Chapter 6: The Viewers' Verdict
The two-hour recharge bled into a dazed nap tangled in cool sheets. Aidan woke to the lavender wash of dusk and the distant clink of glassware. His body ached in a dozen new, interesting ways. He dressed slowly—clean shorts, a loose shirt—and followed the sound of voices and laughter to the open-air lounge.
The terrace was a different world at night. The brutal sun was gone, replaced by a warm, velvety darkness punctuated by hundreds of tiny ivory lights strung across the railings. They reflected in the dark sea below, mirroring the stars beginning to puncture the sky. The air was cooler, carrying the scent of frangipani and the smoky hint of a barbecue from somewhere down the beach.
The women were arranged on low couches, drinks in hand. The mood was superficially relaxed, but Aidan felt the crackle of static beneath the laughter. A large monitor had been set up, currently showing a slow-motion montage of the day’s highlights: Hazel on the roof, the poolside pop quiz, his own spent face gazing at the sky.
“Ah. The main attraction arrives,” Svetlana said. She patted the cushion beside her. She wore a sheer black wrap that did nothing to conceal her body. “Sit. It is time for the democracy.”
Mei offered a small smile. Jazz raised her glass in a mock toast. A woman he’d only briefly met at breakfast—Isabella, with fiery red hair and a nervous energy—gave him a tight, fleeting smile. She was the newest arrival, still finding her footing.
A producer, a man named Carl with a tablet perpetually glued to his hand, stepped into the circle of light. “Alright, folks. Live feed starts in sixty seconds. The viewers have been voting all day. Favorite performance. Least favorite. We reveal the top and bottom now. Results are… uncensored.”
The casual vibe evaporated. Isabella’s knuckles were white around her wine glass.
The monitor switched to a live studio audience somewhere else in the world, then to a sleek host whose smile was blindingly white. “Caribbean Dreams viewers! The results are in. Your favorite performer of the day, by a landslide… Svetlana Volkova!”
Svetlana didn’t even smirk. She gave a slight, regal nod to the camera, as if accepting a foregone conclusion. The other women clapped, the sound polite, edged.
“And now,” the host’s voice took on a theatrical somberness. “The performer currently facing elimination due to the lowest vote count… Isabella Moreno.”
Isabella flinched as if struck. A single tear tracked through her meticulous makeup. “I… I just got here,” she whispered, her voice breaking.
The rules were simple. The lowest vote-getter could be saved by a unanimous decision from the others to eliminate someone else instead. Or, they could propose a high-stakes challenge for redemption.
Jazz looked away. Mei studied her hands. The silence stretched, thick and cruel.
Then Svetlana spoke, her voice cutting through the tension like a knife. “I propose a challenge. A live one. Right now.”
Carl’s eyes lit up. “Go on.”
She turned her icy gaze to Aidan. “He is still warmed up from today. Good. Isabella, you are nervous. This is your problem. You think too much.” She leaned forward. “A blindfolded duet. Aidan will be blindfolded. He must make you come. And me. At the same time. Simultaneous orgasms, live for the world. You succeed, you stay. You fail…” She shrugged. “You pack.”
Isabella’s eyes were wide with terror. “I can’t… under that pressure…”
“You can,” Svetlana said, and it wasn’t encouragement. It was a command. “Or you are not meant for this house.”
Aidan felt the trap snap shut. This wasn’t just about saving Isabella; it was another test for him, a more brutal one. Blindfolded, he’d have to read two bodies purely by touch and sound, orchestrating a finish with impossible precision. The live feed added a layer of naked, public risk.
“Aidan?” Carl asked, the camera already swinging toward him.
He looked at Isabella’s desperate face, then at Svetlana’s challenging stare. He nodded, pulling his shirt over his head. “Get the blindfold.”
The next few minutes were a blur of logistical chaos. The largest couch was cleared. Lavender oil was poured and warmed. Aidan sat in the center, a sleek black sleep mask pulled tight over his eyes, plunging him into utter darkness. His other senses sharpened violently. He heard the rustle of clothing, the quick, anxious hitch of Isabella’s breath, the calm, even rhythm of Svetlana’s. He felt their weight settle on either side of him, their different heats.
