Lena stepped toward the stage, her gaze locking with the lead singer's. There was a story there—one of late-night rehearsals, shared cigarettes in freezing parking lots, and the kind of understanding that didn't need lyrics.
Stage Div—the band everyone called the "next big thing" while they were still living out of a rusted Ford Econoline—was mid-soundcheck.
"We're missing something," Mal shouted over the feedback, wiping sweat from his brow.
In the back of the darkened club, tucked into a vinyl booth that had seen better decades, sat Lena. She wasn’t a groupie. She wasn’t a scout. She was the one thing the band actually needed: a stabilizer. A woman who could navigate a tour schedule as easily as she could navigate the egos of four men who lived for the roar of the crowd.
