How to Steal Your Best Friend's Fiancé - London Casey Page 0,54
one second made me shiver and the next second made me a little jealous.
I had been walking by this club for so long, not sure if I could enter it and enjoy myself. Because Liam was right. Singing and playing guitar had been an important part of my life.
Then.
Not now.
I hadn’t sang a note… other than in the shower or while cooking, which really wasn’t singing. It was just messing around.
Everyone clapped for the three women.
Carla. Faye. Robin.
Carla waved.
Liam whistled.
Then he said. “Your turn, Em.”
My head whipped around. “Stop it.”
“If you don’t, I will,” he said.
“What?”
He stood up. “I’m going up there. I’ve never sang in my life. I don’t sing. Ever. Not even in the shower.”
My eyes struggled to look at his eyes.
Liam… in the shower…
No, no, no, no…
I blamed the beer.
That whole one beer that apparently was so strong that it was making me think about Liam naked in the shower.
“Liam, sit down,” I said.
“Nope,” he said. “I have a song to sing.”
He moved from the table and I stood up.
There’s no way…
There is a way, Emily. This is the Liam you knew all those years ago. The one who was crazy like this. Who looked for adventure and trouble, no matter what…
Maybe he wasn’t exactly the same bad boy, but he was badass enough to walk up to the stage like he owned it.
The person controlling the lights and mic pointed to him.
A few seconds later, Liam was on the stage.
I put my hands over my mouth as the shock rippled through my body.
“Hey there,” Liam said.
A few people yelled HEY! back.
“I’m going to be real with you,” Liam said. “I can’t sing. But I’m doing this to get the best singer in this place up on this stage. And I’m not leaving this stage until she comes up here. So feel free to boo me, to yell at me, to chase me off this stage. If you’re going to throw a drink, place it on the stage so I can drink it. Or better yet, you keep drinking. Because I really suck at singing.”
Liam looked at me.
I shook my head.
He cleared his throat.
He put both hands around the microphone and closed his eyes.
Liam, no. No. You can’t…
He belted out a note that made my eardrums want to call it quits.
I put my fingers to my ears and cringed.
I was embarrassed for him.
It took three seconds before people started to boo him.
I looked around and everyone was slowly covering their eyes.
Even the gorgeous bartender.
She looked at me, remembering who we were.
She pointed to me, then to the stage.
I shook my head.
She put her hands together, begging me.
Liam didn’t stop with that first note either.
He began to sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star… but he tried to do it like a professional singer would do the national anthem, except he was incapable of hitting any note that was even semi decent.
I allowed the monstrosity to continue for another ten seconds before I took one step forward.
When I did, Liam looked right at me. And he pointed.
Now I had almost everyone in the club looking at me.
And he kept singing.
Those awful notes… eating at my ears…
I mentally marked the date and the time, because that’s when I officially decided I was going to hate Liam for the rest of my life.
Because I knew I was about to get up on that stage and sing.
I got applause before I even started to sing.
That’s how bad Liam sang.
People were happy to see him climb off the stage.
When he did, he didn’t walk away.
He stood right there, looking up at me.
My eyes looked down at him.
Oh, I was angry.
But I was also slightly excited.
Liam nodded. The smile on his face…
I thought about Jon.
Of all people and of all times.
And maybe not just Jon.
I thought about the others too. The other guys I had dated in my lifetime. Not a single one of them knew that I had once wanted to be a singer. Or that I could play guitar.
“Are you going to sing or what?”
The voice jarred me back to reality.
I looked to my left and the guy behind the equipment had his hands opened, wondering what I was going to do.
It would have been nice to sing with music playing… but…
I shut my eyes and took a deep breath.
“I’m Emily,” I said into the microphone. “And I know this will sound better than what was just up here.”