Page 100 of Good Vibes Only
“He’s definitely a grower, not a shower,” Dakota said.
“Now if only the rest of him was a grower,” Fisher said.
“Hahahahhaha!”
“Hey, give the guy some credit,” Tank said from the rear of the plane. “Showtime might stand five-foot-nothing, but he’s six-four where it counts.”
The cabin roared with laughter again.
“Hey! Tank! YouknowI’m five-foot-nine, asshole!” I fired back as I took my seat.
We lobbed jokes and insults around the cabin, and the laughs kept coming as the plane taxied onto the runway. But it’d been a long and exhausting road trip, and the boys were beat. Eyelids grew heavy. Minutes after we went airborne, the banter tapered off, and the travel pillows came out.
* * *
Somewhere over the middle of the country, the only thing I could see outside my window was the steady flashing of the wing lights. The darkened cabin was quiet and still—the endless droning of the jet engines had lulled the boys to sleep hours ago.
But I couldn’t sleep, no matter how much I tried. I wished I could just open my eyes and wake up in Vegas—but I was far too antsy to sleep. All I could think about was McKayla, and what a wild and busy week it’d been since we got together.
Shit.I guess I haven’t even told you all the stuff that went down with BarDown since last week, have I?
Obviously, the way I fired Mike was kind of a spur of the moment thing. And I wasn’t sure if my brewer, Eric, would stick with the project or not. It’d reallysuckif his allegiances lay with Mike over me—I’d need to find a new brewer to run the whole beer side of the operation, and God only knows how I’d do that while playing hockey.
So, right after I fired Mike, I reached out to Eric. I wanted him to hear about the business shakeup from me before anyone else. He was understandably confused I’d given Mike the axe, since Mike was the one who found him. Thankfully, though, he liked our product so much, and the opportunity he was getting with BarDown, that he decided to stay.
All we had to do was come up with a plan to get the ball rolling so we could still open in time. Which meant finishing the interior and hiring the kitchen and bar staff. But I couldn’t give the problem the attention it needed because I was on the road.
That’s when I accepted McKayla’s offer to help. I wasn’t sure it was a good idea to rope her into the project—the last thing I wanted to do was intertwine business in our budding relationship—but she insisted, and hell, I neededhelp from someone I could actually trust.
And I gotta say, Mac was an absoluteforcewhen it came to getting people together and making things happen. Mike made everything seem like such a long, convoluted and expensive process; but with McKayla, it was a totally different story. Right away, she posted wanted ads for bar and kitchen management staff. I couldn’t believe it when, by the end of that first day, McKayla had interviews lined up for me, along with her notes on the applicants’ resumes and everything. The girl was incredible.
A couple days later, she found a three-man outfit to finish building out the BarDown interior. Scrapping Mike’s vision for a stuffy, fine-dining interior, we went with a more rustic aesthetic, with sick live-edge slab bar tops and tables. The new crew agreed to do the whole job for less than I’dalreadypaid the old crew.
But the best and very first thing those guys did? They put up the soundproofing panels, just as we’d asked. Shocking, right? McKayla said they work like a charm; they couldn’t hear a thing over at Good Vibes Only.
I want to make sure that point isn’t glanced over: McKayla was doing all this work for me whilerunning her own business.Which was going great, by the way; without all the awful noise those jokers were making, she had her workshops up and running again and customers were actually sticking around the store and spending their money.
The only thing McKaylahadn’tdone that she said she would?
And I feel ridiculous even mentioning this, after all the work she’s done for me … but she never wrote that review of my toy.
I know, Iknow. I sound like a baby. And it’s not like Ineededthat review. Because, hell, I saw her use it almost every single night of the road trip—and she clearly enjoyed it.
But I won’t lie. I kept thinking about that review all week long. I was so curious and excited to read it, I even looked up the other reviews she wrote on her site to see what they were like. I read one after another. I never imagined I’d have a reason to read a bunch ofdildo reviews,but hell, I read every one she wrote. I liked the way she wrote—she had a really fun voice and I enjoyed listening to her write about sex. It wasn’t explicit or scandalous or dirty or anything. It was just … I dunno …fun,witty, and hilarious, in a good way.I could totally see how she’d earned such a big following.
Plus, I felt like I learned a lot about what she liked. So that was a cool little benefit.
I guess all I’m trying to say is, thinking about the review of my “toy” was a fun thing to look forward to all week, y’know? Every time my phone buzzed with an email or a text, I got my hopes up, wondering if this was it.
The excitement of reading her review was enough to keep me going. So whether she wrote the review or not doesn’t matter, I guess. I’m just thankful I had something that made a long road trip go by a little faster.
Oh well,I thought, closing my eyes.I’ll have her soon.
* * *
Ding.
A loud sound roused me from a slumber.
