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41 " An eternal truth of the human condition was that no one ever thought they were evil. No matter how reprehensible their actions, people always convinced themselves they were justified. "
― Matthew FitzSimmons , The Short Drop (Gibson Vaughn, #1)
42 " For the next two weeks, WR8TH’s virus kept to its routine—waking up at nine a.m. and systematically nibbling away at ACG’s database. It was a model employee that way. Didn’t take a lunch break and never called in sick. "
43 " Anyway, the trick is seeing what they’re trying to hide. What are they trying to draw your eye away from? Figure that out, and you figure out the man. "
44 " I’d throw Kirby Tate in there too.” “It gets weirder,” Jenn said. “I saw that same guy shoot one of the tactical guys in the back.” “Friendly fire?” Hendricks asked. “Nothing friendly about it.” Hendricks chewed that over. “So Lombard gets wind that we’ve been in contact with WR8TH and calls in his old hitter to tie up loose ends. He’s been on us from day one. Follows us to "
45 " Vaughn’s morning began at five thirty with a five-mile run. Two hundred push-ups, two hundred sit-ups, followed by a shower. Afterward, he ate the same breakfast at the same diner at the same counter stool. Every damn morning, like it was his church. "
46 " you were going to go missing in America, it certainly helped to be white, female, and pretty. "
47 " Holloway—if you were going to go missing in America, it certainly helped to be white, female, and pretty. Throw "
48 " Her hair was cast in a brittle perm that looked like the unholy union of a microwave and caulk. "
49 " Leland Reed,” the man said and put out a hand. Gibson looked at the hand. “A little friendly advice, Leland. Get your résumé together. "
50 " Hope is a cancer. One of two things happens. Either you never learn the truth, in which case it gnaws down to the bone until there's nothing left, or worst, you do, and you go through that windshield at ninety because hope told you it was okay to make the drive without a seat belt. "
51 " The security camera caught her eye, and for a long moment Suzanne gazed up at it—an expression frozen in time and, like Mona Lisa’s smile, interpreted a thousand different ways. "
52 " But in a pinch, he was a capable coder too. He just wasn’t especially fast. So when he was finally done coding and debugging his program and ran a successful test, it was past eleven on Tuesday night. He hadn’t slept but for a few hours on Sunday night, and the lack of sleep had cooked him. "
53 " It amazed him how much sky you surrendered to live in a city. "
54 " He had questions, but the suit was too cheap to have the answers to them. "
55 " An eternal truth of the human condition was that no one ever thought they were evil. "
56 " Entitlement breeds laziness, which in turn breeds decline. But of course with enough money, it is possible not to notice for decades that your family name is gathering dust. One day you awake to discover that the last member of the family to accomplish anything of note died before Kennedy. "
57 " he had long ago lost his ability to perceive the passage of time. A minute, an hour, a year—it all felt the same to him. "
58 " Most people were overawed by time. They allowed time to bully them, fearing that it was passing too fast or too slowly, sometimes both simultaneously. But "
59 " What was it they said about Ginger Rogers . . . ? She did everything Fred Astaire did only backward and in heels? "
60 " Gibson Vaughn sat alone at the bustling counter of the Nighthawk Diner. The breakfast rush was in full swing as customers milled about, "