by Ashton Johns
“Don’t fucking tell me he’s been bumming around and spent it all,” Roddy hissed.
“God, no!” I exclaimed, eyeing my chocolate hungrily, wishing Roddy would just fuck off. “He’s been investing it and now has double what his parents left him.”
I held the receiver from my ear as Roddy whooped down it.
“Good job, Meredith. Good job.”
“Thanks, Roddy,” I simpered. “It wasn’t hard to persuade him to take part in the show either. He jumped at the chance. Now he’s back in the country, he wants to settle down and thinks this is the ideal opportunity. The deal of the show is he has to live with the winner for six months, so who knows? He could find a wife out of this. I think that’s what he’s hoping.”
“How old is he?” Roddy asked. “Are you sure he’s going to take it seriously, because if he doesn’t, the audiences will know. They’ll fucking hate him, and the show will bomb, which will be on your head, Meredith.”
Thanks for the reminder, shit head.
“He’s twenty-eight,” I said, adding three years on to Kade’s age.
“And the girls are going to like him?”
“Oh yes,” I said, truthfully. “He’s dark and tanned with amazing blue eyes, and he has real titled features. You know the kind—square chin, long nose. He just oozes money, Roddy, and he’s damn pretty with it.”
It was true. He really could pass for someone who’d lived a privileged life. I didn’t know how he’d done it, but three years on the streets hadn’t harmed his physique or weathered him in any way. Lucky little bastard; it took me thousands of dollars every month to look good and he thought he was hungry. He didn’t know what hunger was until he’d spent a week in my shoes.
“Okay, so he’s not going to back out on us then?” Roddy asked, and I could hear the alarm bells ringing in his ears at the thought of losing any cash that had already been spent on the show.
“No,” I said gravely. “Not a chance. He’s signed the contract.”
“Which he could easily buy himself out of,” Roddy growled before pausing for a few beats. “Maybe that would be a good thing. We could take him for millions.”
“Roddy, come on,” I said, feeling my heart pick up its rhythm. “You don’t want to do anything to make him quit. He’s perfect and will bring millions of female viewers to the show.”
Do not fucking mess with this, Roddy. Don’t you fucking dare!
“Okay, he’s probably got a shit hot lawyer anyway. One who could get him out of any penalty clause. These rich fuckers always do.”
I breathed a quiet sigh of relief.
“Okay, tell me what you have cooked up for the show then,” he said, changing the subject as quickly as he changed bed partners.
“There’ll be ten girls in the house with him. For the first week he’ll have a private date every night. They’ll kind of compete for his affections and to get to know him better while we’re showcasing the plethora of beauties he has to choose from. Right from the off, they’ll be competing to get laid by Kade.” I laughed.
“I like that,” Roddy said. “That’s the name of the damn show.”
“Well, I’m not sure, Roddy…”
“My decision, Meredith. This fucking show is going to be called, ‘I Wanna Get Laid by Kade’. It’s a fucking winner. Now carry on.”
“Okay,” I sighed, making a mental note to try to dissuade him later. “So, the viewers will vote for their favorite two girls for a private date that we’ll film. All dates will be held somewhere in the house. We’ll mock up a restaurant or they’ll go on a boat on the lake in the grounds. At no point will they go out in public.”
“Yeah, I like that. Minimizes the chance of any of them hearing rumors about what’s going on behind the scenes. Okay, what else?”
“The two girls who come first and second in the vote will be who Kade has to choose from for his date. But,” I said, with a laugh, “before that, he’ll have to evict one of the other girls.”
“Excellent. You got shit lined up for them, too?”
“Oh yes. We’re going to get them to do all sorts of things to rock the boat.”
I had no idea what yet, but it wouldn’t take me long to think up some real nasty tricks to mess with them.
“There’ll be so much shit, in fact, that they’re all going to wish they’d joined an online dating agency instead,” I said, breaking off another piece of chocolate.
