Monday, January 26, 2015

Lisabet Sarai says that Adversaries can be Lovers

Lisabet says:

Sometimes we authors don’t know what we’re getting into.

My romantic erotica novel Nasty Business, just re-released by Fireborn Publishing, had its genesis in the rejection letter for another book. Declining that proposal, the editor wrote “Miranda isn’t exactly the sort of kick ass heroine we’re looking for.”

Okay, I thought. You want “kick ass”? I’ll give it to you in spades. I proceeded to create Ruby Maxwell Chen – brilliant, ambitious, ruthless, and sexy as hell. Readers who favor “nice” heroines might have a hard time with Ruby. She’s determined to succeed and willing to bend the rules if that’s what it takes. Her Chinese tycoon father taught her how to seek out and exploit her opponents’ vulnerabilities. Ruby takes his tutelage further, using her vibrant sexuality to both lure and punish her competitors.

I honestly don’t know where Ruby came from. Once I’d envisioned her, though, I needed a hero who’d be more of a challenge than the typical businessmen she wraps around her finger. What sort of guy would give Ruby a run for her money – and ultimately manage to penetrate her well-armored heart?

Rick Martell was the somewhat unlikely result of my contemplation. Although he’s no movie star, he is, through some biological quirk, irresistible to women. He’s almost as smart as Ruby, equally self-confident, and even more arrogant. And he likes to win as much as she does.

Although they’re competing for a multi-billion dollar deal, the two are drawn to one another from the start, and their adversarial relationship does not preclude a sexual connection. Indeed, each tries to use the other’s lust to further his or her own plans. As the game heats up, the deal loses importance. Surrender becomes the ultimate prize.

Nasty Business is different from anything else I’ve written. Most of my protagonists partake of some of my personal traits, but aside from her intelligence (and her interest in BDSM), Ruby is nothing like me. (Really!) I’ve never had a partner like Rick, either, though physically he has some resemblance to one of my lovers when I was in graduate school – someone whose chemistry really meshed with mine.

Anyway, as I’m sure Suz will confirm, once characters have their claws sunk into your consciousness, you can’t let go until you’ve told their story. Nasty Business includes a lot of dirty tricks and a lot of sex, but ultimately it’s a love story. And I have to admit, it’s one of my favorite books, despite the dubious morality of the hero and heroine. Ruby and Rick may be brilliant, but they’re both blind to their personal needs. It takes some rather extreme games to open their eyes.


Blurb

All’s fair in love and business.

Ruby Maxwell Chen, lovely and ruthless CEO of a huge British business empire, is used to getting her way. When she encounters the strangely charismatic American entrepreneur Rick Martell, though, she wonders if she hasn't finally met her match.

From the trendy clubs of London to the Hollywood Hills, Ruby and Rick compete for ownership of a strategic factory in Malaysia. Neither has any qualms about using sexual wiles to smooth the path to success. Neither anticipates that their mutual attraction will turn into something far more intense and difficult to control.

As their struggle for dominance escalates, they draw their employees and associates into their outrageous power games. The stakes could scarcely be higher, as Ruby and Rick play for the ultimate prize: a night of total physical surrender.

Excerpt

“So, for the trip home, why don’t I put down the top? It’s a lovely evening. I’ll take us back along Mulholland Drive. Slower, but a lot more scenic.”

“Why not?” I fasten my hair into a loose ponytail and settle back in my seat, steeling myself for another aching ride with him within arm’s reach, a million miles away.

Driving in the open car is a totally different experience, though, exhilarating and a bit scary. The wind tears at my hair, tangles it in my eyes, steals my breath. It’s too loud to talk, but we’re both laughing as he steers the roadster off the highway and up into the hills.

Mulholland Drive turns out to be a narrow, torturously twisted road that runs along the crest of the mountains above Hollywood. Rick drives much faster than seems safe, yet once again he’s relaxed and in control. The MG careens around curves, hugging the pavement. My whole body hums with excitement. I can’t tell how much is sexual and how much born of our reckless velocity and the wildness of my hair whipping around my face. The wind is simultaneously a slap and a caress against my skin. I feel as though I am glowing. Totally alive.

My sex is humming, too, quivering, throbbing along with the engine of the car. Rick glances over at me. For the briefest instant, his eyes are pools of pure lust. Triumph and fear simultaneously seize me. He wants me. He’s dangerous. Then both emotions are submerged by the answering lust flooding through me.

