Sadie feels like eye candy at the meeting

We’re still in the maze of corridors between the departure and luggage pick-up areas and I know full on stopping is a bad idea, so I pack my phone back up, get to Marley, and start directing us faster through the terminals traffic. With Marley it’s pretty easy to move quickly as he parts the sea of people smoothly and seemingly without effort. Just his baritone polite “Pardon me, excuse me, on your left…” keeps us moving forward.

When we’re in sight of the luggage carousels I tap Marley’s arm and tell him that I’ll be over on the bench for a bit. He proceeds on, hopefully finding out exactly where our luggage will come tumbling down while I find a spot near an outlet. After plugging my phone in to the charger I pull out my laptop and go through the process of setting its VPN and firewall up before connecting to the airport’s Wi-Fi network. Once online, I go directly to Instygram and check my own feed. And right there at top is a photo of me snuggled up to Marley’s arm. My eyes are closed as I’m sleeping, but the photo almost feels staged. Like I’m faking sleeping. And of course, you’d think that, as taking a photo of someone sleeping on a plane is just creepy otherwise. The caption below the photo nailed it though, as I’m sure it helped the algorithm pick it up. “Sleeping Beauty found her Prince Charming!”

The post already has thousands of views and hundreds of interactions. I see that it’s already been reposted dozens of times, so even if I could delete it, which would require my phone, it would never really leave Instygram. The same goes for the TokTic video that Marley posted. It’s a short ten second video of me snoozing on his arm. He nailed the timing as I mumble and seemed to move to get more comfortable. He doesn’t put his face in the post, but you hear his voice whisper “Shhh… Sleeping Beauty needs her rest.”

I’ve never really considered race in my posting and streaming. I know that most of my audience is white, but I have black followers too. Black guys, black girls, Latinos, Latinas… all genders and races are within my audience. And I can’t afford to offend any of them. I’m just afraid of that normally silent racist minority that not only look down on a white girl with a black guy but will stand up and scream about it behind the anonymity of an online account. I have absolutely no desire to be the poster girl for racial acceptance but now, if something happens, that’s exactly what I’m going to do. It’s not like I’ll badmouth Marley or anything as I don’t have any problems with interracial couples.

Thankfully, the few comments seem to be what I’d hope for. There’s only one even hinting at a racist take, and he’s being shouted down by almost everybody else for even getting close to that topic. Knowing that since I can’t delete the posts means I need to lean into them, I look for a good background and snap some quick selfies. I then post them as replies to my own posts, so they can see an ‘after’ or ‘landing’ post. With my wide smile and happy affect, I eliminate the few posters worrying about me having my photo taken while sleeping. After all, if I’m ‘okay with it’ then my audience should be too.

With that done, I turn my phone off to save the little bit of charge I’ve got and find Marley. He’s already found all of our bags and we head to the pickup area where we go retro and take an actual taxi to the hotel.

I’ve always been fascinated with Las Vegas. The huge complex of hotels and casinos all built up in a desert, all trying to bully each other with more and more over the top themes. While the trip from the airport to the hotel is short, I find it cool that we can spot our hotel blocks away from its iconic black pyramid shape and the sphinx out front. I can’t help but fan girl out a bit and lean over to Marley saying, “Hey, this is where they shot the finals for Just Dance! I love that show!”

Marley impresses me by pulling his phone out and showing that he not only is a fan of the show too, but he’s bookmarked the UsTube videos of the finals where the Jive Dolls beat Dark Phoenix and earned their headlining show at this very hotel. We both said we’d like to get tickets but we likely wouldn’t have time.

Getting checked in was easy, as was getting up to the 23rd floor in the pyramid for our rooms. We get to my room first and both peek in. It’s nice, but nothing really special. I take the time to unpack everything, making sure my dress isn’t wrinkled, and all my cosmetics and personal items are ready in the bathroom. A few minutes later Marley’s at my door. Once I open it to let him in, I can see that he’s upset. He’s on the phone, and the side of the conversation that I can hear confirms it. “…and it’s dripping like every second. No, I love that it’s a marble countertop with counter to ceiling mirrors, because that makes the dripping ECHO all that much LOUDER. Yes, either get the damned room fixed or get us different rooms. NO! No, if you’re going to move me, then you’ll move both of us.”

Marley holds his hand up toward me, letting me know he’s not as angry as he’s acting on the phone. I’m thankful as he’s coming across as really hostile and bossy. But it seems to get the job done when he relaxes and smiles. “So, they’ll be there this afternoon and fix it? And it won’t be leaking when I get back to the room tonight? Okay, good thing. Thank you.”

Neither of us want to stay in the rooms, but we know we need to stay close as the appointment with the investor is in a few hours. We find Starbucks inside the casino and get a couple highly caffeinated beverages then go to the Pyramid Café for a light lunch. I know Marley would have liked to hit the buffet, but I honestly didn’t see a good reason to pay over $30 for me to basically get a fruit salad.

After lunch we wandered and touristed around, visiting the casino floor, playing some slots, and even paid to see the Discovering King Tut's Tomb exhibit. When it was time, we headed back to our rooms to get ready. It didn’t take long as I’d done my hair in the morning, and it only needed a little touching up. After I washed my face clean, I reapplied my cosmetics in the style Marley and I had talked about. We wanted to just straddle that line between athletic and club. Sexy and stoic. When I believe it’s all good, I slip into the dress and heels. Looking at myself in the mirror I find it odd that when dressed up to the nines in maybe my most sensual feminine attire, I have no stockings or pantyhose or tights on. But that’s by design as Marley wants to show off my legs. And while they’re not the most athletic, I have to admit they do look good. Adding my dangly addition to my belly button ring will bring attention to my bare belly and will also be a constant distraction as it tickles across my skin and catches the light.

