Down the Rabbit Hole - Holly Madison

disappointed to learn that, just an inch below the surface, he didn’t appear to be the sharpest tool in
the shed.
Whenever he announced his next “great idea,” I usually fell silent. I didn’t have the heart, for
instance, to tell him that I wasn’t interested in cohosting a regularly scheduled “LoveSex” Pool Party
(yes, that was the real name he actually came up with) at the Luxor with him. I felt sorry for him and
didn’t want to embarrass him.
Criss asked me what my parents thought of him as we rode the elevator back up to his suite. He
was clearly in need of some affirmation.
“They liked you,” I said with a big smile. After all, they hadn’t told me they didn’t like him. My
parents confided in me that they found him a bit controlling, but they were seeing things I wasn’t
necessarily ready to accept. On the other hand, they saw that I appeared truly happy. Plus, seeing me
with a man closer to my own age had to be a lot easier to swallow.
He then asked me if I had told them I was “in love” with him.
“Um, I told them I really liked you,” I offered honestly. I’d already moved in with him, adopted
so much of his life, and gushed relentlessly about him to the press. I wasn’t going to profess my
undying love to my parents after just four months of dating, no matter how much of a whirlwind our
time together had been or how often we said it to one another.
Criss pouted, crossing his arms, turning away from me, and, grumbling, asking why he was even
wasting time on this relationship.
“Hey,” I said defensively, “I don’t introduce my parents to many people. This was a really big
deal for me.”
THE WARM MEXICAN SUN beat down on my shoulders as Criss and I sat at our beachside table eating
sushi and drinking Coke Lights with our friends Barbara and Ron. Enjoying a few days off from the
show, Criss swept me away to Cabo San Lucas for a late January getaway.
“We’re going to miss you guys,” I bemoaned to Barbara beneath a perfect cloudless Cabo sky
after a boating excursion. The couple’s trip overlapped with ours for only a few days. They were
longtime friends of Criss’s—and would soon become close friends of mine. The couple kept
conversations lively and fun—they were the perfect antidote to the dark energy that I was starting to
feel from Criss more and more lately.
“Let me give you my info,” Barbara said. “Text me any time you’re bored and want to go to
lunch or something.”
“Thanks!” I said, pocketing the business card with Barbara’s information.
After we finished our leisurely lunch and said our good-byes, Criss and I went back to our suite.
Criss snapped at me as soon as the door had shut behind him. He demanded I give him the card
and forbade me from texting her.
“Why?” I asked, confused. She seemed really sweet, but perhaps there was something about her
I didn’t know.
He put his hand out, motioning with his fingers for me to cough up the card. He gave me a lame