Page 28 of Worth Your Wild

When it’s time for our duet, I walk out on stage, and it’s a vastly different experience this time. At the last show, they were disappointed. This time, they chant my name and stomp their feet with such ferocity, my fight-or-flight instinct kicks in. I almost book it off the stage to go hide in the safety of the dressing room, but when my gaze latches on Deke’s, the nerves recede and there is only him.

Maybe Deke watching me face my fears will inspire him to face his own.

It’s wishful thinking that I could join the tour and say the magic words to fix Deke Decker, but a girl can dream, can’t she? And honestly, I don’t think he needs much fixing to begin with. To me, he’s incredible exactly how he is. What he needs is some healing.

“Hey, June Bug,” he rasps into the microphone.

To my ears alone, it sounds like an apology.

I accept it with a small smile.

“Hey, Deke,” I say, lifting onto my toes to say into the mic.

The crowd screams in response.

“These people want to hear ‘Sweet Venom,’” he says in that deep drawl. “You reckon we should give them what they want?”

“Guess we ought to. They paid the admission.”

We’ve been gravitating toward one another while speaking and now, we’re close enough for the brim of his cowboy hat to brush my hairline. Our argument lingers in his eyes, but there is yearning in their depths, too, and I’m sure it matches mine. It’s not an act for the audience. It’s real. It’s my dream come true, but it’s better than any fantasy, because I can smell him, feel his breath when he sings the opening notes to the song. There’s whiskey in the air between us, and I know he’s been drinking since our fight. My body is sore from the last two days of making love with Deke Decker and I know that’s a plight I want to endure for the rest of my life.

I must be telling him all of that with my eyes, because he goes off key at the end of the verse, his throat shifting with a heavy swallow. He stares at my lips while I sing my line, his fingers strumming with added insistence on the strings of the guitar. I respond to that forcefulness involuntarily by batting my eyelashes and swaying my hips. An invitation.

The invitation is more than sexual, though.

It’s an invitation to keep me.

This doesn’t have to end.

Be my boyfriend. Be my man.

“Sweet Venom” ends and the crowd releases their deafening approval while Deke stares down at me, his eyes narrowed beneath the brim of his hat. The longer we go on looking at one another, the air rife with longing, the louder the audience cheers. Finally, when our moment has stretched too long, I force myself to turn on a heel and leave the stage, waving as I go⁠—

Deke strums the opening chords to Worth Your Wild.

A ripple of shock goes through the crowd. Exclamations of disbelief and joy.

My heart launches into my mouth and I turn, just outside the spotlight, to find Deke’s hand hesitating on the body of the guitar, his body riddled with tension. It’s clear that he’s not sure about continuing, but his conflicted gaze ticks up to mine and I nod.

When he strums the next series of chords, he keeps going.

He keeps going.

Then, into the microphone, he drawls, “Darling, dance a little closer, tell me what it takes to be worth your wild…”

I can barely hear his voice, everyone is singing along so loudly.

A brief sweep of the audience reveals faces covered in tears or smiles. Both.

But Deke looks at me while he sings the song that made him a household name. Every backstage hand and roadie flanks me in the wing, in awe of what they’re witnessing. For the first time in almost a decade, Deke Decker is singing his most beloved song. It’s about halfway through the second verse when his posture relaxes and he winks at me.

That’s when I realize I’m in love with him.

I’ve always been in love with him. But I loved a one-dimensional hero on a poster.

Somehow, almost overnight, I’ve fallen for the real man.

The stubborn one who makes mistakes and drinks too much. I love him.