How I Met My Next Hero

When it came time to come up with a hero for the second book in my Lords of the Seventh House series, where each hero exemplifies a different astrological sign, I knew I wanted him to be a Scorpio. After all, no other sign has the reputation for sexual intensity that Scorpio has.

But Scorpios are happiest when they use their powerful insight and ability to manipulate others to achieve some important goal. So the more I thought about it, the more I realized I’d have to find a hero for this story quite different from the dukes and earls who populate most Regency-set historical romances.

This hero needed to be a self-made man, one whose power derived from what he had done—indeed, being a Scorpio, it should stem from what he had survived. The dukes and earls waltzing through Almack’s wouldn’t do at all. Their power ultimately derived from the accident of their birth, but I wanted this hero to be a man who’d radiate the kind of power that only comes from living on the edge—from achieving great, difficult, and dangerous things, and from facing death.

It didn’t take long to realize what kind of man would have lived that kind of life in 1820: a soldier engaged in active duty. And since this book was intended to follow Lord Lightning, which was set in 1819, there was only one major military conflict in which an English soldier would still be fighting—the Third Maratha War in India.

Since Scorpios are also famous for their secrecy, I decided my hero, who I’d begun to think of as Captain Trevelyan—Trev for short—would be involved in some kind of covert operation. So imagine my delight when after beginning my research, I learned that covert operations had, in fact, played an important role in British policy in India during my chosen time period, thanks to the efforts of Sir Charles Metcalfe, who was the head of an organization called The Political and Secret Department. Sir Charles was a genius at negotiating behind the scenes with native rulers to win what the English needed through diplomacy—and bribes—rather than going to war.

My excitement for writing a hero who played a key part in Sir Charles’ secret work grew even stronger when I learned that Sir Charles himself had sent his son, who had born in India, to England to be educated when the child was no more than six or seven years old and that this had been a common thing for the English in India to do.

This gave me the last piece I needed to understand what might make my Scorpio hero tick, because Scorpios are not only sexy, and secretive. They are also prone to be survivors of difficult losses early in life, and Sir Charles’ real life story pointed me to what Trev’s childhood must have been like.

When all these pieces fell together, Trev came alive and began to tell me his story. It’s a rich and complex tale that will take you far from Regency ballrooms into the seamy underworld of Regency London. It’s a tale worthy of my heroic Scorpio, whose secrets are his stock and trade, though they lead him and his beloved into dangers from which they can save themselves only by using the only kind of power most of us, not born into the nobility, will ever wield—the power they find deep within their own hearts.

How do you feel about heroes who are not the usual charming Regency nobleman? Do you find a hero’s personal power as compelling as rank and wealth? If you do, I hope you’ll download the first chapter of Star Crossed Seduction and see if Trev’s story moves you as deeply as it did me.