A KNIGHT IN SHINING LEATHER…
IN YOUR ARMS
For Your Love #2
Shannyn Schroeder
Releasing Dec 27th, 2016
Zebra Shout
A KNIGHT IN
SHINING LEATHER…
Sean O'Malley has never tried to
hide who he is. He shows it in the motorcycle thrumming between the legs of his
tight jeans…the shaggy hair that falls in his gorgeous eyes…the wicked gleam in
his smile when he asks Emma out for a drink. Sean is a rebel, a bad boy, and a
ton of fun: exactly the kind of guy she's sworn off forever.
Emma isn't just the prim
kindergarten teacher she appears to be. And somehow Sean can tell. As soon as
he pulls up to her overheated car he knows that a fast bike and a cold beer
will fix her rotten day better than compliments or a bubble bath. Her
straitlaced exterior and her wild heart light him up. But Emma wants to escape
her past and settle down—and if her desk jockey dates don't understand where
she comes from, at least she doesn't worry about them bringing her back.
One weekend of intense connection
can't change the paths Sean and Emma have chosen. But with a little space to be
themselves together, maybe the rest of the world can wait...
Don't miss the other FOR YOUR LOVE titles!
The blast of air-conditioning hit them
as the automatic door swung open. Emma paused, looked up and around, and turned
toward the bakery. Sean followed. She kept walking, and he stopped by the
coffee cakes. A chocolate-chip cake sounded good.
“What about this?” He held up the
plastic container.
“Uh-uh. It needs to be birthday cake.”
Sean held on to the coffee cake but
followed her to the refrigerated section. She looked at the display for a
minute before choosing one. As great as Emma seemed, she sure had some weird
quirks. She picked out a round cake with Happy
Birthday written in blue handwriting. Red, yellow, and blue icing balloons
decorated the edge.
Emma said nothing. With the cake in
hand, she turned toward the register. Although she quickly offered answers to
his questions, she wasn’t like other girls he knew, who would fill silence with
any kind of pointless chatter.
“You okay?” he asked when they got to
the self-checkout.
“I will be.” She scanned her cake, and
he jumped in to scan his too before she could finish the transaction. Then he
swiped his card to pay.
“You didn’t have to buy my cake.”
“I know I didn’t have to, but if I
have a crappy day and someone buys me a beer, that beer tastes even better
going down.”
His answer got the reaction he’d hoped
for. A smile. Emboldened by her smile, he pushed on. “So why does it have to be
birthday cake?”
She sighed and he thought she might
not answer. “Birthday cake was the one thing my mom got right when I was a
kid.”
He waited, hoping she’d explain,
because how could anyone mess up store-bought birthday cake? They walked
through the automatic door, and the heat of the afternoon swamped him.
“You met her. Even with that brief
encounter, you can probably tell Brandi is far from a stellar mom. A lot of
things were uncertain when I was little. But birthday cake was something we
could always count on. It didn’t matter where we were living or even if she had
a job, Mom made sure we had birthday cake on our birthdays.”
“It’s weird now that you mention it. I
guess I always took birthday cake for granted. In my family, we’re all adults
and we still make a trip to Blackstone’s to get a birthday cake.”
“For me, birthday cake is comfort.”
She leaned over and bumped his shoulder as they walked. “I keep some in my
freezer because you never know when you’re going to have a bad day.”
“Seriously?”
“Well, it’s not like I buy a cake and
eat it all by myself in one sitting. It would be a waste to throw it out, so I
cut it into pieces and freeze it.”
The walk back to his house was too
quick. Sean liked Emma talking about herself. He didn’t know how he’d even
managed not to realize how much he missed having a girlfriend. Then he
remembered that every girl at some point pushed for something more than he
wanted to give. He wasn’t about to put a ring on anyone’s finger. That kind of
commitment would ruin his easygoing lifestyle.
***
Meet the Heroine (In Your Arms)–
Emma Long
By: Shannyn Schroeder
I had a great time writing Emma Long. She came to me in
pieces a while ago as a character. I thought about a Kindergarten teacher who
normally has a potty-mouth, but limits how many times a day she can swear
(five) and the rest of the time, she improvises (fudge monkey). At first I had
no reason why she was like this or any of the rest of her backstory, but I
wanted to know.
As I started thinking about Sean O’Malley, I knew she would
be a good fit for him. The O’Malley boys use the word fuck in every other
sentence, so pairing Sean with a woman who really tries not to swear would be
fun.