“Take off your top,” he shouts at me above the wind. “I dare you.”

A silly notion, I think, but I want to do it. I want to feel the wind against my naked breasts. “Keep your eyes on the road,” I call back. I pull my blouse over my head and push it down in the space between the seat and the door so that it won’t blow away. Then I slip my bra straps off my shoulders and peel the cups away from my swollen nipples.

The air dances over my heated flesh, cool, provocative. “Go ahead, touch yourself,” Rick shouts. “You know you want to.”

He’s right, and suddenly I don’t care that he’s there, or what he thinks, I’ve got to pleasure myself. I grip my nipples between index and forefingers, squeezing until the sensation reaches the edge of pain. My cunt contracts as I release them, then contracts again at the exquisite tickling of their stiffness against my palms. The wind lashes my hair against my skin, sweet little stings that make me hunger for more intense sensation. My clit is so swollen that the slightest movement in the bucket seat sends sparks of pleasure shooting through my body.

Rick is yelling something again, but the wind carries his words away. He makes a rude gesture, pantomimes raising my skirt. I’m already in the process, wriggling against the seat belt as I try to pull the fabric out from underneath my bum. Finally, I manage to free my thighs from the skirt’s constriction. Looking straight at my companion, I pull my soaked panties out of the way with one hand, and sink the other one deep inside my hungering pussy.

Oh, I love the look on his face, shock, astonishment, arousal, but the sensations welling up in me are too intense to bear open-eyed. I’m not delicate. I don’t tease myself, don’t play, don’t take myself gradually to the top. No ceremony, no technique. Desperate, I use both hands, working with single-minded fury to bring myself off.

I forget Martell. I forget where I am, racing along a dangerous road at a dangerous speed with a dangerous man. There is no reality but the fire, the electricity, the tension crackling in my cunt like lightning in a thunderhead. I tilt my pelvis, forcing my fingers deeper into my slippery depths. My thighs stick to the leather seats as I rock back and forth. In and out, faster, harder, more, more please just a little more…

The climax is sudden and unexpected. A shattering like glass, fragments ripping gloriously through my stretched flesh. Momentary blackness cloaks the setting sun. When I finally open my eyes, I find I’m slumped in the seat, skirt and bra tangled around my waist, still trembling.

It takes me a moment to realize that the car has stopped. Martell is watching me in fascination, like a cat stalking a bird. He grins when he realizes that I’m back among the conscious. “Wasn’t that fun?” he asks, with heavy irony. Torn and tired as I am, his voice still sets up stirrings in my sex.

****

Nasty Business is available now from all your favorite ebook outlets.

Buy Links

Amazon US

Amazon UK

Barnes and Noble

Kobo

All Romance Ebooks

Fireborn Publishing

About Me

I became addicted to words at an early age. I began reading when I was four. I wrote my first story at five years old and my first poem at seven. Since then, I have written plays, tutorials, scholarly articles, marketing brochures, software specifications, self-help books, press releases, a five-hundred page dissertation, and lots of erotica and erotic romance – more than fifty single author titles including eight full length novels, plus dozens of short stories in various collections. My credits include contributions to the Lambda winner Where the Girls Are and the IPPIE Best Erotic Book of 2011, Carnal Machines. My gay scifi erotic romance Quarantine won a Rainbow Awards 2012 Honorable Mention. I have also edited a number of acclaimed erotica anthologies. Currently I am responsible for the charity erotica imprint Coming Together Presents, which as of December 2014 has published six volumes by top erotic authors, supporting causes such as Amnesty International, Planned Parenthood, and the Multiple Sclerosis Association of America.

I have more degrees than anyone would ever need, from prestigious educational institutions who would no doubt be deeply embarrassed by my chosen genre.  Aside from writing, travel is one of my most fervent passions.  I’ve visited every continent except Australia, though I still have a long bucket list of places I haven’t been. Currently I live in Southeast Asia with my indulgent husband and two exceptional felines, where I pursues an alternative career that is completely unrelated to my creative writing.



2 comments:

  1. Thanks for coming by, Lisabet ;)

    ReplyDelete
  2. And thank YOU for having me. I'm off to do some promo, see if we can pull some readers over here!

    ReplyDelete