One Empire Night
Page 11
Together, Hope and I work the living room. Making sure to check in with everyone. She even talks me into going downstairs for a tour of Sparky’s latest crop—decked out in red Christmas balls. When the tour’s over, Hope convinces Sparky and Stash to join us upstairs for dinner.
“Enjoy it now,” I say before dinner. “We’re going away for New Year’s.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yup. I’m thinking somewhere warm where you can prance around in bikinis for me all week.”
“Mmm. I like the sound of that,” she says, reaching up to kiss my cheek.
After dinner, I pull Hope’s chair closer to me and curl my arm around her shoulders. “Did you have a good Christmas?”
She glances around the table at our extended Lost Kings family and smiles.
“The best one yet.”
Author Notes
Thank you so much for purchasing and reading One Empire Night! I hope you enjoyed this peek at one night and one afternoon in the lives of the Lost Kings. I’ve wanted to write another collection of short holiday stories like Three Kings, One Night for a while.
It’s an awkward time of year personally, as I know it is for a lot of people. While everyone else is busy putting up their trees and showing off their decorations, I’m usually cringing, waiting for the season to be over. I hate being one of those downer types who ruins the holiday for others, so I usually try to keep to myself.
The last two years, I’ve posted a Christmas card sign-up in my reader group. I wasn’t sure I was going to do it again this year, because it ends up being a ton of work and way more expensive than I anticipate. I always say I’m going to cap it at a certain number, but I hate disappointing people and try to send out as many as I can, especially when I’ve come to recognize so many names on the sign-up list.
But then my readers started contacting me for my address. I went to my mailbox several times and found it so jammed with cards, I didn’t think I’d get them out! It really helped me find my joy this year. My readers are the best. I receive some of the sweetest messages about how much you love my characters and how fast you’ve binge-read the series. Sometimes you share what you’re going through and how my words have helped you through it and I really cherish those.
One Empire Night almost didn’t happen. After the back to back releases of Teller’s books, I was exhausted. I promised myself I’d take some time off, but then other things came up and although I wasn’t getting my time off, I wasn’t writing any new words either, which started to freak me out. But I couldn’t resist the idea of Murphy, Heidi, Teller, and Charlotte taking Alexa to get her first Christmas tree. I loved Rock and Hope attending their very different parties together and being each others’ support. Plus, I get asked about Mara and Damon a lot, so I wanted them to be there as well. Then, I posted a poll in my reader group about who they’d want to see a short story about. Rock was the winner by a landslide. Like, wow. That made me so happy. Then someone (Tanya, I know it was you!) added a “catch up with everyone” option to the poll, and that took the lead. Which was awesome, because that’s sort of the turn the story was taking as Hope interacted with everyone at Crystal Ball.
I wrote One Empire Night for my core readers who really “get” me. And most of all, I wrote it for me. I loved catching up with everyone. I giggled every time I read the part where Murphy’s waiting for Heidi to come back from changing Alexa, all the North Pole jokes, when Alexa makes a mess, Charlotte’s lap dance, Wrath telling Trin he doesn’t need porn, and most of all, the snow ball fight. When I first sent it to my crit partners, I said “it’s really fucking sappy,” but they loved it. My betas said it left them with the warm-fuzzies, and that was my goal.
My stories aren’t conventional and I guess I write these notes to let you know, I’m aware of that. My deviation from what readers “expect” sometimes is intentional. I’m a firm believer in knowing the rules before you break them. So it’s a conscious decision on my part. I talk about this endlessly with my crit partners and my writer friends. “I think I’m supposed to do this at this point in the story, but I don’t wanna (yes, insert whiny writer voice there) and unless it’s something major (like some of the loose threads I like to leave hanging) they usually tell me to go with my gut.
So, as I write this, it’s a couple days before Christmas. I wanted to have One Empire Night on your e-readers before Christmas, but it needed more tweaks to get it right, so I hope you’ll forgive me. While I’m typing these notes, Mr. Lake is sitting next to me stuffing envelopes with holiday cards to my readers. I’m looking forward to 2018 and what it will bring. I know what I want to write and publish. It will be interesting to see what actually ends up happening.
Thank you for supporting my work. Thank you for reading these notes.
I wish you the very best in the New Year.
xo
Also by Autumn Jones Lake
Slow Burn (Lost Kings MC #1)
Corrupting Cinderella (Lost Kings MC #2)
Three Kings, One Night (Lost Kings MC #2.5)
Strength from Loyalty (Lost Kings MC #3)
Tattered on my Sleeve (Lost Kings MC #4)
White Heat (Lost Kings MC #5)
Between Embers (Lost Kings MC #5.5)
Bullets & Bonfires
Stand-Alone in the LOKI World
More Than Miles (Lost Kings MC #6)
White Knuckles (Lost Kings MC #7)
Beyond Reckless: Teller's Story, Part One (Lost Kings MC #8)
Beyond Reason: Teller’s Story, Part Two (Lost Kings MC #9)
One Empire Night (Lost Kings MC #9.5)
Road to Royalty Boxed Set (Lost Kings #1-#3)
Includes: Slow Burn, Corrupting Cinderella, Strength From Loyalty and a few bonus scenes not available in any of the other books.
Coming Soon:
After Burn (Lost Kings MC #10)
Zero Tolerance (Lost Kings MC #11)
White Lies (Lost Kings MC #12)
Catnip & Cauldrons Series
Onyx Night
Onyx Shadows
Feral Escape
Newsletter
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Request from Autumn
Dear Reader,
If you loved One Empire Night (Lost Kings MC #9.5) (or any of my books,) please consider stopping by your favorite retailer, Book Bub, or Goodreads to leave a review. It may seem trivial to you, but reviews are so important for Indie Authors like myself. A few short lines is more than enough and greatly appreciated.
Thank you!
12.26.17 Version
The End.
Autumnjoneslake.com
Autumnjlake@gmail.com