Take Me with You (Take Me #2)(48)

My heart thudded in my chest in time with the beat McAvoy thumped against the drums.

Then, Grant found me.

His smile was one of pure devotion. It was my smile—the one that had won me over, the one I would never stop loving.

“Leaguers!” Grant cheered into the microphone.

The building shook with the enthusiasm of the crowd’s screams, claps, and stomps.

“Thank you so f*cking much for being here tonight. We’re ContraBand! This is a special show for us. This kicks off our first ever tour with The Drift, who we’ll be meeting in New Orleans on Monday!”

I smiled and shook my head, imagining how much trouble the band could get into on Bourbon Street.

“You’ll always be our hometown, so we’re going to start tonight off with a song we wrote about getting the f*ck out of here!”

I laughed as the crowd went wild.

“This is ‘Hemorrhage.’”

The girls were already dancing around like crazy to the music we’d listened to hundreds of times. I knew every word to every song, but nothing compared to when the guys performed live.

Grant took over, captivating the crowd and drawing them in with his sexy, seductive voice and flirtatious glances. I’d once said he owned the stage, and it had never been truer than tonight.

The other guys were drawing on his mood and the crowd’s fervor. Vin rocked back and forth across the stage, raising his guitar high in the air. He jumped up onto one of the speakers and then crashed down onto his knees before sliding across the floor. The theatrics were ridiculous, but even I couldn’t keep from smiling at how much fun he was having.

Miller met Vin halfway across the stage, and they rocked out together. Miller’s backbeat blared the shuddering bass through the speakers.

During the bridge of the next song, McAvoy was so into the music that he stood and slammed his sticks down with more vigor than I’d ever seen.

After nearly an hour, all the guys were breathing heavily. Grant pointed his finger out into the audience, directly at me, and I stood there, stunned, wondering what he was about to do.

“This next song is a new one. When I wrote it, I was going crazy over this girl, and that has never changed. Now, I get to drive her crazy.” He winked. “This is ‘White Hot.’”

Oh my God, he actually winked at the crowd. He was talking about the song about us having sex to the entire room, and he’d just winked. My face flamed.

“God, he loves you,” Cheyenne said into my ear as the intro picked up. “It’s disgusting.”

I laughed because there was nothing else to do. Cheyenne glanced over at me and laughed, too.

The sexual lyrics clung to me as if Grant and I were all alone, doing all the cleverly crafted innuendos he was portraying. Our eyes met across the room, and desire rushed into me. I knew he was going to be singing this song all over the country to thousands of other women, but the look on his face said the only person he was going to be thinking about was me.

The last lines of “Life Raft” echoed across the room.

In that brief moment of silence at the end of the show, I tasted life. Then, the room erupted, the crowd cheering our names and scrambling forward to try to touch us while we were still onstage. It was manic and incredible. I knew then that there was nothing else I wanted to do with my life. It was about more than the chicks and booze and notoriety.

Music was born in me, begging to be released.

It was the music.

Always the f*cking music.

I placed my guitar on its stand and then followed the guys offstage.

“Damn, I’m going to miss that crowd,” McAvoy said. He retrieved a joint from his pocket and was lighting up. “Smoke?”

“Bro, yes,” I said, taking it from him.

“Can you believe we’re going to be in New Orleans in thirty-six hours?” Miller asked in disbelief. “I know we opened for The Drift on New Year’s, but this feels so much more…real.”

“Yeah, it f*cking does!” Vin clapped Miller on the back.

It was the most camaraderie I’d seen out of them since Vin found out that Miller and Sydney were f*cking. It was surprising, considering—as far as I knew—Miller and Sydney hadn’t stopped f*cking the entire time she was in town on her spring break.

“We’re going to be f*cking famous, and we’ll get so much f*cking *. Get the f*ck out of Jersey and f*cking make a name for ourselves. You heard them cheering, ‘ContraBand!’ That’s going to be in every f*cking city in the nation!”

“Getting a little ahead of yourself,” Miller muttered, “but I like the sentiment.”

“Positive thinking, bro. You think it. It’ll f*cking happen.”

I questioningly raised my eyebrows. “You listening to f*cking New Age shit?”

Vin flexed his muscles and looked as if he might deck me for even suggesting it. He opened his mouth to throw some lame-ass comeback at me when the backstage door burst open, and the girls filtered in. One for each of us.

Cheyenne bounced in, her flaming red hair announcing her entrance before she opened her big mouth. She didn’t even look at Vin. I hadn’t asked what the f*ck was going on between them, and I didn’t f*cking care as long as he stayed in this good of a mood.

Gabi and Shelby followed behind Cheyenne, both seeking out their respective guys. McAvoy immediately tugged Gabi down the hallway and into the back room. It would likely be occupied for a while. Shelby uncertainly walked up to Miller, which made me think she knew about Sydney. My f*cking cousin really was the root cause of all the problems in this band.