And while the stage falls silent, the crowd yells the last line again and again and again. They don’t want to let go.

From the back, Ian counts down from five, four, three, two. On one, we pick up the bridge again. The crowd screams in glee. Hands go up, bodies start jumping. Hair is swung around. Davis wraps one hand around the pole of the mic stand, one hand fisted around the mic itself, and then leans over the edge of the stage, dripping his sweat onto the front row.

Hands reach out to grab his jeans. He steadies himself, singing about how much he wants his girl’s sweet taste on his tongue, all over his body, all over him.

He’s getting laid tonight by at least one of those honeys, if not more. Hell, we all could. Even Rudd.

My fingers are sore, nearly cramping. When my dad was king of the scene, he always talked about how hard he’d get up here, looking out into the lust-filled faces of the girls who were so turned on by his music, they would strip down right in front of him and throw their clothes onto the stage.

This is what those old guys who sit at the top of my old man’s bar, Gatsby’s, reminisce about. It’s a high that can’t be re-created by any drug. No number of pills can light you up inside like this. And I should be enjoying the hell out of it, but I can’t take my eyes off Landry, who’s been chatting up some guy for the last thirty minutes.

Oh, she’s nodded her head a few times with the beat, but mostly she’s engaged in some intense conversation with a guy wearing one of those trendy-as-fuck man buns. He keeps taking it down and wrapping it back up. I’m going to tear it off, since it obviously bothers him so much.

The last note arrives, and Rob, the sound and light guy, douses the lights as we fall completely silent. Ian’s sticks are up. My palm’s flat on the strings. Davis is running a hand through his sweat-drenched hair. On stage, we’re silent, but the bar is rocking. It’s the crowd making the noise—screaming for us to play one more song, one more lyric, one more note.

The lights come up in the bar, signaling that our act is over. The crowd isn’t happy. They boo for a bit. Davis grins down from his elevated perch. Rudd joins him and the two spend a long moment looking over the crowd, no doubt deciding which one of the eager honeys they’re going to take back to the bus tonight.

A none-too-quiet shuffling sound offstage to the right grabs my attention. I look up to see Keith waiting impatiently for us to get our asses out of the way.

Ian spots the same thing and hops up from his seat. I drop my guitar into the stand and help Ian break down his kit. Even if Threat Alert’s drummer wouldn’t mind using Ian’s drum set, Ian would pimp out his sister and mother before anyone laid hands on his instruments. Musicians are like that. In all the years I’ve been around music, I’ve seen more fights break out over someone fingering the wrong guitar than someone fingering the wrong girl.

“You’re supposed to warm them up, not give them a full-blown orgasm,” Keith says as he toes his guitar case out of the way.

“They’re wet and ready, dude. That’s the best way to get a woman,” Rudd proclaims as he drags Davis offstage.

“I’m not a fan of sloppy seconds,” Keith’s bassist, Albie, grouches. He’s pissed that we played so well, because it means he’ll have to be on the top of his game to maintain the same crowd response. Albie wants to play well enough to get a few free drinks after the gig and make his girl’s pussy wet. He doesn’t love the music enough to be inspired by someone else’s play. Keith’s going nowhere with this guy, but that’s on Keith. Dude will have to figure it out for himself.

I set the bass drum by the door with the rest of Ian’s kit. Rudd flings open the door to see if Ian’s back from the bus with the cart. He’s not, so I lean against the wall and lift the bottom of my T-shirt to swipe the sweat off my forehead. Across from me, Albie’s pretty girlfriend runs into a mic stand. That boy is punching so far above his weight class, it’s a miracle he hasn’t torn a muscle. The way she’s eating up the glimpse of my abs, though, suggests that the minute he unstraps his guitar, she’ll be moving on. I drop my shirt and angle away from her.

“You ready, man?” Albie asks.

Keith adjusts the strap and shakes his head. “No. Give them a minute to come down off the high.” He leans toward me. “Don’t mind, Albie. He’s bitter cuz his girl followed him down here. He was hoping for the night off, if you know what I mean.”

Translation: Albie was hoping to get laid by some out-of-town strange, and his old lady is ruining it for him.

“That’s unfortunate.” For the girl, for him, for Keith’s band. He’ll need to get that sorted.

“He had his eye on Davis’s girl, I think.” Keith tips his head toward Davis, who’s peering out the back, yelling for Ian to get his ass inside.

“You mean his sister,” I correct sharply.

“Sister. Girl. Whatever,” Keith rolls his eyes. “She’s off-limits, right?”

“Right.” The possessive urge I felt from the first moment I laid eyes on Landry rises up. If she belongs to anyone, it’s me.

Chapter Thirteen

Landry

Threat Alert is good, but they’re not FMK. The crowd never gets as loud, never gets as hyped. They still have fun, though. A couple of Threat Alert’s girlfriends come to collect me again, and I end up a sweaty mess by the end of the night. After Threat Alert finishes its playlist, a DJ takes over.

Rudd’s stumbling around while Ian smokes something that’s not a cigarette in the booth I abandoned. Davis is in a deep conversation with a pretty blonde. She’s so close to him, she’s practically inside his T-shirt. I turn away from that scene, because there are things I don’t need to see, especially when they involve my brother.

My eyes scan the large venue for Adam, but I don’t find him. Even though I know I’m just having an affair with him in my head, I’m sad that he’s already replaced me with a real girl.

“We’re headed to the bus, dollface,” Rudd says. “It’s party time!” There’s a girl on either side of him. They all look lit.

“What about the party in here?”

Tags: Jen Frederick Woodlands Romance
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