Who is your favorite television anti-hero? For the longest, mine was Dexter, but the man known only as Sheriff Lucas Hood on Banshee now takes first place.
My first shot at a true literary anti-hero, I just kind of got my feet wet. Duke is a bad guy, but by bringing someone in from his past, someone who knew him before he went to the dark side, I could ignore a lot of the bad parts of him. He’s the president of the MC, so he’s certainly had to make some tough decisions, but his story wasn’t so much about that side of him.
I partnered Brain with a female anti-hero, and while their story also isn’t about the truly bad things they’re capable of, we see more of the dark side in both of them, and the action sequences at the end show they aren’t afraid to get a little bloody. Or, a lot bloody, for that matter.
And then we get to Bash. Now I’m comfortable writing bad guys. I made people hate Bash during Brain’s story — my readers already know Bash is a cold-assed bastard. I continue showing just how much of a bad guy he is, and the terrible things he’ll do for his club without even thinking about it.
Bud warns Angelica:
“Bash can turn his sociopathy on and off. He wouldn’t hurt someone he cares about, but people he doesn’t know? He doesn’t think twice about hurting or killing them. No guilt, no remorse, nothing. Cutting a person in two is the same as cutting a two-by-four into sections. I’m not even sure he hears their screams, Angel.”
But Angelica is used to her dad coming home with other people’s blood on him, so she takes it in stride when Bash does, too.
It took me three full length novels to tell Bash’s story. Calling him difficult would be an understatement.
I know some people shy away from MC books because of the cheating factor, but once my wolves commit, they don’t cheat. That’s not to say they don’t play on a very large playing field before they commit, though. We see both Brain and Bash with other people early in their stories. Angelica too, for that matter.
I’ll leave you with a teaser image I think explains why we like anti-heroes so much.
Whatever it takes. If you have the love of an anti-hero, it means they’ll probably kill for you. We may not want this in real life, but I have to admit — the fantasy is kinda fun.
Who is your favorite anti-hero? I’ve already mentioned Sheriff Hood, but I must also bring up Dominic Toretto from the Fast and the Furious movies. A bad guy with a heart of gold… and a body you just want to lick all over.
*****
Excerpt:
Chapter Two
Eight years ago
Angelica
Kayla met me in the bathroom after last period, and watched as I changed out of my super tiny mini-skirt into jeans. God, if my dad saw me in this skirt he’d have an aneurism.
“I can’t believe you lost Brain. God, Ang, he’s the best biker-bitch you’ve had yet.”
Speaking of aneurisms, my dad nearly had one when he found out Kayla called me Ang. He calls me Angel, but says no one else is allowed to shorten my name. One of the reasons I love Kayla is she isn’t afraid of my dad, or any of the other bikers, and she just kept calling me what she wanted.
I shrugged as I buttoned my jeans and stowed the skirt in my backpack. “I got one of the new guys, I’ve only met him a couple of times. He looks like he’s pissed at the world, and I seriously doubt he’s going to be any fucking help at all with my calculus or chemistry homework.”
“He have a cool name?” she asked as we left the bathroom.
“Bash, and best I can tell, it isn’t ‘cause he’s bashful. And damn, the boy is beautiful.” And he’d be so fucking pissed if he knew I’d called him a boy.
“How you gonna break him in?”
I shook my head. “Haven’t decided. He’s actually kinda scary, even for one of my dad’s men. Also, I don’t think he’s that much older than us. I know when he first came, he couldn’t have even the prospect patch yet, ’cause he wasn’t old enough. They treated him like one, which had to suck, but he didn’t get his first patch until a few weeks ago, so I think he just turned eighteen.”
“You know his story?”
I shook my head. “He has a fucked up accent though. He isn’t from around here.”
Kayla showed the assistant principal the note from her mom saying she could ride home with me, and he waved us to the RTMC vehicle waiting in the car line.
