Tera Patrick - Sinner Takes All

“No, darling,” Suze said. “Keep your clothes on this time.” She took ten photos of me in my bra and panties and said, “Oh yeah. We’re getting you in Penthouse . I’m shooting you next week.”

She followed through. We shot that Friday for Penthouse . It was just a few days before my scheduled Monday meeting with Playboy . I couldn’t believe it was happening so fast. All I could think was, “I’m going to be in Playboy and Penthouse , make tons of money, and be famous!” This was my second chance at modeling and my ticket back. I was filled with a newfound optimism about my career and my life.

The shoot for Penthouse was unlike any shoot I had done up to that point. It was at Suze’s ranch in Calabasas, California, and it was the biggest, most glamorous shoot I’d ever done. I was so thrilled to have Emma Nixon, one of the most highly regarded makeup and hairstylists in the industry, do my hair and makeup. She worked with everyone. I was floored that the same woman who helped make Pamela Anderson look so beautiful was working on me, too. I felt like I was finally at the level I always wanted to be.

The problem was that I had no idea what I was doing. Sure, I had modeled before, but never completely naked! For instance, I had no idea I was supposed to spread my pussy. I’m starting to pose for photos and I’m just lying there with my legs wide open, thinking this was how you do it. The next thing I know, Suze takes a Q-tip covered in baby oil and she starts petting my pussy with it. She stroked the lips, she stroked the inside edge, she stroked around the outside of my pussy with this moist little Q-tip.

“Pinky, pinky, pinky,” Suze was saying in that British accent of hers.

“Pinky?” What the hell is she saying?

“Yes, darling, you need to show your pussy. We need to see more pink. Pinky, pinky, pinky!”

I had no idea you had to, as Suze said, get the pussy all “shiny and glistening and inviting.” That’s where the baby oil came in.

With my pussy moistened, open, and ready to be properly photographed, I really got into the shoot. But every time Suze would remind me to “show more pink,” I would laugh my ass off. As she shot me, she would say things to coax the sex kitten out of me, such as “Come on, you little slut. Open your legs, you little slut. Let’s see the pink!” Thinking about it now, it sounds so vulgar but at the time she sounded very charming and posh in that British accent, and I couldn’t help but giggle every time she said “pinky, pinky, pinky.”

Suze and I got along great and I was excited to share my other news with her. I told her that I was meeting with Stephanie at Playboy on Monday to discuss shooting for them. That was the biggest mistake, because after hearing this news Suze rushed the layout to Penthouse to make sure that her spread would get published.

That Monday, I walked into Playboy to see Stephanie and she showed me the contract for me to pose for the magazine. I didn’t know anything about contracts, but as I was reading it over it sounded too good to be true: $25,000 for a week’s worth of work! I mentioned to Stephanie that $25,000 was practically a year’s pay at the nursing home and that I was only paid $5,000 for Penthouse .

“Um, Penthouse ?” said Stephanie as she took the contract away. “You can’t be in Playboy if you are in Penthouse . That’s how it goes. Sorry.”

I quickly got on the phone with Suze and tried to stop the Penthouse spread, but it was too late. The Penthouse spread was a done deal and I was fucked. I walked out of Playboy ’s offices in tears and cried myself to sleep that night. It wasn’t until years later when I became a famous porn star that I would have my shot at Playboy again. And that time, I ended up on the cover of Penthouse and Playboy within a month of each other, becoming the only girl in history who has ever done that. So, all’s well that ends well. But that day in Playboy ’s Santa Monica studio, I felt like someone just punched me in the stomach.

I decided to suck it up. It wasn’t a total loss. I mean, Penthouse was a huge magazine too. And Suze Randall told me there was more where that came from. She said, “I’ll put you in every nude magazine out there.” So, that’s what I did. I became a nude model, and I was Suze’s muse.

Within my first year of nude modeling for magazines like Penthouse , Hustler , High Society , Club , and Cheri , I got a phone call from a man named Andrew Blake. He’s a very artistic filmmaker who makes beautiful fetish and softcore erotica movies. To this day, he’s considered the most artistic director of adult films. His first film, Night Trips in 1989, was given a silver medal at the WorldFest-Houston International Film Festival, making it the only porn movie to win a medal at a major international film festival. If you wanted to make a beautiful film, Andrew Blake was the man to work with.

Needless to say, when Andrew called, I freaked out. He told me, “I have seen your work in all the magazines and I’m interested in filming you in one of my movies.”

I was so flattered that he knew my work that I didn’t hesitate. “OK,” I immediately replied.

“Are you sure?” he asked. He must have been shocked at how easy it was for me to say yes.

I’d never really thought about doing movies before, but the idea instantly appealed to me. Right then and there, I was ready to make the leap. I told him, “Yeah, I’m ready to do something different. I’m ready to live out some of my fantasies. I’m in.”

And that was the truth about why I wanted to do porn. It really was all about the sex for me, and about acting out my sexual fantasies. Unlike so many girls in the industry, I got into porn for the right reasons.

Yes, there are right reasons and wrong reasons to get into porn.

THE RIGHT REASONS TO GET INTO PORN:

• You love sex and are turned on by doing it in front of a camera.

• You’re a free spirit.

• You don’t give a fuck what other people think about you.

• You love the money.

• You feel empowered, not degraded.

THE WRONG REASONS TO GET INTO PORN:

• Your boyfriend made you do it.

• Daddy didn’t love you enough.

• You have to support a drug habit.

• You need the money.

• You want to get into Hollywood. (Ladies, porn is not , I repeat not , the gateway to Hollywood!)

When Andrew told me that my part in the film Aroused would be glamorous girl-girl scenes, it sounded like the perfect opportunity to see if film work was for me. I told him right away that I was OK with having my pussy licked by a girl, but I didn’t want to lick pussy. I didn’t really know how to negotiate, but I knew enough to tell him what I would and wouldn’t do in a film. I never let anyone talk me into anything I wasn’t comfortable with. This film was like dipping my toe into a pool to test the water.

I went down to the Aroused set, which was at a beautiful mansion up on Cielo Drive off of Benedict Canyon in Beverly Hills. I was excited because Cielo Drive was also where the Tate Murder House was, which was where Charles Manson and his followers killed actress Sharon Tate and her friends. I was still obsessed with serial killers like I was when I was a young girl. I had read all about the Manson murders in Helter Skelter and now I was actually going to be able to see the house where the madness occurred. It didn’t look as creepy as I thought it would on the outside; just your typical Beverly Hills ranch house.