Black Rose of the Wild Rose Press: The connection between fear and sex

I'm Barbara Edwads and I collect weird facts.

Psychologists claim there is a direct correlation between fear and the need to reproduce. That fact doesn’t sound romantic to me. It reminds me of teenage boys taking girls to see a slasher movie so she’ll cuddle close for protection. Did you come from a small town where the boys coaxed the girls to go into a cemetery at midnight? Guess what they hoped would be the result?

So as the author of romances, I take the cold fact and twist the feelings into a close encounter of the intimate kind.

In Ancient Blood, Lily and Cole develop a relationship before Cole reveals he is a werewolf. Scary yes, but also sexy and passionate. Lily already trusts him. Love is a short leap away.

Steve and Mel face an immortal danger in Ancient Awakening. Fear drives them together. It’s a wonderful chain made of linking incidents.

The idea is to take the reader along with the hero and heroine as they experience the danger, the fear and the closeness of escape to safety. There are a thousand different trails to that romantic ending. It’s even fun to stop them at the last minute so they are left panting for more.

Do you have a favorite story with these elements?

Ancient Awakening, Book One: Finding Rhodes End Series by Barbara Edwards

Blurb:

Police Officer Melanie Petersen is the only one who believes a suspicious death is murder. By disobeying direct orders from the Rhodes End Chief, she risks her career to follow clues that twist in circles to her backyard and lead the killer to her. Her neighbor Stephan Zoriak is a prime suspect. While working for a major pharmaceutical company, he is exposed to a dangerous organism that changed him. He suspects he is the killer and agrees to help Mel find the truth when the deaths continue. In the course of their investigation Mel and Steve find more death and continued distrust that make them wonder if love can defy death.

Excerpt:

“Don’t touch me, Mel, not unless you’re willing to do a lot more,” he warned as her hazel eyes flared golden.

“Don’t threaten me, Steve. You’re…”

He pulled her into his arms despite the alarm bells clanging in his head.

Danger! Danger! Danger!

Her widened eyes met his. Mel’s hands were trapped against his chest, but she didn’t push him away. Instead, her fingers curled into his shirt.

Her mistake. His mistake was to crush her mouth under his.

Mel’s soft lips parted. Need exploded. The taste of black coffee didn’t hide her sweet flavor. As her tongue tangled with his, her arms slid around his neck and her fingers burrowed through his hair.

Steve hungered to peel the starched shirt off her soft shoulders, lay her on the thick turf and ease his desire. He tasted her brows, her cheek, along her throat, seeking the source of her call. Her pulse whipped under his mouth, awakening another need.

His teeth gently closed on the vulnerable vein.

He wanted, wanted, wanted…

Cold alarm chilled his pounding blood.

Steve gasped for air. He’d forgotten his own ironclad rule. Mel’s eyelids flittered open to reveal the molten glow of desire but he forced himself free.

He had no right to touch any woman. Not until he knew he hadn’t become what he had set out to destroy.