Roddy’s laughter on the other end of the line was low and chilling.
“Excellent,” he said. “It sounds award winning.”
And for once, we agreed.
Nineteen
Kade Sutton
My last few nights in the motel were a somber affair. I’d been living such a luxurious life while my transformation for the show was taking place. It was nothing special, but it was clean and warm. It was probably a good thing that Meredith had put me in here first. I felt grateful for the chance to acclimatize back to the basics of being a human with four walls to claim as his own. The problem with that was that I was starting to get a bit jumpy over what was to come, the house—fuck… mansion! —was going to be something my brain didn’t have the capacity to dream up. My needs were so simple that I couldn’t visualize the grandeur I knew I was going to find.
My back-story was simple enough. I’d spent a whole night going over it, and I could easily come up with enough conversation to talk my way around running a Caribbean beach bar. My frat days weren’t a period of time I was happy remembering as they almost always led to me thinking about Cory but they were a pretty good point of reference. A bunch of teenagers high on booze on drugs couldn’t be much different than rich entitled dicks in an exclusive resort, could they?
Just as I was about to get my head down for the night, the phone in my room rang. It startled the shit out of me and because I jumped so much, it put Brody on guard duty, too.
“Yeah?” I answered wearily.
“Kade? It’s Meredith. A limo will be at your room at 10am tomorrow morning. We’re transferring you to the mansion. Pack your… What am I saying? You don’t have any stuff.”
Even on the end of a phone she was a bitch. I imagined this to be her least favorite method of communication. Ms. Hennessey was the type of troll who liked to see the reactions she caused in people. Using common tech like phones removed that sadistic pleasure from her.
“Are you still there? You haven’t said anything.”
“Haven’t had a lot of opportunity,” I barbed back at her.
“Anyway, be ready for the driver. He’s taking you there-”
“And Brody.”
“Yes. You and your dog will be relocating and getting familiar with the place before the girls arrive. Ideally, I’d like you to know the layout and not make us all look stupid by getting lost. I’ve arranged for some media to be at the mansion gates. Please stay inside the limo and do not open the windows. I’m building up the intrigue. You will have a whole night to yourself to explore and get acquainted with your new house staff. The camera crew will also be there to set up the live TV feeds and whatnot. The show kicks off filming with the girl’s arrival tomorrow night.”
She kept on prattling, obviously not hearing or understanding my little jab from a moment ago.
“Now you need to remember this. All filming will take place as agreed in our contract, and then it will be edited to remove dull, non-essential activity. The final edit will be what is screened by the network. Ten girls, Kade, ten whole girls to have fun with,” she suggested. “Once a week, the viewers will vote for their top two girls, based on your interactions with them. You, Sutton, will then pick one of them to take on a date. Aside from that selection, you will also need to evict one.”
“Right.”
“I will have a line of communication with the on-set director, Carson. He will pass messages to me if you have any. Got it?”
“Yes.”
My answers were short. I could tell I didn’t have long to insert them between her comman
ds while she took in more oxygen.
“Is that it? Right?” she shouted. “No questions? Just right.”
I was over this. “Ms. Hennessey, this doesn’t feel like a conversation. Conversations are usually where two people move words back and forth. What we have here is a dictation, so I have heard your orders. Be ready for 10am, don’t open the limo windows, go wander around my new home. Ten girls, the viewers pick two favorites, I select my favorite from the two, take her on a date and do something with her. Evict one. Find Carson. Am I missing anything?”
Meredith stuttered a little bit. I knew that people didn’t serve her own shit back at her often.
“No. I think you have it down. We’ll line up the actual date activities for you, and Carson will inform you of the details.”
“Sure.” I smiled. I was struggling to hide my glee at pissing all over her rampage.
“Good night then, Kade, and one final thing. If I get even the smallest hint that you are favoring Daisy or scheming, she will be the one who pays. I promise you that. After all, you have nothing to lose.”
