Annabelle goes statue-still.
Dex screams, “GO, PRINCE OF CHAOS!”
I glance sideways.
Annabelle’s eyes are saying: Don’t. Even. Think. About. It.
So naturally… I go.
I hop onstage.
The crowd roars.
Lola circles me like she’s choosing a karaoke sacrifice. “Look at him, ladies,” she says into the mic. “Isn’t he pretty?”
The audience shrieks.
Annabelle looks like she wishes for an asteroid...aimed at Lola.
Lola starts her new single... slow, sultry, deliberately intense.
She sings itto me.
And I let her.
She launches into the chorus, voice smoky and dramatic:“Darlin’, I fall too fast, too hard, too soon… End up crashing every time I look at you.”
She points straight at me on that last line. The crowd screams. Lola slow-walks around me, dragging her fingers through the airlike she’s tracing heat waves. When she hits the next verse about "a bad boy who breaks all the rules," she leans in, lifts the mic toward my face, then circles me like I’m a prop in her music video.
Phones flash. Fans lose their minds.
And I stand there taking it, letting her perform the entire songatme.
Hands in my pockets. Playing along. Giving the crowd what it wants.
But I keep glancing toward the VIP pit.
Annabelle’s eyes never leave me.
Not once.
And something about that… hits.
Hard.
When the song ends, Lola gives me a quick hug and a kiss on the cheek before turning to the crowd with a grin. "Bryce Blackhorn, everybody. Love those Nashville Outlaws. Thank you, Bryce."
While I hop back down, Dex is losing his mind. “BRO, YOU DIDN’T EVEN BLINK. KING BEHAVIOR.”
Annabelle won’t look at me.
But her cheeks are flushed.
Her breathing is shallow.
She’s jealous.
And I like it.