Gabbing my clutch, I put my ID, a couple credit and debit cards, some cash, just enough makeup for touch ups, a tiny tin of mints, a tiny bottle of perfume, and a couple bobby pins in case my hair needs touching up. After adding my phone, I can barely close it but admit it looks totally adorable with the dress and heels.

When Marley arrives at my door, I look him up and down twice. I’m used to seeing him in his athletic clothes. Some combination of sweats, tshirts, and bike shorts. Occasionally I’ve seen him in more casual clothes including the jeans and polo shirt he wore on the plane. But this is the first time I’ve seen him dressed up. I have no idea how he manages to look both dressed to the nines and casually relaxed. His pants are perfectly fitted so that you can see his muscular thighs and even notice the bulge of his manhood but still have room for his pockets and flare out just enough over his shoes with a break. His white semi translucent shirt looks like it was painted on and I can actually see the shape of his abs and pecs under it. Over that he has on a sport jacket that has that popular skinny fit a lot of guys wear, but on Marley is works to emphasize just how wide his shoulders and how massive his arms are. His open collar shows off the gold necklace and the fact that he doesn’t have a tie on makes it all look that much cooler.

Poking Marley in his chest I smile up at him and say, “You look amazing. You’re gonna knock him dead.”

Marley grins and places his finger under my chin, making sure I’m still looking up into his eyes when he replies, “Sadie, with as hot as you look, he’s not even going to know I’m there!”

I blush at the compliment as he has to know how good he looks. If he thinks I’m going to outshine him then he has a very high opinion on my appearance.

We make our way down to the Tender Steakhouse where we’ll meet with the investor and are guided to our seat. The entire way, from my room to the elevator, to the walk across the casino floor, to the walk to our table, Marley has his arm around me. His hand feels natural where it rests on my waist, but it’s a little maddening as that gives him access to stretch his finger out and play with my belly button right which feels magical. Magical enough that the ache from my cage returns and I’m fairly sure won’t be going away all night long.

Marley orders us glasses of wine and they arrive just as the investor gets to the table. Marley introduces him as Maximilian Bellamy. Mr. Bellamy aggressively shakes Marley’s hand and afterward takes my hand in his, brings it up to his lips, and gives my knuckles a kiss. “Sadie, it’s lovely to meet you. I see that Marley has brought out all the stops to impress me. Well, consider me impressed. But please, call me Max. All my friends do!”

Max strikes me as a high end wealthy professional. Everything he has on is meant to impress. Marley’s suit is nice, but I get the feeling that Max’s suit was custom made. Marley has a nice Omega watch that probably cost a few grand. Max has a Patek Philippe that might go for six figures. Marley’s shoes are a gorgeous soft leather. Max’s look like they may be sharkskin. And while he seemed to appreciate me, once we were sat back down at the table, his attention was completely on Marley. He was a businessman and wasn’t going to get distracted away from business. Which unfortunately meant I was lost in their conversations. I knew they were talking about gyms, but beyond talking about high end concepts, they didn’t mention anything gym related. It was all about markets and growth potential and specialization. Marley had most of the information that Max asked for and could talk intelligently about the things he didn’t have at hand.

The food at the steak house was amazing. I’d never had a dry aged steak before, and it was almost like it deserved its own category to separate it from regular meats. Even the outrageously expensive side dishes were amazing. I mean, how do you make salad taste that special? And I had to eat all of it, without being able to gush on how good it was as Marley and Max just kept talking business. About the only time I felt useful was when Marley pulled up the demo video on his iPad and showed it to Max. Clearly, Max had seen it before, but his eyes moved from the screen to me several times in an appreciative manner. Hearing the song and sounds from the video and knowing that this powerful man was enjoying watching Marley and me and our sexually intense workouts, had me practically squirming in my seat. Marley putting his hand under the tablecloth and gripping mine is about the only thing that kept me calm enough to stay at the table.

I’d hoped that I could help Marley in ways other than being the girl on his arm. I’m intelligent and thought of myself as world wise. But in this conversation, I was just lost. Returns on investment, corporation structures, multiyear projections, expansion opportunities and market outlooks. It’s as though they were speaking a foreign language. They didn’t cover the topics that I’d thought about like interior design, logos, marketing, or whether they should be in a retail location or a stand-alone building. Evidently that was all irrelevant.

But as bored as I was with the dinner meeting, it all ended well. I didn’t understand exactly what Max and Marley agreed to, but they shook hands and agreed to ‘get the contact to the lawyers’ next week. They celebrate by ordering a bottle of champagne. We stayed and drank the whole thing, meaning when we slip out of the table I was already feeling a little wobbly on my feet. Three glasses of bubbly will do that!

As we walk out of the restaurant Max steps between Marley and me and hooks his arms around both of us. Marley’s shoulders and my waist where his fingers, like Marley’s found their way to my belly button right. “So now that business is done, let’s celebrate! I got us tickets to the Fantasy show, and these are really going to blow your mind!”