Page 30 of Song Bird Hearts (Green River Hearts #4)

Valerie

T he Boot Skoot has never seen anything like this.

I stand at the entrance with a cold beer in my hand, stunned by the sheer volume of the crowd.

They stand inside the bar, filling up as much space as possible until the fire marshal showed up and actually did their job.

They spill into the street beyond out of sheer necessity, not because they want to.

Still, we’ve prepared for all of that. For those unable to fit inside, there are screens set up outside, speakers there so they can hear the music and anyone singing for karaoke night.

Hank had thought of everything and if anyone was prepared for the sheer amount of people crushing around the building, it’s him and the Boot Skoot.

Hell, the streets look like there’s a parade rather than just everyone here to enjoy karaoke night.

Steele has always been scrappy and knows how to throw a hell of a Friday night party, but this? This is something else entirely.

Fairy lights glow along the edges of the weathered front of the Boot Skoot, a last-minute addition that tells me someone thought it needed a little jazzing up for the camera.

The large neon sign with the boot clicking back and forth is bright and beautiful as always, one of Hank’s best investments.

Someone had a banner made and hung it up across the other side of the building, the words “Stagborn Strong” emblazoned on the front of it.

Amplifiers buzz on makeshift stages around the streets and then inside.

Hell, food trucks from five different counties are all parked along the street, offering food for the vast number of people Steele wasn’t truly prepared for.

People are dancing barefoot on the concrete or dressed in their best western outfits.

Strangers are swapping names and stories like they’ve known each other forever, bonded by their love for me or their love for drama.

I’m not just back home.

I’m free, and everyone knows it.

Inside, the Boot Skoot is a sweaty, glittering mess of cowboy hats, denim jackets, rhinestones, and cell phones capturing every minute for the fans who can’t make it.

I’ve been told we’re livestreaming from five different angles from our equipment alone, one for each social media platform and another for some dark web forum Gilden says “isn’t worth asking about.

” I don’t really care where we’re streaming as long as they see.

Let the Foundation watch.

Let them choke on it.

I smile and tilt my head toward the bar. “You ready to cause some trouble?” I ask Gilden, who is leaning beside me in a sleeveless flannel and a borrowed cowboy hat that he still somehow looks sexy in. He has his beer in hand and the grin he wears is wide.

“Trouble’s already here, cher ,” he drawls before winking at me, “but let’s give it a mic.”

The DJ, good ole Dwayne Jeffries, starts talking into the mic and everyone turns to pay attention.

“We’re all here for one thing and one thing only,” he says, grinning from ear to ear.

This may be the biggest crowd Dwayne has ever been an MC for.

“To have a hell of a good time!” The crowd cheers.

“But let’s kick off this karaoke night with someone you all know very well.

We can’t have a good time without startin’ it off right, mainly the woman we’re all here for.

Everyone, clap your hands for our very own Valerie Decatur, and maybe, just maybe, she’ll come on up here and sing some karaoke for ya. ”

The crowd cheers and hundreds of eyes turn toward me. I grin and listen to everyone as they chant my name.

“Valerie! Valerie! Valerie!”

My cheeks flush at the thrum of it all, as I feel their boots stomping on the old hardwood floors beneath my feet.

It feels like thunder in my chest, and I realize this isn’t a stadium I’m playing in.

These are my people. This is for me. It’s like life before the fame all over again, just with more bodies present.

I peel off my jacket and toss it toward Knox where he stands off to the side of us. He catches it one handed without even looking at me as I make my way to the stage. He still hasn’t said much to me after our last argument, but he’s always present. At least, I’ll give him that.

The room surges with energy as I make my way to the stage.

Every table has been shoved against the walls to make room for people.

Familiar faces cheer for me as I part the crowd, their bodies interspaced with faces I’ve never seen before.

The cheers coming from outside where those in the streets watch the screens is just as thunderous as the cheers from in here.

