Page 75 of Knot Their Opening Act

“Fable on Fire! God, that’s cool as shit. How can I help you, mate?” asks Teddy.

“Well, you have a friend of ours DJing there tonight I believe, Tristan?”

“That’s right. Do you want to speak to him? He’s setting up.”

“No, no thank you. He’s actually not a friend. I used the term ironically. He’s the ex of our opener, Jez. And apparently your man there’s got a real inferiority complex with her, and has tried to fuck up her chances over the years. Well, she’s playing the Air Dome to a screaming crowd right now, and he’s in a small club—no offense—playing other peoples’ music.Ourmusic.”

“I see what you’re getting at,” Teddy says.

“I don’t want to ask anything of you, but I do want to invite you with VIP passes to our show in Bristol tomorrow night, for you and anyone you’d like to bring. Family, partner, kids, whoever. Not Tristan, if you don’t mind.”

“Holy shit. That’s amazing! Right, well, let me talk to me missus but I think we could both make it, and our teenage son would absolutely die of happiness. How do I get in touch?”

I get his details to pass on to Steve and tell him I need to go. I make it clear that he doesn’t need to change a thing about Tristan’s set there tonight. But I have fairly decent confidence in word getting round Bristol that Tristan is a backstabbing piece of shit and not to be trusted.

Now, just need to not forget to talk to Steve about our VIPs tomorrow.

As Jez and her band stride off the stage wearing the crowd’s excitement on their faces, the excitement for tonight and the days ahead rises up in me. Kai and Holden embrace her as we wait to go out, and then she looks around and spots me standing up in the corner. She beelines toward me.

This powerhouse of an artist, of an Omega, is coming straight for me. She grabs my hands, pulls back to look at me, then leans in and plants a kiss on my mouth.

“Everything turned around when your words came to my rescue. You made me feel like I could withstand whatever happens out there.”

I know byout thereshe doesn’t just mean the stage. And I’m floored. I give her a squeeze back as her citrusy floral scent of honeysuckle dares me to bury my lips in her neck and leave a hot trail down to her breast. But I merely smile and whisper, “We work best together, wouldn’t you say?”

She grins coyly and winks, then heads off to her green room. “Catch you guys later. Viv’s waiting.”

“Have fun.”

As I find the guitar tech preparing us for the opening song, part of me feels like a big bully, until I remember the things Jez said to me, on the way from the tour bus to our dressing rooms the other day.

He made me feel like I wasn’t a real Omega since I didn’t want a pack. I told him the idea made me feel suffocated. He said he was man enough, and even he seemed too much for me. If I couldn’t handle him then maybe I was some kind of defect. And yet he claimed to be an Alpha, despite never seeming to care about my security, my sense of contentment. My … orgasm.

She’d shrugged shyly at this and looked away. I’d nudged her gently as we’d walked inside the secured back door of the venue, and whispered,You can handle what you’re meant for, Jez.

She’d raised her head to quickly look me in the eye, then pressed her lips together in a smile.

* * *

After the show, we don’t see Jez. I don’t immediately feel there’s anything wrong with that—we were all up late, her friend Viv was backstage both before and after, and they undoubtedly had loads to catch up on. And on top of that, we’re headed to her hometown tomorrow, where her twat of an ex lives.

But even once we’re done packing it up for the night, we don’t see her atall.She and Viv and their mates must’ve left the venue immediately, because Holden got no reply when he called her hotel room, and none of us had her mobile. Thomas even mentioned going online to leave her an in-game message but Kai waved this off.

“She’s busy tonight.” Though I saw the hurt in his face. He’d expected to be invited into her room even for a minute to say hi to Viv. In fact, he’d mentioned more than once that she’d asked him to.

Something wasn’t right, but we were all exhausted, especially after last night, and then rehearsing the new song before tonight’s gig. Which went off better than any of us expected. The crowd loved the song, and the surprise addition of something brand new seemed to blow everyone’s minds. Ash and Steve were rapturous, pounding us on the backs and insisting we work it into regular rotation.

No one mentioned Jez, and I began to get a funny feeling that we’d made a huge, huge misstep. We’d done it as a surprise for her, after all, and there was no hint she’d even seen it performed.

As we sat in the green room well past the point of sense, since our hotel was five minutes away and the minibus was just there waiting to take us, Holden said it again. So pure, a simple fact, without any adornments.I love her.

Is it really that easy to admit, when it’s true? Maybe for someone like Holden, who doesn’t mince words. He doesn’t complicate shit like the rest of us do. But when he said it the first time, the other day, that’s when I realized it was true for me, too.

I hadn’t obsessed over her and her music sinceTen to Onelike he had. For me, it was the way she’d moved with such a confidence beyond her years. She knew all eyes were on her during her audition and her discussion with the judges afterwards. Don’t get me wrong; the fear was in there, like it would be naturally with anyone in such a position, chasing their dreams, laying their heart on the table to be held or stabbed.

But she fought the instinct to shrink, to look away, to quiet her voice or hunch her shoulders. She was all in that room, and all in her music. Believing in every note. She owned her art, and herself, and our attention. And she had again that day in Ash’s office.

The sting of our rejection of her has come back to me many times in recent days. What had happened in the studio afterwards was a horrible exchange of words I’ve tried to forget, where she truly believed we’d all talked the producers into passing on her because she was the only one on the show—of all British contestants—performing a country song. It was more indie folk than country, I’d argued, but that particular song was based solely on her love and respect for country music, as her father had been American and grown up in the Midwest. She’d listened to a lot of traditional country music and some modern country growing up, and while she was more folky-pop than anything, her country slant was unique, especially here.

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