Immediately a sea of phone flashlights lit up the entire crowd who were swaying to the beat Jace tapped out. Zane’s haunting guitar layered over the top of Ty’s acoustic work was so beautiful it brought tears to my eyes. Connor’s deep plucks of the bassline joined in. Ty looked up and gave the most emotional performance of the entire night, singing his newest love song about me to the crowd. From where I was standing, I could see about fifteen rows deep where the blue illuminations indicated that dozens of people were recording the performance on their phones.
As the last chords ended, the crowd went absolutely bananas, and the cheers didn’t die down for nearly four minutes, despite Ty trying to get them to stop. Turning from the audience, he handed his guitar off to Pokey and strutted over to about ten feet from where I was standing and winked at me. I could feel Sienna’s gaze boring into me, but I remained focused on my man, giving him a thumbs-up and kissy-face. Ty swaggered over to the drum riser, took a long swig of water, and whispered something to Jace.
Ty sauntered up to the front. Now that the crowd had calmed down a bit, he held his finger to his lips to quiet them. The entire venue went dead silent within seconds at his command.
“Are you ready for a song about a butterfly?” Ty purred into his mic.
The crowd lost its collective mind when Zane’s fingers strummed the intro to Butterfly, and Ty sang with Connor’s low backing vocals about letting me fly away. It was such a beautiful song, it was crazy that some of music’s biggest songs of the past few years were about me. After the song ended, Ty addressed the audience.
“Did you guys see the picture of my real butterfly on our Instagram?”
The crowd roared.
“We love you, Ty!!” “Marry me, Ty!!” Shouts from the audience permeated the venue.
“Aww, I’m not on the market, my friends, but I love all of you!” Ty looked over at me and pointed.
Shrinking a bit, I covered my eyes with my hand, feeling very shy about being the subject matter of any audience banter. Sienna had turned fully around to stare at me, her contempt not hidden even a little bit. My gut feeling had been right about her. She certainly wasn’t my fan. I pretended not to notice, after all I wasn’t about to let her get the upper hand, and I certainly wasn’t going to let her ruin the show for me.
Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. The initial beats of Down began with Jace’s heavy beat of the bass drum. Connor joined with the low bassline intro, swinging around toward the front of the stage. Zane’s melodic chorus blasted right in front of me, startling me into looking up right into Sienna’s cold stare.
I stared right back, narrowing my eyes, and cocking my head slightly.
Tilting her head, Sienna bent down to my ear and through her glossy red lips whispered just loud enough so I could hear her. “Sucks that they found out about you on TMZ, I knew you’d be a fucking liability to Ty and the band. I’m going to have my work cut out for me to fix it.”
Startled, I stared at her, trying like hell to keep my face impassive.
“See for yourself.” Sienna handed me her tablet and returned her focus to the stage.
Looking out at my sweet Ty, who was closing out the show, and then back at the tablet, I didn’t know what to do. Curiosity got the best of me, and I read the article, unable to prevent myself from recoiling in horror.
Devastation set in.
The best night of my life had just turned into a nightmare.
Chapter 28
TYSON
Cathartic. The show was absofuckinglutely cathartic. As we played our set, I felt invincible. Zoey being with me made it so much better. Catching glimpses of her on the side of the stage, smiling and encouraging me, swaying and dancing to the music. It made me even more excited about our new normal of being together always.
When I bellowed the final chords of Down and the crowd went crazy, I glanced over to see Sienna hugging Zoey, almost comforting her. The hairs on my neck tingled. Something was really wrong. My butterfly looked absolutely shell-shocked. Almost like she was going to faint. Panic set in. Suddenly my focus was only on my girl.
I quickly addressed the crowd, signaled to Zane to do a solo, and ran to the side of the stage where they were standing.
“What’s going on here?” I directed my question at Sienna.
“Finish the show, Ty.” I could tell Zoey was struggling to keep it together. “This can wait.”
“What the fuck, Sienna?” I whirled around at her.
“Look, Ty.” Sienna glanced down to check a long, red nail. “Don’t worry, I’ll fix it. I’m pulling in all the favors I could. I’ll try to get to the bottom of how it happened.”
“I’m doing a goddamn show, Sienna,” I shouted. “What are you talking about?”
A look of hurt passed over Sienna’s eyes as she reached for my arm, “Ty, I’m just here to do damage control.”
“For what?”
Zoey stared up at me with her big hazel eyes and shook her head, handing the tablet back to Sienna.
“I’ve got to get set up at the after-party.” Sienna grabbed it and sauntered off toward the dressing rooms. “Zoey will fill you in after the show.”
She gestured to where Jace was waving me over, glaring at all of us. Zoey motioned for me to go finish the set, then slumped against the wall next to Zane’s guitars. I reluctantly obeyed, but it
