Monday, July 20, 2026

Author Interview- Intimate Choice by DC Stone #RomanticSuspense

 

What inspired you to become an author?

Trust me when I say, never in my life did I think I’d become an author. English class was not one I enjoyed in high school or college, and I was never a huge reader. However, one year while I was stationed in England on a little USAF base, I was bored and walking around the BX (what most people would refer to as a military Walmart or Target), and came across a pile of books. I started going through them and came across a Nora Roberts romance novel that looked interesting. If you put me on the spot, I will probably be able to figure it out by going through my Goodreads list, but off the top of my head, I can’t recall which one. She’s got like a gazillion. J I did pick it up, bought it, then read it overnight. The next day, I went back and picked up more. Always romance novels. Always read like I was some malnourished being who hadn’t eaten a single word for years—which, I guess could be true, since I hadn’t. This continued on through me leaving the Air Force, then getting pregnant and having my son. But there were certain books that always left me wanting “more.” Whether it be a different ending or another scene played out a certain way. Something. So one day, my husband put this nugget in my mind of “why don’t you just write your own book and end it the way you want?”

So I did.

Is the book, characters, or any scenes based on a true life experience, someone you know, or events in your own life?

Funny enough, out of all my books in this series (there are seven), this book’s hero is based on a real-life person. It’s not a secret that in my day-life, I’m an investigator. In doing those duties, I work with a lot of law enforcement agencies. Years ago, and I’m talking like ten or so years ago, I met a Secret Service Agent who worked a case with me to prosecute someone for financial crimes. That may be something a good majority of folks are surprised to hear, that USSS also works financial crimes, but protection obviously always comes first. Anyhow, back to this agent…him and I became good friends over the years. I’ve watched him get married, move around the country, and eventually become a dad. He’s one of the most genuine, kind-hearted folks I know. But this character, who happens to have the same first name as him, was created years ago over lunch when he joked with me after learning I was a romance author. “You should base one of your characters off of me.” Me: easy. And it was, because like I said above, he’s a great guy. He’s had a feature on my past blogs, where we jokingly refer to him as “Agent Hottie.” And he’s hinted at making a splash into romance cover model.

With every hero I create though, there is always a hint of my own happily-ever-after, and a piece of my husband is set into either a scene, something the hero says, or a characteristic of them. It’s easy for authors to use real-life inspiration and it’s something I refer to time and time again. For Mike Gonzalez, it was just legitimately based on an entire person.

Of all the characters you’ve ever written, who is your favorite and why?

There would be two. This changes over the years, and it’ll probably change again. One of my first favorite characters was one by the name of Bari, from Feral Craving. He was just so outrageous and had this “IDC” type of attitude. But then I met Charlie from Intimate Danger, and she was a girl that no one wanted to mess with, and one that could hold her own in a room full of men. She reminded me a lot of Bari but in the female form.

However, to date, my two favorites of all time are Hailey and Luke in Intimate Addiction. Their story was super sensitive to write for several reasons. I won’t go into those reasonings here as it’ll give away the plot, but the genuine growth I witnessed from these two made them feel as they came alive for me on the page. They were so much fun to write, to challenge with each turn of the page, and to watch ultimately bend to my will and get their shit together. They weren’t easy to get to where they needed to be, but they will always hold a soft place in my heart.

If this book is part of a series…what is the next book? Any details you can share?

This is the final book of this series! Took a long time for us to get here and I’m sad to put this piece of it to rest, but I’m looking forward to building out another series that will break off from this one. I’m sure folks will figure it out as they read through this one, but the spin-off is going to be so much fun!

What book are you reading now?

I just opened a book last night called Pieces of the Night by Jennifer Hartmann. She has a way of writing about sensitive topics that just draws the reader in and doesn’t let go.

What books/authors have influenced your life?

Oh this is tough, because there have been a lot. But influencing my life? It would be impossible to say. Influencing the way I write and build my characters? Kristen Ashley. Julie Ann Walker is another. Both women have such unique ways in how they build their worlds and develop their characters until I find it extremely difficult to put the book down. It’s inspiring and pushed me to want to do the same within my stories.

Can you share a little of your current work with us?

