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“You’re going to be fine. I’ll be right here with you.” I put my hands on her shoulders and speak into her eyes, trying to reassure her.
“But…”
“We got this.”
“But…”
“What’s step five, Lucky?”
“I have to write a letter?”
“Step five is a writing assignment?”
“Yes.”
“Well, let’s sit down. We can knock it out quick. We wrote three sonnets before our second cup of coffee.” I smile at her. “We’re a good team.”
“That gets you whatever you want normally, doesn’t it?”
“What?”
“The dimples. The smile. The…” She waves her hand up and down my body, frustrated. “The whole hot-guy package.”
“You think I’m hot?” I grin.
She rolls her eyes. “Can we get back to the point, please?”
“You mean a point other than you think I’m hot,” I tease.
“Seriously. That smile probably gets you laid all the time. But it is not getting me up on that stage.”
“Are you offering to have sex with me rather than go up on the stage?”
She blushes. “You’re in a mood today, aren’t you?”
“I’m always in the mood.”
She smacks my abs playfully and I grab her hand. “Seriously, Lucky. I want to help. If you really don’t want to get up there, I won’t push. But I think you want to. For some reason, I think you need to. And I think you need me to push. I get the feeling no one has pushed you for eight years and, you know what, everyone needs that someone who will be that person for them.”
Our gazes hold and I watch as her eyes soften. “Thank you,” she says.
“Anytime.” And, oddly, I really mean it. Any damn time.
She nods. “How about we work on your performance first. I want your voice to have as long of a rest as it can before you sing tonight.”
“Whatever you say, teach.”
She shakes her head and chuckles. “How about showing me what we talked about yesterday. Did you get a chance to practice?”
“I did.”
She squints, not believing me. But the truth is, I stood in front of the mirror and practiced singing the damn song with my mouth and neck in the position she wants me in. If only I’d put in this much effort in school. Then again, my teachers never looked like Lucky.
Gently push. It’s an odd saying. Can you really gently push someone? And does it even matter if you were gentle or not when the end result is the same? I pushed him over a cliff, so what that he went careening to his untimely death…it was a gentle push. I seriously doubt the last thing that goes through your mind before your brain is splattered all over the ground is, I forgive him, it was a gentle push. Yet here I am, pushing anyway.
“We can do this the easy way or the hard way. I’ll carry you up there. Although I can’t promise my hand won’t connect with your ass when your body is slung over my shoulder.”
Even though she smiles, I can see in her eyes that she’s terrified. She has the kind of eyes that betray her, showing everything she’s feeling even though her face attempts to tell a different story.
“I’m going, I’m going.” She looks like any second tears might come. I’m just about to tell her to forget it—gentle or not, I don’t want to be the cause of her splatter. But then she closes her eyes, takes a deep breath and walks toward the stairs on the left side of the stage. I take a seat front and center.
She climbs the stairs and stops on the side of the stage. At first, I think she’s steadying herself, taking a deep breath before the plunge. But then a minute passes, then two. I want to give her time, let her do it when she’s ready, but I know from personal experience that the longer you stand up there and think about what you’re about to do, the more the panic starts to set in.
Another minute passes. She’s just staring into space, but I get the feeling she can’t see whatever is in her line of view. She’s seeing something else. Remembering.
More time passes.
Nothing.
Whatever haunts her, I can’t let her face it alone.
Without saying a word, I walk to the stairs and climb them. I stand next to her and wait until she looks over at me. I wait until her eyes focus, really focus on mine, and I know she’s back in the moment. Then I offer her my hand. A sad smile attempts to hide her pain, but fails ruefully.
I take the first step and look back. Even though there is a pleading in her eyes, there’s also a question. An unspoken one. I nod and wait for her to take the step on her own before continuing. Ever so slowly, we walk to the center of the stage. Hand in hand, we stand there until she eventually turns and faces the empty seats in the massive auditorium. Her eyes focus on an area in the center of the first few rows.
The sound comes before the tears. It’s low, but gut-wrenchingly painful—an awful anguish-filled sob. It shreds a hole right through my heart. Whatever causes her pain, I want to slay it. I want to bear the pain for her.
And then everything she’s been holding back releases. Her body begins to shudder, tears stream from her eyes, and she loses it. “He died while I was on stage. I never even got to say good-bye.”
I catch her before she falls, wrapping my arms around her and hugging tight. Her body trembles against mine and my own tears burn in my throat as I hold them at bay. This cry has been kept contained for a long time. It isn’t a cry from a bad memory. It’s an avalanche of pent-up pain that has been building, waiting, needing to release. And it does. Shit, does it ever.
We stay that way for a long time. Until eventually every last sob has wracked its way through her body and I feel what amounts to a sigh of relief wash over her. Her tense limbs ease and she takes a deep breath before she pulls her head back and our silence is finally broken.
“Flynn,” she whispers, and I lean my forehead against hers and watch her eyes close. When they open again, something is different. Her eyes are still filled with emotion, but the sadness is replaced by need. Our gazes lock and both our breaths change, becoming more labored, more heated. My heart pounds in my chest, and it takes every bit of willpower in my body to not take what I so desperately want.
Her lips part and I think she’s about to say something, but then, suddenly, her mouth is on mine. Jesus Christ. My self-control goes out the window, chased out by desperation. Desperation to kiss her. Feel her. Consume her.
She may have started the kiss, but it takes less than a heartbeat for me to take over. One hand fists her hair, wrapping it snuggly around my fingers, while the other tightens around her back, pulling her even closer against me.
Our kiss deepens, tongues frantically find each other, but it’s the little moan that escapes her body and travels through our sealed lips that does me in. Resolve shattered, fire pulses through my veins, any fleeting uncertainty is forgotten by both of us. She reaches up, her fingers tugging at my hair. Her soft curves contour to fit my body. We grope, pull, scratch, tug—to get closer—to get more. Just more.
When we finally break the kiss, we’re both panting. My lips move over her neck, my ragged breath intensifies the rawness of my words when I speak. “I’ve wanted you since the minute I laid eyes on you,” I whisper into her ear. “God, I fucking want you.”
