But not Mack Blanton.
He seemed to feed off the crowd’s energy—or was it the knowledge she was in the audience?
After performing three more songs from his album, Mack and the band did take a five-minute break, and Jorrie waited for questions from Hannah and the rest of her companions about why she had made such a spectacle of herself.
Instead, Hannah and Pepper chatted across her about how quickly they could get the concerts up and going at Old Garnet.
“I want that guy at Old Garnet every Friday night until there’s snow on the ground!” Hannah declared. “People would come to the distillery from far and wide to see him. Think of the branding potential…”
“We don’t want to wear the man out,” Pepper pointed out.
“Or the distillery grounds,” Lila said. “If we get crowds even a fraction of this size at the distillery, it will take us some time to clean up and prepare for the next event. I’d say we need at least two weeks between events.”
Hannah nodded. “And that would build anticipation if there’s a little time between his performances.”
After a few more minutes discussing possible Old Garnet concert plans, the band returned and Mack took to the microphone.
“Folks, now it’s Bluegrass time,” he said, and the crowd clapped and yelled with approval once more. “I wrote these myself.”
Mack and his band launched into several Bluegrass pieces Jorrie suspected had been intended for the album he never got to make. They were lovely, traditional, and lively—everything Bluegrass music was supposed to be.
It was not just the music of a particular place—such as Kentucky or the South or wherever—but more evocative of an attitude.
To Jorrie, it simply sounded like home.
“Folks,” Mack said a little breathlessly into the microphone, “this is the last piece for the evening and—”
The crowd began to cry no, nearly in unison.
“Thanks, but, really, this is the last one,” Mack said. “I think they’ll throw us out if we don’t end it here. This last one I wrote just this past week, so this is the world premiere of this song. I don’t have a title yet—the only part that’s unwritten. But that’s not important right now. What’s important is the music and the message. I hope you like it. Because this one’s special.”
6
As soon as Jorrie heard the first notes, she recognized the structure of the song as more of a spiritual piece than the upbeat songs Mack had previously played. It had a very different mood, like a hymn.
And just like a hymn, it transported her to another realm…
O where is my home now?
Are my feet back on the ground?
Or need I fly away once more?
Spread my wings, I want to soar
Flying so high, I had to roam
Never said good-bye, I had to go
Flew so high, I did not hear
The call of hope, the whisper in my ear
I lost my hope, that is so true
Many times, I played the fool
How do I find my faith again?
My soul is tired; do I break or bend?
Flying so high, I had to roam
Never said good-bye, I had to go
Flew so high, I did not hear
The call of hope, the whisper in my ear
But can I see the way ahead?
Guide me, Lord, I need a friend
And in another’s face, Thy Spirit shines
There it dwells; help me claim the light
The crowd was on its feet and Jorrie among the first, before the last line was sung. Mack and the band bowed, and then the band joined Mack at the front of the stage where they all joined hands and took another bow. The crowd was calling for more, but the group trotted off stage.
Pepper and Hannah again talked across Jorrie, who was wiping tears from her face, her emotion unnoticed by the others.
“Let’s go find Mack,” Pepper said to Hannah. “He’ll be in a great mood and receptive to what we have in mind.”
Hannah, who was six months pregnant, groaned.
“I want a drink of water and some ice cream right now,” Hannah declared as she put her hands under her belly.
Pepper, Lila, and CiCi simultaneously expressed concern for Hannah and bombarded her with questions about whether she needed to leave or take a rest somewhere.
“I think I saw Miranda around here earlier,” CiCi said, referring to Dr. Miranda Chaplin, Hannah’s OB/GYN. “Want me to go fetch her?”
“No, I don’t need a doctor. I’m just pregnant,” Hannah grumbled. “Get me a place to sit and something to eat and drink, and I’ll be fine.”
“I’ll find Mack,” Jorrie volunteered. “Just tell me where to find all of you.”
Pepper said to meet back at the same place they’d eaten the elephant ear since she remembered one of the food stands in that vicinity sold ice cream. Jorrie said she’d try her best to locate Mack and bring him along but had no idea where to look.
“Try the tent where they were originally supposed to perform,” Jon suggested. “I bet they went back there since they knew the place would be empty. Maybe they even left their instrument cases there.”
Pepper nudged Jorrie in the ribs as they were filing out of the grandstands and down the stairs.
“That was one hell of a song he wrote for you,” Pepper said.
Hannah, making her way down the stairs next to Pepper, managed to overhear the comment even in the rush of departing people.
“Mack Blanton wrote that last song for you?” she gushed. “How sweet! So you two are dating?”
“Uh—well—I guess it’s a little early to say that.”
“The man wrote a song for you,” Pepper said. “If you’re not dating, you’re well on your way.”
Outside the grandstand, the group parted, with Jorrie heading off by herself toward the tent where Mack’s concert had originally been located. The crowd was thinning out, and Jorrie easily moved toward the tent.
When she got there, she found Mack and his band toward the front of the tent and away from the entrance. They were packing up, chatting, laughing, and in generally high spirits.
