Page 115 of When the Storm Breaks
“Am I worth fighting for?”
“If you have to ask, I’m thinking you’d better get naked.”
“And why’s that, Brody?”
“Because I obviously did a shit job of showing you that you’re worth fighting for.”
“And you need me naked for that?”
“Uh huh. I find that my words sink in better when I’m buried deep inside you.”
“How convenient.”
Chapter Thirty-Six
Brody
The week before Christmas,I flew to New York to see Shiloh. It was her last concert for this leg of the tour, and after this she had a six-week break before she hit the road with Acadian Storm. So she was spending the holidays with me.
“Holy shit,” Gideon said. He sounded impressed. Which was rare for him. But how could you not be impressed when you were watching Shiloh perform on a stage in Madison Square Garden?
It was the first time I’d ever sat in the audience for one of her concerts, and she’d hooked us up with floor seats. We were four rows from center stage, surrounded by her most avid fans. The view was different from here. When I’d watched her from backstage in London and Paris, I’d been impressed. In awe of her talent. But that feeling was amplified a thousand-fold when I was surrounded by twenty thousand screaming fans who knew every single word to every single song she performed.
“How in the hell did Brody McCallister end up with a rock star?” he mused, his eyes still on the stage, Shiloh holding his rapt attention just like every other person in this stadium.
“That’s the question for the ages. It’s a goddamn mystery.” I didn’t mention Shiloh’s belief that we were each other’s destiny. I didn’t tell him about her grandmother who had supposedly predicted that we would find each other. Gideon was too logical, too cold and cynical to believe in the mystical or unexplained phenomena.
When she finished the last song of her setlist, the lights went down, and she was gone. The crowd chanted for two minutes straight and I knew what would happen next. Time for an encore. That was all part of the show business of a rock concert. She always gave her fans more, never held back, and left it all on that stage no matter how exhausted she was or how much it strained her voice.
Tonight, though, when the lights came up again, she was sitting on a stool, cradling her acoustic guitar. She was dressed in black. Her skirt was short, her bustier was leather, and her stockings were fishnet. I didn’t have a fucking clue how she’d strutted across the stage in those sky-high heels of her ankle boots, but she’d done it for ninety minutes. By now, she must have been exhausted but her smile was bright.
“I want to sing a song that’s very special to me. It’s not one of mine. But back when I was a teenager, playing in dive bars or anywhere that would give us a gig, I always finished the night with this song. So tonight, I’m going to sing “Iris” by The Goo Goo Dolls.” She waited for the cheering to stop and her eyes found mine. “This song is for a man who speaks his own truth and always fights for the things he believes in. My life would be so much emptier without him in it.”
“Well, damn,” Gideon said.
Well, damnwas right. I sat back in my seat and I listened to the girl I loved singing “Iris” for twenty thousand people. But she held my gaze and it felt like she was singing just for me.
“What if every song I sang was for you…”
What if… what if…
It had been almost ten years since the first time I saw her perform this. Her voice had changed, improved, was more mature, but it hadn’t lost any of its magic.
Her voice was my favorite sound, and I didn’t think I’d ever tire of listening to it. It still reached deep inside and rattled my bones. Made my heart ache in a way I couldn’t explain. Nobody had ever touched me the way she had. Not even Lila had ever had this kind of power over me. There was nothing I wouldn’t do for Shiloh.
Sometimes I still couldn’t believe she’d chosen me. She could have had her pick of any guy she wanted. But still. She’d chosen me. Was I worthy of her love? Hell if I knew. But I’d fight for her and I’d do everything in my power not to fail her. I’d prove to her that I was nothing like her father who had abandoned her. Or her brother who had betrayed and manipulated her. Or Dean the fucking douche who had tried to break her.
Maybe we shouldn’t have made sense. Maybe there was no world in which we ever should have gotten together. But somehow, we were two imperfect, flawed people who fit together perfectly and made each other’s worlds a better place.
Shiloh and I belonged together. It was just that fucking simple. And I’d do whatever it took to hang on to the good thing I found.
* * *
What the hellhad she done now? I looked down at the papers in my hand then around at my family. Nobody looked surprised by Shiloh’s grand gesture. They’d all been in on this. Every single last one of them had known about it before she’d sprung this surprise on me. My gaze returned to Shiloh. “I told you not to come here and start flashing your money around. Remember when I told you that?”
She nodded. “I remember,” she said calmly.
I grabbed her arm, pulled her off the sofa, and dragged her away from my family who were all gathered in the living room at Patrick and Kate’s house. We stopped by the staircase in the hallway, out of earshot, and I crossed my arms over my chest.
