Made in Nashville: HarperImpulse Contemporary Romance (9 page)

Despite missing her initial cue she’d not faltered. Jared was on his feet with the rest of room applauding the return of an outstanding singer. Pride swelled in his chest and coated him all over with a sensation of purpose. If him reaching out to her at the music store was in any way responsible for her come back then he was glad.

‘She blew everyone away. Now I’m believing she could support you on your tour,’ Byron remarked.

He nodded but he didn’t really agree. He wasn’t sure she needed the chance to be a supporting artist. The way the media had rolled today she’d be capable of selling out an arena tour alone.

Her joy was evident though. Her smile was vaster than a queue for Vince Gill concert tickets. Her eyes were bright with delight, her movements showing her pleasure and understated gladness at getting through it.

‘So, ladies and gentlemen, give it up one more time for Honor Blackwood and her brand new single,
Goodbye Joe
, available to download right now!’

The crowd needed no encouragement to go wild a second time, some even started to reach for their iPhones or MP3s at the mention of ordering the track. Honor beamed at their response before moving off to the edge of the stage as the announcer continued.

‘But that’s not all everybody. Micro has kinda been teasing you a little on Twitter all day but now the moment has come. I’m gonna hand you over to Micro’s Radley Stokes who’s going to let you in on this huge news for the label.’

Jared turned to Byron. ‘D’you know what’s going on?’

‘Me? I didn’t even know
this
was going on.’

People retook their seats.

Radley Stokes was dressed in a business suit that looked like it was making him sweat. His round face was flushed and his bald head slicked with perspiration.

‘How y’all doin’?’ The forced accent drew sniggers and snorts from the crowd. ’Wasn’t Honor fantastic?’

Jared could see that Honor’s new found confidence was waning. The smile was abashed. She was rubbing her palms on her jeans.

‘You’ve just heard a familiar voice re-launched, now it’s time to introduce you to a new voice. Please put your hands together and show your appreciation for a rising star. The latest artist signed to Micro Records …  Dan Steele!’

When his name was announced it was like someone had cut into her. The pleasure of her performance simply evaporated. Everything muted. She could see the crowd clapping, see their mouths opening in appreciation, but it was as if she was having an out-of-body experience. She looked to the left and saw Dan approach from the wings. Wearing a black Stetson, plaid shirt, jeans and boots, he almost bounded center-stage to embrace Radley and clap him on the back. This couldn’t be happening. This had to be some sort of bad joke. She was back on track with her career at Micro and they had gone and signed her ex-boyfriend. She wet her lips with her tongue, took a step backwards and tried to think about something else, anything else than the car crash of her life unraveling before her.

She should leave. She should back her way off the stage and go. She wanted to think. She needed not to be here. Her foot caught on one of the leads and she stumbled.

‘Fuck! What the hell is going on? That asshole!’ Jared was out of his seat, anger burning him up from the inside.

‘Jed, come on, man,’ Byron started, standing up next to him.

‘What the hell are they thinkin’? How can they do this to her?’

He was livid. Micro had taken her moment and given it to Dan Steele. The one guy in the business he’d always loathed. He’d wanted to smash his face in before, now he wanted to smash it in and bury him. He’d done this deliberately. He’d signed with Micro because that’s where Honor was. Dan either wanted to taunt her or get back with her. Whichever one it was he wasn’t going to stand by and let it happen.

On stage someone had passed Dan a guitar. Honor was looking like she wanted the ground to swallow her up. All color had faded from her cheeks and that glow, that light and passion from a job well done had vanished.

‘Move,’ Jared ordered Byron.

‘Jed … ’

‘Get outta my way.’

Jared pushed past Byron and started striding towards the stage with purpose and a look of determination set on his face. As realization dawned that another Nashville artist was in the audience, the press guests started snapping Jared’s approach. He grabbed the guitar from the roadie at the side of the stage and jumped up onto the platform in one leap.

The cameras were the only thing reacting to Jared’s stage invasion. The supposed tight security seemed to have no idea what to do. Did a Nashville star pose a threat? Before anyone could work that out, he’d stepped in front of Honor’s guitarist and taken the microphone from its stand.

‘Hey, everybody. How are y’all doin’?’

The audience responded positively with whoops, cheers and whistles.

‘Say, wasn’t Honor Blackwood amazin’?’ The crowd cheered in agreement. ‘Come join me, Honor.’

He looked to her. Her puzzled expression mixed with the unease he knew she’d be feeling about Micro’s announcement was evident. He couldn’t and wouldn’t let this guy walk in and take her moment from her. His moral core bound him to do right.

