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Pres leaned into the mic, his heart slamming against his chest. “We’re gonna take a twenty minute break. Go buy some beer, kiss your girl, do whatever you can do in twenty minutes. Then come back, because we have more songs for you.”
He flicked off his microphone and pulled his guitar over his head. Sweat was dripping off him and he had to grab a towel to dry his face.
“Fucking A,” Alex said. “We’ve got them in the palm of our hands.” His eyes were bright. Maybe too bright. Alex had been known in the past for using drugs to get him going. Pres hoped to God he wasn’t now.
That’s not what he wanted the band to be known for. He had a kid to think of.
Marley grinned at him as he climbed down from the drum set. “You were amazing.”
“Cassie was the one that carried us,” he murmured, looking over at the keyboard. But she wasn’t there.
He frowned.
“We need to record ‘Beautiful Liar’,” Alex said. “Put it up on YouTube or something. It was fucking electric. Did you see the crowd?”
“It’s a second song,” Pres murmured, and Marley laughed.
“But what a fucking second song.”
He looked over at the keyboard again. Then across the stage. There was no sign of her. “Where did Cassie go?”
Marley followed the line of his gaze. “I don’t know. She okay?”
Pres wasn’t sure, that was the truth of it. Something happened while they were singing. He wasn’t sure what it was. And he wasn’t sure he could put it into words even if he knew. But it was there and it was in him.
Like electricity, you couldn’t see it or taste it. But damn, it was powerful.
“I think she went outside,” Alex said. “Through the back.” He inclined his head at the emergency exit to the right of the stage. “Want me to go get her?”
“No.” Pres said it a little too fast. Alex blinked. “I’ll get her. Maybe she messed up a vocal or something. I can talk her through it.”
“She didn’t mess anything up,” Marley said.
And no, she didn’t. But he needed an excuse and that was it. “I’ll be back in a minute. Can you grab me a soda or something?”
“They have non alcoholic beer,” Marley told him.
“Then that’ll work.”
He put his guitar against the stand and walked to the edge of the stage, jumping down onto the floor. It took him a couple of minutes to make it outside, mostly thanks to fans and friends wanting to tell him how good they’d sounded, and how much they’d missed the band.
When he pushed the emergency door open a little alarm sounded, but he ignored it, stepping out into the sultry night. There’d been no rain since the last storm they’d had, and the ground beneath him was dusty and dry. He looked around, taking in the few smokers and the late arrivals, before stalking around the corner to the back of the bar.
And there she was.
Leaning against the brick wall of the building, her head lifted as she stared up at the moon. The light of it caught her face, illuminating her profile so that she looked almost other-worldly.
She was wearing a pair of cut off shorts and a black Fleetwood Mac tank, that she’d knotted at the front. Her hair was long and wavy, tumbling down over her shoulders.
He wanted her like he’d never wanted anything else.
And yeah, he knew it was the effects of the performance. It was a drug like no other – he’d forgotten how potent it was.
But his body didn’t care. It needed what it needed.
His jaw was tight as he walked into her view.
Her lips parted as she saw him. Her gaze was as foggy as his. Yeah, she had the high, too.