Mayyyyyyybe. Just kidding. ;)

I’m working on the sequel to A Piece of Me. This was a self-published book that recently was updated and re-edited. A Piece of Me dealt with a woman who fell in love with her best friend’s boyfriend, only to have to sit on the sidelines while they got married and had children. Then her best friend is killed in a car accident and the husband could die without a transplant. And it’s something she can give to him but it legit happens the night after she lets her feelings slip for him and he rejects her. That story legit tore my soul from my body. This is the follow up to that book called, A Piece of You, which is about her twin sister and a secret marriage gone wrong.

Who designed the cover of your latest book?

The absolutely amazing Jay Aheer. I LOVE HER.

When you’re not writing what do you do? Do you have any hobbies or guilty pleasures?

Anyone that follows me on social media knows that I unfortunately have developed an obsession with bird watching. It’s like you enter your 40’s and all of a sudden going to bed by 9PM and getting a bird camera are the top spots on your list. 


Intimate Choice
Empire Blue 
Book 7
DC Stone

Genre: Romantic Suspense
Publisher: Evernight Publishing
Date of Publication: 07/10/26
ISBN: 978-0-3695-1480-6
ASIN: B0GX2VK1HW
Number of pages: 306
Word Count: 87,000
Cover Artist: Jay Aheer

Tagline: Real world, Real Men, Real Crimes

Book Description: 

Ava Larsen has spent her adult life trying to outrun the shadow of the girl she used to be: a bully whose mistake cost her sister’s life, and one who pushed away a boy they both loved. But her redemption is cut short when her latest investigation into a high-profile money laundering ring turns deadly.

After surviving a brutal kidnapping, Ava’s only hope for survival is Michael Gonzalez, a Secret Service Agent fueled by a decade of bitterness. Mike doesn’t believe Ava has changed, and he certainly hasn’t forgiven her for the accident that killed his first love. But with a corrupt government official determined to silence her, Mike is ordered to protect her at all costs.

From the streets of New York to the corridors of power in Washintong D.C., the two are hunted by an enemy that will stop at nothing to keep their secrets buried. As the investigation reaches a breaking point, Mike and Ava must navigate a minefield of political betrayal and personal trauma. In a race against time, they’ll have to trust each other to survive—or let the sins of their past bury them both.

Excerpt:

“Get to the point. What’s up?”

She sighed. “I don’t even know where to start.” The watch on her wrist buzzed with a notification. She checked it, and her mouth tightened into a thin line. “This case looks to be seriously fucked up. Not a whole lot to tell you right now other than there were several, and I mean we’re talking numbers in the teens, bodies found in this old house. Owner is this guy everyone said was super quiet, always kept his yard clean, etcetera, etcetera. From what the neighbors are saying, no one would have thought any of the horrors we’ve found were happening in this house. Talking victims, all women, completely cut up. Sometimes methodically so. As if he had all the time in the world to do the perfect job.”

Mike grimaced. “This is why I do protection and white-collar fraud. I could never sit through those forensic shows you and Dwayne used to watch.”

Charlie threw him a saucy smile, then went serious again. “Early this morning, a woman actually got out of the house. Naked as the day she was born. Ran a few houses down and collapsed on the porch but not before she rang the doorbell.”

The mental image she painted had him wincing. “Jesus. Is she okay?”

Charlie took a deep breath and let it out super slow as if she was preparing for something. He braced, suddenly feeling a sense of foreboding. Whatever she was about to say was going to mess him up entirely. That’s why she’d been taking for-fucking-ever to get to the point. It’s why she was here in person instead of calling him on the phone. It’s why Dwayne had sent her. She’d always had ways of calming Mike down, even under the tensest of situations.

Except for that one time. He shook his head, refusing to think about that now. It’d been years since he’d seen her.

“Who was the woman?” he asked, his voice rough. But he knew. The answer was written all over Charlie’s face, from the grimace to the pity stamped across her faery features.

“The woman was Ava.”

Her name spoken was like someone socked him in the gut. He let out a rush of air, expelling oxygen immediately, as if it needed a place to escape. Kind of like his body was fighting to do, too. It was amazing how one’s body reacted to news or the presence of someone who’d made part of their life hell. That whole fight-or-flight response was true, and as he thought of the Ava of his childhood, and both the sister and the murderer of the first woman he loved, his body was warring with itself, trying to figure out which response it wanted to go with.

The urge to flee was so strong, he actually took a step back. Charlie’s knowing gaze sharpened on him, and she sighed, the sound coming out with a lot of pity he didn’t need. It only served to piss him off.