She felt giddy. The heat from the excited people, the lights and the music equipment was enveloping her. She didn’t feel like a participant anymore. It was as if time was going slowly, revolving around her, spinning out of her reach.

‘Honor, come over here.’

Jared’s voice seeped into her senses. Instinctively, without stopping to question, she was moving towards him. A spotlight to her left flashed into vision. Black spots floated in her sight and nausea flooded her throat. Her balance was off. Everything was off.

‘I don’t know what else you were gonna say there, Mr Micro Records, but I’m just gonna step right on in and let everyone hear some of my new material.’

She couldn’t really digest what he was saying. Her ears were buzzing, her heart was galloping and she was trying hard to keep her vision in line.

‘Well, I … ’ Radley Stokes started.

Jared hit a loud, well-timed chord on the guitar that silenced him.

‘So, Honor and I, we’ve been workin’ on a little somethin’ together and I was thinkin’ you might like to hear it.’

The noise from the crowd almost took the roof off the bar. The allure of an exclusive and their reaction to it was what he’d been counting on. If the press kept taking photos like they were doing right now, Dan Steele’s news would hardly figure. Now all he had to hope was that Honor would come through.

He moved towards her, tried to get her to look at him. She was static now, looking in the direction of Micro’s latest signing. This stunt had to work.

‘This is
Trapped by Love
.’

He began to play the song he’d worked on with Honor at his studio. The track she’d helped him with but not sung. Apart from punching out Dan Steele again, this was the only other thing he could think of to make this right.

We’ve come so far, left the past behind

But the memories won’t let us switch off

We’ve hurt so long, we’ve prayed so hard

Now a new start’s all we’ve got

With your hand in mine, we’ll try to stop time

Just long enough to run away

You’re the only one that’s ever made wanna stay anyway

She loved the song. She’d love the song the second he’d played her the first verse. It combined everything she adored about country music. There was a strong story in the words, a tight verse, written traditionally with a rock kick. It was going to be a huge hit and it deserved to be. She stepped up to the microphone and joined in with the chorus.

Trapped by love, not circumstance

Trapped by heart, it’s bad romance

Trapped by lust, no coincidence

Baby, I’m trapped by you

And Lord I know you feel it too

She took up the second verse as if it had always been destined to be their song. She was so into the music everything else was forgotten.

Wasting here, just biding time

Making up for falling down

The times I cried cos you’re my guy

I saw the way my momma frowned

But touching you and feeling this close to something so far away

Has me made feel like a lonely star who finally found the Milky Way

She locked eyes with Jared as he joined her in singing towards the bridge and her whole body began to feel the glow from the performance. This was the sensation she’d missed. These moments with the notes and lyrics, completely absorbed in the here and now, totally immersed in the sound - it was as if there was no one else in the bar at all. She was there in body alone, her spirit flying, her essence soaring up as the music built to its crescendo.

So get the keys, unlock the truck

We won’t know where we’re going

We’ll find somewhere that we’ll fit in

With everybody knowing … 

Hearing her vocals on the track for the first time was sending shots of heat like molten lava through his veins. He gripped the strings of the unfamiliar guitar desperate to do the song justice …  for her. Listening to their voices combining he was struck with a feeling so strong it physically rocked him. An emotion deep inside rose up and hit him. This could hurt him.
She
could hurt him if he didn’t tighten up. He was caught here, torn, stuck between two places he was equally afraid to revisit.

He played the last chord and raising his head his eyes found hers. They were wide open, clear, moist, telling him she’d shared every emotion of every note. There was a second, a brief contact through the space that separated them before he realized the patrons of Cody’s had erupted.

The applauding and roaring jolted her as she became fully aware of just how many people had been watching. She put a hand to her chest and swallowed her anxiety. What should she do? The clapping for her solo performance she’d dealt with and had been expecting, but this! She didn’t know what to do with this. And she didn’t know what to do about Jared.

Then, invading her line of vision was Dan Steele. His hands redundant on the guitar hung low over his neck. He wasn’t putting his hands together in appreciation. He looked pissed. And Micro, her record company, had signed him.

‘You need to take a bow,’ Jared coaxed.

He was next to her, smiling at her, those gray eyes soft and warm. Before she could speak he’d linked her hand with his and raised it high into the air as the audience cheered harder.

‘Miss Honor Blackwood!’ Jared yelled. ‘Let’s hear it!’

‘Champagne, ma’am?’

