“We’re just going to take a look around and then head to the stage, if that’s all right with you.”
“Anything you want.” She slips her card into the front pocket of his jeans. Into the front pocket of his jeans. Really? “My cell is on the back. Call me if you need anything.”
Flynn nods.
I wait until she’s out of earshot. Barely. “Could she be any more obvious?”
“What do you mean?”
“Don’t play coy with me, Mr. Beckham. That woman practically threw herself at you.”
“Oh. That.”
“Yes. That. You make it sound so commonplace.”
Flynn shrugs.
“Oh. My. God. Seriously?”
“What?”
“That’s how women react around you?”
“Sometimes.” He looks down, almost a little embarrassed about it.
“It’s like having free room service at your fingertips.”
Flynn’s brows draw together.
“You know. You can whip out your phone when the mood strikes and pick whatever you want from the menu.”
Holding out his hand to me, a charismatic smile adorning his ridiculously handsome face, he shrugs. “Problem is, I’m in the mood for something that’s not on the menu.”
I roll my eyes and shake my head, but it’s really to cover the flutter in my belly. Then, hand in hand, together we tour the stadium.
An hour later Flynn is up on stage and I’m sitting in the first row. “Why do I need to be up here while you’re down there?”
“So I can see you in action.”
“You wanna see me in action?” He wiggles his eyebrows.
I smile. “It’s like when you run on a treadmill, you don’t run naturally…your feet have to fit the limited space that you have to run, so it changes your stride. When I watched you in the studio, it was different than watching you on stage. Performing in a real live setting will allow your natural habits to show through better.”
“Do you have any requests?” he teases.
“Just sing something that comes easily. What’s the most popular song you sang when you were on tour with In Like Flynn?”
“‘Back on Top.’”
“Okay, sing that.”
The song is one of his band’s slower ones, but it’s actually a perfect display of everything I need to see—range, reach, falsetto, reverb, movement. His voice is expressive, deep and rich at some points, with a flawless transition into the falsetto that makes women go crazy. He sings about being broken, climbing back to the top after falling hard. His delivery is so convincing, I find myself mesmerized by the story he’s telling, really listening to the lyrics when I should be watching him with a clinician’s eye.
As the song comes to a close, I softly sing along to the final chorus. “Wow. That was…incredible. You showed your feelings rather than singing about them. I felt everything you gave.”
“Thank you,” he says, with a modest smile this time. It’s absolutely endearing that he still hasn’t gotten used to praise.
“You’re going to steal the show.” The words leave my mouth before I think about them. Before I think who it is he’d be stealing the show from.
“Not sure that would go over well.”
I’m positive it wouldn’t. In fact, after watching his performance, it makes me a bit nervous. Linc is a good singer, his voice complements Dylan’s well. But that’s what it does, it complements. It doesn’t compete with. Flynn’s voice…it might just give Dylan a run for his money on stage.
“Come up here and sing one with me,” Flynn says, surprising me.
I shake my head.
“Come on. It’s just us. No one will see. We’ll take off our shoes and everything.”
I force a smile. “Thanks. But it will take a lot more than that to get my ass on that stage.”
“I’m willing to take off more than my shoes if it helps.”
“You’re so dedicated to the cause.”
“Hey. I’m all in for you, baby.” He winks.
“Thanks. I appreciate it. I really do. But…”
Flynn walks to the end of the stage and sits on the edge, his long, lanky legs hang almost to the floor. “Come here.”
I hold his stare for a moment before rising from my front-row seat and walking to him. He reaches out to offer me his hand. I take it without hesitation and he weaves our fingers together.
“This stage is just higher off the ground. It’s no different than the one you sang on at Lucky’s.”
“It’s step six. I’m only up to step five.”
Flynn’s face expresses I’ve lost him…understandably.
“My therapist and I made a twelve-step-ish program to try and get me back on stage. It’s not actually twelve steps…but you get the idea. One foot in front of the other on the road to recovery. Step four was singing in front of three people at Lucky’s.”
“There were more than three people there.”
“I know.” I smile
“So you kicked step four’s ass. Just take a flying leap over step five and land on step six.”
“I’m moving along. I’m just doing it at my own pace.”
“How long have you been working on the list?”
When I say it aloud, it sounds even more ridiculous. “Two years.”
Flynn smiles. “Two years? Moving at your own pace? What are you, a turtle?”
I laugh. “It sounds worse than it is.”
“I’m sure it does,” he says, not believing a word of it. “Come on. Let’s do it. I’ll carry you up here. You won’t even have to walk the steps.”
“Tomorrow,” I blurt out, nervous that he might hop down from the stage and actually carry me up there.
Flynn squints. “Tomorrow, huh?”
I nod my head.
“All right. But I’m holding you to it.”
We work for two more hours at the arena. I notice that he isn’t arching the soft palate as much as he should, which is limiting his throat space and causing him to strain a bit when he moves into his falsetto. A few other minor posture corrections could also help reduce the tension on his cords and minimize the chances of reinjuring his voice. He’s only singing lead on two songs, but the two songs are challenging for any voice to perform without strain, no less one coming off an injury.
We make plans to return early tomorrow to practice the techniques I suggested so he’ll have a few hours of rest before his debut show tomorrow night. As seems to have become a running theme with us, as soon as the band arrives at the arena, Flynn and I slip back into being distant friends. At this point, it’s easier to ignore each other than it is to hide our obvious attraction. But it makes me wonder how long we can continue to ignore the obvious.
Chapter Fifteen
Lucky—
Eight years earlier,
age seventeen
“Are you nervous?” Avery is lying belly-down, diagonally across my bed, her legs kicking as she talks.
“Not really.” I shrug.
“How many people will be in the audience?”
“I’m not sure. A lot. My mom doesn’t play small places.” I’ve never been to Town Hall, but I know it holds well over a thousand people. Mom thought it would be a good venue for my debut as her opening act. Opening act. Me. In three hours, I’m going to be on stage in front of a shitload of people living my dream. I still can’t believe my dad is letting me go on tour with Mom. When I mentioned it to him more than a year ago, he was initially dead set against it. He wanted me to go to college, have something solid to fall back on, before trying my hand at a career that isn’t an easy one. But somehow Mom and I changed his mind. Now, two weeks after my high school graduation, and one week from my eighteenth birthday, I’m getting ready for my first night as one of two opening acts for Iris Nicks.