There was a reason why.
The band wasn’t good. They were fantastic.
So fantastic, I wondered why they were playing a local biker bar. The only reason I could come up with was that the music they played with ease and sheer, swelling rock goodness, were all covers.
Luckily, the stage was up high so the mass of bodies out front didn’t limit our view. Although every muscle in my body was screaming at me to get up and move to the beat, sing out loud and enjoy the vibe, Hop’s arm around my chair kept me anchored, slouched into him, tapping the beat with my toe.
But I did it smiling.
It was after song five when the lead singer stopped the music in order to speak into his microphone.
“Those of you who been with us for years, you’ll know, sixteen years ago, we lost the best front man in the business. Tonight, you give him a yell, he might come up here and show you how we used to do it. Caid! Why don’t you get your ass up here?”
I found this confusing—not only the wall of sound from the crowd that concluded this announcement, but also the fact that the lead singer seemed to be looking directly at Hop.
It hit me that “Caid” was Hop when I heard him mutter, “Fuckin’ shit.”
Part of the older contingent of groupies started to chant, “Caid, Caid, Caid!”
Still, I was stunned when Hop leaned into me and murmured in my ear, “Be back, babe,” before he straightened from his chair and headed around the table.
“Oh my God,” I whispered to no one as I watched Hop wind his way through the crowd to pats on his back, applause, and come-hither eyes.
He took a big step up to the stage, and I watched him do a man hug with the lead singer before moving to shake hands with the bassist and give a chin lift to pianist, keyboard guy, and drummer. A guy who appeared to be a roadie ran on stage with a guitar.
“Oh my God,” I repeated as Hop looked at the guitar, then wrapped a hand around its neck and lifted the strap over his head.
Hop played guitar.
Hop had been in a rock band.
Oh my God!
He was looking down, strumming the instrument like he was getting used to it, when the roadie handed him an amp plug and he shoved it into the guitar.
Another cheer rose from the crowd.
He was going to sing.
And play.
Hopper Kincaid, badass biker and hot guy, was going to sing and play with a rock band.
I wasn’t surprised when I immediately felt my panties get wet (or wetter, considering his last kiss started that action).
I watched Hop do a lips-to-ear brief chat with the lead singer. The lead nodded enthusiastically, grinning like a lunatic, then he turned to his band and shouted something I couldn’t hear.
Hop went to the microphone that was front and center.
I again stopped breathing.
“Gotta do this shit again, gonna make it count,” he growled into the microphone, his voice coming through the speakers rougher and sexier than ever, and the crowd again went wild. He started strumming and my heart stopped beating when he finished, “This is for Lanie.”
When the bassist kicked in, my hand darted out to wrap around the edge of the table, to hold on even though I was sitting, eyes glued to Hop as he started singing about gypsy wind and scarlet skies in that growly, sexy voice of his, his eyes locked to mine.
Then Hopper Kincaid, badass biker and hot guy, sang Bob Seger’s “You’ll Accomp’ny Me” straight to me.
Straight.
To.
Me.
Words I’d heard time and again (and enumerable times recently) came from his beautiful lips and pummeled right into me.
Exquisite pain.
The kind you wanted to feel every day for the rest of your life.
It was the pain of finally having something you wanted. Something you’d longed for. Longed for since you had memories. Something life taught you to believe you’d never have. Something, if you lived without it, it left a void in your soul you knew would never be filled. Something, without it, you knew you’d never be whole.
It was something you needed.
It was as necessary as breath.
It was what was required to complete you.
And, I found in those four minutes as Hopper sang to me, when you got it, it filled you so full you thought you’d rupture but it was so precious, you would do anything to hold it all in and not lose a drop.
Not one drop.
That was what Hop gave to me by telling me through Bob Seger’s words exactly how he felt about me.
And what he intended to do about it.
By the time he was done, every inch of my skin was tingling, my eyes were burning from holding back tears, and my fingers hurt from gripping the table.
And when he was done, I had no idea what to do. How to communicate what I was feeling. How to tell him what he needed to know.
But I was Lanie Heron and even if my mind was scrambled by the beauty of all Hop had just given me, my body knew exactly what to do.
So I straightened from my chair. I put one high-heeled boot into the seat, pulled myself up and turned to Hop. Then I lifted the fingers of both hands to my lips and threw them out toward a good man, a handsome man…
My man.
Then I shrieked like a groupie, “You are the shit, Hopper Kincaid!”
It was the right thing to do. It got me a sexy smile that I was pretty sure melted my panties clean away (and those of most of the women in the audience) before he followed the Nine Tonight (Live) playlist, turned to his friend. His mouth moved and they went right into “Hollywood Nights”.
I danced on my chair until a bouncer told me I had to get down.
Hop finished the first set with his boys and then the entire band joined us for a drink at both their breaks.
Hop held me so close while he was talking to his buddies I was practically in his lap.
Later, looking back, I had no idea if I even spoke a word.
But I do remember smiling so big and for so long, the next morning, my face hurt.
Like I said.
Exquisite pain.
Chapter Nine
No Regrets
“So, you were a rock star?”
I grinned as I watched Hop press his handsome head into the pillow and burst out laughing.
It was Tuesday night.
I was in Hop’s bed at Hop’s house. It was the first time I’d been there.
I found, after following his directions, that Hopper Kincaid lived in a nondescript split-level on a cul-de-sac in a regular neighborhood, not a clandestine biker bunker I had to be led to blindfolded.
This was a surprise but not a disappointment.
The house was nice although it was clear he could spend more time on the yard. The moment after I had this thought, my mind purged it. Hopper Kincaid and yard work didn’t go together. What did go together was, if his neighbors didn’t like it, since he was a badass biker, they probably didn’t complain and just put up with it.