Emily Quartermaine walked up to the door at L&B. Her large, rambunctious family was fighting again, and she was glad to have a place to escape to.
She opened the door and Juan greeted her with a warm smile. "Hey, how's my girlfriend?" he asked.
Emily smiled. "All right. I got away from the mansion, that's enough to be happy about."
Juan gave her a hug. "I'm sorry. Is all the fighting getting to you?"
"You think I would be used to it by now. I don't want to talk about it." Emily looked away.
"Well, then, how about some good news to get your mind off things?"
"I would love good news right now." She smiled at the only boy who really considered her his equal, not like some little sister who was fun to hang around with, but never old enough to be seriously interested in.
"I found a band willing to play the backing tracks for my demo."
"That's great! How did you do that?"
"I found them playing in one of the battle of the bands contests they have in the park on Saturdays. They were good, and they were the right price."
Emily laughed. "Cheap?"
"Yeah." Juan chuckled. "But I still think they're pretty good."
As if on cue, the door opened. Four men carrying various pieces of equipment came in. One had an upright bass; another carried a keyboard, a third had many pieces of a drum kit he was lugging in, and the fourth brought in a steel guitar.
"Hi, we're part of the band you hired," said a man of medium height who wore wire-rimmed glasses. He held out his hand. "I'm Jon."
Juan shook his hand. "Hi, I'm Juan."
"That's the same thing, right?" he grinned. "Let me introduce the rest of us: That's Chuck on bass, Cris on keyboards and Keith on drums."
Chuck, a short and husky man with short brown hair, nodded his head at the sound of his name, Cris, a young Latino man who was wearing a green Hawaiian shirt, smiled, and Keith, a tall, lean man wearing a Peyton Manning football jersey, had a drumstick in his mouth, so he grunted a hello.
"So, are you ready for our particular brand of country?"
Emily looked at Juan. "Did he say country?"
Juan looked slightly embarrassed. "You get what you pay for?" he said sheepishly. "Hey, um, the guy on guitar didn't tell you the kind of demo we're doing? I worked something out with him."
"He was right behind us, he had to park the van, but we know nothing," Jon said.
"As usual," Cris remarked.
The door opened and Emily turned to see who was walking in. A man with long dirty blonde hair and big brown eyes came in with what looked like an electric guitar on his back and an acoustic in each hand. He's gorgeous, Emily thought. Then she took a second look and realized she knew him. "Sly?"