Quotes from At Peace

Kristen Ashley ·  660 pages

Rating: (24.9K votes)


“You’re mine, the girls are mine. I’m stakin’ my claim with you right now and, you force it, I’ll do it with him too.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“Nothing can fill you up,” she stated.
“Nope,” he agreed again.
“You won’t let it.”
“Barrel’s got a hole in the bottom, buddy, everything leaks out no matter how much you pour in.”
She was silent a moment then she whispered, “Right.”
She turned to the door and his hand gripped his bourbon so hard he had to focus everything on loosening his grip or the glass would shatter.
Before she opened it, she turned back. “You don’t know, Cal, you have no idea.
You’ve shut yourself up for so long in this fucking house with your tragic memories, you have no idea what’s about to walk out your door. Kate, Keira and me, we could have plugged that hole. We could have filled you so full, you’d be bursting. We would have loved that chance. We’d have given it everything we had, no matter the time that slid by, graduations, weddings, grandbabies, you’d have been a part of us and we’d have given everything we had to keep you
so full, you’d be bursting.”
Cal didn’t reply.
“Joe,” she whispered, “you let me walk out this door, you’ll lose your chance.”
Cal didn’t move.
Vi waited.
Cal stayed seated.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“Yeah, you lose this attitude, I can help you work that hurt out.”
Who was this man? He held onto his tragedy for seventeen fucking years, how could he stand there and tell me
he could help me work through mine?
“Really, Joe? Like you helped me work out my grief at losing Tim?” I asked sarcastically.
“That’s not what I was offerin’, buddy, but you want it like that I’ll give it to you.”
“You’re unbelievable,” I snapped.
“I’m yours.”
That socked me in the gut too, so hard it winded me and all I could do was stare up at him.
Taking advantage, his face dipped close and his hands curled around both sides of my head.
“First fuckin’ time you smiled at me in my bed, that’s when it happened,” he murmured.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“Fuck,” he muttered.

“Language in front of the girls,” I snapped.
“Baby, they hear it all the time,” he returned and I felt my eyes get wide in motherly affront.
Cal looked at my face then over the seat to the girls and asked, “You gonna say fuck because I say fuck?”
“No,” Kate answered immediately.
“No, ‘cause Mom doesn’t like it,” Keira replied waspishly.
Cal looked back at me and raised his brows.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“You talk about Cal, you look like a woman who's talkin' about the man she needs to breathe.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace



“Not worth it," Cheryl decreed, "been there, done that, got the fuckin' t-shirt and it didn't fit so I threw the motherfucker out.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“Told her she needs to look at her Mom and learn. You had three men in your life, all of 'em willin' to hand you the world. She should accept nothin' less.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“Yeah, Vi, unless Armageddon hit while i was fuckin' you this morning and we missed it, I'm thinkin' grocery stores still exist and they're all still stocked.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“Never bury something deep, baby. Takes twice as much courage to be who you are, say what you think, feel what you feel and let it show then it does to bury it.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“You’re unbelievable,” I snapped.
“I’m yours.”
That socked me in the gut too, so hard it winded me and all I could do was stare up at him. Taking advantage, his face dipped close and his hands curled around both sides of my head.
“First fuckin’ time you smiled at me in my bed, that’s when it happened,” he murmured. “You’re under my skin. I’m under yours.”
I shook my head and his face got even closer, all I could see were his sky blue eyes, all I could feel were his lips a breath away from mine.
“I like you there, buddy, and you like me there too.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace



“Violet, there a reason Joe Callahan is lookin' at me like he wants to rip my head off?”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“It was a shit time for you, the worst, but you were there and you saw 'em doin' it. They crawled into this same fuckin' bed with me, so did you, and when you did, you all became mine.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“We’re all lost, Mike. The best chance we got is to wander this life with the people who matter.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“I closed my eyes, sucked in breath and felt like a slut.
This was mainly because I was acting like one.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“I hope she doesn't break up with Dane. He's the hottest guy in school and he's nice. That means you both have the hottest, nicest guys in school and in town. This means good things for my future because I'm up next.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace



