What’s it to you, Miss I-don’t-know-him-hey-look-a-squirrel?
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
I seem a little strange, that's because I am
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
My heart cartwheeled, finishing its flip with an Olympic bow.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
And where’s Mathias, Célian?”
“Why would I care where my fa—” I started, my eyes already darting to the spot where they’d last seen Jude, and found him talking to her, his hand on her lower back.
On.
Her.
Fucking.
Back.
You’ve been warned, Papa. And you have failed.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
you put the STD in stud and now all you need is U.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
he used words like a weapon. Strategic,
sparse. Each syllable a vicious strike.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
if I could
marry this job, I would make sure it was happy and give it a
foot massage every evening
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
I’d wanted to curl up like a kitten under his desk at that moment and listen to him talk all day.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
I like beautiful , lifeless things
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Happiness was something you were eager
to share. It was pain you wanted to keep private.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
. He’s bad news.”
“And you’re good news?” I huffed.
“I’m the best fucking news, have been for two consecutive
years, and I have the numbers to back it up.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
I don’t want you to pity me. I don’t want you to look at me
as anything less than an equal.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
My life is her life.”
" I was hers, and she was mine.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
I’m not for the taking, my eyes said.
That’s for me to decide, his hissed
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Stop the blame game, Célian. Every relationship you touch wilts. Every connection you make perishes. I don’t want to burn. I want to flourish. I deserve to bloom.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
But right now, standing in front of him, trying to make it in this cruel, real world, chase debt, and look after my father, something was better than nothing - especially something that came from him
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
My second climax soared from my toes to my head like an electric shock, sending me to heaven, and when he closed his lips over my swollen clit and sucked it with force, I was pretty sure every angel in my vicinity got their wings.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
I called you here because I want to eat your pussy and fuck your brains out. And I want your pussy to smell and taste like a pussy, not like soap.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
Célian: If you two were to read anything more substantial than the National Enquirer, such as our company’s newsletter from three months ago, you would know that messenger chats on our web software are now publicly available to view by any user in the company.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
I’m talking Chris Pine perfect, Chris Hemsworth mammoth, and Chris Pratt charming. He was a triple-C threat, and I was S.C.R.E.W.E.D.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
All the things I want seem unachievable, so far away.
Is your heart lonely too?
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
He
looked like he worked out for a living, but dressed like he had
no time to hit the gym.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
I was going to kill him.
I knew it right there and then.
Maybe not today and perhaps not tomorrow either, but it was going to happen.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
His touch sent a jolt of electricity straight to my groin, which only proved that my mind was savvy, and my heart was lonely, but my body was just a dumbass.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Dirty Headlines)
“
The results of family disintegration are seen all around us. Runaways. Child abuse. Abortions. It is dirty laundry—once hung in the nation’s backyard, but now hung shamelessly in front yards —flaunted in headlines and glamorized on television and in films.
”
”
Billy Graham (Hope for the Troubled Heart: Finding God in the Midst of Pain)