Everything I want: Will Alfie and Lily's love survive?... by K. L. Shandwick Page A

shook his head, and I grinned at Sandy. “Private joke.” I smi rked.
    As I headed back to the dressing room in front of Lennon he caught up with me and tugged my hand.
    I turned and smiled at him. “Come here.”
    He hugged me. “No matter what happens from this night on, Lily, we’ve all got to be there for one ano ther.”
    I nodded, knowing he was worried that we’d either fuck this opportunity up, or we’d get too big for our boots and change for the worst as people. Fame could do that.
    Hugging him tightly, “No worries from me, Lennon. You can guarantee that I won’t change. My outfits will always get you hard and piss you off at the same time.”
    “Thing is getting into that outfit isn’t as easy as imagining what’s underneath.” He smirked and burst out laughing. “How come you always know the right thing to say to reassure me?” he a sked.
    I winked cheekily. “Woman’s intuition, Lennon, I don’t expect you to unders tand.”
    Cody got to his feet and hugged me when he saw me. “You look scrumptious, h oney.”
    I smiled and checked them all out. “Damn, I’m gonna be up there with four hotties tonight. Who’s got my back, covering my mist akes?”
    They all looked at each other. “I figure it’s time to audition for an ugly new member for the band,” Digs quipped and grinned wick edly.
    Spence came in with one of the stagehands. “Ten minutes, guys.” He grinned as he took in our appearances. “You all look great. This is where the magic starts to ha ppen.”
    Shawn muttered, “Umm…that’s my line.” We all burst out laughing, and Spencer walked away grinning and shaking his head. “Get out there and enjoy your moment, we’ll talk after the gig.”
    Tonight was our launch concert, and I was physically shaking with nerves. Spencer opened the dressing room door, and we all traipsed out after him.
    Standing backstage, Cody’s arm snaked around my waist as it had many times before when we were waiting to go out t here.
    “You are going to be fantastic, Lily. We’ve done this hundreds of times before. Just imagine you’re in D’mond. The crowd might be bigger, but remember, all those guys are out there because they love you. They don’t want you to fuck up any more than you do. Just enjo y it.”
    A smile spread on my lips. Cody was right. The fans hadn’t bought tickets because they felt sorry for us. Our fans were out there because they believed i n us.
    Suddenly the lights in the auditorium went out and the emcee began introductions. I could hear the familiar tick of Shawn’s drumsticks, and my heart was beating wildly in my chest. Cody’s fingers linked with mine and tugged me forward onto the s tage.
    With the first chord, we were bathed in bright lights. The intense heat from the spotlights bore down relentlessly on us. Loud riffs from Lennon’s guitar reverberated as he played the familiar intro to our first song.
    Digs bass boomed out from the huge amplifiers on each side of the stage. Strange, a lot of people hate heavy bass, but I’ve always found the familiar vibrations comforting. It spurred me on to forget my ne rves.
    Cody smirked and grabbed the mic as I was pulling my guitar strap over my head. He went into his routine of greeting the fans, warming up the crowd, and thanking everyone for co ming.
    We ran through the set we knew so well, only this time, we were doing it to make sales as well as to entertain our audi ence.
    About three songs into the performance, I began to feed on the buzz from the c rowd.
    They began to sing along to the words of songs I had actually helped write. For the next hour and a half, we gave our fans everything we had.
    I could tell they were feeling our music, and the thought of that made me smile. Being able to move people with music was what I had aspired to when I set out to study. I never believed in a million years that it would be at this l evel.
    After the gig ended and we’d done an encore, Keiron and Spence took to the