Tera Patrick - Sinner Takes All

Evan’s first mission was to get me on the cover of a major mainstream magazine. Evan set his sights on FHM. It was hip and known for its sexy covers and classy spreads. He worked those FHM editors for months, letting them know what I was up to and dragging me out to every FHM party so I could network with the magazine and be seen on their red carpets. Finally, one day we got the call. They wanted to shoot me. But at first, I thought it was just another one- or two-page feature. I had no idea it would be for the cover and that I would be the only porn star to ever grace the cover of FHM! That was a huge deal.

I shot the FHM cover on January 30, 2006, at Quixote Studios in Studio City. What a way to kick off the year. About a month after the shoot, Evan got the call from the editor at FHM who told him, “Guess what? It’s going to be our July cover.” When Evan told me, I couldn’t believe it. He said FHM felt that the photos were just too good not to use—I’d have the cover plus an eight-page spread in the magazine. I went to bed that night with the biggest smile on my face and gave my husband the sex of his life as a thank-you. The FHM cover and the Playboy cover from 2002 are the two proudest moments of my career.

Even though Evan and I proved that I could be successful in life after Digital Playground, landing this cover really nailed it for me. Every little bit of mainstream success I would get, I thought of it as a big “fuck-you” to Digital, and that felt good. It further proved that I could do it on my own, and that was the best feeling ever.

I couldn’t believe how many people came out for my signings of the cover, which had the headline THE POWER OF TERA, at the Virgin Megastore in Times Square on June 19 and the Virgin Megastore at Hollywood and Highland in L.A. the next day. I’d done many signings at porn conventions and adult video stores, but I had never done a mainstream store like Virgin and wasn’t quite sure what to expect. My fans didn’t disappoint, coming out by the hundreds. To my surprise, there were a lot of fans there who didn’t know me from porn, they just knew this cover and came out for that. The FHM cover was the crossover moment of my career and really put me on the mainstream map. I ended up on their Sexiest Women in the World list that year (number 57, not bad for a porn chick!).

That one cover brought a new level of recognition, and with that my fears and anxiety increased. I didn’t feel safe doing everyday things, like shopping or getting gas, by myself. It was probably one part paranoia, one part reality. One day I was grocery shopping in my neighborhood and a guy was following me around the store. He kept his distance and didn’t make contact with me, but he was definitely following me. I left that store and went to another one and he showed up there as well. That really scared me. I’d have to call Evan to rescue me sometimes because I didn’t feel safe driving home by myself and risking this guy finding out where I lived So, Evan would sometimes come out to get me or tell me to drive around a bit to make sure no one was actually following me.

The upside, of course, was that lots of new doors were opening for me. I did a ton of mainstream TV, including E! True Hollywood Story: Rock Star Wives, VH1’s Top 40 Hottest Rockstar Girlfriends and Wives, WE’s The Secret Lives of Women, A&E’s Mindfreak, Spike TV’s Guys Choice Awards, and HBO’s porn documentary Thinking XXX, and I hosted the AVN Awards in its most pivotal year—2008, the year it finally crossed over to the mainstream by airing on Show-time for the first time.

Also in 2006 we appeared on VH1’s show SuperGroup, which featured a bunch of musicians getting together to form a band, write a song, and play a show. Evan was invited to participate, along with such legends as Jason Bonham and Ted Nugent; one of my favorite singers ever, Sebastian Bach of Skid Row; as well as Scott Ian from Anthrax, which was the closest in genre to Evan’s band, Biohazard. The show shot for about two weeks at an extravagant mansion in Las Vegas.

One week the wives were invited, and Scott’s wife (and Meat Loaf’s daughter), Pearl, greeted me with a big hello. I gave her an even bigger hug, and the two of us became close pals. Pearl’s a very touchy-feely, huggy, warm-spirited girl, who would always greet Evan and me with a sweet kiss on the lips. We didn’t think anything of it, of course, until one night Pearl was a little buzzed and said to me, “Scott doesn’t want me to have sex with you.”

I just thought to myself, “Hmmm. Why on Earth would she say that?” At the time I was really confused and thought, well, I guess everyone thinks that since I’m a porn star that I’m out to fuck them. Pearl and I are good friends; I respect her a lot as a woman for all she’s accomplished, and not only do I think she is beautiful and talented, but she and Scott have been good friends and supporters of me.

When it came to Sebastian and his wife, Maria, though, things steamed up big-time. Sebastian and I hit it off immediately over our shared love of smoking weed. He caught me trying to roll a joint one day and laughed at my poor form. “Here, let me show you how to do that right,” he said, as he took the rolling paper and some weed and rolled the perfect joint. I was a huge ’80s rock fan when I was a teen and drooled over Sebastian’s photos in rock magazines, so I felt like a schoolgirl every time we hung out. Sebastian was so funny about smoking. He didn’t care if the VH1 cameras caught him; he only cared if Ted Nugent caught him. I think he looked up to Ted like a father figure because his own dad had passed away. He would get really paranoid of Ted finding out. (I guess now he’ll know. Sorry, Sebastian.)

Sebastian’s wife, Maria, was super hot, and there was a lot of innocent sexual energy between Evan and me and Sebastian and Maria. We decided to do something about all that energy. Not a foursome, though we came close! Instead, we decided to do a very sexy photo shoot of Maria and me for our husbands. It was our little treat for them. One of Evan’s many talents is his photographic work, and over the years, he’s photographed me many times. So he grabbed his photo equipment, even found someone to be his photo assistant, and set up a sizzling shoot in the room we were staying in. We had the best room in the house. It was a round room with hand-painted dragons on the walls, a round bed in the center, and a badass custom motorcycle for adornment… perfect for a photo shoot.

Sebastian was hilarious during the shoot. He kept making these noises because he was so excited to see his wife half-naked with another woman. But at the same time, he couldn’t stop directing her and it seemed to make her nervous. I’ll never forget when Maria laid me back on the bike and we were face to face. If it weren’t for Sebastian and his big mouth interrupting the moment, who knows what would’ve happened. Well, I know what would’ve happened.

It wasn’t all sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll during SuperGroup, though. Evan and I had our romantic moments too. One night, Evan told me to be ready in twenty minutes because the show’s limo would be taking us somewhere. We really abused our limo privileges during that shoot. I assumed we were going to dinner or a strip club, as per usual. But instead, we pulled up to a wedding chapel, and the second I saw the chapel sign, I started to cry.

“Again?” I said to Evan, being that this would be the third time we renewed our vows.

“Yep, again,” he said.

Our theory on getting married over and over again was this: You don’t go to the gym just once and stay fit for life. So, why commit yourself to each other just once in your life? Renewing our vows and recommitting ourselves to each other is like maintenance for our marriage. It’s constant work and needs constant reaffirmations. So, we said our “I Do’s” in front of an Elvis Presley impersonator and the VH1 crew, and I felt giddy like a new bride all over again. We hopped back in the limo, closed the partition, and made love like newlyweds once again.