I was still gripping the receiver a long time after the dial tone told me she’d hung up. I wasn’t sure how long I sat there contemplating throwing it across the room, but it was long enough for some kind of alarm siren to sound from it. In the end, I slammed it back on the handset so hard that I made Brody jump again. I needed to get some rest because for the next six weeks, I would be playing someone else’s game, and this could be my best night’s rest for a long time.
The limo collected me, and I had my own idea for a show. It was going to be called ‘Live in a Limo.’ It was that big I could have easily made it into a home. Life was crazy really. People were living on the streets without basic human amenities, and here I was riding around in a fucking box with a fridge and disco lights that was used to ferry the entitled back and to.
“We’re ten minutes out, Sir,” a voice sounded from a ceiling speaker close to my head.
I decided that would be the last rich versus poor comparison I would make. I had a privileged persona to get into and would never be able to fool anyone if I wandered around feeling a growing distaste towards the world’s wealthy.
Scarily, in about nine minutes, I was going to be one of the world’s wealthiest singletons.
The scenery all the way from the motel gradually grew more and more rural. Wherever the mansion was, it was in the middle of nowhere. We’d stopped passing traffic a while ago. Every house I passed had no immediate neighbors. They were completely secluded and had acres and acres of fenced off garden space. I knew this place was going to blow my mind. When we rounded a corner, I felt the limo take a sharp right and then head slowly down a single-track road covered in block paving stones with strategically placed palm trees and bushes on each side. After a few minutes, the view from the window changed, and I was shrouded by a brilliant white painted wall over ten feet tall.
My heart rate sped up as the wall continued on and on, and Brody began barking and leaping around the limo. I knew exactly how he was feeling…boxed in.
I felt the driver apply the brake as we slowed down, and then I saw them.
Dozens and dozens of guys with cameras and huge telephoto lenses.
As soon as they spotted the limo, they began to sprint across the curved courtyard driveway in my direction. My heart juddered a little faster and I began to push myself back in the leather seat. Did Meredith honestly think I’d be tempted to open my windows to these people? There was no way in hell I was going anywhere near them. They were pushing and shoving, braying for the best shot. Camera lenses smacked against the windows in the frenzy, and Brody had had enough. The barking and growling coming from his tiny, furry frame was that of protection, and no matter how much I tried to calm him down, it wasn’t working.
I knew they couldn’t see me, but I still felt like hiding and when we finally came to a stop, I could hear them shouting to the driver whose arm I could see pushing an intercom button for entry.
“Just one picture!”
“Come on, open up!”
My fear ratcheted up a notch when I heard the door handle being tugged, but before I could completely freak out, the car sped forward and we were moving again. Looking behind me, I could see enormous wooden gates closing automatically, shutting out the craziness.
“Sir are you okay?” asked the box in the ceiling.
“Fuck! I thought they were getting in here,” I breathed out in relief.
“This isn’t my first rodeo.” He laughed and I could tell it was the truth.
As soon as he drew to a complete standstill and I heard the doors unlock, I jumped out. I needed space and fresh air. Fresh air would be my salvation, and it was the one thing I could always depend on. Brody leapt out from behind me and was off, his nose to the ground, investigating our new surroundings,
“Don’t get lost, buddy,” I shouted and then turned to look at the house.
Fuck. Me.
“Because I might get lost myself,” I whispered when I finally saw it.
The place was so big and white and grand that I wasn’t sure whether I was shielding my eyes from the sunlight, the size, or my own shock. There was no way this was a house. It was a hotel. The only way this was a house was if someone had read the building plans wrong and built it to the wrong scale.
My feet were rooted to the spot, as I surveyed the windows and the little pointy tiled roofs. I was seriously considering having to tie Brody up somewhere. There was every chance we could get lost and not find one another for a whole week.
