Page 34 of Dream (Fighting Fate)

She looked down, taking a deep breath, and began. Her fingers ran over the strings beautifully. Dean looked at me and raised his eyebrows, clearly impressed too. Then she began to sing.

She kept her gaze down as she sang, which was probably for the best because neither Dean nor myself could keep our mouths from popping open a little with our surprise. She had an amazing voice.

Dean’s eyes narrowed at me with the silent question I knew he was dying to ask. Was she looking for a foot in the door? I chose to ignore it. He could ask her himself.

As the song came to an end, her voice trailed off, and she strummed the last chord before shyly glancing up. “Sorry to subject you to that, but I did warn you.”

Dean smiled and nodded with appreciation. “You actually have a nice voice, and you have pretty good guitar skills too.”

She laughed then, her shoulders relaxing a little as she sank back down beside me. “Why, thank you, Mr. Rock Star,” she said sweetly.

I watched Dean’s eyes harden a fraction. Here he goes . . .

“Are you thinking of going into the music industry?”

The look Liv gave him was priceless. It was pure horror. “God, no! I want to be a writer.”

Dean’s expression changed to one of contemplation. “Well, there you go.” He looked at me with amusement for a while, then his eyes sparkled. “Actually, you might be able to help me. I’m writing a new song for a movie soundtrack, and I think it needs a female voice accompanying it. Wanna help me?” He looked excited at the thought.

Liv’s eyes widened. “You want me to help you with a song?”

Dean was already standing, pulling out a piece of paper with lyrics scrawled all over it. “I need to get the keyboard out of the van first, though. Here,” he said, handing her the paper. “You can read over the lyrics while I get it.”

A range of emotions flowed through Liv’s eyes. I could tell she was nervous, excited, and humbled, all at the same time. It was so sweet, I just wanted kiss her.

“You need a hand, man?” I asked him.

He nodded briskly. The creative energy was practically oozing from him. “Sure.”

He didn’t speak as we walked down to the garage, and I didn’t want to interrupt any creative thoughts he might’ve had going on, so I kept quiet too. But when he opened the back door to the van, he paused, looking up at me.

“She’s amazing” he said. “I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone quite like her before.”

I smiled. I’d told them, but you really had to experience Liv to believe she was real. “Yeah. She’s fucking thrown me into a spin, that’s for sure.”

His gaze was assessing. “Why don’t you just tell her who you are? Let her decide?”

I sighed. “I’ve thought about it. But I like the way she is with me now. I don’t want her to start treating me different.”

Dean nodded. “She might surprise you, man. Just because she hasn’t had the experience, doesn’t mean she’s not equipped to handle it. Maybe you should give her the chance—or at least tell her the truth so she can decide.”

I inhaled deeply. I knew what he was saying, because it was the same stuff I’d been arguing with myself over for the last five days, but it seemed I was too selfish to make that step. The thought of her looking at me differently was just too much for me to chance it.

Helping him carry the keyboard upstairs, we took it into the formal den, where the acoustics would be a little better. When it was all set up, I stood back and watched Dean walk over to Liv.

“I’ll sing it for you first, so you can hear how the melody goes, then we’ll do it together, okay?”

Liv bit her lip with uncertainty. I brushed my hand over her arm. “Go on. It’ll be fun, if nothing else.”

She looked at me like I was crazy, but nodded anyway. “Okay.”

Giving her hand a quick squeeze for encouragement, I smiled. “I’m going to go check on everyone else while you go through it. I’ll be back soon.”

She nodded again, biting on that luscious bottom lip of hers. Not able to help myself, I leaned forward and gave her a quick kiss before leaving them alone.

Matt grinned at me the second I stepped foot inside the games room. I growled at him. “Don’t fucking say it.”

“What?” he said, not able to stop a chuckle from slipping through. “I was just going to say she’s hot.”

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