I should have known by the tattoos that Sawyer was trouble. My mother always said to stay away from boys with ink, but she ignored her own advice. She also abandoned me and my little sister.
Life's been hard for the two of us, on the run and on our own, but I just turned twenty-one and started working at a bar in a new city. I wear a fake wedding band and a veil of lies.
My gold ring didn't stop Sawyer. He looked into me with his heavenly green eyes, and I nearly forgot my pretty lies. Now he wants to help me get my life together.
I should stay away, because he could blow my cover. When we get found—and I know one day we will—I want my sister to be old enough to handle the truth about our past.
I may be hanging out with Sawyer, but we're definitely not dating. I swear, he's not setting me on fire with every glance or casual touch. We're just friends. I'm not thinking about him wrapping those tattooed arms around me, every second of every day.
Book 1 in the Runaway Lies Trilogy. New Adult Contemporary Romance. Find on Goodreads.
For You is available now at:
Kobobooks
Fun Facts:
1.For You was originally planned as a trilogy, with a love triangle. Another love interest named Carson was introduced in the beginning of the first draft, but the story completely rejected poor Carson. (Sorry dude, maybe another book!) Toward the end of my draft, I decided against using a cliffhanger, and made the book a stand-alone novel rather than a series. I did this because all the possible options for a second book extending this particular story didn't seem very romantic to read, or fun for me to write. Sometimes you just have to go with your feelings.
2.For You is my fourteenth book. I started out self-publishing YA books in 2011 under the name Dalya Moon. I frequently had to tone down the romantic scenes in my stories to keep them YA, so moving into erotic romance and New Adult made perfect sense for me.
3.Sawyer's tattoos were inspired by a cute waiter who served me and my friend breakfast the day I started writing For You. I feel like a sponge sometimes, picking up details from the world around me to put into novels. I love writing in coffee shops, because if I need an idea for a side character, I can just look out at the sidewalk. For example, I left Sawyer's bike description blank for a few days until I saw a bike in real life that inspired me. I could have just looked something up online, but reality inspires me more.
4.The original title was Forget You, for all of about a day. The other people I tested the title on didn't really “get” the title, plus it seemed a bit aggressive, like the Cee Lo Green song. I knew that the simple title might be hard to find using a search engine, but I enjoyed it so much, I used it anyway.
5.Aubrey was a huge challenge for me. She's way more serious than I am. I found myself hitting the Backspace button to delete lines of dialog way more than I do when I'm writing a really smart-ass character. I actually published a book called Smart Mouth Waitress (as Dalya Moon) about a year ago, and while there are some parallels between the two books, such as the waitress dating an artist, I was very careful keep Aubrey the way I meant her to be. By the end of the book, I knew her a lot better.
6.Some beta readers asked me if the infamous maple syrup scene might be taking it too far. I'm sure for some people, it was. However, is there anything more exciting than hearing an artist you enjoy saying the phrase, “I took a risk”? I have a musician friend who pointed out that I'm quite brave with my work. Trust me, I don't always feel brave, but I'm willing to take risks.
7.I don't get a crush on my leading men every time, but I sure fell for Sawyer. How bad was this crush? Let's just say there was a guilty confession made to my husband.
8.My treat to myself for finishing the book on time was a new pair of glasses. They're tortoiseshell-patterned, but with purple arms. Business in the front, party along the sides!
9.What do I want as an artist? The same thing I want as a person. To make people laugh, or at least smile. My fifth-grade teacher once greeted me with “Good morning, sunshine!” The other kids mocked the crap out of me, but I was proud (and still am) that even though I was having a tough time in school and had no friends for a few of those early years, I still brightened someone's day. So, I want to be a source of sunshine to others, and keep loving what I write and writing what I love.
1.For You was originally planned as a trilogy, with a love triangle. Another love interest named Carson was introduced in the beginning of the first draft, but the story completely rejected poor Carson. (Sorry dude, maybe another book!) Toward the end of my draft, I decided against using a cliffhanger, and made the book a stand-alone novel rather than a series. I did this because all the possible options for a second book extending this particular story didn't seem very romantic to read, or fun for me to write. Sometimes you just have to go with your feelings.