I grab the mic and give the crowd a sideway grin. “What song would y’all have me sing?”

The shouting all blends together, the different songs morphing until I can’t make out any one song title. I glance at Dwayne. “What d’you think, Dwayne? Something emotional and slow like My Heart Will Go On? Or something wild and free like Redneck Woman?”

Dwayne laughs. “Nah. I got something for ya.”

And then the first notes of “Hit Me With Your Best Shot” by Pat Benatar comes on and the crowd goes wild.

I think every kid grows up with this song, belting it out at least once. Little Valerie definitely sung her heart out to this song with her mama in the old red truck we used to call Betsie. Now, I give it all the same heart, putting on a show for the crowd and for the Foundation I know is watching.

I stomp in time with the music, clapping my hands until the crowd joins in.

My hips swing with the words as I move back and forth on the stage, belting into the mic with so much sass, my voice makes the rafters shake.

I don’t care about being perfect. I scream that chorus with everything in my soul.

I dance across the tiny stage like it’s Madison Square Garden.

At some point, someone tosses a flag up on stage and I grab it and hold it up as I sing, the “Stagborn or Die” words painted across it.

Gilden whoops so loud where he stands close to the stage, he knocks his beer over on the table.

Wolf watches me, enamored with the performance and I wonder if I still look like a dying bouquet of flowers to him.

My eyes flick to Knox where he watches me silently.

There’s no smile on his face, just concerned awareness, like he fears I’ll drop dead at any moment. Maybe I will.

By the time I hit the last note, the Boot Skoot has officially lost its damn mind.

Panting, sweating, and buzzing with adrenaline, I pass the mic back to Dwayne and make my way back down into the crowd, riding the high as people gush and shake my hand while I pass.

By the time I slide back in beside Gilden, at least three other people have gotten up on stage and sung their own power ballads, the mood in the dance hall electric.

“Now that’s what I call a war cry,” Gilden tells me when he loops his arm around my shoulders. “I reckon you shook the Foundation’s bones just now.”

“Good,” I say breathlessly. “Let ‘em hear me.”

Dwayne’s voice comes through the speakers again as two women finish a hilarious rendition of “Summer Nights” that had ended with them playfully singing to each other like they were in the movie Grease .

It’d been cute and exactly the vibe I need to be surrounded by.

For the first time in what feels like years, I can breathe.

“Alright, alright,” Dwayne says, calming the chaos of the crowd. “This next one’s a surprise, one I don’t think y’all are ready for.” I perk up, listening, wondering who it is that’s going to sing. “Y’all give it up for Knox Holloway!”

There’s a beat of silence.

I turn toward the man in question in total disbelief. Surely, Knox—stoic, buttoned up Knox—didn’t sign up to sing karaoke.

Knox is frozen where he stands, his beer bottle halfway to his mouth for a sip. His eyes are locked on the DJ like he’s just been handed a death sentence.

“No,” he says. “No, absolutely not.”

I turn toward Gilden. “Did you?—”

“Maybe,” he says, grinning.

“Gilden!”

“He needed a push,” he shrugs.

“He’s gonna kill you,” I laugh, watching as the people around Knox start pushing him toward the stage.

“Probably,” he chuckles. “But it’ll be worth it.”

The crowd has picked up the chant now. “Knox! Knox! Knox!”

I realize suddenly that I probably need to do something about this when Knox pales as he’s shoved through the crowd.

I start to move toward him, to intervene, but he’s already being firmly shoved through the crowd.

A pair of local girls shove him toward the stage like he weighs nothing.

Someone slaps him on the back. Someone hands him a mic.

He’s standing on the stage now, his face pale, and it’s a strange sight, to see someone so stoic suddenly so panicked.

His eyes find me in the crowd, his gaze sharp with panic, but as I move to help him, something shifts in his expression.

He straightens and holds up his hand when I go to step onto the stage.

“Don’t,” he says quietly. “Don’t save me.”

