Guest Author & Giveaway with Author Tori St. Claire

Please help me welcome National Bestselling Author Tori St. Claire here with us today with a fabulous post and giveaway! Make sure you read all the details to enter!

Welcome, Tori!

Character Quirks & Things You Didn’t Know

Good morning, readers!  I’m really glad to be able to be here today and share some insight on my latest release, Lie to Me, the second in the Black Opal series.  I thought, for fun, I’d give a little bit of character tidbits that didn’t necessarily make it into the story.  But before I do, let me field a few questions that have been following me around.

Q.  Does the Black Opal series have to be read in order, or do you need to have read Stripped to understand Lie to Me?

A.  Absolutely not.  While there might be mentions of previous characters or books, each one is designed to stand alone.

Q.  What can we expect when we pick up Lie to Me?

A.  A lot of action, danger, and twists to keep a reader on her toes.  This is, however, an erotic romantic suspense, and you will find lots of steamy between-the-sheets encounters.

Q.  What exactly are the Black Opals?

A.  I think the book puts it the best:  They exist only in shadow. An elite team of deadly operatives created to satisfy increasing international threats. Their world is the dark underground, where sin and pleasure dominate and lies are second nature. To those who cross them, they are professional killers. Within the CIA, they are the rare Black Opals . . .

Okay now that those are out of the way:

Did you know…

Alexei Nikanova, hardened Black Opal agent, has a secret craving for chocolate ice cream sprinkled with tiny peanut butter chips.  It’s a carry over from childhood, a rare treat he shared with his mother.

Sasha Zablosky, the lady he can’t keep his hands off of, fell in love with goats while in Dubai, and wants to own one of the fainting variety.  She believes it might curb Alexei’s trigger-finger if he has to stop to tend the critter every time he practices with targets.  And of course, if the goat is more afraid of bullets than she, then she won’t feel so silly.

Alexei has gone almost ten years without wearing a pair of shorts.  Even in the hottest desert sun, he’s been in full dress.  Usually dress pants and a sports jacket.

Sasha has never swum in the ocean.  In fact, her one up-close glimpse of the sea was from the window of a private car, during her initial arrival in Dubai. 

Alexei’s favorite sport is baseball.  In his early teens he harbored a secret desire to play for the San Francisco Giants.

Sasha’s favorite type of music is American Country Western…though she can’t sing a single note.

Alexei’s unspoken fantasy with Sasha involves a hot tub, a private tropical island, champagne, strawberries, homemade whipped cream, and the belt to a terry-cloth robe.  Not necessarily in that order, or all at once.

Sasha shares the similar fantasy of tropical climates, only her unspoken fantasy includes cresting waves, the rumble of thunder, the crackle of lighting, and raindrops on Alexei’s skin.

Okie dokie, now it’s your turn.  Using one of these “favorites” above (food, pet, destination, music, sport, etc) what is your secret dream?

Thanks again, everyone!  I can’t wait to hear your answers!

~Tori St. Claire

Lie To Me

Tori St. Claire

Black Opals, #2

Berkley HEAT

Release Date: July, 2012

Back of the Book:

A man of action…

After helping to break up a Russian human trafficking ring as part of the CIA’s elite Black Opal team, Alexei Nikanova’s newest assignment is to rescue one of the stolen women and return her to her father. When he arrives in Dubai, he discovers his target is Sasha Zablosky—a woman he knows all too well, and who has haunted him ever since their unforgettable time together in Moscow, two and a half years earlier. But he finds Sasha reluctant to leave her sheikh, the only true friend she’s ever known. Only Alexei can’t give her a choice.

A woman of deception…

With their yearning roused by intrigue, Alexei and Sasha can no longer resist temptation, and spend night after night in forbidden pleasure. Soon Alexei finds himself falling for her, even as he battles a shadowy menace to protect her. But Sasha is no innocent. She has a past darker than she could ever admit, one that Alexei could never forgive. And it is about to explode into her life once more. As the lies they tell themselves—and each other—pull them deeper into a perilous desire, what began as simple passion becomes a love certain to destroy them and end the lives of countless innocents.

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GIVEAWAY

Tori will be giving away a $25.00 Amazon Gift Card to one random commenter during the month of July.  Two additional commenters will receive a basket of swag.  Follow the tour – the more times you comment the better your chances of winning!  Complete tour dates can be found here.

About the Author:

National Bestselling author Tori St. Claire grew up writing. Hobby quickly turned into passion, and when she discovered the world of romance as a teen, poems and short stories gave way to full length novels with sexy heroes and heroines waiting to be swept off their feet. She wrote her first romance novel at seventeen.

While that manuscript gathered dust-bunnies beneath the bed, she went on to establish herself as a contemporary, historical, and paranormal author under the pen name, Claire Ashgrove. Her writing, however, skirted a fine line between hot and steamy, and motivated by authors she admired, she pushed her boundaries and made the leap into erotica, using the darker side of human nature and on-the-edge suspense to drive grittier, sexier, stories.

Her erotic romantic suspense novels are searingly sensual experiences that unite passion with true emotion, and the all-consuming tie that binds -- love.