Honor looked at the tray holding half a dozen glass flutes. As much as she craved an alcohol hit, her throat was so dry. She’d been interviewed by every country music magazine, some radio stations, a prime time Nashville chat show and done a piece for the Micro Records blog. Everyone had been ordered not to mention the attack of 2004, everyone
had
asked about the duet with Jared. Except Larry. Yet. She was still hiding from him.

‘Man, I’ll have yours,’ Mia stated, taking a glass for each hand.

This event at the Sheraton Music City hotel was completely unexpected and if she was truthful, unwanted. What she’d planned to do after the PA, no matter how it had gone, was escape back home and reflect. A long hot bath and a chance to breathe, analyze how it had gone, decide whether it was the right decision. Instead Radley Stokes had ushered her off stage right and the interviews had started.

She remembered the second she’d had to break contact with Jared. His fingers had been interlocked with hers, his thick rings tight against her hand. She’d hung on, pressed stronger, looped a finger over his until the last second, before Radley maneuvered her off.

‘Have you had some food, doll? They’ve gone all out here for you,’ Mia said, gulping down the bubbly from the glass in her right hand.

‘No, I’m not hungry,’ she lied. She hadn’t eaten a thing all day because of her nerves for the show, but now all she could focus on was the room full of people. The few hundred people she didn’t want to talk to and the one person who wasn’t there.

As if reading her thoughts, Mia spoke. ‘So, what’s the deal with Dan Steele? You didn’t know about that?’

‘D’you think if I’d known about it I’d have performed today?’

The answer was instant and from her gut. Was that true? Would she have let him ruin her comeback? She guessed she’d never know.

‘Not that anyone’s gonna be talking about him after your knight in shining armor stole the show. What
was
that track?’ Mia teased.

She felt her face light up as Mia nudged her elbow and snorted a laugh. ‘Just something we knocked up together last week.’

‘And you wanna share what else you did together last week because from where I was standing the air was crackling with hot promise,’ Mia carried on.

Heat flooded to her cheeks and she toyed with a curl, pulling it over her scar.

‘Is there something going on?’ Mia hissed in a whisper.

Honor shook her head vigorously. ‘No …  it’s not like that.’ She had no idea what it was, if it was anything at all.

‘We need to talk. I’ve had every gossip magazine leaving me voicemail messages, Jared.
Gossip
magazines, tittley tattley editions that usually talk about Justin Bieber and his monkey. What the hell is going on?’

He took a long swig of his bottle of beer, working out in his mind exactly what he should say. The truth was, he didn’t know what to say. Sometimes with Buzz it was better to say nothing, let him blow off some steam before trying to make any explanation.

‘What you did was against everything in your contract with Gear. You can’t do stuff like that, Jared. How many times do I have to remind you of that?’

The man’s cheeks were puffing out and he unfastened the button of his jacket. Jared could tell he was nearly done.

‘You took over another record label’s gig. You played a hellish loud minor chord over their new media representative … ’ Buzz continued.

‘They got that on You Tube?’ Pride licked up all over the sentence and he straightaway regretted it.

‘What are you even doing here?’ Buzz threw his arms out, highlighting the lobby bar of the Sheraton.

He couldn’t answer that question either. He didn’t know. He’d not been invited to the party in the Plantation Ballroom but he’d heard it was happening and he’d made Byron drop him at the entrance. Buzz was there because he knew everybody and got invited to everything.

‘Is this still about wanting Honor Blackwood on the tour? Because … ’

‘Because what?’ He gritted his teeth, feeling the fierce loyalty bubbling inside of him. ‘She blew everyone away at Cody’s tonight. Her own song. Our song … ’

Our song
. That shouldn’t have come out. It was but it wasn’t. He hadn’t got the right to call it that. And Buzz would pick up on it.

‘
Our song
? Are you serious? Jared, what’s happening here? You have a responsibility to Gear. They’re putting everything into this tour. Millions of dollars.’

‘I know that,’ he snapped. ‘What you tryin’ to say?’

‘I’m saying I think you’re letting your pants rule your head.’

He tightened his hold on the bottle then. ‘You’re talkin’ bullshit, Buzz.’

‘Am I? I don’t know what it is about this girl but since she’s come back onto the scene you’ve lost … ’

‘Lost what? Tell me, what have I lost? Because the last time I looked my album was back up in the top ten.’

Buzz shook his head and refastened his jacket. ‘For whatever reason, Honor Blackwood is a distraction. And she’s a distraction we can do without if we want this tour to go off the way Gear wants it to go off.’

‘You don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.’ The words came out bitter and rough.