Mack had his back to her as she approached, and she was pleased that she was going to be able to sneak up on him and surprise him with her appearance.
“So when you gonna leave us again, Mack?” said one of the band members as he put a banjo in a case. “After a reception like tonight, it’ll be back to Nashville any day now, right?”
The other band members began to laugh and tease their leader.
“I wish,” Mack said as he put his guitar in its case. “I mean, I love home and all, and the reception we got tonight was great, but it’s not like there’s much of anything to keep me here if—”
“So you’ve decided to fly away from us?” Jorrie asked him, using the words of Mack’s own song. “There’s nothing to keep you here in Bourbon Springs?”
Mack spun around and Jorrie glared at him.
The band members all became quiet, stared at Jorrie for a few moments, then busied themselves with packing up their instruments and other equipment.
“Jorrie? That’s not what—”
“Not what you meant?”
She knew what she’d heard, and she wasn’t going to let Mack have the chance to talk himself out of his predicament. Although they’d shared nothing more than some hot-and-heavy make-out sessions, hearing him so casually disregard the existence of anything worthwhile in Bourbon Springs infuriated her.
“It’s just—”
“I’m actually here to deliver a message,” Jorrie said and crossed her arms over her chest. The message, she hoped, was clear: I didn’t come here just to see you.
“Message?”
“Pepper and Hannah Davenport want to talk to you,” she said flatly.
“About what?”
“Follow me, and you can find out for yourself.” She turned and walked away.
M
ack hastened to follow Jorrie out of the tent, toting his guitar as he walked beside her.
“Look, I didn’t mean it like that, okay? I was just talking to the guys and—”
“Here we are,” she said, cutting him off as they arrived at the picnic area near the food kiosks.
Pepper waved to them from a table, and Mack turned to Jorrie. She gave him a cold look, clearly broadcasting the message that their interview was over.
“Mack?” Pepper continued to call. “Come on over here!”
Jorrie held out an arm, indicating Mack should go before her. He rolled his lips into his mouth, and she could see that he was struggling with what to say or do next.
“Don’t keep a pregnant woman waiting!” Pepper pointed to Hannah, who was sitting and happily consuming an ice cream cone.
“Join us, won’t you?” Hannah asked and gave Mack a little wave.
“She’s technically your boss—or one of them,” Jorrie reminded Mack.
Her dash of snark had its desired effect. Frowning, Mack skulked to the table.
Jon introduced Mack to Hannah, Lila, and CiCi. Jorrie remained standing for a moment until Jon urged her to sit next to him, which was at the opposite end of the picnic table from Mack.
“Looks like two of you are my bosses,” Mack cracked as he took a seat across the table from Hannah. He put his guitar case carefully on the ground, then explained he was starting his part-time bottling job at Old Garnet the very next morning.
“Then we’d better get down to business so you can get home and get some rest,” Hannah said as she polished off her ice cream cone. “We have a proposition for you, Mack Blanton.”
“We?”
“Old Garnet Distillery and GarnetBrooke Farm,” Hannah clarified. “We want to sponsor concerts this summer on the distillery grounds. And we’d love it if you and your band could play.”
“Tell me more,” Mack said, leaning on the table.
Jorrie looked on as Hannah and Pepper discussed the idea with Mack. Jon made it clear that he wasn’t going to be involved in any of the legal work related to the concerts since he was married to the owner of GarnetBrooke.
“We’d probably be able to pay you a small amount for the concerts,” Lila said. “Like an honorarium, a small amount to cover your costs.”
Mack nodded. “I’ll talk to the band, but I’m sure I can get most of the guys to go along with this. And you said these are supposed to be on weekend nights?”
“Is that a problem? Will it be too much to handle since you’ll be working at the distillery the next day?” Hannah asked.
“Not at all. I love to perform live. And there’s no better place for me to perform live other than right here in Bourbon Springs. Home.” He turned toward Jorrie as he finished the sentence.
After a little more discussion, with Hannah and Pepper revealing that they hoped to get the concerts up and going before the Fourth of July, the group rose from the table. Hannah was the first to get up.
“I want another ice cream before I get out of here.” She headed toward the ice cream stand with Lila and CiCi in tow.
After the others had left, Pepper pulled Mack into a bear hug.
“I’m so excited for you!”
Mack smiled and thanked her.
“That was one great idea you had,” he said.
“Maybe this is just what you need to get noticed and on your way back to Nashville.”
“Yeah, maybe,” Mack said, his eyes cast downward.
Jon yawned and Pepper announced it was time to go. Mack and Jon walked ahead of Jorrie and Pepper, talking about the distillery and the bottling line.
“I think you’ll like working in the bottling house again,” Jon said. “Not that much has changed, and the bottling line supervisor is probably the same guy you remember.”
“Sims is still the supervisor?” Mack asked.
“That’s the guy. Been there for twenty years, from what I understand,” Jon said. “Hannah tells me his wife died a few years back. She used to work in accounting.”
“Yeah, I remember that. She was sick for a while as I recall. That was a hard time for Sims. For all of us,” he added.
Pepper put her arm around Jorrie as they lagged behind the men.
