“Are you seriously asking me that? You’re bestselling romance novelist Kara Sullivan! You should be a lust-game master. How do the people get together in your novels? Do you use any sort of formula?”

“I don’t think of it like a formula, but I guess there are certain steps I take to get my characters together.”

“Good. Let’s start there.” Maggie looks over to the woman at the next table, who is working on her laptop with an open notebook beside it. “Hi, I’m sorry but can we borrow a piece of paper and a pen?”

The woman hesitates for a second and looks from Maggie to me. I give her a smile, hoping we’re not creeping her out.

“Sure,” the woman hesitantly says, tearing a piece of paper out of her book and handing it over with a pen from her bag.

“Thank you so much.” Maggie takes the paper and pen and immediately gets to work. She writes Seducing the Cowboy on the top of the sheet and underlines it.

“Hey, that would be a good title for a book. You think you could use it someday?”

“I’m going to go ahead and guess that there’s a lot of books with that title.”

“Figures. It’s catchy.”

I squirm in my seat, growing more uncomfortable by the second. Maggie holds her pen at the ready.

“Okay, so what’s step one?”

I take a breath and at the end of a few minutes, Maggie has written out all the basic steps my characters typically go through to find love, in her own words. The list states:

1. They meet.
2. They have issues—internal and external.
3. They have goals.
4. One or both need the other to achieve said goals.
5. They clash (smooch).
6. They’re drawn together (hard-core smooch).
7. They clash again (smooch and over-the-shirt stuff).
8. They’re really, really drawn together (smooch and under-the-shirt stuff).
9. They give in (full enchilada).
10. It all falls apart.
11. I hate you.
12. I love you.
13. Happily-ever-after and babies.

“Now,” Maggie says, reviewing the list and drawing another column, “let’s add some romance-novel-specific actions that you and Ryan can accomplish.”

“This makes no sense. Fiction isn’t applicable to real life.”

“Let’s just see. Give me the actions.”

I sigh and rub my hands on my thighs as I think. Five minutes later, Maggie’s second self-worded list is complete, now in bullet points.

• Throw the flag—challenge the heroes, get under their skin.
• Touchy-feely time—create physical contact (i.e. trip, fall, horseback activities won’t work here). Once they’re close, chemistry takes over.
• Anger hookup—argue, get in each other’s faces and then get frisky to ease the tension.
• Oh, hey, other handsome stranger—make him jealous.
• Cheers! Heroine and hero get drunk.
• Secrets, secrets are so fun—have one or both reveal something deeply personal. Now it’s them against the world.