We had a sordid history that spanned 21 years-- just a hair over half his life. Our love story included all the classic romance novel tropes: friends to lovers, second chances, fated mates. He made writing romance easy, because I was living the fairytale.
He passed away suddenly and very unexpectedly in his sleep a few weeks ago.
As you can imagine, my life has been turned upside-down. We had chosen not to get get legally married-- he'd been married twice. I often told him he was obviously very bad at it and that there was no sense fixing what wasn't broken.
Unfortunately, he also never bothered to get that life insurance policy that he'd finally agreed to after a decade of nagging (Did I mention he was stubborn?) and we didn't share money (and never fought about it) so naturally, my name is not on any of his property. Like our home.
His family has been wonderful and I have no reason to fear that I (and the pups-- the rest of our pack) will be facing the loss of our lifestyle as well as the loss of our alpha. But supportive friends and family do little to quiet the anxiety.
The next year will be a stressful one as the dogs and I claw our way out of the grief and work to find a new normal.
I've fallen behind on my release schedule: It's difficult to write happy endings when my own glass slipper just shattered.
Fortunately! I'm a pretty independent lady. I am surrounded by wonderful people who give me strength daily. I'm going to be OK. I'm going to keep writing-- because I love it, because the little extra income helps, because he was proud of me.
I am currently working on a short novella that will be included in the upcoming Halloween bundle: Shifters in the Shadows. By the same group of authors I worked with on Shifters in the Snow and our USA Today Bestselling Shifters in the Spring.
He was the one who came up with the premise of the story. Working on it since his passing has been healing as well as heartbreaking. And ominous. It is, after all, a Halloween story!
A lot of people ask me how they can help...buy books.
~Claire
I am so very sorry for your loss. You - and the pups - have a guardian angel watching over you for always. He will always be with you.
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