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By Root 1600 0

shoulder. As he stares out over her head, he shoots me a small, sad smile. Like the reason he’s holding on to her so hard is because he’s won the lottery with his mate and doesn’t understand why he got to be the lucky one. I nod once . . . and leave them to themselves.

Lover Eternal

The People:

Rhage

Mary Madonna Luce

John Matthew, aka Tehrror (Darius reincarnated)

Zsadist

Phury

Bella

Wrath and Beth

The Scribe Virgin

Mr. X, Fore-lesser

Mr. O(rmond)

Mr. E, who gets hung up in the tree

Caith, vampire female who has oral interlude with Vishous at One Eye

Dr. Susan Della Croce, Mary’s oncologist

Rhonda Knute, the Suicide Prevention Hotline’s executive director

Nan, Stuart, Lola, and Bill, workers at the hotline

Amber, the waitress at T.G.I. Friday’s

Places of Interest (all in Caldwell, NY, unless otherwise specified):

Suicide Prevention Offices on Tenth Street

One Eye, bar on the far side of Caldwell off Route 22

T.G.I. Friday’s in Lucas Square

Mary’s house, which is a converted barn on the edge of Bella’s property

Bella’s farmhouse, located on a private road off Route 22

Tohr and Wellsie’s home

John’s apartment

Brotherhood’s training center, under Darius’s (now Beth’s) mansion, undisclosed location

Mr. X’s cabin, on the edge of Caldwell

Lessening Society persuasion center—east from Big Notch Mountain, thirty-minute drive from downtown

Summary:

Rhage, the Brotherhood’s most dangerous member, falls in love with a dying human—who is the only one who can tame his beast and his heart.

Craft comments:

Perfect men (males) are just not all that interesting to me. You know the ones I’m talking about, the BMOC types? The gorgeous guys with the pearly-pearlies and the big laughs and the overload of sexual confidence (like they’re packing a rocket launcher in the cup of their boxer-brief Calvins)? Well, those numbers have always left me cold.

While I was writing Dark Lover, Rhage struck me as one of these beautiful males I wouldn’t give you a plug nickel for. He was full of bravado and so self-assured and all over the place with the ladies that I wasn’t really feeling him as a hero. After all, what kind of journey could someone like that have for his story? Fabulous guy meets girl. Fabulous guy gets girl. Um . . . fabulous guy keeps girl, and keeps keeping girl and then she hangs on even longer because, hello, he’s the Perfect Man, and she likes having sex with the lights on.

I’d be done at, like, the second chapter. Largely due to disgust. I mean, what’s the happily-ever-after for them? She installs mirrors over their marital bed and he . . . well, hell, he’s already happy because he’s perfect.

The truth was, I was disappointed that Rhage was book two in the series.

I found out he was up after Wrath about three-quarters of the way through the writing of Dark Lover. It became clear to me during that scene down in Darius’s underground rooms, the one where Beth gets Rhage those Alka-Seltzers and soothes him as he tries to recover from the beast having come out again. It was while I was writing those pages that I started getting visions for Hollywood’s book: I saw Rhage and the beast and how hard it was for him to live with his curse. Saw that to him all the sex he had was hollow, simply a way to keep himself level. Saw him fall for Mary and sacrifice for her.

He was not perfect. He suffered. He struggled.

By the time I was through outlining his story, Rhage not only interested me, I loved him. He was so much more appealing for the fact that he and his life weren’t a playboy’s paradise.

Which brings me to rule number six: Conflict is king.

One of the things I think works in Lover Eternal is its conflicts. Mary and Rhage must overcome a hell of a lot to be together: They’ve got to confront her disease; deal with the fact that she’s human and he’s not; come to terms with his beast and what he must do to control it; and get through her transition into the world of the Brotherhood.