“Maybe, but Ariel, you’re the heart of the band. You’re every man’s sweetheart and every girl’s ideal.”
“I don’t know about that, but I busted out of my bubble, Auntie. For exactly one date with Caleb Kennedy. But it would never work out. And I don’t want to disappoint you either.”
“Well, Auggie trusts him, so I will too. And I trust you—with everything.”
Everything? “Like a new direction for the band?”
“Auggie thinks I might have held on to the band a little too tight in the past. And to you. So I want us to expand our franchise into two bands—yours and mine.”
She’d wanted this freedom so much it was hard to tell her she no longer needed it. “That sounds good. But Caleb still hasn’t decided between the inn and Drake Hamilton’s band.”
Aunt Dahlia laughed her great big laugh. “He’d better stick to music.”
“Right, and that’s his dilemma. He doesn’t want to disappoint his grandfather and the relatives before him who tried to keep the inn in the family.”
“I wouldn’t worry about the ancestors. They’re dead, aren’t they? It’s hard to offend a dead person.”
After she hung up with her aunt, Ariel finally settled on shorts and the T-shirt for their final rehearsal before tomorrow’s concert. She grabbed her guitar case and straw handbag and started for the inn. Since they hadn’t opened again after the jelly bean incident, Ariel wouldn’t bother anyone if she ran through a few songs in the parlor before nine o’clock rehearsal.
The town still slept this early Tuesday morning, with only one carriage and a few bikes on the streets, so Ariel carried her guitar the four blocks to Island House. When she arrived, she set her music on the piano stand and took the bench. While leafing through the music, Ariel found Earl’s “Mercy Song.” She played through it twice, singing along softly.
The world needed this song.
Caleb’s distinctive, sophisticated clicking sounds of wingtips on the wood floor leading to the carpeted parlor rang in the hallway. Moments later, Caleb came into the room, carrying a tray.
Caleb—unreachable now. If only things had ended differently…
“The song sounded great.”
“It sounded better with the whole band.”
He set the tray with her regular breakfast on a nearby table and sipped his creamed coffee.
“How sweet.” Ariel stood from the piano and took a place at the table, the good aromas of fresh, hot bread and peanut butter drawing her. “Thank you, Caleb.”
He sat next to her but kept his thanksgiving private, which hurt a little. Ariel gave her own thanks silently as well.
“You need to play and sing ‘Mercy Song’ at the concert.” He took a long drink of his almost-coffee.
“Tomorrow? I haven’t practiced it much, and it’s pretty complex. Lots of jazz chords.”
“It’s right for you.”
Maybe…
“You should also include the song you sang on your porch that morning.”
“‘You Come to Me at Night’?”
“It has a jazz flavor, like ‘Mercy Song.’”
This man certainly liked to stretch her.
But Ariel had reduced the song to chords the day she’d sung it on the fly. She could have it ready to play in no time. “Aunt Dahlia won’t sing the new jazz songs. So if we use them, we’ll have to divide the band.”
“There are ways to do that well.”
Her mind raced with possibilities as she sipped her tea. “We could have both a country band and a jazz/gospel band.”
