I settle deeper into the chair and watch Tro. It’s the first time I think I’ve ever seen him totally sober out there, focusing on just the music. He always sounds incredible, but tonight, he’s on fire. His vocals are clear and perfect, even when he’s screaming out the lyrics.
I don’t realize he knows I’m still here until he takes a few steps my direction and looks directly at me. “What did you guys think of Lucky tonight? That girl’s something, huh?”
An appreciative roar goes up from the audience.
He comes closer and beacons me with a crook of his finger. “Come on out here, Lucky.”
My eyes go wide and my feet are suddenly lead. I shake my head.
“How’d you like a Lucky exclusive?” he asks the crowd. “Something no one’s ever heard before?”
The audience sends the roof off the stadium.
I feel like a rabbit, trapped in the headlights of an oncoming Lamborghini. It’s coming so fast that no matter what I do, it’s going to flatten me.
I glance at Grim and he strums his bass and gives me an annoyed look. Apparently he’s about as onboard with this detour as he was with “Happy Birthday” a few weeks ago.
“Go, Lo,” Lilah says from beside me and gives me a gentle shove.
I turn to look at her with pleading eyes. When I turn back to the stage, I find Tro right in front of me. He takes my hand and gently draws me to center stage. One of the roadies brings over a stool and sets it up in front of Tro’s mic and Tro helps me onto it.
And all I can think the entire time is, this is a huge mistake. He wants us to do a song we’ve never rehearsed. It’s basically a rock ballad—nothing like anything else in either of our set lists. The audience, who came here to hear Roadkill’s heavy rhythms and Tro’s angry lyrics, is going to totally turn on him.
On us.
But then he starts fingering out the notes on his guitar—his song, the one he wrote for me, and a desperate tickle starts deep in my chest. I don’t know what it means or exactly what I’m desperate for, but the sensation grows stronger with every note until I’m overwhelmed with need so intense that I feel like my heart is about to cave in.
Tro must have given Grim and Jamie a heads up, and the music, because they slide right in seamlessly. And when they come around to the beginning, I open my mouth and sing his words.
“I walk from what I’ve left behind
as if it has no hold.
As if the chains aren’t forged from steel
and welded to my soul.”
Out in the dark of the arena, one by one, lighters begin to glow in the air. By the end of the first verse, as far as I can see, arms are waving overhead to the slow beat. And when I glance at Tro, he’s watching me with a quiet intensity that sets off sparklers in my chest.
All of a sudden I can’t take my eyes off him. They trace the lines of his face as I sing, and when a light I’ve never seen there before begins to shine out of his eyes, like a reflection of the thousands of lighters out in the audience, it warms me to my core.
He’s not drunk. Or stoned. He’s right here with me, and despite the fifteen thousand onlookers, it feels like we’re all alone.
Emotion begin to choke off my voice, but I fight it because more than I’ve ever wanted anything, I want to do his song justice.
Chapter 13
Tro
She’s a fucking angel.
It’s cheesy as all fucking hell, but it’s what’s running though my mind the entire time I’m listening to her sing my words. She turns them into something bigger than what I wrote.
I want to keep her out here. Close.
But the song comes to an end, because that’s what they do, and she slips off the stool. For a moment, she holds my gaze, but then she’s gone, retreating to the wings.
I can’t keep my eyes off her for the rest of the set. I’m pretty sure this is the first time she’s stayed to hear us play. I know it’s probably because she’s got people here with her, but I can’t help hoping it’s at least partly because she’s feeling the same draw I am.
When we head to the dressing room to change between sets, Lucky stands as we pass and gives me a small smile.
And right then, with that gesture, Earth’s magnetic poles shift and up turns to down.
I fucking float into the dressing room, the whole time thinking about Lucky and me in the studio, recording that track.
Jamie rips his shirt off and beats his chest like a gorilla before tugging on a fresh T-shirt, but Grim’s uncharacteristically quiet.
“Everything cool, man?” I ask.
He looks hard at me. “I’m just not sure what the fuck we were doing out there at the beginning of that set.”
“Just wanted to try something new,” I say. “The crowd seemed into it, so I don’t get the problem.”
“I’m not saying it wasn’t good, man, but what the fuck’s going on with you and that little girl.” He tugs on a dry shirt. “I mean, if that’s your grand fucking gesture or whatever—”
“We gotta go,” I say, pulling on a shirt and heading to the door. Because it kinda was, but I’m not sure I’m ready to admit that yet.