I stumble to a stop, my eyes wide.

He turns to Dwayne. “Acoustic. Just. . . give me the acoustic.”

The lights dim and the bar hushes as the first soft chords roll out like honey.

Knox stands stock-still for a long moment. Then he closes his eyes, and starts to sing. The song is familiar, one of the old, classic country love songs I grew up with. It’s pretty and full of yearning the way all those old country songs seemed to hold.

His voice isn’t trained. It isn’t exactly smooth. But Knox has a great singing voice. It’s real, raw, and intimate. And as he sings, his eyes find me and lock on, and he doesn’t look away.

It feels like every word is for me.

I can’t breathe as I listen to him. He’s not performing for the crowd. He’s not trying to impress anyone.

He just. . . means it.

The whole bar is spellbound. I’m locked in place, my heart throbbing painfully in my chest as our eyes stay locked on each other.

The crowd stares between us, watching as he sings to me alone.

They disappear, until it’s only me and him, an acoustic guitar strumming, his voice filtering through the air.

When Knox finishes the last line, the silence stretches so long, it almost becomes sacred.

And then comes the applause. It’s thunderous, endless, the whistles and hoots and hollers mixing with the clapping. It immediately makes Knox flush, as if he hadn’t even realized they were there to begin with. He was so lost in the song, he’d forgotten he was standing on a stage.

I smile, my eyes welling, my heart in my throat as I raise my hands to clap with everyone else.

CRACK!

I duck on instinct as the first gunshot rings out, cutting through the applause and immediately sending everyone into a panic as the light above the stage explodes, raining sparks.

The second shot hits the bar behind us, shattering glass and sending people screaming.

The doors are too small for everyone to push out of at once and panic sets in as everyone tries to push out it anyways.

The stampede of people shoves me against shoulders and trips me on feet.

“Get down!” someone shouts.

I hit the ground instinctively, trying to avoid any of the bullets flying overheard and being trampled on by those rushing toward the door. Strong hands wrap around my waist as I move. Familiar hands.

Knox.

“I got you,” he growls as he scoops me up and tosses me over his shoulder like I weigh nothing at all.

“What the hell are you doin—” I shout, kicking, worried he’ll get shot for standing up and running with me.

“Keepin’ you alive!” he shouts, his arm wrapping around my thighs and keeping me solidly on his shoulders.

The back doors slam open as people rush out of them.

Gunfire rattles the air behind us. Wolf and Gilden surge from the crowd, flanking us on either side.

We push from the Boot Skoot together, a unit trying to find where the gunshots are coming from.

Wolf surges ahead of us, a pistol drawn as his eyes sweep the area.

Gilden brings up our rear as he shouts directions to everyone running.

He turns and starts to return fire as bullets ping off the ground around us.

“Where are they?” Knox shouts.

“Two on the roof! One in the street! Two down! Go, go, go!”

More shouts follow his, filling the air as everyone rushes to take cover. Their panic fuels my frantic heartbeat and I start to worry someone is going to get shot, has already been shot, because of me.

Something pings by us and my arm stings, making me jerk in Knox’s arms. The sting disappears and is replaced with something wet. . . something. . .

CRACK!

A final shot, clear and controlled, rings out over the chaos. The screaming stops as everyone realizes the gunshots aren’t coming anymore. A loud thump follows the silence. I twist in Knox’s grip to see. . .

John stands in the middle of the street, his revolver still smoking.

On the ground in front of him is a body where the man must have rolled off the roof.

Someone thinks to grab one of the cameras livestreaming and come closer to John, zooming in on the intensity of his face.

Good ole John, the man who has zero social media, seems to understand.

He looks directly into the camera, but he says nothing as he tucks his gun away and tips his hat to anyone watching.

Steele fought back. And the entire world saw it.

And there’s no mistaking the message we’d just sent.

We’re done hiding.

I’m done hiding.

And Steele won’t be going down without a fight.