TBT: Budding Hopes

MLR Press put out a submission call a couple weeks ago that has my brain awhirl. As soon as I have a little room in my schedule, I'm going to write something for it. It'll be nice to work with them again. It's a great family, incredibly supportive of all of their authors.

Budding Hopes was the last story I had come out at MLR, three years ago for Valentine's Day. It's a romantic little ditty set in 1950s Baltimore about a flower shop employee and the doctor who visits him every week.

For eight months, Dr. Mark Vance has been visiting Sheehan's Nursery to buy flowers for his mother's grave, and every week, Hal Sheehan slips an extra lily into the bunch. Mark would love nothing more than to get to know the gentle giant better, but in 1954 Baltimore, a man just doesn't ask another man out. His fears are compounded when a visit the day before Valentine's casts doubts on Hal's intentions. Maybe he really was meant to live a life of secrets. Or maybe he just needs the holiday to discover the best secret of them all.

The excerpt at the publisher site is the opening of the story. Honestly, I adore this romantic story. The time period was fraught with fear and still rife with possibility, and the potential of Mark and Hal still gives my hope a flutter. At some point, I'd really like to write a follow-up and see how they are doing.

Check it out at MLR!

TBT: Chains of Jericho

I did something earlier this week that I've meant to do since RT 2014. I finally joined RWA. It's been ten years since I published my first romance, but it took almost all of that for me to be comfortable joining the professional organization.

I couldn't do it for the longest time because I would've felt like a hypocrite. When I first started writing, e-publishing didn't count. Then when they couldn't ignore e-publishing anymore, they discriminated against LGBT authors. I couldn't, in all good conscience, be a part of an organization that wouldn't recognize so many hard-working people. It felt wrong.

That finally changed, and in all honesty, I was ready to join after having a long lunch with my old friend Denny Bryce at RT 2014. I didn't get around to it before the convention, then honestly forgot until RT of this year. It's been on my list to do, and finally, FINALLY, I applied.

I still have to join the LGBT charter and look for other charters to be a part of, but the first step is done.

So today's TBT is my very first romance that I ever published. It's an m/f vampire story that was originally published through Linden Bay Romance. When Linden Bay was bought out by Samhain, I got the rights back and re-released it through Liquid Silver. It was also an EPPIE finalist, which I'm very proud of.

Declan Jericho is a vampire with a purpose. His best hope for success rests on the shoulders of a brilliant young cancer specialist, but saving the undead isn’t exactly the career path Dr. Maya Sheldon has in mind.

When Dec kidnaps Maya from work, the last thing she wants to do is help him. Then she discovers what he wants her for: develop a cure for the mysterious illness killing the young vampires in his care. Vampires or not, she’s unable to abandon them. Her interest in Dec quickly shifts from professional to something more intimate, but as their attraction grows, darker secrets threaten their newfound relationship. Dec has his own reasons for wanting the young vampires cured, and he’s not telling…

For an excerpt and purchase information, head over to Liquid Silver Books!

TBT: Aria of the Eclipse

In honor of my new sci-fi/futuristic story coming out at Amber Allure this weekend, this week's Throwback Thursday goes to an earlier sci-fi story I had come out there, Aria of the Eclipse.

Nothing has ever excited Tylen Merodine more than being invited by the Regent himself to celebrate the first solar eclipse in his planet’s recorded history. It’s the party of the millennium, and if he has to restrain his normal exuberant instincts to fit in, that’s what he’ll do to be a part of it. His good intentions vanish, however, the moment he’s presented to the Regent. Because there, in a gilded cage, playing music unlike anything Tylen’s ever heard, is the most beautiful alien he could imagine.

For more than twenty years, Dek has lived in captivity, performing at the whim of those who see him as an animal. The Regent is just the latest in a long line of owners, and while he’s kind, he’s still blind to Dek’s sentient nature. Only music gives Dek a voice, until Tylen breaks the rules and sneaks in to see and speak to him alone.

The time they have together is stolen and precious, the minutes ticking away until the eclipse is past and they have to go back to the way their lives were before. But when the Regent shows an unexpected interest in Tylen’s future, they begin to wonder if their worlds need to remain so separate...

In actuality, the two stories are drastically different. While my upcoming release is about gritty military men trapped in political intrigue, Aria of the Eclipse was romantic and melodic, about two sheltered men of different species who find love within the constraints of their existence. It's one of those worlds I've longed to get back to, but time and obligations haven't been kind to those desires. I really need to tell the Regent's story more than anything else. To this day, he fascinates me the most out of all the secondary characters. If I can get to it, his will be the story I write.

For an excerpt and purchase information, visit Amber Allure.

TBT: Walk Among Us

My idea journal has been chock full of dark ideas lately, which makes me nostalgic for one of my early novellas. It was part of a collection about priests I did with Pepper Espinoza called A Calling of Souls. We each wrote a novella, and then wrote one together as Jamie Craig. Pepper's was a fantasy about a young man who'd given up going into the priesthood, our Jamie title was about an English priest questioning his faith, and mine is a paranormal about an ex-priest who sees demons.