2.For You is my fourteenth book. I started out self-publishing YA books in 2011 under the name Dalya Moon. I frequently had to tone down the romantic scenes in my stories to keep them YA, so moving into erotic romance and New Adult made perfect sense for me.
3.Sawyer's tattoos were inspired by a cute waiter who served me and my friend breakfast the day I started writing For You. I feel like a sponge sometimes, picking up details from the world around me to put into novels. I love writing in coffee shops, because if I need an idea for a side character, I can just look out at the sidewalk. For example, I left Sawyer's bike description blank for a few days until I saw a bike in real life that inspired me. I could have just looked something up online, but reality inspires me more.
4.The original title was Forget You, for all of about a day. The other people I tested the title on didn't really “get” the title, plus it seemed a bit aggressive, like the Cee Lo Green song. I knew that the simple title might be hard to find using a search engine, but I enjoyed it so much, I used it anyway.
5.Aubrey was a huge challenge for me. She's way more serious than I am. I found myself hitting the Backspace button to delete lines of dialog way more than I do when I'm writing a really smart-ass character. I actually published a book called Smart Mouth Waitress (as Dalya Moon) about a year ago, and while there are some parallels between the two books, such as the waitress dating an artist, I was very careful keep Aubrey the way I meant her to be. By the end of the book, I knew her a lot better.
6.Some beta readers asked me if the infamous maple syrup scene might be taking it too far. I'm sure for some people, it was. However, is there anything more exciting than hearing an artist you enjoy saying the phrase, “I took a risk”? I have a musician friend who pointed out that I'm quite brave with my work. Trust me, I don't always feel brave, but I'm willing to take risks.
7.I don't get a crush on my leading men every time, but I sure fell for Sawyer. How bad was this crush? Let's just say there was a guilty confession made to my husband.
8.My treat to myself for finishing the book on time was a new pair of glasses. They're tortoiseshell-patterned, but with purple arms. Business in the front, party along the sides!
9.What do I want as an artist? The same thing I want as a person. To make people laugh, or at least smile. My fifth-grade teacher once greeted me with “Good morning, sunshine!” The other kids mocked the crap out of me, but I was proud (and still am) that even though I was having a tough time in school and had no friends for a few of those early years, I still brightened someone's day. So, I want to be a source of sunshine to others, and keep loving what I write and writing what I love.
Connect:
Excerpt:
Aubrey had been telling me, in her own way, to keep my distance. But then, just when I was about to back off, she invited me in.
She stood three steps up from me, on those stairs with their dark blue carpets, and said, “There is no husband.”
I honestly thought we were going up to her place for another beer, or to talk about what she'd meant.
Not many of my friends were married, but of the ones that were, all the women wore two rings: the engagement ring, with the diamond, and the wedding band that fit alongside it. Something about Aubrey's plain gold band had never seemed right to me. No way would any man on this planet, no matter how broke he was, not give a woman that beautiful something equally pretty to show off to her friends.
I'd actually had this crazy thought that maybe she was in a religious cult, and they were all married to their cult leader or something. That happened in a movie I'd just watched, so it was fresh in my mind. I didn't really believe it, but I knew something was weird about her situation.
I followed her up the stairs to her apartment. My roommate Spanky wasn't wrong about her having a nice ass. I tried to keep my thoughts under control, but my blood was still racing from dealing with those little shitheads by the front door. I'd wanted to use the one kid as a bowling ball and knock the other ones down—bang their heads together until some manners came tumbling out. Little fuckers like that didn't understand reasoning and talking things out. That's what their mothers had been using on them for years, for all the good it did.
If somebody has no sense, you have to smack it into them. That's just how it is.
Once Aubrey and I got inside the apartment, she looked at me with those pale eyes, and I felt the pull of the moon. The force was stronger than ever, drawing us together.
She let me kiss her, and her sweet lips made me hungry. I stopped thinking. All instinct and desire. Her neck. My mouth on her breasts. Her writhing underneath me. Pushing against me and pulling me to her at the same time. So much confusion and desperation. Up was down, and she let out that sweet cry of relief.
Thank you so much for being part of my big tour!
ReplyDeletexoxo