“Live in three… two…” Carl’s voice faded.
A hand—Svetlana’s, he knew by the confident, possessive grip—guided his face to the left, to Isabella’s thigh. Her skin was fever-hot, trembling. He used his mouth on her first, gentle, coaxing, trying to melt the fear out of her muscles. She was quiet at first, all trapped tension.
To his right, Svetlana took his hand and placed it between her own legs. She was already wet, and she moved against his fingers with immediate, aggressive purpose. “Do not ignore your soloist, conductor,” she murmured, her voice loud enough for the mic.
He was split, a man divided. His mouth worked on Isabella, his fingers on Svetlana. He had to listen, to differentiate between Isabella’s building, shaky moans and Svetlana’s controlled, deep-throated praises. Isabella’s hands suddenly fisted in his hair, a good sign. Her hips began to move. “Oh god, okay, okay…” she chanted, losing herself.
But Svetlana was ahead, her climax a steam engine barreling down the tracks. He could feel her tightening around his fingers, her breaths shortening. He had to slow her, speed up Isabella. It was a brutal, physical calculus.
He withdrew from Svetlana entirely, earning a sharp curse. He focused everything on Isabella, adding a second finger, curling it just so. She shattered with a raw, sobbing cry that seemed to surprise even her, her whole body convulsing against his mouth.
The second she peaked, he turned, lunging for Svetlana in the dark, pushing her onto her back and entering her in one desperate thrust. He was operating on instinct now, on the furious need to meet the impossible demand. He drove into her, hard and deep, his rhythm frantic. She wrapped around him, her earlier control gone, her nails scraping down his back.
“Isabella,” he grunted, his voice rough. “Touch her. Now.”
He heard movement, a gasp. Then Isabella’s hand, small and unsure, found Svetlana’s breast, then lower, mirroring Aidan’s rhythm. The combination—Aidan’s relentless thrusts, Isabella’s tentative but growing participation—tipped Svetlana over the edge. She came with a guttural, Russian shout, her body arching violently off the couch, her heels digging into the small of Aidan’s back.
He followed, a white-hot burst of release that felt more like surrender than victory, collapsing between them as the live feed buzzed with frenzied cheers.
For long moments, there was only the sound of three people gasping for air in the dark.
Aidan pulled off the blindfold. The world rushed back in a smear of string lights and stunned faces. Isabella was crying again, but this time with relief, a bewildered smile on her face. Svetlana lay beside him, a sheen of sweat on her chest, looking at the ceiling with a strange, unreadable expression.
Carl’s voice was giddy. “We’re gold. Isabella, you’re safe. Viewership just spiked forty percent.”
The women gathered around, handing them towels, water. Jazz clapped Aidan on the shoulder. “You maniac. You actually did it.”
Aidan just breathed, the adrenaline leaching away, leaving a deep, humming exhaustion. He’d passed. Again.
Svetlana finally turned her head on the cushion, her blue eyes finding his in the dim light. She didn’t thank him. She didn’t praise him. She just reached out and wiped a smear of lipstick from his cheek, her thumb rough.
“Tomorrow,” she said, her voice a private murmur meant only for him, “we see what you can do when you can actually see.”
The silence after her words felt heavier than the blindfold had. The hum of the cameras powered down, leaving only the crash of waves and the low chatter of the crew packing up. Aidan sat up, his muscles protesting, every nerve feeling scraped raw. He looked across the disordered cushions at Isabella. She was pulling her dress back on with shaky hands, her eyes wide and glistening in the string lights, like someone who’d just survived a car crash.
He stood, his body feeling both hollow and weighed down, and walked over to her. The other women were dispersing, talking about showers and cocktails, the moment already metabolizing into content. Svetlana watched him, unmoving, from the couch.
