How to Build Romantic Tension in a Romantic Thriller Scene
A romantic thriller is more than just a thriller with a romance in it. The romance and its buildup should be so intertwined with the suspense that one would fall apart without the other. I like to think of it as a braided rope—the hero, heroine, and villain are three separate characters, but their stories braid together to make a much stronger book than any one of their stories alone.
(50 Reasons for Your Characters to Be Stuck Together.)
The romance should start with a strong emotion—attraction, desire, or even dislike. That, along with a villain with a strongly motivated and intelligent plan, will get the ball rolling. The fact that the hero and heroine need each other to solve the mystery is what will drive the story as they get to know each other. At each stage in the chase, the hero and heroine get closer to each other, they learn about each other, and discover how to leverage the other’s strengths to stop the bag guy. They start with affection which will grow into love and happily ever after in a stand-alone book. (Or at least happily for now.)
In a series that features the same two main characters, like Kit and Sam in my San Diego series, the end of each book needs to see them growing closer. They hold each other after a near-death showdown with the villain. They share their first kiss or a first date. They meet each other’s parents. Their commitment to the other person and to the growth of the relationship is progressed with every story. When they’re finally together as a couple, they’ll need to learn new things about each other in every book. They’ll need to lean on each other in different ways.
They need to grow individually and as a couple.
Romantic tension itself is escalated through increasingly intimate touches, through dialogue and shared history (or secrets) and their growing yearning for each other. But in a romantic thriller, including the element of danger is critical and that danger needs to be personal to the MCs. The romantic tension is ratcheted up as the villain gets closer and closer. The MCs want to protect each other, to keep the other alive. Even if it means being willing to sacrifice themselves for the other.
The danger they face must be personal. The bad guy is either targeting one of our main characters or someone they care about. The risk of injury or death is high, but the stakes are even higher—too high for our moral-high-ground MCs to even consider walking away.
Now, the “someone they care about” doesn’t have to be a family member or even someone they know personally. In Cold Blooded Liar (San Diego #1), Kit cares about each teenage victim of a serial killer. Her sister had been the same age as the victims when she was murdered. This is personal for Kit.
That Sam cares as well draws Kit to him. He’s earnest and compassionate. He’s a good man who shares her values. That starts softening her heart, prepping her for romantic feelings. Then she learns that Sam has suffered loss as well. It’s a moment where they grow closer, where their stories begin to braid together.
This is an example of a quiet moment. Every thriller, romantic or not, needs the quiet moments. They can be pockets of time where the characters share secrets or where they share physical intimacy. (I’ll get to sex in a bit.) The quiet moments can be scenes where the characters’ families and/or friends get together for simple family dialogue, maybe some light-hearted humor. These moments are important because they give the reader a chance to breathe, to process all the murder and tension that’s come before.
And then you immediately hit the reader with something harsher and even more dangerous. The lull makes the ensuing danger even more tense because they’ve had a chance to relax and because now the hero and heroine have even more to lose.
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A few words about the villain. He or she needs to be real to the reader—a three-dimensional character the reader will fear and come to understand, even as they hate him/her and wish that they’ll be caught and punished. I want my readers to think, “Yes. If I were evil, that’s exactly what I’d do.”
The villain has to be smart, perhaps even smarter than either the hero or heroine alone. But together, the MCs have the arsenal to win. The villain has to be a few steps ahead of the MCs until towards the end of the book when the MCs gain ground—because they are working together, using what they’ve learned about each other. This is what makes a tight romantic thriller.
And as they work together, the MCs feel their bond strengthen. Again, as their relationship grows, they know they have even more to lose if the villain is successful. One or the other (or both) will be willing to do whatever it takes to stop the bad guy, even if that means self-sacrifice. And knowing that, knowing that their romantic partner might not survive the take-down of the villain ratchets up the romantic stakes. “I’ve just found you, I can’t lose you now.”
And now, the sex scene. You don’t have to have one, but I like to read them, and I like to write them. No two couples will have the same physical dynamic, so the sex will be different in each book. When they have it and where they have it will also be different in each book.
Be careful with the when and where. If bullets are flying all around them, doing the deed seems frivolous and downright dangerous. Use one of those quiet moments to introduce sexual intimacy. Find a lull when they’re waiting for lab results or maybe even believe they’ve caught the bad guy, only to find later (after they’re done) that there’s a new victim. Then they must work even harder to take down the bad guy and, again, the stakes are higher as the bond is now deeper.
Ratcheting up the romantic tension and the suspense should happen in concert, like a dance. The stakes must be personal and the MCs must grow together to defeat the villain and make their corner of the world safe again. And at the end, they have their happily ever after.
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