“I guess Drake will have to do the legal work for the farm on the concerts,” Pepper said. “I mean—if you two are dating or whatever—”
“Yeah—whatever,” Jorrie interrupted, causing Pepper to give her a confused look.
The song he’d written for her was nice.
The lyrics were beautiful, the music evocative.
But she’d heard his words in that tent.
And that was what mattered, his intent, his plans, and not the sentiment he’d crooned out on the stage that night.
Mack felt the ache and burden of every one of his thirty-two years when he rolled out of bed on Saturday morning at six. The fun and adrenaline produced by his rapturous reception at the Craig County Fair had completely evaporated, and now he was faced with a long day on the bottling line and trying to figure out how the hell to get back in Jorrie Jones’s good graces.
Albert was still asleep when he left shortly after seven, and he left a message for him, putting out his medicines next to the morning paper. Although the bottling house didn’t open until eight on Saturdays, Mack didn’t want to run the risk of being late on his first day of work.
Especially since Sims Pierson was going to be his boss again.
A man who hated him for no apparent reason other than Mack had exhibited ambition and had acted on it.
When Mack had come into the bottling house one day a few years back, telling his coworkers that he’d been selected in one of the preliminary rounds of The Big Sing Thing, Sims had accused him of lying. Told him that if he heard any more talk like that, he’d see to it that Mack got fired for dishonesty.
Mack shut his mouth—at least at the distillery—and let his singing do the talking for him instead. One of the most satisfying moments of his life had been when Mack had been selected as a finalist, allowing him to give notice to Sims.
The man had gone through a really rough time losing his wife—the cancer had taken its time and its toll. But Mack had never been able to untangle how much of Sims’s unpleasantness arose from his circumstances rather than his character.
He parked in a small dirt-and-grass parking area beyond the main visitors’ center lot, which made for a long, hot walk. Mack was dressed in jeans, work boots, and one of his grandfather’s polo shirts—dark red, of course, so as to fit in amongst the other garnet-wearing coworkers. He figured that he’d either be given an Old Garnet shirt or allowed to buy one at a discount and expected to wear it every Saturday he worked.
He was looking forward to the work and being back in a familiar place. But not so much to seeing Sims. And he knew that he’d have hell to pay once Sims found out that the distillery was cosponsoring concerts with GarnetBrooke and that the not-so-famous-anymore Mack Blanton would be headlining.
He walked to the bottling house alone; it was only seven thirty and he sensed no one was around. But when he arrived in the small courtyard between the old rickhouse and the bottling house, he saw that he’d been mistaken.
A small group of workers had congregated in the space, drinking coffee and chatting. When Mack appeared in their midst, they immediately stopped talking and looked at him.
The new guy.
A young man in his early twenties tossed his coffee cup into a nearby barrel which had been impressed into service as a trash can. He then took a few steps toward Mack.
“You Mack?”
“That’s me,” Mack acknowledged, shaking the kid’s proffered hand and pleased by his welcome.
“I’m Derrick Upshaw.” He motioned the other members of his group over. “Heard we had a new coworker today”
Derrick then introduced Mack to his new coworkers, Laura, Bill, and Fred.
“We’re the weekend crew,” Derrick said.
&n
bsp; “I think you’re forgetting someone, aren’t you?”
Mack moved away from the courtyard entrance to see Sims standing there, looking almost exactly the same as he did the last time he’d seen him: bald, thin, tall, bespectacled, and sour faced.
Mack immediately put out his hand.
“Sims, glad to be working with you again.”
Sims shook the hand but no expression of welcome or warmth passed over his face.
“Really? I thought you’d left us forever, Mack. Gone off to make your fortune and all that. But now you’re back.” There was no mistaking the hint of satisfaction in his tone.
“Yep, I’m back,” Mack said wearily.
“Derrick,” Sims said. “Set Mr. Nashville here up on broom duty this morning, and then put him on the labeling line.”
“Sure thing.” Derrick gave Mack a sympathetic glance and told him to follow him into the bottling house. The other workers trailed behind.
“I see that Sims is just as charming as ever,” Mack said once they were well inside the bottling house. Sims had disappeared, and the only people around were bottling workers.
“So he’s always been that sweet?” Derrick asked as he pointed to a push broom in the corner which Mack claimed.
“Some things don’t change.”
Derrick told him that after he finished sweeping, he could start on the labeling line.
“I take it from Sims’s comment that you know how to do that?”
“My favorite thing to do in the bottling house. That’s why I never let him know.”
Derrick laughed and nodded and said he’d come and get him soon to put him to work labeling.
Mack pushed the broom around the bottling house and tried to push away the resentment at the fact he was back in this place. His coworkers seemed nice enough, and he was grateful for the reception he’d gotten that morning. With the exception of Sims.
He expected a steady stream of snarky statements from the man and had been surprised not to hear more meanness in their first encounter. Mack wondered whether he was in for regular, insulting cracks from his supervisor and so decided to make a game of it with himself.
Bourbon Springs Box Set: Volume III, Books 7-9 (Bourbon Springs Box Sets Book 3) Page 6
