Ecstasy Read Free Page A

you,” Candace said, flashing a smile at him, but before she could feel better about her evening, an old biddy who had just contributed a story about her cat said, “I will not stand for such smut! I think we should take a vote right now. Who here wants to listen to this trashy porn?”
    Only the middle-aged man half-raised his hand, giving Candace a sheepish grin, and she had the awful feeling that he was only voting for her because he thought she was easy.
    Looking smug, the ringleader asked, “And who wants her to leave immediately?”
    Everyone else raised their hands while their eyes shot daggers at her.
    “Fine,” Candace said, calmly slipping her papers back into her leather satchel. Swinging it up onto her shoulder she stood and left the room without a backwards glance.
    She was none too surprised when she heard footsteps behind her in the hallway and turned to see her one supporter hurrying to catch up with her.
    “Candace,” he said, slightly out of breath. “I feel terrible about this.”
    “I’m sure you do,” she said, a slight twinge of bitterness lacing her words.
    “Even though this didn’t work out, I was hoping that, ah, maybe I could take you out for dinner next Saturday.”
    Candace acted like she was considering his words carefully. Forcing a coy look onto her face she asked, “Is that all you want from me?”
    Giving her a sleazy smile, he leaned in until she could smell his bad breath, and said, “I’m game for helping you try out some of your new scenes, any time you want.”
    Candace worked hard to keep her hands firmly at her sides. He wasn’t the first guy she’d wanted to slap, and he wouldn’t be the last. From between gritted teeth she said, “I don’t know why every guy who meets me thinks all I want to do is fuck his brains out simply because I write erotica. Because I wouldn’t have sex with you if you were the last man on earth.”
    Clearly upset by her slam, he looked her up and down and disdainfully said, “Then maybe you should stop begging for it, you slut,” then ran back down the hall to the meeting room, slamming the door behind him.
    Standing in the hallway, stunned by her latest bad experience, Candace heard the distinct sounds of lovemaking coming from the women’s bathroom. A minute later, the two people who had left the room right after she read her chapter emerged, clothes in slight disarray, and sneaked back off towards the meeting room, thinking no one was the wiser.
    Candace smiled momentarily. “I guess that means it was a good chapter,” she said. But then, falling despondent again over the difficulties of her new writing direction, she added, “At least some people are having a good night.”
    Trying not to be too down about the events of the evening, she headed out for her car and another lonely night curled up on her couch with a paperback, where she could dream about having a perfect life, like the characters in her favorite books.

Chapter Three
     
    Candace stood underneath the huge “Sensual Writer’s Conference” banner and took a deep breath. As soon as she walked through the double glass doors she would officially be entering into her new life. Instead of continuing to write young adult stories, where sex was never allowed to enter into the storyline, today she was officially going to make the jump into the world of erotica, where the only limit was how far a writer wanted to go. Practically nothing was forbidden.
    Now, if she could just muster up the nerve to walk through those damn double doors.
    She tried not to be too hard on herself. After all, anytime anyone made a career change they were bound to have some butterflies in their stomach. Unfortunately, what Candace was feeling went far beyond butterflies. More like huge ravens flying around inside of her, picking at her innards.
    A middle-aged woman brushed past her and hurried inside the conference hall. Candace knew it was now or never—time to either bite the bullet and commit