Fade Into You (Shaken Dirty #3)(9)

“Because I’m about to let you in on a little secret,” Sam continued. “One nobody else in the whole world knows but the people in this club. Are you ready to hear it?”

The crowd murmured an assent, the sound starting low but swelling by the end. Wyatt could feel the electricity building in the air, could feel it running along his arms and the back of his neck. The crowd was waking up, looking around as if they knew something big was about to happen.

He closed his eyes, stretched out his neck, licked his lips. And tasted her on them.

Fuck. She tasted good.

He licked his lips again, savoring the taste of her even as he did his best to ignore the fact that his dick was rock hard and aching. Fuck Jared. If he’d waited five more minutes, Wyatt would have been buried balls deep in her as she made those strangled little sounds that drove him crazy. Fifteen minutes more, and they both would have been coming and he would have been thinking about that right now instead of how much he still wanted a fix.

“I asked, are you motherf*ckers ready to hear it?” Sam yelled into the mic. “Are. You. Ready?”

The crowd grew louder, shouts ringing through the small space, bouncing off the walls and the relatively low ceiling.

For a second, just a second, he regretted not getting her name. Or her number. They could have ended the night the way they’d started it off—with his tongue deep inside of her as she came and came and came all around him.

But that wasn’t what he was here for, he reminded himself as he tried to get his dick under control. To keep the demons at bay, he could f*ck himself raw after the set. But right now it was about the music. About the show. He’d screwed up enough to last a lifetime—he needed to make this gig count. Needed to show the others that he could still do the job they needed him to do.

“That’s what I’m talking about!” Sam screeched. “Now, get ready to scream, people, because the truth is, Fly by Night is just a cover name so tonight’s band could sneak in here under the radar and surprise you guys with the best f*cking show you’ve ever seen down here. Are you ready for that?”

The crowd got even louder, their screams echoing across the still empty stage and bouncing off the walls. The familiar nerves had his stomach clenching up.

“All right, then! Let me hear you as you help me welcome back to the stage for the first time in over two months, one of the greatest bands I’ve ever had the privilege of hearing live. Shaken Motherf*cking Dirty!”

For a few seconds that just might have been the longest of his life, the audience was completely silent. No cheering, no screaming, nothing. Just crickets. Just quiet. Nerves getting worse—this wasn’t how he’d expected news of their first show since the forced hiatus to be received—Wyatt exchanged glances with the other guys as he tried to figure out if the crowd’s silence was good or bad. From the look on his bandmates’ faces, he wasn’t the only one confused, wasn’t the only one nervous about how the night was going to go.

But then the crowd erupted. Screams rocked the club, people whistled and stomped and shouted their approval until it felt like the whole place was about to bust at the seams. Or go up in flames. Or both.

Wyatt grinned at the others as relief swept through him. Now that was more like it. Definitely the reaction he’d been waiting—and praying—for.

They all grinned back at him before Ryder threw back his head and laughed like a maniac. He punched a fist in the air, slammed his other hand down on first Jared’s back and then Quinn’s.

Jared laughed, too, yelling, “Let’s tear this motherf*cking place to the motherf*cking ground!”

“Hell, yeah!” Ryder shouted back just as loudly. Then he leaned over and pushed hard at Wyatt’s back, shoving him out into the spotlight before he knew what had hit him.

The audience gasped when they saw him, then started cheering and chanting his name. Flashes exploded as picture after picture was taken and he knew it was only a matter of minutes before his comeback was all over social media. The crowd’s enthusiasm was exactly the response he needed to ease the tension that had had a stranglehold of his chest for the past hour, exactly what he needed to get past the craving for a fix that never quite went away, and just focus on the music and the crowd and the joy of once again making music with his friends.

This was what was real, he reminded himself. This was what mattered. He was here to play the f*cking drums beside Quinn and Ryder and Jared. He was here to entertain the crowd. Everything else could wait.

With that thought beating in his brain like a metronome on high, he smiled out at the crowd. Shoved his hands in the air and waved as they went crazy. Then tossed out a couple of the extra drumsticks he always kept in his back pocket during a show, making sure they made it to different corners of the club.

The audience went wild for them, just like they always did. It made him relax just a little more, made this whole thing feel more familiar after two and a half months of being out of the loop. Which in turn had him grinning and tossing out a couple more sticks as a thank-you to the crowd for being so f*cking cool.

As the fans continued going nuts, he made his way toward his kit, securing his in-ears as he went. This was his shot to show the band he was worth the faith they’d put in him—his shot to show everyone that he wasn’t completely f*cked up beyond repair—and he was going to take it.

Just as he reached his drums at the back right of the stage, Ryder ran past him to take center stage.