“It’s one of many antique styles.” Ariel pulled her phone from her purse, opened her photo app and scrolled, then handed him the phone. “This is the lobby at Greenbrier, an elegant Victorian resort in West Virginia. Greenbrier always lands a spot on our annual Christmas tour. They have new furniture, but it looks older because they use vintage styles and patterns. Lots of bold stripes and flowers in bright colors.”
Caleb studied the pictures, then scanned his lobby. “Fresh colors on new furniture—I like it.”
She strode to the far side of the room and picked up a flower arrangement from one of the deep windowsills. “I’d also replace these little vases and artificial flowers.”
“They look dated too?”
Ariel replaced the vase. “We’re missing a great decorating opportunity. If we use big vases and fill them with fresh lilacs from the grounds, we’ll get natural beauty and a great scent. Plus bigger vases with more flowers look better in these huge sills.”
“Nothing smells better than island lilacs.” He noted it in his phone. “How about the fireplace mantel?”
They started across the room for another look when Ariel’s phone alarm sounded.
“That’s my end-of-the-evening warning. We have an early meeting with our manager in the morning.” She shut off the alarm and faced him, eyes sparkling as they stood under the oversized brass chandelier. “Thanks for supper. Sorry if my aunt caused too much commotion for your grandpa.”
“He needed some excitement.” After they exchanged numbers, Caleb slid his phone into his pocket. “Your suite is around the corner—the only room on this hall.” He caught himself before offering to walk her there.
Ariel gave him a little wave goodbye. He waited a moment, then followed at a distance, making sure nobody bothered her.
And he realized just how much more complicated—maybe even richer—his life had become since the two singers arrived at his inn.
Was this how traitors felt?
Sitting in their suite with Aunt Dahlia, the songwriters, and their manager the next morning, Ariel tried to focus on brainstorming their new reimagined band. She spent most of the meeting pondering her own career as a solo artist—when she wasn’t thinking about her aunt and Caleb’s uncle dancing and flirting last night. Although thinking about her own career felt dangerously close to betrayal.
Not that she wanted to leave the band. And she’d never purposely hurt Aunt Dahlia. But if Ariel couldn’t find success on her own, would she have success at all? Or was she merely an average musician who couldn’t have made it without her aunt? A fraud the rest of the band had to prop up?
Now into the afternoon, she squirmed a little, seated between silver-haired, barrel-chested Earl Butler, who’d written Aunt Dahlia’s first big hit, and tawny-haired, smooth-faced newcomer-with-promise Seth Malone on a worn mauve sofa. Fiona McCleary, all business as usual in her red midi-dress and heels and hard-living lines on her brow, sat on Seth’s other side, fifteen number one hits to her credit.
“I want to hear something fresh,” Aunt Dahlia said from her place at the mahogany grand piano in the corner of the living room the size of Caleb’s grandfather’s. She’d teased her favorite platinum wig even bigger than usual, and glitter fell from her hot-pink pullover onto the piano bench, her jeans, and the hunter-green carpet. “All y’all are great songwriters, and you’ve given us fantastic music through the years. Now we need something new and unexpected. Something we’ve never done.”
The songwriters glanced around the room at each other. When the silence grew awkward, Earl Butler spoke up, tapping his mechanical pencil on the side table next to him. “Miss Dahlia, we could help you more if we knew exactly what you want. A new sound or a new image? Or something else?”
“I don’t know, Earl. I only know we need to move forward and explore new possibilities after our huge CMA success.” Aunt Dahlia paused and gazed out over her “audience,” making eye contact and giving them her big smile. “And that’s why I’m putting Ariel in charge of the change.”
“What?” Ariel bounded off the couch, where she felt a little squished anyway, her idea book and pen hitting the floor with a thump and a rattle. “No! I don’t know anything about?—”
“Sure you do. You’re the best problem solver I know.” Her voice smoother than Jeff Davis pie, Aunt Dahlia smiled that stunning smile of hers, her voice silky, pouring on the charm. “All I need is a plan to advance our brand, grow bigger, and reach more people with our music.”
“Oh, is that all?” If her polite Southern mama and auntie hadn’t raised her better, Ariel would have rolled her eyes. “You do have a way of springing things on people, Auntie.”
Aunt Dahlia waved away Ariel’s concern. “You’ll be all right. This room is full of creative people. Just roll with it.”
Roll with it.She’d had plenty of experience with that onstage. She paced the room that looked like a time warp back to theeighties with its plaid couches and chairs, ruffled throw pillows in the same pattern, and framed florals.
Then she thought of Caleb. He knew even less about bringing this hotel into the modern day than Ariel did about changing a band’s image. Or sound, or whatever nebulous variation Aunt Dahlia wanted.
If Caleb could transform his inn, Ariel could do the same with her band. Apparently, she had to.
“Fine. I’ll need to take notes.” She moved to the table, happy to escape Seth’s fidgetiness and Earl’s cigarette smell.
She sat next to former Texas rancher Stu Patterson, who’d left behind his family’s thousand-acre spread for the love of turning out hit after hit, his cowboy hat on the floor next to him and pure grit backing him. On the other side, Mark Radke, in gray flannel pants, a pressed white dress shirt, and polished black Cole Haan loafers, looked like the banker his family wanted him to be, but whose love-song compositions could bring a grown man to tears in the first verse.
Across from her sat Eli Charles, whom Aunt Dahlia had discovered nineteen years ago in Memphis. She’d heard him singing original songs and accompanying himself on a beat-up budget guitar on the corner of Beale Street and B.B. King Boulevard, near the Blues Hall Juke Joint, his overturned hat collecting ones and fives in tips. Eli had proven himself with fourteen CMA Triple Play Awards.
Ariel blew out a frustrated breath. What did she know about changing images? Mixing up their style? Leading a mismatched team of writers who, except for Seth, had started writing hits before she was born.
She glanced back at her aunt, who had picked up her phone, her eyes soft and her lips parted in a half smile.