As an artist in New York City, Calvin Shumacher finally has the life he’s always wanted. In fact, only one thing can get him to come back to Illinois—his father’s funeral. All he wants is to bury his dad and hightail it back to New York, but a sniper at the graveyard puts those plans on indefinite hold.

So does Matthew Soto. The gorgeous gunman who speaks of monsters wearing human faces. And predicts there won’t be a body for police to find.

Calvin doesn’t know what to think when Matthew claims he didn’t do anything wrong. All he knows is that this man’s haunted eyes seem to pierce right into his soul.

But as each of Matthew’s assertions comes true, Calvin slowly realizes this killer could be the only thing standing between him and an unspeakable evil…

Even though it's been six years since I wrote this, the tale sticks with me. These men are both incredibly lonely, and I found Calvin's head a familiar place to reside for a while. He's an artist and views the world as such, filtering things by color and shape. Most writers I know do the same, except with words and phrases.

To read an excerpt and for purchase information, check it out at Samhain!

TBT: Ruby Red Rebels

I'm currently working on editing a vampire hunter story that appeared in an anthology that's no longer available, which got me to thinking about other vampire stories I've written. You know what? The very first solo title I published with Amber Quill was a vamp story.

To a casual passerby, it’s just a small country bar in the middle of nowhere. To a vampire in the know, it’s the most popular hangout in the entire state of Texas. To Serena Darville, though, Ruby Red is the last hope for an answer to all her deadly troubles.

Walking into the bar to retrieve the bracelet she needs to save her father’s skin—and her own—is the most dangerous thing she’s ever done. She doesn’t need or want a vampire’s help. Not even if that vampire is peacemaker Max Markow, there at Ruby Red with his own grudge to settle.

When an unexpected bar fight gets them locked away in a cellar to die, Serena and Max are forced to work together in order to escape. In such cramped quarters, passions flare. All they have is each other, but only time will tell if that’s enough to survive.

I took a ton of elements I enjoyed and threw them together into the pot to see what would come out. Vampires. Cowboys. Snark. A locked room.

Here's how they meet:

*_*_*

“Here’s a little tip.” The murmured words in her ear came with a drawl and whiskey-soaked slide that would have raised goose bumps even if she wasn’t nervous about being in a vampire bar. “Always look ’em in the eye, darlin’. Don’t do that, and they’re going to think you’re dinner.”

Serena twisted around to find herself staring into the bluest eyes she had ever seen. Laugh lines marked their corners, and the sensual mouth was curved into an amused grin. His shoulder-length dark hair was mostly hidden by a white cowboy hat, swept back to reveal the silver studs in both of his ears. He hadn’t shaved, either, his jaw rough with stubble, but that didn’t hide the slight pallor in his skin. It just masked it a little. It probably made it easier for him to pass when he was in human company. Because if Serena didn’t know to look for it, she would never have pegged him for a vampire.

It was never good when you couldn’t pick the enemy out of the crowd.

“I’ll take that under advisement,” she replied, keeping her tone cool.

The bartender placed her beer in front of her, giving her the perfect opportunity to turn away from the stranger’s attention. Her gaze flickered to the shot glass he then set down for her new neighbor. Apparently, she wasn’t going to be drinking alone.

“See, already you’re asking for trouble. If I wasn’t such a gentleman, I’d be looking at you like a tasty treat right about now.”

Behind the counter, the bartender snorted and shook his head before heading down to the opposite end of the bar.

“Someone thinks you’re lying,” Serena observed.

“Will thinks everybody who walks through those doors is a liar.”

“Most bartenders usually know their patrons better than anybody.”

“And most bartenders usually don’t finish their shift by draining the last patron standing.” The stranger was still grinning when she glanced over at him. “Take it as you will.”

He clearly wasn’t going anywhere. Serena had half a mind to pick up her beer and move to one of the few empty tables, but then that might encourage some of the less attractive vampires in the place into thinking she was fair game. This one seemed content to play the game, and if he was easy on the eyes, what was wrong with that?

He knocked back his shot with practiced ease and set the glass down on the inner half of the counter to indicate a refill from the bartender. “So if Will here knows his customers so well…” His mouth curved in amusement as he spoke, his gaze deliberately flicking over her form-fitting black tank top and the outline of her legs in her jeans. “I guess that means you’ve got a few backroom secrets of your own you’re toting around.”

Only years of practice with cousins who could read every single body rhythm kept Serena’s heart from skipping a beat. “You’ve got an awful lot of opinions for me, considering I don’t even know who you are,” she replied evenly. The cold beer soothed her throat, making it easier to focus on the here and now, and not on the later when everything might go all to hell.

“Max Markow.” He even tapped the front brim of his hat as he nodded at her, as if they were being introduced in polite Texas society. “Now you get to tell me your name.”

“I get to? Did I win some door prize I don’t know about?”

That easy smile returned. He kept his fangs well out of sight, this one did.

“I’ve been called worse in my day.”

In spite of her better judgment, Serena snorted. “You might even be called worse yet tonight.”

He toyed with his shot glass as Will carried over a bottle of Jack Daniels and refilled it. “If it means I get to stick around with your company, I’m goin’ to reckon it’ll be worth it.”

*_*_*

Ruby Red Rebels is available at Amber Heat. Check it out!