But as I got to know Emma, there was so much more to her.
She has an older brother, Nicky, who is completely unreliable. She was raised
by a single mother, Brandi, who wasn’t the best provider. The only thing that
Emma could count on as a kid was birthday cake on her birthday. As she says,
it’s the one thing her mom got right. So now, birthday cake is comfort food for
Emma.
Emma grew up as a wild child. School was hard, so she charmed
her way through. Once she got out of high school, she worked random jobs, often
at the same bars where her mother worked. The party lifestyle suited her.
Until they were evicted (again). Then Emma decided she
wanted more out of life. In order to make that happen, she needed to change.
She went back to school and became a teacher. She’s now the responsible member
of the family and her brother and mother rely on her.
Emma wants everything she didn’t have growing up. She wants
a husband, kids, and house with a backyard. She needs something she can count
on and she’s working her ass off to make that happen. Unfortunately, she tends
to be drawn to guys who don’t fit the bill.
When she meets Sean, she knows he’ll be great for a night,
or maybe even a weekend, but she can’t count on him for the long haul. Or can
she?
***
Meet the Hero (In Your Arms)
– Sean O’Malley
By: Shannyn Schroeder
I love the O’Malleys. From the first moment I wrote about
them in my O’Learys series, I fell for them. And Sean is one of my favorites.
Everyone describes him as a live-and-let-live kind of guy who happens to be
quick with his fists. And that really sums up who he is.
Sean is all about enjoying life. He works as a mechanic
because he likes working on cars. It’s not a stepping-stone to some other
career. He plays hockey every chance he gets and rides his motorcycle until the
weather prohibits it. He does whatever he wants, pretty much no matter what.
When he has a chance to enjoy a long motorcycle ride due to some unexpected
awesome weather, he goes, even though it costs him his job. He knows he won’t
have a problem getting a new one.
Sean loves his family and likes having them around. It’s
part of why he continues to live at home. He can afford to live in his own
place, but he chooses not to. He’s very protective of everyone he cares about,
and that’s the reason he’s usually so quick to use his fists.
Part of why Sean refuses to be more than an “overgrown boy”
is because he grew up watching his older brother Jimmy take care of everyone.
Jimmy is ultra-responsible and Sean doesn’t want to live with that kind of
burden.
When he meets Emma, he starts to want a relationship with
her and doesn’t understand how he could fall for a woman who is a female
version of Jimmy. She expects him to be something he can’t be, but for her he’s
willing to try.
For a few years now, I’ve been developing my process for
writing a book, especially since I’m not a plotter. I can’t outline a book
before I write. One of things I do that I find really helps ground me in a book
is having a playlist. I create the playlist before I ever write a word. I
choose songs based on what I know about the characters and the arc of the
story. Sometimes I choose songs that still fit by the time the book is done,
other times, not so much. Once the playlist is created, I listen to it almost
nonstop before writing (to the point of annoying my children) and every time I
sit down to write.
It’s been almost a year and a half since I drafted In Your Arms and I have to say this is
one of the best playlists I’ve ever created. It still holds up for the
characters and the book. It’s also one of my favorite lists. It’s mostly fun
and upbeat, just like the book.
If I had to choose just one song to represent the book as a
whole, it would have to be Shut Up and
Dance by Walk the Moon. It’s all about being attracted and belonging
together, but she holds back and he knows it. Running a close second would be Bad Enough for You by All Time Low
because Sean knows that Emma loves his bad boy side. It’s what she’s drawn to,
and she doesn’t really want him to be nice to her.
Shut Up and Dance –
Walk the Moon
Bad Enough for You –
All Time Low
All I Wanna Do Is You
– Bon Jovi
Stay with Me – Sam
Smith
We’ve Got Tonight –
Bob Seeger
Lonely Tonight –
Blake Shelton
I Need You – Saving
Abel
Touch – Josh Abbott
Band
Free Me – Joss Stone
Tell Me What We’re
Gonna Do Now – Joss Stone
Head Over Feet –
Alanis Morissette
Stand Here with Me –
Creed
Shannyn
Schroeder is the author of the O’Leary series, contemporary
romances centered around a large Irish-American family in Chicago and the Hot
& Nerdy series about 3 nerdy friends finding love. Her new series (For Your
Love) will release this summer with the first title Under Your Skin. When she’s
not wrangling her three kids or writing, she watches a ton of TV and loves to
bake cookies.
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