The Blessed - By Tonya Hurley Page 0,16

her bicep, twisted like a tourniquet, matching her stark white ensemble with the unusual charm dangling perpendicularly from it.

For her, the applause was beside the point. It was about communication. It was the look of adoration in their eyes she’d sought. That she needed. Their respect, not their approval, that turned her on. That’s what inspired her to begin with, the same compulsion that had driven her musical heroes and the people she admired. To tell the truth. To reveal to people what they already knew deep inside. To shake them up.

Sebastian was a total stranger but he got that about her. And she got the same vibe from him. She wasn’t into playing it safe. If anything, her goal was to put some risk, put the unexpected, back into music and into life for that matter.

In the end, she just wanted to cut through the bullshit, on stage, at least, if not off, where she’d fashioned a persona that resembled both a wounded soldier and a sharp blade, but more a shiv than a rapier. The suggestion of violence, disruption, thinly veiled and always present.

She wasn’t afraid to show her lady balls.

To be hard.

To be intimidating.

The warrior queen of her own private dystopia.

As she held fast both her dramatic pose and the audience’s attention, she looked out past the bright lights and into their eyes. It was mesmerizing.

She took the time to stare down each and every one of them. Surveying the crowd for one in particular. Sebastian. But he was nowhere to be found. A no-show.

She noticed all of them.

Watching her.

Watching for what she would do next.

The bartenders unfolded their arms.

The girls stood still.

The guys, waiting. Patiently.

For her.

For her to make a move.

She slowly opened her hand, keeping eye contact with the crowd, and let her guitar pick fall in front of her, off the stage. The lonely, lost eyes, out on a Thursday night, looking to her for something. Something she realized she couldn’t give them. Not tonight.

“What the hell is going on?” a guy in the crowd yelled. “Play for us!”

“Cecilia, play for us!” the crowd began chanting in unison.

If I can’t play to him, she thought, I’ll play for him.

She slyly slid the chaplet over her wrist and wrapped it tightly around her hand, the most gorgeous set of brass knuckles anyone had ever seen, the sword charm suspended just low enough for her to grip it, like a pick, between her thumb and forefinger. She cranked her guitar up and tore into a wailing solo, channeling all her feelings into a wordless maelstrom of sonic aggression, the bow of her gold charm slaying the steel strings and feeding back relentlessly into the amps and out into the audience.

CeCe attacked the fretboard, bending notes with such passion that she nearly pulled the instrument out of tune. The pointed end of the sword charm dug deep into her hand. Drops of blood ran from her palm down her fingers to her cuticles and onto the pick guard and the whammy bar. Without uttering a word, she’d said everything she needed to say to the stunned gathering.

Spent, she turned and faced the drummer, on the verge of tears, and mouthed, I can’t.

But she already had.

CeCe bolted from the stage, guitar in hand, and headed straight for the backstage closet that doubled for a dressing room. She grabbed her bag, squeezed it to make sure her wallet was still inside, looked indifferently at herself in the tiny cosmetic mirror on the door, and started for the exit.

“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” a gruff voice quizzed. “I paid you for an hour show.”

“You didn’t pay me, Lenny,” Cecilia reminded him. “It was a door deal, remember? I keep the cover, you get the bar.”

“What bar? Those freaks you brought in were underage. I don’t make money selling ginger ale.”

“That’s your problem.”

“Now it’s your problem. Don’t come back here.”

“That’s the idea.” Cecilia wasn’t sure what had come over her.

“I was doing you a favor. Giving you a night here to showcase. Build something. A following.”

“A favor?” she huffed. “You mean like the weekly photo shoot of me changing that you tried to arrange from the camera you have planted in the bathroom? You just want to get in my pants.”

“No thanks, honey.” Lenny wagged an arthritic finger. “I’m a little too scared of what I might find when I get in there.”

“Pay me,” Cecilia ordered, holding her bloodstained hand out.

“Ha. You’re like all the others. You screw