But Dallas just kissed me on the cheek again and pushed me in the direction of the Monster tent. “I’ll text you if I need you, Ax.”

“I’ll have Nik check on you,” I finally conceded. Nik would let me know if she was okay and he’d dealt with sick chicks before. The only time I’d had to deal with a sick chick before was the night Emmie had passed out from dehydration. My hands started to shake at the thought of that happening to Dallas. “I want to go with you, Dallas,” I said, changing my mind quickly. My heart was pounding like crazy. She just had an upset stomach and I was freaking the fuck out.

She stared up at me for a long moment before her lips twitched in a small smile. “Okay. Walk me back to the bus. But when Linc shows up, you need to go meet the others. I don’t want to be the cause for you disappointing your fans.”

I would have disappointed the fucking world for her. Nothing was more important to me than her. Nothing.

As soon as we got back to the bus, I sat down on the couch with her head in my lap after she had taken a dose of Pepto. I started to wish that Linc wouldn’t show up, but he did and I had to kiss Dallas goodbye. Linc took my seat, and started combing his fingers through her hair like I had been doing. As I stood there, looking down at her, I nearly choked on the words ‘I love you’ in an attempt to keep them from spilling out. This wasn’t the time, though. I didn’t want her to remember the first time I told her how I felt by also remembering how sick she was.

With one last kiss to her forehead I told Linc to call me if Dallas got worse and reluctantly headed back out into the masses.

Over the next few hours I did my job, but my head wasn’t in it. Every five minutes I was checking my phone to make sure Linc or Dallas hadn’t texted me. I sent Nik over to the bus to check on her, and when he didn’t come back or call right away I got worried. My mind flashed with images of having to take her to the hospital because she was too ill to lift her head.

Someone nudged my shoulder from behind and I turned to glare at the culprit only to find Emmie standing there frowning up at me. “What’s wrong with you?”

“Dallas isn’t feeling well. She’s back at the bus and I want to be there with her.”

“Why didn’t you say something earlier?” she demanded. “I could have gotten you out of half this shit. Damn it, Axton. We need to communicate a little better. Family before anything else. Understand?”

“Yeah, Em.” I glanced at my watch. Damn it. I had to be over at stage two with Gabriella in five minutes. “Can you get me out of this?”

“If you had left me with more than a few minutes, of course I could have. But she’s already been on stage for thirty minutes, dumbass. As much as I would love to make her look like an idiot, my professionalism won’t let me.” Emmie punched me in the arm. “Go on. I’ll check on Dallas and see if she needs anything.” When I started to open my mouth to tell her to text me she cut me off. “Don’t worry. I’ll call you, but I’m sure she’s fine.”

Dropping a kiss on Emmie’s cheek, I headed off to do the one thing I hoped Dallas didn’t find out about today. I was feeling guilty about keeping it from her and I hadn’t even done anything wrong.

By the time I reached the second stage it was nearly time for Gabriella and her band to pack it up so that the next band could start setting up. I climbed the stairs and moved to the side of the stage so she could see me as she finished her last song.

As the last notes of her violin filled the air and the fans went crazy screaming her name, she left the stage glaring at me hard. “Where the fuck have you been?”

“I’ve had other shit to deal with today, Brie. You aren’t my only obligation. Just be thankful I’m here at all,” I snapped and she shut her mouth but continued to glare at me. I rolled my eyes. “We doing this or not?”

“You’re such a fucking douchebag, Ax.”

“Tell me something I haven’t heard yet, sweetheart. Now get your little ass out there and let’s do this or I’m gonna take care of something a million times more important than you and this bullshit.” My days of putting anything other than Dallas first were over. This was the last time I ever let something else stand in my way of my girl.

Still glaring at me, she shot me the finger before going back onto the stage where her band was waiting patiently and the fans were screaming for more. “One more song!” she screamed and the crowd started yelling in agreement. “This is something that I wrote a few years ago and has a special place in my heart.”

I rolled my eyes again, knowing that the crowd was going to be thinking that the song was about me and her. It was what all the paps had reported when the song had first gotten popular and neither of us had ever corrected them.

A roadie handed me a microphone and I waited where I was while Gabriella started with her violin. I didn’t have to step in until a third of the way in to the song so I tapped my foot to the beat so that I didn’t get lost in my own thoughts. When I finally stepped out onto the stage, singing along with Gabriella, the fans went crazy and I had to adjust my earpieces so that I didn’t go deaf from them alone.

Normally when I would perform this song with Gabriella like this, we would stand close and look at each other. Not happening today. I worked the stage, reaching out to shake hands with a few of the male fans standing close to the stage, which had a fence and security guards standing between them. Some chick handed me a red rose and I blew her a kiss and winked at her before turning back toward the other side of the stage.

The song was nearly over when I glanced out across the sea of fans and saw Liam standing in the crowd. He was watching Gabriella closely, but she was in the moment, her violin like an extinction to her arm the way she was playing so effortlessly. When I glanced back at Liam he was walking away, but I saw a slight hunch to his shoulders and grimaced.

Fucking chicks were going to be the end of my band and there was nothing I could do about it.

Dallas

My stomach was starting to feel better, but my mind wouldn’t fucking shut up. The nurse in me was going over my symptoms and trying to figure out what had brought on the sudden nausea that had left me vomiting most of the afternoon.

I wasn’t one to get sick easily. In my line of work you had to have a strong stomach and I prided myself on having the strongest. I’d seen guts spill out of a person onto the ER floor for the love of God. I could count the times I’d had a stomach virus in my entire life on one hand. This wasn’t a stomach bug, though. Nausea was all that I had.