I listen to Shiloh and she’s good, but the honest to fuck truth is, Shiloh has nothing on Lilah.
There’s a commercial break and the house lights come up. People all around us start chattering, but Lilah is still absorbing. She reaches for my hand again when they start cueing us to quiet down and the house lights lower.
The spotlight flashes to Spit and Polish, who says, “Here to sing her original song, ‘More Than Nothing,’ written by her best friend, Delilah Morgan, put your hands together for Shiloh Luck!”
I spin on Lilah as everyone rises to their feet and claps. She’s standing next to me with her hands pressed to her flushed cheeks, an overwhelmed kid at Christmas. “Did you know?”
She nods, and there’s a mix of terror and exhilaration in her eyes that makes them glow in the dim lighting. “She called me when they were deciding on songs and asked if I had anything fresh. I sent her the one I wrote for you and they loved it. I had to sign a release so they could use it.”
I smile and shake my head as her friend launches into the song I first heard Lilah sing from her perch on my barstool weeks ago. As I listen, I realize the song is about so much more than I first believed. It’s about breaking chains and not being afraid to live. It’s about making life count. And fuck me, that’s what this girl has done to me. All my fears about dying before I’ve lived, and missing out on something great—she’s the fix to all of it. Out of the blue, she showed up in my life and made it into more than the nothing it was before. She’s the thing I look forward to every morning. She’s the thing that gives my life color and flavor and amperage. She brings me to life.
I can’t stop staring at her as she jumps to the rhythm and sings along, oblivious to the furtive looks from people around us. And her voice does to me what it always does, wakes up the starving beast inside.
She speaks to me on every level, body, mind, and soul, and right now, they’re all in agreement.
Delilah Morgan owns me.
Chapter 20
Lilah
Lo is crushing it and everyone is on their feet. One second I’m rocking out and the next, the fat guy to my left bounces right into me. I go flying and I find myself in Bran’s arms. Pressed against his chest. His biceps ripple as his hands lock over my hips. He pulls me against him so we each have a knee between the other’s, and his gaze melts me as he starts so sway to the rhythm.
All of a sudden, I’m standing five inches from the sun. I feel every hard ridge of Bran’s ripped body pressed against me. I feel his hands glide to my ass and pull me tighter against his leg. And god, that leg. It’s steel between my thighs, rubbing on my most sensitive spot and forcing my breath to catch. I close my eyes and feel my breathing go ragged. And when my lips part in a gasp that’s swallowed by the pound of the music and the roar of the crowd as they woot for my best friend, Bran takes the invitation. His mouth closes over mine, insistent and unyielding, taking what he needs from me. And I give him that and more.
Our first kiss rocked my world. Our second knocked it off its axis. This one is going to blow it apart.
I claw at him, because there’s suddenly no way I can get close enough. His mouth on mine goes from desperate to ravenous and he grasps my ass harder. I grind myself against his leg and drop my head back and gasp again, louder this time, as I feel my world coming apart all around me.
He knows just how to play me and I realize I’m going to come right here in the middle of a crowded television studio with my best friend tearing the place down.
The song ends and the place erupts in applause, but I barely notice because I’m crying out for an entirely different reason. It occurs to me I’m going to hate myself in just about five minutes when I realize A) I missed most of Lo’s performance and B) All I care about right this second is fucking my sister’s…boyfriend? Or is he just a prospect? She told me she doesn’t love him. But she thinks she needs to provide me with stability, and Bran is her plan to do that.
All I know is that every time I catch him watching me play at the bar, despite my heart beating a little faster, I feel lightheaded. I can’t concentrate and my fingers sometimes forget what they’re supposed to be doing on the strings. I’ll blank on the lyrics to a song I’ve sung a thousand times.
I wrote the song Shiloh just sung because he made me feel like everything wasn’t shit. Looking forward to seeing him is what made my life “More than Nothing.” He messes with my head and twists my body into knots. He makes me feel electric with the slightest touch. I don’t know if that’s love, but I do know no one’s ever done those things to me before.
And sure as hell, no one’s ever made me come with their thigh pressed between my legs. But as I gasp out his name, sparks flash behind my closed eyelids.