“I told him he could.”
”Then you must be worried because you’re not supposed to be having sex right now. I don’t think this actually counts, but if you need to talk to your therapist we’ll take you back to Kansas.”
Nikki shook her head. “The reason that video has so many views is not because of anything I did.” Nikki grinned deviously. “Well, okay, I do look pretty sexy riding that thing, and I’m an excellent vocalizer.”
Gabe suddenly needed a pillow. For his lap. And he needed to watch Melanie looking sexy riding the Sex Stallion and doing her own excellent vocalizing right now.
Melanie lifted her eyebrows and shook her head, waiting for Nikki to drop whatever bomb she was holding.
“Everyone wanted to know where to get one of those machines,” Nikki said. “I figured they were all talk. I told them it was a prototype and there was only one in existence. Still, thousands of women and men all vying for an opportunity to own one or at least ride one. And then I got the idea to crowdfund and earn enough money to put the Sex Stallion into production. I set the price to participate super-high—a thousand dollars just to get on the waiting list. Of course, that thousand would count as a down payment and they’d be guaranteed a unit as soon as they were produced. I wasn’t sure how much each machine would cost in the end. I estimated five thousand, and you will not believe how many people were willing to pay that.”
“What are you saying, Nikki?” Gabe said, his heart racing. Cold sweat trickled down the middle of his back.
Melanie turned to stare at him, her face ashen, her mouth open wide.
“We’ve made two million dollars in that past three days.”
“What?” Gabe bellowed.
“But now I sort of need you to make two thousand Stallions.” Nikki smiled hugely, as if she’d given him the best news of his life.
“It took me ten years to build that one and perfect it,” Gabe yelled.
Nikki flinched, but he couldn’t help the rage boiling inside him. Was she crazy? Two thousand units! He was good at math, so he knew that at five thousand apiece he would gross ten million dollars, but still. How in the hell was he supposed to build two thousand of the damned things?
“But it is perfect,” Nikki said. “It’s time to share it with the world.”
Melanie clutched her hands together. “Gabe, please tell me you filed a patent on it.”
“Years ago,” he said.
She released a long breath. “Good. Now, I know you don’t know much about my past careers, but I used to be the office manager for a small manufacturing plant. And I know how to run the business end of things.”
“And I can be the spokes—erm—the moan model,” Nikki said, thrusting her hand in the air like an eager elementary school student.
“She’s an excellent PR person, Gabe.”
“That’s what I went to college for,” Nikki said.
“We’d need a larger team, of course,” Melanie said. “Especially on the manufacturing end, and I don’t know many people in Texas, but—” Her eyebrows drew together. “Doesn’t Owen’s girlfriend run her own alternate energy business in Houston?”
Gabe just stared at her as if she had seventeen nipples.
“Gabe?” Melanie said when he didn’t respond.
“I guess,” he said. “But what does Caitlyn’s corporation have to do with sex toys?”
“Uh, everything,” Melanie said. “It’s not what you’re making or selling but the structure of how to produce and distribute that most businesses have in common. I’ll have to look into business laws in Texas. I’m sure they can’t be that much different from those in Kansas.”
“Isn’t Texas notoriously business friendly?” Nikki said. “I’m sure this will be a piece of cake for you.”
“You’re forgetting something,” Gabe said.
The pair of scheming women turned to look at him, questions in their eyes.
“It’s my invention. What if I don’t want to mass produce it? What if I want only Melanie to have one?”
Melanie laughed. “That’s silly.”
It didn’t seem silly to him. It seemed special. A unique one-of-a-kind gift for his one and only true love.
Nikki popped open her laptop and showed Melanie her crowdsource funding page.
“Holy shit! There’s a waiting list for the waiting list!” Melanie clapped her hands. “Baby,” she said, turning to gaze adoringly at Gabe. “I’m so proud of your filthy, inventive mind right now.”
Gabe had never seen her this excited about anything. Well, maybe when she was enjoying objects designed by his filthy, inventive mind. But definitely not about financial or business success.
“Gabe?” Nikki said, tilting her head to look at him. “Do you not want to give mind-blowing orgasms to all these people? They’re counting on your Sex Stallion to bring them joy.” She sat next to him on the porch swing and showed him the excited comments of people who’d slapped down a thousand dollars of their hard-earned money for a chance to be delighted by his invention.
After a few minutes of having his head filled with compliments about his brilliance, he closed his eyes, licked his lips, and swallowed his doubts. That future he’d been so uncertain about? This could be the answer. He’d never expected Nikki to be responsible for pushing him down a new path of success.
“Okay,” he said. “Let’s do this.”
Chapter Sixteen
Melanie pulled into Gabe’s driveway—she still had a hard time thinking of this gorgeous A-frame log home as hers—and shut off her engine. Nikki’s car was gone, but Gabe’s truck was in the drive, so she knew that he was home, even though the door didn’t open and no dogs bounded excitedly off the porch to greet her. She tucked the little paper sack containing the pregnancy test she’d bought at the drugstore into her purse. She was only a few days late, so didn’t want to get Gabe’s hopes up, but hers were currently sky high.
The past few weeks had flown by like a whirlwind. It hadn’t taken her long to file for a business license and organize the corporate structure of Bangin’ Toys. After having been only a small part of a large accounting team for so long, she’d forgotten how much she enjoyed running a business and solving the little problems that always arose. They’d had to deal with some ordinances about the sexual nature of their products, so they’d settled on a location outside city limits. The first units were making their way through their small but highly skilled quality assurance department today. Of course she felt the need to be there to make sure everything was running smoothly. Gabe seemed keen to look the other way, however.
The typical little start-up hiccups weren’t really an issue. The main delay to production was Gabe. He was insistent that they didn’t mass produce a piece of junk. He wanted dedicated artisans creating each machine, not an assembly line of unskilled dildo-makers cranking out a subpar product. She’d tried to convince him that such a labor-intensive method of production would severely cut into their profits—showing him graphs and projections she’d generated to support her cause—but he refused to budge on that particular issue. And she respected him all the more because of it. But it had taken for-freaking-ever to find suitable employees, and they were still grossly understaffed.
Since Nikki was busy creating a PR maelstrom for the first shipments of the Sex Stallion, wedding plans had temporarily been set on the back burner. Caitlyn and Dawn were still throwing together an engagement party for both Gabe and Adam. Now that Madison was out of the hospital and staying with Adam in Austin, Melanie had run out of excuses to put it off any longer. The party was scheduled for tomorrow afternoon at Owen’s house. The day had somehow crept up on Melanie while she’d been insanely busy getting Gabe’s new corporation up and running.
Melanie opened her front door, trying to be quiet so she could sneak into the bathroom and pee on the test in her purse. She was immediately assaulted by a loud rhythmic thumping. The sound—heavy and hard—throbbed through her body with an intensity that only Ga
be could create within her.
He was playing his drums.
She was pretty sure that he hadn’t touched them since the night Jacob had walked off the tour bus almost a month before. Dancing to the beat—she couldn’t help herself—she quietly shut the front door and tried to figure out where the sound was coming from. It filled the house from floor to rafters. Both dogs were sitting in the foyer staring up at the loft area over the kitchen. Oh. Right. The loft. She’d been up in the open spacious room a few times, but had never spent time there. The loft was Gabe’s space, full of various drums, band paraphernalia, scientifically inclined nonfiction books, and the ugliest old recliner she’d ever seen. But drawn by the beat, she climbed the open wooden stairs and stood perched on the topmost step to stare.