Sex, Lies and the Dirty (23 page)

“Nik! Are you doing that?” she laughs.

“Hey, you’re famous. I can’t help it if you’re getting recognized.”

We sit there in the club, drinking casually and talking in what looks like whispers to the crowd. It’s a date. We’re a couple. Tonight, Nik Richie is here for one woman, not the twenty-five ASU girls across the club. Not the bottle rats or the fame-chasers. From time to time, I’ll get a text from Scooby or JV as to whether or not I’m going to come over and hang out, but I don’t even bother answering. They can have it all: the girls, the booze, and the special treatment. I don’t care anymore. DJ Vice gives Shayne another shout-out, maybe the thirteenth or fourteenth of the night, and she’s blushing hard enough to see in the almost-dark. She leans in, and I think it’s to say something in my ear but then she kisses me. A little one.

I say, “That’s not a kiss.”

She smiles and comes back at me, harder this time, lips sliding over mine. A real kiss. A meaningful one. I can feel it throughout my entire body, in my heart, like I’m a kid that’s doing it for the first time.

“We should get married,” she says, smiling like it’s a joke but not completely. She laughs, takes a sip of her drink and curls into me.

I say, “I know. We’re kind of perfect for each other,” but she has no idea how much I’m downplaying it.

In reality, I’m thinking,
I’m done, I’m yours, I want to have babies…get me the fuck off this
Dirty
train.

“There’s something I don’t get,” Shayne says. “You’re hosting, but you don’t have any friends here…I mean, is this really your table?”

I feel like I can be open with her now.

I say, “I’ll be honest with you—that table with the twenty-five chicks,” and I point so I know Shayne’s looking at the same spectacle I am. “That one’s mine.”

“
That one?
” she points too.

“Yeah, don’t judge me.”

It’s our little moment of truth, but instead of getting all weirded out or turned off to the idea that I’m some kind of player, she smiles. Shayne kisses me again, because what she sees is that I could be over there with the girls, all those young stupid girls, and yet, I choose to be here with her. I want Shayne, and I’d give it all up to be with her.

We tried to get married last night.

One of the big misconceptions about Vegas is that people think it’s so easy to get married, as if you can just drive through some chapel and it’s a done deal. It’s not. We found that out the hard way. We tried, but everything was closed down for the night and getting married is a process with documents and paperwork. It’s not like the movies where you can make a snap decision and it’s over before you know it.

Regardless, I wake up feeling good—better than I’ve ever felt.

Shayne is in my arms, curling hard into me like we’re on our honeymoon. We’re in bed. Nude. Warm and comfortable. We made love last night. I took my time with her because I never wanted it to end, still don’t want it to end. Even now. I’d love to just lie here with her body pressed into me, breathing, kissing. Last night I told Lonnie I’d see him before he went back to L.A.

In the bathroom vanity, I’m looking at myself smiling, smiling like a goddamn happy idiot who’s doing the wrong thing that feels right. I’m thinking,
You’re doing it again…you’re chasing…you’re gonna chase this girl and she’s going to hurt you.

Brush my teeth. Clean up a little.

I go back out to Shayne who’s laying in bed, wrapped in blankets, and I say, “I’ve got to see Lonnie before he goes, so I have to leave soon, but…I’d
really
like to hang out in L.A.”

I stress that last part. I’m so used to fucking girls and throwing them away that it’s important Shayne knows that I want to see her again, that this wasn’t a one-night thing for me.

“I would love to, Nik,” she smiles at me from the bed.

I’m not ready to say good-bye.

She was almost my wife.

At Rehab, Lonnie name-drops me and we get all of our drinks comped.
He’s trying to chase down some
American Idol
girl, and I’m trying to talk to him about Shayne.

I say, “Lonnie, I like this girl.”

He says, “Forget about it, dude. It’s not going to happen.”

“We had a great time together last night.”

“Did you fuck her?” he asks.

“No, nothing happened,” I lie. I don’t know why I lie. I’ve never done that to Lonnie before, but I don’t want to cheapen what Shayne and I did.

“That chick is impossible, man. Forget her. Move on.”

“Why? Why should I move on?” I ask.

“Because every one of my friends that has tried to hook up with that chick has never been able to do it, so forget it. Enjoy your weekend.”

“Lonnie, we tried to get married last night.”

“You’re lying. Why do you lie? Just relax, Nik.”

We’re in a cabana. Scooby is there along with all these girls. Hot girls. They’re drinking, flirting. I’ve seen it before. I’m bored by it. Scooby asks what the hell happened last night, and I give him the short version. I like Shayne. I tried to marry her.

“Well, thank God that didn’t happen!” he says.