“She’s something, ain’t she?” said the limo driver, coming to stand beside me and looking up at the house. He was a huge black guy who looked like he should have been a quarterback for the NFL rather than folding his massive frame into the front of a car for nine hours a day. “Some Film star from back in the day used to live here.”
“Well, whoever it was had plenty of money, but maybe not so much taste.” I nodded toward the huge gilt door knocker shaped like an Oscar.
He laughed. “Well inside is a little more tasteful.”
“That’s good to know.” I offered him my hand. “I’m Kade.”
“Clint. I’ll be bringing your young ladies over tomorrow and hanging around to help remove them as you kick them to the curb.”
Clint’s grin was wide, and I felt relieved that I wasn’t alone right now. “Fancy doing the tour with me?” I asked.
“Yeah, I guess seeing as I’m gonna live here, too. Every millionaire has their own personal driver, so I already have a room and know my way around.”
I watched as he lugged his tall frame from the parking courtyard and up the steps, and because Brody was never one to miss out, he appeared like a magician the minute we got near the front door.
The cool air conditioning hit me immediately. I could feel the breeze bouncing off the marble… well, everything. There was marble everywhere. The reception area was massive and all I could see were doors and hallways. The height of the ceiling was something else, and the chandelier that commanded the space above us was like something from Dynasty.
I didn’t say anything as Clint started to show me around the various rooms. I was too awestruck to process that this level of opulence and magnificence existed. It was nuts. There were so many bathrooms that the running water available to the property would have been enough to solve the drought in some third world nation somewhere. There were dressing rooms, luggage rooms, studies, play dens and sitting rooms. Too many TV rooms to count, including a thirty-seater movie theater and not to mention all the damn closets and bathrooms.
Occasionally, I would glimpse a member of the house staff who would nod at me, and when one said, “Welcome home, Sir,” I nearly had to pick myself up off the floor.
“The staff have been recruited using your legend and the show’s premise. If they think you’re rich, there’s less chance of them selling the real story on the outside.”
“You know?”
“Well… yeah, I picked you up from the motel.” He shrugged.
I was beginning to desperately hope that Clint could become a little slice of normalcy for me.
In each of the rooms we wandered round, there was discreet filming equipment. Someone had worked hard to turn the place into the ultimate filming location.
Clint led me down into the kitchen, which was four times bigger than the one at the shelter. “The kitchen staff will be here twenty-four seven. Everyone, including me, has been told to keep a low profile. We’re not to get in the way of filming.”
“Where’s my room?”
“Follow me.” We walked for what felt like miles and ended up at the top of a very large staircase with two routes leading off it. “Your wing is that way,” he said, pointing to the side of me. “The girl’s bedrooms and bathrooms are that way.” Clint continued pointing in the opposite direction. “The TV crew are staying in the old staff block at the end of the garden. They’ll work rotated shifts, and your house staff are all on the ground floor, behind the kitchen. Me included.”
It was all starting to make my head spin a little. It was like being woken up from a nightmare and dumped in a make-believe world. “I’m struggling with all this,” I admitted.
“Anyone who isn’t born and bred into this world does. How about I show you something that will cheer you up?”
“Does it pass a cold-water fridge?” I asked.
“It does, and it’s called your drinks room.”
Shaking my head in disbelief, I let him lead the way again. Eventually we got to some cheesy bar inserted into a room built for entertaining and I grabbed a bottle of water. Brody passed me at one point, sliding along as he struggled with the marble floors. He was like some hyped up cartoon dog who had figured out the only way to slow himself down was to bang into the walls. After seeing him do it about twenty times, I began to use the sound of his claws on the floor as an early warning system and my cue to get out of his way.
Clint opened a doorway in front of him. “This here is a half-sized basketball court, and there’s a fully equipped gym next door. You have a movie room in the house, and I’m told that’s like something from the fifties, although I haven’t found that myself yet. There is a state-of-the-art disco-slash-nightclub, but in all honesty, most of the rooms are wired for music.”