“Look, maybe we can find someone else,” Charlie said, shaking her head, then did a double take at something over his shoulder and tossed a glare at the women still admiring them from afar. “Those fucking women…”

It was at that moment his mother decided to make an appearance and came storming out of the house having found her shoes. His normally very demure mom looked spitting mad, her red face a mask of irritation and anger.

“Shit,” he said.

Charlie chuckled low, following the path his Ma took to the garden hose, who then bent and turned the water on.

“Shit,” he said again, ignoring Charlie’s outright laughter now. He started toward Ma, intent on intercepting her before she could open the hose up on the neighbors. He knew her plan almost as if she’d put an announcement in the paper. “You could help, you know,” he said to Charlie.

She crossed her arms over her chest and shook her head. “Not a chance. This is the best entertainment I’ve had in ages. Come on, don’t be a spoilsport. Let Karen teach those hens a lesson.”

He picked up his pace to a jog as his Ma started across the lawn, her intent now screamingly clear. That the ladies hadn’t moved and were still watching on with faces of various bemusement was baffling. “Ma,” he called. “Come on now, don’t.”

“Michael James,” she said, and he winced. “Go put a shirt on. I’m about to teach the girls some manners.”

Standing behind her in the doorway was his father in a similar pose as Charlie had been, crossed arms and a smile stamped across his face.

“Pops, come on,” he called. “Don’t just stand there.”

Daniel Gonzalez shook his head, his chest moving with a chuckle Mike couldn’t hear. “I’m not getting in the middle of this. Anyone want some popcorn?”

He reached his mother just as she lifted the hose and pointed, then squeezed the handle, causing a spray of what had to be icy cold water shoot out and over the women sitting along the edge of the lawn. Shrieks and screams lit up the neighborhood before he could grab the nozzle and push it down. The smile on his mother’s face was the loudest of them all.

“That should teach them,” she said, and he sighed.

Approximately thirty minutes later, Mike took a deep breath, calling on patience and strength, the confidence he’d grown as he went through weeks of training at FLETC and the Secret Service Training Academy. His hands were sweating like they normally did when he did any kind of public speaking, something he’d been struggling for years to overcome. If he’d been in the gym he normally went to, he’d be able to put some chalk on his hands to soak up the moisture, but as it was, all he could do was rub them on his light-wash 501s.

After his mother had doused the neighborhood watch ladies with water earlier, he’d gone inside to change and had put on jeans and a pale baby-blue button-down. He was by no means wanting to impress the woman on the other side of the door, but he couldn’t escape the feeling driving inside of him. The one that told him he wasn’t a young teen able to be pushed around anymore. That he couldn’t care less what she thought of him.

But all of that was a lie, and he knew it. He just refused to admit it.

Ava Larsen had an impact on his life and who he’d grown to become.

He was here at the hospital at his brother’s request to consult on a case, apparently. There was nothing saying he had to spend any length of time with her at all. He’d listen to what his brother had to say, would hear her version of events, then he’d make a recommendation for what they should do next. That was it.

With another deep, calling-on-calm breath, he pushed and held the door open for Charlie, keeping his eyes downcast as she entered. He blew out a breath through pursed lips, then stepped inside and lifted his gaze to meet the sky-blue ones of his childhood bully.

 

 

About the Author: 

D.C. “Desi” Stone is a best-selling romance author and full-time fraud investigator. She lives in the northeast with her incredibly supporting husband, two kids, a cat, and the ever-growing family of dogs.

After serving eight years of service with the United States Air Force, she went on to transition into the world of financial crimes and became a lead investigator for many years.

Reading has always been a passion of hers, getting lost in a good, steamy romance is one of her favorite past times. She soon after discovered her own love for writing and recreating stories and characters in her head. Her writing concentrates on romantic with specifics in paranormal, suspense, and erotica.

Now, when she isn’t trying to solve a new puzzle in the world of fraud, she is engulfed with coffee, her laptop, and all those crazy characters in her head. She is a member of the Romance Writers of America, Hudson Valley Romance Writers, New Jersey Romance Writers, RomVets, RWA Kiss of Death, and the Liberty State Fiction Writers. She served as the 2014 NJRW Vice President and Conference Chair. Come stop by on Facebook, Twitter, or her website and say hello!








Posted by Roxanne Rhoads at 12:30 AM

0 comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)