“Seventeen years, no longer...I've been waiting for you, for those girls. You're here, I'm letting go of my shit, finally, fucking moving on from all of that, moving on to something good in my life, something to wake up and get outta bed for. I'm not leaving it cause of some hang up you have. You and me, I haven't made it easy, I'll admit that, but that's done. You gotta get over it or you're never gonna move on.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“Worth the wait," Joe muttered and my head tipped back.
"What?"
"Every bit of it. Every day, every week, every year, every fuckin' second, buddy," he kept muttering, his eyes intense, his face serious and my breath caught, "this. All of it. Worth the wait.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“The girls were there, her friends, her parents and he didn’t give a fuck. He dipped in closer and kissed her lightly on the lips.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“I'm gonna piss you off, honey, probably enough for you to want to leave. I've got a temper and so do you, we're gonna clash. It won't feel good, it'll feel not worth it sometimes but, you leave me, I'll wait for you to come back. And you'll come back because, something we've both learned, this, what we have is worth getting over it. Whatever it is that ticks us off of holds us back, we know it's worth fighting for.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“I had the world sleepin’ on my chest,” he replied, his voice low, thick. I looked at the photo. “Funny how the world can fit in your arm.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace



“He needs Mom and us more than we need him. He needs a family. He's over there, all by himself, he has nobody. We have each other." She looked at me and stated, "He needs somebody. I can tell.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“You're cool Joe" she told him, her voice weighty, as if she was bestowing a grave honor on him even though a blind person could sense his utter coolness.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“there, “You already think I’m a dick.” I felt my heart beat faster and I whispered, “Joe –” Joe cut me off. “So, don’t matter tomorrow morning you still think I’m a dick, ‘cause now, even though you’re drunk, I’m gonna take you inside and fuck you ‘til you ache.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“Joe,” I whispered. “What’s on your mind?”
Did booty call partners care what was on their booty call’s mind?”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“You don't know, Cal, you have no idea. You've shut yourself up for so long in this fucking house with your tragic memories, you have no idea what's about to walk out your door. Kate, Keira and me, we could have plugged that hole. We could have filled you so full,you'd be bursting. We would have loved that chance. We'd have given it everything we had.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace



“I didn't exactly give you a choice, seein' as you were playing games, fuckin' another guy and I needed to stake me claim. I did, I'm here, I'm stayin'.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“I have my own stalker, Joe. I don’t want to have to deal with yours.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“He needs Mom and us more than we need him. He needs a family. He’s over there, all by himself, he has nobody. We have each other.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


“You think it’s something in the water or is she just touched?” “She’s just touched,”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from At Peace


About the author

Kristen Ashley
Born place: in Gary, Indiana, The United States
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“You can get so that every step, every little obstacle on the battlefield, becomes so big that you can’t see much past it, and when you do get past, it’s sometimes hard to remember what the hell you were supposed to be doing.”
― Robert Hicks, quote from The Widow of the South


“One of the biggest - and I would guess most common - mistakes parents make is to transfer their own childhood shit onto their kids. Whatever their joys and agonies were growing up, they assume will be exactly the same for their children, and they let it guide their parenting. I can see the same dumb instincts in myself. When I first started hanging out with my old boyfriend's kids, I found it depressing because I would just look at them and think of how miserable they must be, and how totally alone they must feel. To me, that's what childhood meant. But the truth was that they were fine. Happy-go-lucky, even.”
― Sarah Silverman, quote from The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption, and Pee


“His demanding tongue tasted so damn good, and his piercing bit deliciously against her lip from the aggressive way he pursued her over and over. His hands tugged and massaged at her hair and neck. He just surrounded her. The difference in their height made Caden lean down over her. The way he forced her head back commanded her to open up to him. With the metal handle of the door pressing into her back, she felt completely enveloped in him, in his ardor, his scent. The world dropped away. There was just Caden.”
― Laura Kaye, quote from Hearts in Darkness


“I'd witnessed for the first time in my vampire- obsessed existence an actual vampire bite. The only problem was that it wasn't my neck being bitten.”
― Ellen Schreiber, quote from Cryptic Cravings


“Last of all, this book owes perhaps its biggest debt to the ultimate models for Kira and Heron and every other awesome girl in the Partials series: my two daughters. May you always have heroines to inspire you, role models to look up to, and the freedom and courage to make your own choices, no matter how simple or scary or hard or eternal they may be.”
― Dan Wells, quote from Ruins


Interesting books

Big Machine
(3.1K)
Big Machine
by Victor LaValle
Full Tilt
(4.6K)
Full Tilt
by Emma Scott
The Monster of Florence
(24.9K)
The Monster of Flore...
by Douglas Preston
Apology
(25.5K)
Apology
by Plato
The Land: Founding
(7K)
The Land: Founding
by Aleron Kong
Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead
(164.8K)
Lean In: Women, Work...
by Sheryl Sandberg

About BookQuoters

BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.