When nine o’clock rolled around, Piper looked at her watch. “We should get going. The guys will be going on stage soon.”

I found Bridget to say goodbye.

“Have a good time.” She smiled and then raised a perfectly arched eyebrow. “But don’t touch anything. Even the walls will get you pregnant.”

* * * * *

The music was so loud I could barely hear myself think. Everything about the place was a warning to stay away. Set off an alley we passed a fat bouncer and climbed a grimy staircase leading up to the darkened club.

Before going in I heard the violent thud of live music and powerful male vocals. I hesitated but Piper grabbed my wrist and pulled me through the doorway, into the unknown. Immediately, two scantily clad girls pushed passed us, giggling and squealing something about the singer on stage.

It took me a moment to focus my eyes and ears in the darkness. I looked across the smoky room to the stage where the band were performing and recognized him immediately. Jean clad and with motorcycle boots, that magnificently muscular and tattooed body was moving amidst a glow of blue and white light. For a moment I couldn’t move. The sight was mesmerizing. He moved from one side of the stage to the other where he rested a booted foot on an amp and belted out such a powerful note that goosebumps tickled my skin.

Piper bounced about with excitement and tugged at my arm.

“There they are,” she cried, clutching me close to her. “Look at Jesse, isn’t he gorgeous?”

She squeezed my hand and squealed again. It was a noise that would be annoying from anyone but her. Somehow she made it sound adorable.

I nodded and grinned. Her boyfriend was the rhythm guitarist with curly blonde hair. But my eyes fell back to the guy in command of the microphone. I didn’t want to admit it, but he kind of had me spellbound as he performed on that stage in front of a club of adoring fans.

Piper gave me a quick run-down on the band. “That’s Armie on lead guitar; Tommy on bass, Zack on drums … and that’s Heath singing.”

Heath.

The club was full. Everywhere I turned I saw girls dressed in tight clothing. Everyone seemed drunk or well on their way and I felt immediately intimidated and out of place. Perhaps coming here wasn’t such a good idea. Since arriving from Savannah a few hours earlier I hadn’t had a chance to change and my knee length dress and cashmere cardigan fit in here as much as my grandma at a rave party. But Piper had me firmly by the wrist and pulled me deeper into the swarming crowd towards the stage.

I didn’t recognize the song but everyone reacted to it like it was some kind of anthem. The beat was slow. Seductive. Heath’s voice was hoarse and powerful. The words were raw and sexual; a promise of what was to come.

Feeling it rise, like a cool hand on your thigh,

It’s hard in the dark; yeah it’s me you despise

Cos you know I’m gonna make you scream

Go ahead hate me; I’m gonna make you say my name

This is my seductive game

Put together, the mix was intoxicatingly potent. Heath was fucking each and every woman there with every sexually saturated word. On stage he held them captive with his powerful vocal style and sexy smile. His magnetic stage presence made it hard to look away. The way he looked. The way he moved. The way he strode across the stage and stepped onto the amps, standing luminous in the bluish-white light, looking like a god. His big boots. His jean clad legs. The glint of his belt buckle as it moved with the phallic rhythm of his hips moving to the music. It was hard to look away.

Every now and then his shirt would rise up and the light would find his perfectly chiseled belly. Each time, women would scream. Or just stare with rampant desire. Others shot him invitations with their eyes or via the not so subtle gyrations of their bodies.

I tried to look away, but damn it if he hadn’t already sucked me in. Aviators covered his eyes but I could feel them on me and my body reacted with violent longing, surprising the hell out of me. His raspy voice had detonated something inside of me, unfurling it with every word until I began to throb with the beat of the music. Spellbound, I watched as his arm extended forward as he pointed at me.

Right.

At.

Me.

The seduction had begun. With every word he sang. And it terrified and excited me all at once.

I reached for the string of pearls around my neck. His words stripped me bare and I felt naked, standing in front of him, waiting, anticipating, needing him to finish me off with every seductive word falling from his lips.

This wasn’t like me. It wasn’t like me at all. But I’d never seen anything like this back in Savannah.

Swallowing hard, I peeled my eyes off him to glance around me. Epic was a large club, packed wall to wall with the band’s growing fan base, and you’d have to be blind to not notice that every single woman there was in love with Heath.

To the left of the stage a stunning blonde, in a tight black dress and boots, stood out in all her glamour blondeness. She focused in on Heath as she moved her hips slowly to the music despite its tempo. Her lithe figure flowed like silk beneath the black dress. She was trying to catch Heath’s attention but he was still singing to me. True, I couldn’t see his eyes. But I could feel them on me like a pair of large, caressing hands as he sang:

Yes you. By the time this night is through.

By the first rays of the morning sun.

I’m going to make you come undone.

Oh.

My.

God.

I bit my lip. I’d never experienced this before and was utterly spellbound. Which was ridiculous because I was hardly your typical groupie. I was a good Southern girl, church going and well-behaved. Okay, maybe not church going. And perhaps not always so well-behaved thanks to my inner bad girl. But I was Southern.

To break the spell I looked away and cast my eye around the room. The crowd had separated me from Piper, and she had vanished into the hordes of people that were moving and pushing like a living entity around me. I was in the middle of the action and it was getting more and more frenetic, and aggressive.

After an elbow to the ribs amidst the violent jostling, I decided to escape the crowd. I turned and struggled towards the other side of the room where there was space to breathe. But as I went I was pushed and pulled in different directions like I was moving with a tricky tide.

My only escape was to head towards the door. Swimming with the rip, I finally made it towards the back of the room.

I hadn’t heard the vocals stop.

The first moment I knew something was amiss was the hand on my arm as it swung me around.

And there he was.

The god from the stage, standing before me, his beautiful god-like face looking even more beautiful close up.

He had parted the crowd to get to me like a modern day Moses parting the Red Sea.

Wait? To get to me?

The band was still playing but everyone—and I mean everyone—was looking at me.

“You can’t leave,” he said in a deep and amazing, hoarse voice.

My ability for speech had abandoned me. I knew I was staring at him like a fool and I had to tell myself to close my mouth.

Say something.

Anything.

“Okay,” I managed to breathe.

He smiled and it devastated me. A dimple appeared either side of his glorious mouth. He lifted his aviators so I could see bright blue eyes staring back at me.

“I’m not going back on stage unless you stay,” he said with a grin.

He was wildly cocky, in an annoying yet charming way. And somehow it snapped me out of the spell.

I raised a brow in a very Scarlet O’Hara-ish kind of way. “Is that right?”

He grinned harder. “If you leave, I will be forced to abandon this gig and chase after you.”