I got into the front passenger seat and settled my backpack at my feet as I put my seatbelt on and told him, “Bash, meet Kayla. She’s my BFF and you’re her ride now, too. Not just mine.”
He breathed deep, and I assumed he’d just realized she’s human and not wolf, and I added, “We have a problem, you take care of her first, then me. I can handle myself a few minutes, but she isn’t a fighter. Get me?”
He pulled forward and glanced in his rear view mirror at Kayla before looking forward again. “My orders are to keep you safe, Princess.”
I sighed and leaned my head back, looking at the road instead of him. “Those are your orders from my dad. Thing is, I can make your life a living hell if I want, or I can help make this a cushy assignment until you get your patch. I’ve grown up in the club, I know the drill. When Kayla and I became best friends in the fourth grade, our dads had a talk. Their agreement was she’d come to the house, but never to the club, and there’d be no parties at our house when she’s over. She hasn’t been around ya’ll much at all. Her parents have met my prospect chauffeurs over the years, and they’re mostly chilled about it now, but they’ll need to meet you sometime this week.”
“Basically,” Kayla said from the backseat, “you’re our bitch now. You’re our ride when we need one, and you go get stuff we need, even if it’s tampons at two in the morning. You’ll carry our packages for us when we go shopping at the mall, and if we ask if our ass looks fat when we try on clothes, you’ll be honest and tell it to us straight from a guy’s perspective.”
“And not,” I added, my voice low and deep, “from my father’s viewpoint.” I held my wolf in, so I didn’t growl at him in front of Kayla. “I know you’re supposed to cock-block us, but I also know you can’t actually hurt any of the guys.” He held his hand up, thinking he could silence me, and I said, “Fuck you, asshole. I’ll talk when I fuckin’ want to.”
He pulled into a church parking lot, put the SUV into park, tossed his cellphone into the little compartment in the dash, and got out.
Bash might only be eighteen, but he wasn’t a boy. He paced like a caged animal and I realized he was on the edge. This wasn’t a wolf thing, though — it was something else. He moved with a lethal, fluid grace that set something inside me on fire, and I didn’t get out of the vehicle, knowing he’d smell it on me.
I’d had a crush on my prospect when I was twelve, and my dad had given me someone else and then hadn’t assigned anyone else who was my type, since. Brain had truly been like a big brother to me. I mean, I knew he was dangerous, all the men of the RTMC are, but to me, they mean safety. I’m their little sister, the president’s daughter, and they’ll all protect me with their life.
I instinctively knew Bash didn’t necessarily represent safety for me, though.
With his back to me, he said, “Out of the car, Princess. You and I need to have a talk without your friend hearing.”
My insides shook from the threat of violence in his voice, and I didn’t want to get out of the car. I reminded myself he couldn’t hurt me without risking my dad’s wrath, and felt my body chilling out. I couldn’t go outside smelling of fear — he’d eat me alive.
I heard him with my wolf hearing, but Kayla wouldn’t have a clue he’d spoken. I sighed and told her, “Stay here a sec. Maybe we pushed him too hard? I’m gonna go talk to him.”
“He’s kind of scary, Ang.”
“My dad wouldn’t have assigned someone who’d hurt us, Kayla. I’ll just go talk to him a second. It’ll be okay.”
As I got out of the car, I suddenly wasn’t so sure my dad wouldn’t have upped his game with my prospects. He and my mom had a huge argument last week, but she convinced him it was time he let me start double-dating with an early curfew. She’d successfully argued they had to let me take baby-steps and learn responsibility slowly, or I’d go wild when I went off to college without him around to supervise my every move. He’d finally agreed to it, but only if my prospect tagged along. It was more than I’d hoped for, but at the time I’d thought it’d be Brain.
As I got out, Bash said, “Leave your cellphone — and anything else with a battery — in the car.”
This was standard RTMC procedure when we wanted to make sure we weren’t recorded. Apparently, he was gonna say stuff my dad wouldn’t approve of. I tossed my phone onto the dashboard, turned the radio up a little, and told Kayla, “I’ll be back in a minute.”
