Every single moving part inside her body seemed to pause, waiting.
For abutor anunfortunately.
And then she knew they weren’t going to come.
“And youknowyou have something special, don’t you?”
And then Wyatt “King” Congdon grinned.
He looked like a boy who’d unwrapped the very Christmas present he’d yearned for but had given up hope of ever receiving. And Glory saw him now not just as a cold-faced vehicle to her dreams—though he was indeed that—but like a human who had a tough job he loved, a human who had absorbed countless disappointments in search of the needle in the haystack, the diamond in the junkyard.
As a human who was relaxed now. Because he knew what to do next. There was a drill, and he knew that drill, because he’d all but invented it.
The thing he and Glory had in common was hope. And love.
Whether it was love of music or money or both didn’t matter. She could work with love.
Because she knew exactly whoshewas.
She smiled back at him. “Call me Glory.”
A now un-handcuffed Congdon all but walked on air down Hellcat Canyon’s Main Street at a speed that had Justin Chen scrambling to keep up with him because there was still a chance he could make his New York flight. Congdonalwayswalked like he was fleeing the scene of a crime. He was pushing seventy years old and he’d taken advantage of nearly every available mind-altering substance back in the sixties and seventies because that’s what everyone did and hell why not, but after one heart episode in his fifties, he was now aggressively fit. Congdon never did anything by halves.
“Holy crap, Justin... that voice... it’s like if Adele had the twang of a Carrie Underwood, but this girl has something raw all her own. Not too many women have that smoky thing going, that depth, with that kind of power or range. And the emotion, the maturity, the expression. Christ almighty. And she’s beautiful, almost elegant, in a raw way. Like... oh, Shania, only dangerous. Bobbie Gentry. Hotter than Crystal Gayle. She’ll be a fun interview, too.”
“Wait... Crystal Who? And remind me who Bobbie Gentry is again?” Justin was embarrassed that he was starting to sweat to keep up.
“How oldareyou, Justin? Do your homework. My uncle had a Crystal Gayle poster in his room. She was my first crush. Hair way down past her ass. Gorgeous, gorgeous woman.”
They spent a moment in reverie about the wonders of getting lost in long hair.
“Pays to know your history in this business, Justin, if you want to survive. We’re about to make some more history.”
“She doesn’t have a cell phone.”
“You can e-mail her. She can tell that story later. About how she was once so poor she didn’t have a cell phone and had to audition without her guitar because it was stolen. To Jimmy Fallon, onThe Tonight Show. Next year, maybe. Soon though.”
Chapter20
So disappointed not to see you today, Eli.
Never had one eight-word sentence from Leigh contained so many dimensions of admonishment. Hewasgenuinely disappointed. Possibly even hurt.
Eli had felt the shame of it flushing his skin as he held his phone and stared at that text.
After he’d dropped Glory off at the Misty Cat this morning, he’d texted Leigh heartfelt apologies and told him that he’d had a personal emergency to attend to and would be unable to make the meeting in Sacramento.
Which was basically true.
The vague nature of the message told Devlin that it was a “personal” emergency indeed—if his mom or his sister was in some kind of jeopardy, Eli would have said exactly that, because Leigh knew both of them.
Still, Eli’s job wasn’t in jeopardy.
Probably.
Then again, he also probably wasn’t in any immediate danger of a promotion.
He’d take his lumps and call Leigh and see if there was some way he could explain what he’d done today in a way that didn’t make him sound callow or irresponsible, or worst of all, purely crazy.