Tasha kissed him, melting into his arms.
But he pulled back. “Is that a yes?”
“It’s a yes to everything,” she told him.
He double-checked, searching her eyes. “It’s not too soon?”
Too soon. He thought it might be too soon for the woman who’d loved him for nearly twenty years. Tasha laughed as she stood up, picked up her bags, and looked around the lobby for the hotel elevators. Ah, there they were, back behind the breakfast area.
“If we’re leaving in the morning, we should go to bed.” She looked at Thomas and smiled. “Follow me.”
He smiled back at her as he pulled her into her arms to kiss her soundly. “Always,” he told her, “and forever.”
Author’s Note
King’s Ransom
Dear Reader,
Frisco’s Kid, the third book in my popular Tall, Dark & Dangerous series, the book in which Thomas King and Tasha Francisco first appeared, was originally released as a Silhouette Intimate Moments category romance in January, 1997.
I started getting emails from readers almost immediately: “You’re gonna write Thomas and Tasha’s book, right…?” For nearly all of my thirty-year career, this has been my most frequently asked question.
Um… Yes? But Tasha and I both needed a little time. Cause she was, like, five…?
Still, I thought, “Sure, someday!” My original plan with the TDD books was to write an ongoing and opened-ended series about U.S. Navy SEAL Team Ten. (I think if you’d approached 1997-me with the idea that I’d still be writing this series in 2020, I would’ve said, “Hooyah…?”)
Oh! Here’s some fun trivia! Back when I outlined the first TDD book, Prince Joe, there was no real-life SEAL Team Ten. There was one, two, three and six, with six being the most elite. So I skipped a few numbers, too, and created my fictional elite Team Ten.
More fun trivia! Prince Joe (TDD #1, published June, 1996) features the original Prince Tedric (Uncle Prince Tedric, as Thomas calls him).
See, when I sat down to finally outline Thomas and Tasha’s book, I thought it would be fun to a) bring this long-running series full circle and end where I started; and b) write a story in which it appears as if Tasha is truly going to become a princess.
But I also knew that this story was going to be a challenge to write, not just because of the heroine and hero’s age difference, but because of their history. After Frisco’s Kid, Thomas and Tasha both appear regularly throughout the TDD series, and most of the time, Tasha is still a very young girl.
I realized right away that I would need to lock Tasha and Thomas away somewhere, alone together, as full-grown adults, to help Thomas (and me!) overcome his “you’re too young” issues. I started with that—a need for isolation—back in September 2018, and I created that whole “9/11-type event” so that T&T would be forced to be alone in the wilderness together, never guessing that our world was on the verge of a global pandemic. Sheesh. I coulda made this a “quarantined together during a hurricane so there’s no power/internet/ability to Zoom/make phone calls” book. If I’d only looked harder into my crystal ball. (Hah!)
About the time warp: I wrote the first eleven books in the TDD series between 1995 and 2002. A variety of issues made me put the series on hold until 2018, when I finally sat down to write SEAL Camp (Spaceman and Ashley’s book, set up in Taylor’s Temptation, TDD #10).
I was faced, at that time, with a choice. Should I maintain the old timeline and set this book in the early 2000s? (Pagers! Dial-up internet! Ugh! No!!)
Should I maintain the old timeline, acknowledge the passage of time, and set the story in the current day? (By which point even the youngest SEALs in the series would likely be retired, so all of the familiar faces would be gone. Ugh! No!!)
Or…
Should I do one of those funky, weird, kinda cheat-y, soap-opera-esque thangs, and warp time so that we (me-the-writer and you-the-reader) could have it all…? (Smart phones! Text messages! Wi-fi! And familiar names and faces! Yes!!)
So yeah. As I mentioned in that little note right at the top of Chapter One, like SEAL Camp, King’s Ransom is set both in the present day, and a few years after the end of Night Watch (TDD #11, Wes and Brittany’s book). Admiral Francisco, Team Ten CO Captain Joe Catalanotto, Senior Chief Harvard Becker, and Lucky and Bobby and Wes and all of the rest of the SEALs from the original eleven books have been in their early-to-mid-to-late-thirties for more than a dozen years. (Gee, I wish I could say the same!) Thomas King, now mid-thirties to Tasha’s early twenties, has caught up to them. Embrace the time warp!
About the future (as long as we’re time traveling!): I’d intended for King’s Ransom to be the final book in the Tall, Dark & Dangerous series, but as I was getting to know both Rio and Dave through their subplot, I found myself more and more intrigued. And then my husband cleverly came up with an enticing title: Blame it on Rio.
No promises, but it’s hard to turn down a good title like that. Plus that story practically writes itself. (Maybe I’ll make it a short, with two stories, one for Rio and one for Dave…?)
But here we are.
The End.
Thank you, TDD readers, so very much for taking this nearly-a-quarter-century journey and choosing to spend your precious reading time with my characters and me.
If you enjoyed King’s Ransom, I’d appreciate it greatly if you’d post a review or toss it some shiny stars and/or digital buckets o’ love at your favorite on-line bookseller.
Authors, particularly indie authors, depend on reader reviews more than ever in this crazy, noisy, option-filled digital world. I’m very grateful, too, when you post, share, tweet, text, and talk about my books, particularly new ones like King’s Ransom! (Thank you so very, very much!)
I love getting interactive: Twitter’s my social media format of choice—give me a shout @SuzBrockmann. And if you want to be absolutely certain you’ll get hot-off-the-press news about upcoming new releases (books and movies!), reissues, appearances, and e-book deals, sign up for my e-newsletter!
Love and hugs and don’t stop fighting for equality, hope, peace, and love, (and come on, Georgia! #VoteBlue!),
Excerpt from SEAL Camp
SEAL Camp
Tall, Dark & Dangerous series #12
First published May 2018 from Suzanne Brockmann Books
Navy SEAL Lieutenant Jim “Spaceman” Slade’s got a problem. A SEAL Team is only as fast as its slowest member—and right now, thanks to his battered knees—that’s Jim. He reluctantly takes medical leave, but he’s a SEAL, so he spends his “vacation” as an instructor, helping out a former senior chief who runs a camp for SEAL wannabes. But to Jim’s shock, he finds himself falling for the one woman attending the camp session—an obviously brilliant but seemingly timid lawyer who is determined to do everything her way, no matter how wrong.
Ashley DeWitt’s got a problem, too. She’s a kickass lawyer, but when it comes to her personal life, she’s a total pushover. When she finds herself hiding behind her condo Dumpster to avoid a confrontation with an ex, she decides enough is enough and signs up for a session at a camp called SEAL World, in hopes she’ll discover how to be more assertive outside of the courtroom. And then she’s assigned to Jim’s team...