I’m having to come to terms with my friends and inner circle not understanding this. They don’t get it, and maybe there’s a good reason for that. I’ve been with a lot of girls, and the few I’ve gotten close to have fucked things up. Last night with Shayne was real though. She and I know that. If it wasn’t, I wouldn’t miss her as much as I do right now. I wouldn’t be so happy. It’s got nothing to do with the girls or the attention or the booze—it’s none of that. It’s Shayne. Only Shayne.

I’m sitting in the cabana with Scooby and these girls, thinking about Shayne and when I can make it out to L.A. My iPhone buzzes, and the text reads:
Still want to get married?

Shayne says:
I’ve researched it. I know what we have to do.

I say:
Yes.

It moves fast.

We get married at The Little White Wedding Chapel. Shayne wears a loose-fitting cream top, a tissue-white veil. I’m in a black T-shirt. Jeans. There’s maybe eight or nine people attending. Lonnie is MIA because he’s passed out somewhere, I’d find out later. Scooby is our “flower girl.” People are pointing Flip cameras and taking photos with their cell phones. It’s the first time I actually want people documenting me. Us. Shayne and I, we’re happy, embracing. She says, “I’m a bride today,” to the cameras, smiling. Glowing. We say our vows. Sign the papers. It’s a done deal. We’re married. The group of us go out to Lavo to celebrate.

Meanwhile, the sharks are moving in.

Now that I have Shayne, I have something to lose.

55
Aired in 2009 for one season on the E! network. The show documents the lives of Lorenzo Lamas, his ex-wife Michele Smith, their two children, Shayne and AJ Lamas, and Michele’s daughter with ex-husband Craig Pike, Dakota.

56
Playmate of the Month, May 1996.

57
Season 12:
London Calling.

Media

CBS gives us 48 hours.

Most of the other news outlets are making snide little comments about how we got married at the same place Britney Spears did the first time, the same one that was over 55 hours later. Everybody is placing bets on this thing like we’re a fucking craps table.

Two days. One week. Not even a month.

In the articles reporting the marriage, there’s usually a couple of pictures to coincide with the text. Just in case you have no idea who Shayne Lamas or Nik Richie is—sort of like how we weren’t aware of each other. The press usually snags a pic of Shayne from her
Bachelor
days, or some modeling shoot she did. Full hair and makeup with the occasional Photoshop touch-up.

As for me, the villain, the “Internet scumbag,” the media has taken the liberty of posting my DUI photo all over again. That grainy little piece of shit is cropping up everywhere, and the comment boards are eating it up.

“You mean she married
him
? Is she on stupid pills?”

So there’s the issue of how we “don’t go together” along with the ever-growing speculation that the whole thing’s a sham. “A hoax,” they call it. One attention whore deserves another. That sort of thing. Even my friends are asking me if this is some kind of publicity stunt. Texts are rolling in from people I haven’t talked to in months, pretty much asking the same thing in one way or another: if this is for real?

I might as well send out a mass text:

Yes, I’m really married.

No, it’s not a hoax.

I’m back in Scottsdale watching Shayne on
TMZ
. She’s coming out of the LAX terminal carrying a few small bags, clutching a Blackberry and not at all surprised that there’s a camera waiting for her. If she’s caught
off-guard, she’s certainly hiding it well. Her fingers keep coming up to her forehead to brush the hair out of her eyes and the cameraman is asking her about the “wild Las Vegas weekend” she had.

“I found a husband!” Shayne says, and quite happily.

“You did!” the camera guy says, “And it’s actually Nik Richie of all people.”

“Of all people” is tabloid code for:
you could have done better.

I watch my wife get on her phone while this guy tries to get the story from her. She’s looking around the terminal for her ride, and this guy asks her, “Is that his real name?”

This is actually a trick question.
TMZ
’s bread and butter is catching celebrities either looking stupid, getting into trouble, or humanizing them in some way. Most of the show concentrates on the third thing, so even though Paris Hilton getting a coffee or Lindsay Lohan picking up dry cleaning may
sound
boring, for some reason people are watching it. In Shayne’s case, however, this camera guy is trying to make her look stupid. The
TMZ
crew knows that certain people are going to come through LAX at certain times, so they prepare lines of questioning to see if they can get a wrong answer on film.

When the camera guy asks Shayne about my real name, he’s hoping that she doesn’t know it because it’ll make for better TV. She knows I’m Hooman Karamian, though. It was right there on the marriage certificate. No matter what the world thinks about me, I’d never marry a woman without being up front on a few things, and that includes my name.

Then the camera guy says, “You seem like a pretty honest person, Shayne,” which is just more tabloid speak for:
I’ll fuck you over if you lie to me.

He asks, “Will you tell me the honest truth? What happened? Is this like a publicity stunt?”

I’m in Scottsdale, watching my wife on TV when I should be with her. She’s miles away while this jerkoff is asking her the same stupid question every other news outlet has. Shayne isn’t camera-shy though. She laughs at this guy and his tired-ass question. Laughs convincingly.