Page 236 of Vixen

It hits me straight in the chest.

Live music always does. The swell of the orchestra, the way the sound fills every corner of the space, vibrates in your bones. I didn’t realize how much of myself I’d muted until it rushes back in all at once.

I’m not thinking about Sage here. Not about work. Not about anything.

I’m just… here.

I clap when everyone else does, laugh when the crowd laughs, let myself get pulled into the story like I’m allowed to be someone else for a few hours. Someone uncomplicated. Someone who isn’t measuring his words or bracing for impact.

When it ends, I don’t rush out.

I stand there a moment, hands resting on the back of the seat in front of me, heart still humming.

Outside, the night feels alive.

I don’t want to go back to the hotel.

I walk instead.

I end up in a dive bar that smells like beer-soaked wood and decades of spilled regrets. The kind of place with Christmas lights still hanging in September and a chalkboard sign that just saysLIVE MUSICin crooked letters.

Inside, it’s dark and loud and perfect.

There’s a guy on stage with a beat-up Stratocaster, sweat already darkening the collar of his T-shirt. He’s not flashy. He’s good. The kind of good that doesn’t need to prove it.

I grab a beer. Then another.

When the guitarist asks if anyone plays, my hand is up before my brain can stop it.

It’s been a while.

My fingers know the weight of the guitar the second it’s handed to me. Familiar. Comforting. Like muscle memory waking up after a long sleep.

I plug in.

And then I let go.

All that tension I didn’t even know I was carrying—the constant vigilance, the adrenaline, the fear of saying the wrong thing or laughing at the wrong joke or being accused of something I didn’t do—it bleeds out through my hands.

I play.

Not for anyone. Not to impress.

Just to breathe.

When I step offstage, heart pounding, beer sweating cold in my hand, it hits me how quiet my head feels.

Then—like a reflex—I check my phone.

Nothing.

No emails. No missed calls.

My relief curdles.

What if she called the company?

What if she somehow got my room number?