One and Done? I can’t do it.

I keep telling myself that I’m done. When I started Small Town Siren, I knew it was going to be one book and then I was going to move on. I had a single story to tell, right? That what stories do. They end. In a romance, all stories end happily. Until those damn characters keep whispering to me.

I never meant to write more than one story set in Willow Fork, Texas. This week my fourth Texas Sirens book, Siren Beloved was released. Where did I go wrong? Well, I listened to those damn characters who kept telling me the story of this little family wasn’t finished. First, Sam Fleetwood had a few things to work out. Julian Lodge was only mentioned in the first book, but by the time I was done with Siren in the City, Julian simply had to settle down. And by the time I was finished with Siren Enslaved, I knew that Lucas and Lexi would need a story. Even as I was writing the second book of this series, I told myself that I would take a little break from Willow Fork and write a one off about a weird little Colorado town. Yeah – that worked out for me. Book four of that series comes out in August.

Why do I go back to the same well? I fall in love. I fall in love with the worlds I create and the people in my mind. Some of my readers might have noticed that I even cross over series characters. In Two to Love (a Bliss, CO book), Callie has a wild night in an unnamed Dallas BDSM club and Stef meets two of his old friends. Of course it’s The Club and Stef is having a drink with Jack and Sam. In Siren Beloved, I make it plain that my charming Dom Leo was raised close to a town called Bliss, and his mother is the girlfriend of Bliss’s notorious alien hunter. I can’t even leave my actual stand alone novellas out it. At the end of Siren Beloved, Dani is opening a spa in Willow Fork complete with a new manager who knows a thing or two about running a BDSM resort. Yep. If anyone’s read it, Gaby and Cal from Away From Me are back in Texas with two kids in tow.

I guess I do it because it’s my world. I see it so clearly in my brain. It’s vivid and alive to me. It’s a place I want to live in and people I want to know. I can’t leave them behind because each one is a piece of me.

But Texas Sirens is done. I’ve finished off that little family.

Except for Leo. And the Dawson twins. And maybe Bo…Damn it.

Sophie Oak writes erotic romance for Siren Publishing. You can read all the first chapters of her books at www.sophieoak.com.