“Looks like you’re staying in the house, Isabella,” Aidan said to her, his voice rough but gentle. He ran a hand through his tousled hair. “I’m exhausted and I expect you are too.” He paused, seeing the deep tremor in her fingers as she tried to tie a strap. “Want to spend the night with me in my bedroom? It would be nice to fall asleep snugged up together.”
Isabella’s eyes snapped up to his, searching for a punchline or a trap. She found neither, just a profound weariness that mirrored her own. The performance was over. This was something else. A slow, tentative relief softened the panic in her face. “Really?” she whispered. “Just… sleep?”
“Yeah. Just sleep. I think my dick needs to file a formal grievance with the union.”
A faint, real smile touched her lips for the first time all night. She nodded, quickly, before he could change his mind.
“How touching.” Svetlana’s voice came from behind them. She had risen, a silhouette against the moonlit sea. She stepped close, her presence still buzzing with a predatory energy. She ignored Isabella, her icy eyes locked on Aidan. “You make her a princess for one night? After I made her a star?”
“You made her terrified,” Aidan said, not backing down. “She earned the save. Let her breathe.”
Svetlana moved closer, so close he could smell the salt and sex on her skin. Her hand came up, not to strike, but to rest flat on his chest, over his heart. Her voice dropped, a conspiratorial scrape. “You feel this? This engine inside you? I lit it today. Remember that.” Her gaze flicked to Isabella, a dismissal. “Take your comfort. Tomorrow, the comfort ends.”
She turned and walked away, the sway of her hips a deliberate punctuation mark.
Aidan let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. He offered Isabella his hand. Her grip was cold but firm. He led her not to the sprawling, camera-friendly main suite, but to his smaller, more private room tucked down a tiled hallway. It was spartan—a king bed, a wardrobe, a single window open to the breeze.
“Bathroom’s through there,” he said, pointing. “There should be clean t-shirts in the drawer.”
She disappeared inside. He pulled on a pair of soft cotton pants and collapsed onto the cool sheets, staring at the ceiling fan's lazy rotation. The day replayed behind his eyes in a garish montage: Hazel’s rooftop cries, the slick heat of the poolside daybed, the blind darkness and two bodies pulling him in opposite directions.
Isabella emerged wearing one of his grey t-shirts, which drowned her slender frame. Her fiery hair was down, damp at the ends from washing her face. She looked about nineteen. She hovered near the edge of the bed.
“It’s okay,” he said, lifting the sheet. “This side’s all yours.”
She slid in, keeping a careful foot of space between them. The mattress dipped with her weight. They lay in silence for a while, listening to the geckos chirp in the eaves.
“Thank you,” she said finally, her voice small in the dark. “For what you did out there. I was freezing up. I was gonna be sent home.”
“You didn’t freeze. You came. That’s what saved you.”
“That’s the thing,” she said, turning her head on the pillow to look at him. “I really did. I wasn’t faking. Even with all the lights and the… the pressure. How does that even work?”
Aidan considered it. “I think when the fear gets big enough, it just flips a switch. Becomes its own kind of focus.” He turned to face her. “Why are you here, Isabella? Really?”
She was quiet for so long he thought she wouldn’t answer. “Money,” she said, the word blunt and honest. “A lot of it. For my mom. It’s just… it’s just money. But what you all do, what Svetlana does… it’s a different language. I don’t know if I can learn it.”
“You might not have to,” he said. “Just survive it. One ridiculous day at a time.”
He reached out, not for sex, but for connection, and found her hand. She laced her fingers with his, holding on tightly. The tension in her body gradually unwound, breath by breath, until her breathing deepened into the slow rhythm of sleep.
Aidan stayed awake longer, listening to the sea. Svetlana was right about one thing. An engine was lit. He felt it thrumming in his chest, a low, relentless heat that had nothing to do with lust and everything to do with the game itself. He had navigated the chaos again, but the rules kept shifting. Today was a blindfold. Tomorrow, Svetlana would demand he see everything.
He finally closed his eyes, Isabella’s hand warm in his, the phantom scent of coconut oil and desperation clinging to the air. The villa slept. The cameras in the hall, their tiny red lights dark, watched nothing at all.