Page 216 of Play Dirty (Brooklyn Dawn 1)

She nodded and stepped back, sliding onto her own stool like the true professional she was.

Would always be.

Tonight, she’d held this entire crowd transfixed. Now it was me who held them riveted.

Breathe. Think about her. Not yourself.

That made it easier. Looking into her depthless blue eyes, I could do anything. Be anything.

Even a man who wasn’t afraid to get on a stage and expose himself down to the marrow.

I sat on my stool with my guitar in my lap and gripped the microphone, tugging it closer. “Hi. Sorry to disrupt your concert. Just a brief interruption, folks. She’s been amazing tonight, hasn’t she?”

The place filled with screams and cheers.

I pulled the paper out of my pocket. It was now wrinkled and damp, the ink probably smeared.

As long as she got the message, I didn’t care.

“Once upon a time not so long ago, a very important person to me told me if something was too hard to say, I should write it down. So, I have. Hopefully, Lindsey will read what I’ve written. It’s short, I promise.” I offered her the paper, willing my hand not to shake.

If it did, I couldn’t tell, because hers quivered violently as she gripped my fingers. Not taking the paper. Just staring at me until the audience started to chant.

Read it.

Read it.

Read it.

She nodded and blew out a breath as she finally eased back and unfolded the paper. She scanned the words I’d written, then closed her eyes. “I can’t read this.”

“Yes, you can.”

When she didn’t move, I gently pried open her fingers and retrieved the paper. I cleared my throat and spoke into the microphone, hoping like hell my voice didn’t sound as gritty as it did to my own ears.

“A beautiful woman once asked me to sing with her. I said no. Hello, she would show me up in front of the whole world. I mean, the Lindsey York? C’mon.”

The crowd laughed and the tension in my shoulders ebbed away, little by little. Once this had been my milieu.

For her, I could do this.

“But that wasn’t why I said no. I haven’t been on a real stage for ten years. Not since the night I drank and took drugs and nearly killed myself and my best mate in a car crash. Some of you probably have heard that story, or the one that occurred more recently.”

The audience wasn’t laughing now. Deathly silence filled the venue.

“I didn’t deserve to sing anymore. I didn’t deserve light. I chose the dark and I stayed there, safe and alone where no one could see the decisions I’d made, etched on my body. And then I found the sun. She shone her light in every corner, giving me the courage to look around and see the life I’d made for myself. I didn’t want to reach for her. God knows, I didn’t deserve her. But she was the reason I found the strength to continue.” I set down my paper and my guitar on the floor and stood to undo my shirt, button by button.

My fingers weren’t shaking now. Nor were they damp. I was now filled with an unshakable resolve.

This was what was right.

Lindsey reached out to still my hand. “Alex, you don’t have to do this.”

“Yes, I do.” I finished with the buttons and shrugged my shirt to the floor. “Because I want them to see not just all of me, but that you’re part of me. The best part. The part that matters most.” I took her hand and placed it over my heart, but not before she took in the stark black outline of a sun tattoo, centered on my chest. “There will always be that devil on my shoulder, urging me back to the dark. But nothing could be stronger than your sun, and the love I have for you. It glows inside me, steady as a sunrise.” I lifted her hand to my lips. “I love you, Lindsey. Today, tomorrow, and always. And I’m so proud of you for living your dreams.”

Silently, tears rolled down her cheeks. “I love you so much.” She slid off her stool and moved to me, cupping my face in her hands as she met my mouth with her own. The salt on her lips burned mine, but then, I wasn’t sure if I could taste her tears or my own.

I gently nudged her back to her stool and picked up my guitar. There was one more thing on the paper, the lyrics to the song I knew my heart.

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