“Jesus, give it a rest, Abby. You checked the rankings a thousand times today and --”
“Oh, God. Oh, God,” I start, my eyes widening as I notice what’s on the screen. No way, this can’t be real.
“What is it?” Aidan asks, peering over my shoulder. “Holy fuck!” he exclaims as he sees what’s on the screen. “We’re at the fucking top!”
“We are,” I say, barely blinking as I try to process the fact that Big Dick is sitting at the Rainforest’s Top 10. “And we’re going up,” I continue, breathing fast as I notice the small Big Dick thumbnail overtaking the other books in the ranking, climbing steadily into the Top 5.
“Fuck,” Aidan breaths out, grabbing the bottle of champagne and refilling our glasses. It feels like we’ve barely finished drinking them when Big Dick finally tops the ranking, an orange ribbon with a bold #1 falling over the thumbnail. “Well, fuck me. We’re the best-selling book in the US.”
“We are,” I squeal, jumping up from my seat and hugging Aidan tightly. I press my mouth against his, kissing him heartily, and then just laugh. This is better than everything I could’ve dreamed of. Number one? Are you kidding me?
“Look,” Aidan grabs the cellphone out of my hands and hovers his index finger over the screen. “There are a lot of books going up too,” he says, narrowing his eyes. “Bad Boy Publishing,” he whispers, and I look down at the bright screen. All the books climbing in the ranking—and there are a lot of them—belong to Bad Boy Publishing.
“They’re unseating us,” Aidan whispers, watching as Big Dick falls from #1 into #7, and then crashes all the way down into #47. “Fuck, we can’t compete without a marketing budget.”
“Screw that,” I surprise myself, taking the cellphone out of his hands and throwing it back inside my purse. “We’ve made the top spot without a marketing budget! Do you know what that means? This is just the start!”
“Yeah, I guess,” he says, but I can tell he isn’t completely comfortable with the idea of having Bad Boy Publishing coming after us. I don’t like it, of course, but right now I’m so ecstatic over the fact that Big Dick made #1 that I can barely think of anything else.
“We need to celebrate,” I tell him, turning toward him and biting on my lower lip.
“Isn’t that what we’re doing?”
“No, I want to really celebrate. I want to do something crazy, I want -- Christ, I don’t even know what I want, but I want it.”
“Are you sure?” he asks, looking into my eyes with a serious expression, but I notice that hunger welling up in his eyes.
“I trust you,” I whisper with a nod. “Besides, isn’t this what Python is all about? Having no limits? That’s what I want right now—no limits.”
Without saying a word, Aidan just grins and goes up to his feet. Taking my hand, he leads me out of the room and down the stairs, back into the lower floor. “Wait here,” he whispers, and then walks to the counter once more. Austin Price is there again, and I feel anxiety spreading its wings inside my chest as I watch Aidan whisper something into his ear. Austin nods with a smile, and Aidan comes back to me.
“What was that all about?” I ask, but Aidan just grins.
“Wait and see,” he tells me, and that’s when the lights go out. The rumbling sound of drums echo through the room, the sound coming from the overhead speakers, and then a lonely spotlight lights up the stage. A few seconds after that, another spotlight lights up the place where Aidan and I are standing.
“Let’s go.”
I walk after Aidan with a knot in stomach, realizing that he’s leading me straight onto the stage. There’s no going back now; I asked for this (whatever this is), and now I’m going to get it.
We walk up the narrow stairs that lead to the stage, and that’s when I notice two long ropes dangling from the ceiling, handcuffs hanging on their ends. Aidan walks me across the stage until I’m under the two ropes, and then makes me lift my arms, closing the handcuffs around my wrists.
“Time to celebrate,” he whispers.
18
Abby
“Do you trust me?”
“With my life,” I whisper at Aidan, my arms stretched over my head. He replies with a smile, resting his hands on my hips and pecking my lips. His mouth lingers on mine, but when he pulls back from our kiss there’s an edge to the way he looks at me. He looks like a completely different man, and I mean that in the best way. Somehow, I know that I’m looking at some old version of Aidan, a man that used to call Python his home. A man worshipped every single night by hundreds of women. And now he’s right in front of me, ready to use me.
Taking one step back, Aidan turns on his heels and walks toward the edge of the stage. The women go crazy, and a few even get up from their tables and saunter over to the stage, trying to reach for Aidan. One of them squeals loudly as she grazes the tip of his shoes with her fingertips.
Moving slowly, he takes his hands to his shirt and pops out the top button on his collar. He undoes two more buttons, and a lot of women start shouting and whistling. And that’s when he grabs at the fabric and simply pulls on his shirt, un-tucking it in one sudden movement and making all the buttons pop out. They scatter around the stage like marbles, their popping noise drowned by the loud music.
“I’M BACK, PYTHON!” Aidan shouts over the music, the shirt falling down his arms, and the crowd goes crazy. Seriously, you can feel the humidity rising in the room. Women are shouting like crazy, and one of them even tries to climb up on the stage before one of the other dancers gently carries her off with a smile
Turning toward me, Aidan closes the distance between us and rests both his hands on the side of my face. His fingers slide down to my cleavage and he grabs at the fabric of my dress. I hold my breath and then he rips my dress apart, baring my bra. Tugging viciously, he turns my dress into tatters and simply yanks them off of my body.