I followed him off the parking lot pavement into grass, assuring myself all the while that my dad wouldn’t have sent someone likely to hurt me. Still, Bash was harsher than the other guys my dad had assigned me, and I needed to be careful with my strategy. As soon as I caught up to him, he said, “Here’s the way it’s gonna be, Princess. I may not be able to bash any of your boy-toys’ heads in with witnesses around, but that don’t mean I can’t do it later. You want ‘em to live? You make sure they stay on my good side. Nobody disrespects someone in the RTMC, not even a prospect.” His voice deepened, and I heard his wolf. “Second thing, is you may be under RTMC protection, but you’re a split tail, and that means you do what you’re told. You want me to show you respect? You show it to me. I’ll throw your words right back at ya — we can either get along, or not. I don’t give a flying fuck which you choose, Princess. You think you can make my life hell? You have no idea what I can do to yours.”
Yeah, this I could work with. I gave him a half smile and shrugged one shoulder. “Take a deep breath, Bash. You smell any fear comin’ off me?”
He took a whiff, shook his head, his eyes suddenly a touch uncertain.
“My dad stopped assigning me guys I could walk all over when I was about eight. He’s miscalculated a few times, though he quickly gave me someone new once he figured it out. So, I can’t boss you around — okay, I get it.” I offered my hand. “Truce?”
He shook his head. “No, Princess. No truce just yet. Let’s give it a couple of days, see where we stand then.”
*****
Blurb:
What do you get when you mix a bad-ass werewolf biker with a beautiful she-wolf who grew up as the MC President’s daughter?
Sparks.
Book one of the Bash trilogy…
Angelica was raised not only as a biker’s daughter, but as Bud’s daughter — the president of the Atlanta RTMC, which meant she also had dozens of ‘uncles’ who made sure she was safe, happy, loved, secure.
Needless to say, her virginity was still solidly intact when she left for college.
She goes to school up north, where no one knows she’s a biker’s daughter at heart, and thoroughly enjoys her time as a civilian. She gets rid of her pesky virginity right away, but is mostly a good girl while she buckles down to get her degree, staying at school even during the summers to take as many classes as she can fit in.
She’s a different person when she comes home with her Master’s degree, and in spite of her intention to remain a civilian, some of the bikers don’t seem so much like uncles, anymore.
Warning: Lots of hot sex, a touch of BDSM, and an abundance of bad-ass werewolf bikers who are used to getting their way.
This is book one of a three book story. There’s a tiny cliffhanger at the end, but only three weeks until book two releases.
*****
About the Author:
Candace Blevins is a southern girl who loves to travel the world. She lives with her husband of 17 years and their two daughters. When not working or driving kids all over the place she can be found reading, writing, meditating, or swimming.
Candace writes BDSM Romance, Urban Fantasy, Paranormal Romance, and is currently writing a kick-ass Motorcycle Club series.
Her Safeword Series gives us characters who happen to have some extreme kinks. Relationships can be difficult enough without throwing power exchange into the mix, and her books show characters who care enough about each other to fight to make the relationship work. Each book in the Safeword series highlights a couple with a different BDSM issue to resolve.
Her urban fantasy series, Only Human, gives us a world where weredragons, werewolves, werelions, three different species of vampires, as well as a variety of other mythological beings exist.
Candace’s two paranormal romance series, The Chattanooga Supernaturals and The Rolling Thunder Motorcycle Club, are both sister series to the Only Human series, and give some secondary characters their happily ever after.
You can visit Candace on the web at candaceblevins.com and feel free to friend her on Facebook at facebook.com/candacesblevins and Goodreads at goodreads.com/CandaceBlevins.
You can also join facebook.com/groups/CandacesKinksters to get sneak peeks into what she’s writing now, images that inspire her, and the occasional juicy blurb.
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*****
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