‘I’ve seen it happen time and time again. Girl comes along, boy falls … ’

‘Stop right there. Do not say another word.’ Jared pointed a finger threatening, accusing. ‘How old d’you think I am, Buzz? This ain’t junior high. You’ve booked Raintown, I know that. They’re gonna be great, I know that too. Just get off my back about Honor, OK? Leave it alone.’

He slammed his beer bottle to the bar and whisked passed his advisor, heading for the door of the function room.

‘Honor, there you are. How are you darlin’?’

Larry had found her and Mia behind the large urn of orchids at the end of the buffet table. Mia had piled up a plate of food, all expensive bites of prawn and triangle-shaped avocado pieces. She’d eaten one and hidden the rest behind the flowers. Larry put his arms around her, drawing her into his cream suit that wouldn’t have looked out of place on Vince Gill in the early Eighties.

‘Hey, Larry,’ Mia greeted, swallowing down some more champagne.

‘Mia,’ he acknowledged. He turned to Honor. ‘So, it was great tonight!’

His voice had gone high at the end of the sentence and she knew he was testing the water. He was seeing how much of a conversation they could have before she mentioned Dan Steele or he mentioned her performance with Jared Marshall.

‘Yes, it went great.’ She nodded her head up and down, her eyes matching his. It was just a case of who would crack first.

‘Cut the niceties. Did you know Micro was signing Dan Steele?’ Mia blurted, tilting her head and fixing Larry with a death stare.

Honor dropped her eyes then, looked into the glass of water she was holding. She still felt sick about the ‘Dan Steele Situation’ as Mia had been calling it for the past half hour. She’d filled Mia in on their history on the ride to the Sheraton and although she’d started off being a little put out this wasn’t something she knew already she’d then quickly changed tack calling Dan Steele every dirty name Honor knew and some she didn’t.

Larry obviously knew the history but didn’t Micro remember? Had the name change fooled them? Or was it that they just didn’t care? Should they care? They wanted talent. If Dan was as talented as everyone seemed to be saying he was, then that would matter more to Micro than an old, broken relationship.

‘Honey, believe me, I had no idea. Not one clue. I found out the exact same minute you did. When he was on that stage tonight.’

She knew he was telling the truth. He’d never lied to her before. She trusted him.

‘It sucks though, right? Taking Honor back and then signing the ass that dumped her when she was at her lowest point,’ Mia jumped in.

Honor lifted her head from her glass and there he was, just a few feet away. Dan Steele chatting animatedly with Radley Stokes. Everything was so perfect in his world. Back in Nashville, a record deal, people fawning all over him, opening the Marlon Festival …  no scar on his still handsome face. A wave of envy washed up from inside. He’d had it so easy and now, just when she was ready to return, he was spoiling it. Right on cue he laughed. That laugh. Something she’d once found cute now raised her hackles. She took a swig of water.

‘Hey there! It’s Jed Marshall isn’t it?’

The tall, slim blonde wearing a figure-molding black mini-dress clutched at his arm. It was a mistake slipping in here. It was crammed full of all the type of people he loathed being with. This was a show. Music industry moguls, press, promoters, Nashville’s councilors with their political agendas. He should have made for the outside and the nearest bottle shop instead of busting into the party.

‘That’s right,’ he replied, taking her hand and lifting it off the sleeve of his leather jacket.

She didn’t miss a beat. She took the beer bottle out of his hand and put it to her lips. Inhaling the drink, her mouth fixed around the neck of the bottle, she sucked hard. The show of lip dexterity was for him but tonight he didn’t want it.

‘I saw you at Cody’s,’ she continued, passing back the drink.

‘Yeah?’ he smiled. ‘Like what you heard?’

‘I like what I see,’ she responded.

She was so transparent he couldn’t help but let out a laugh. He put the beer bottle on the table and took her all in. From her gold strappy high-heels, up the bronzed legs to the hem of the micro-dress and upwards, encountering a large flash of cleavage, her platinum hair sat on bare tan shoulders and that red-lipped smile. Just a few short weeks ago he would have taken the compliment and taken her to a hotel. But something had changed, whether he liked it or not.

‘What’s so funny, cowboy?’

‘Nothin’. Nothin’ at all, ma’am,’ he responded.

‘So what’s say you and me get out of here? Somewhere a little more …  private.’ She put a hand on the peak of his cap and made to remove it. It was like he’d been stung. He grabbed at the hat, pulling it firmly down into place, trying to keep his cool.

‘I’m sorry. As much as I’d love to, I really can’t.’ His voice came out a lot calmer than he felt. ‘There’s someone I gotta see.’