At the beginning.

Explicit Instruction started with Rushe. I suppose for anyone who has read it that’s no surprise!
The scene in my head that I first saw him in didn’t make it into the book, and no, it wasn’t a sexy scene. Seeing him in the way I did allowed me to define who he was and what he stood for. The picture of him began to form, the blurred edges sharpened until he was in focus.
Then there was Flick. Putting two opposite people together is always a great way to ensure entertainment, variety, conflict, all of the things that we love to see in our romantic suspense novels.
Each of them find something in the other. A quality that they crave. Though neither of them would have realised it before they saw it. Rushe might have done everything he could to rebel against his feelings for Flick but that speaks as much to his own insecurities as it does to his desire to protect her.
Yes, odd isn’t it? But Rushe does have insecurities about who he is and about his relationship with Flick.

“‘You’re a princess, I mean you’re a goddess, and I’m not… it’s like beauty and the beast.’”
–Rushe, Explicit Instruction

He knows what she is, or rather what she could have, and doesn’t understand why she would want anything to do with him.

“‘Why would you want to get mixed up with a guy like me?’ he asked.”
–Rushe, Explicit Instruction

His own depth of feeling is such a surprise to him. Never having had love in his life, he really didn’t think he was capable. So when he comes to terms with that it seems to him that the impossible is possible.

“‘I love you, Flick,’ he breathed, though she wasn’t sure he said it to her. ‘I didn’t know I could… f*ck…’”
–Rushe, Explicit Instruction

But while Flick is Rushe’s weakness, he is her strength.

“Flick had found her sass in defiance of this adversity, because she knew Rushe would expect nothing less of his woman.”

They may come from very different places but fundamentally, they are the same, they make each other better. It is something which we should all strive to do for each other.

Good luck on your adventures,

xSx