She nodded shyly, blushing furiously and Matt released her. The two of them forced their way back through the crowd until they were standing near the side of the bar.
"What's up?" Matt asked him. "Is Darren fucking something up again?"
"No, nothing bad," Jake said. "Do you remember sending one of your envelopes to a man named Ronald Shaver."
Matt searched his brain for a moment and then nodded. "Yeah, he was one of the ones I sent the demo tape to. He's the agent for Earthstone. What about him?"
"He's here," Jake said. "And he wants to speak to the two of us outside."
"Here?" Matt said, his eyes widening. "You mean, like, here here? Right here, right now, here?"
"Out in his car," Jake confirmed. "His secretary or girlfriend or whatever came up to me. She wants to take us to him."
"Well fuck my sister," Matt said. "Let's go."
Jake led him back over to Trina, who was waiting patiently by the front door. He introduced Matt to her. Matt was too excited to even make a sexist remark.
"Take us to the man," Matt said.
She led them outside, into the parking lot and out to the street. There was a black, stretch limousine parked in front of the fire hydrant there. The tinted windows were all up. A uniformed driver was standing by next to the rear door. As they approached, he mechanically opened it, revealing a plush, well-lit interior equipped with leather couch-like seats. A man in his forties was sitting against the rear of the passenger compartment. He was dressed in a black suit and tie. His hair was brown and professionally styled. A pair of Vuarnet sunglasses covered his eyes. A bottle of Chivas Regal was on the table before him as was a hefty glass filled with ice and the golden brown liquid.
"Gentlemen," he said, his voice rich and cultured. "Come in, please."
Matt and Jake looked at each other for a moment and then stepped inside, one by one. They sat down in extremely comfortable seats against the passenger side wall of the compartment. The driver closed the door after them, leaving Trina outside.
"My name is Ronald Shaver," the man said, holding out his hand to Jake. "You're Jake Kingsley, correct?"
"Yes," Jake said, shaking with him.
Shaver turned to Matt. "And you're the venerable Mr. Tisdale, are you not?" he asked.
"Yeah," Matt said. "I am."
Shaver took a sip from his drink. He did not offer the two musicians any. "I received your demo tape and your resume last week, Mr. Tisdale," he said. "I didn't think too much of it at the time. In fact, I only opened it because an appointment had cancelled on me and I had nothing better to do. But I did listen to your tape."
"Did you like it?" Matt asked.
Shaver frowned. "A very poor quality recording. What did you do, record it in your garage?"
"Something like that," Matt said. That was, in fact, exactly where it had been recorded, with Bill running their instruments through their soundboard into a series of cassette recorders and then mixing the whole thing together onto a master tape, with each volume level carefully adjusted.
"That's about what I figured," Shaver said. "In any case, though the recording was poor, the actual music was... shall we say... not terrible? You have a decent singing voice, Mr. Kingsley, and you seem to know your way around a guitar, Mr. Tisdale. And your piano player... well, he adds a certain uniqueness to the sound of your music. It was enough to keep me listening for a few minutes and to read over what you'd sent. It seems your little band has developed quite the following here in this... uh... city."
"We're the most popular band in Heritage," Matt said proudly. "We sell out every venue we play."
"Well... yeah," Shaver said. "But, unfortunately, that's a little like saying you're the most popular Chinese restaurant in Pocatello, Idaho. It's not really much of an accomplishment now, is it? The rarity of the medium makes for distorted analysis by the inhabitants. When you can say you're the most popular Chinese restaurant in Beijing, then you're getting up there. Right?"
Jake and Matt looked at each other for a moment, both trying to figure out if they'd just been insulted or not.
"Uh... look, Mr. Shaver," Matt said. "Maybe if you'd..."
"So anyway," Shaver interrupted. "I listened to your demo tape and read over your materials and then threw the whole thing in the garbage. That's a step further than most unsolicited demo tapes get, I might add. I forgot completely about you until earlier today. You see, I'm in town on some business and I happened to be leafing through your local newspaper." He said this last with particular disdain. "And there, in the entertainment session, I saw that your band was to perform tonight at this club. That reminded me of your tape. Since there really isn't anything that resembles entertainment in this town, I decided to take my secretary out to see what you were all about live." He took another sip from his drink. "You folks put on a decent show. As I was watching you I was thinking to myself that there might be something there. The crowd does seem to appreciate you."
"They love us," Matt said, a little defensively.
"That is obvious," Shaver agreed. "That's why I sent Ms. Allen in to retrieve you. Now, I'm probably being stupid and maybe I'm getting old and out of touch, but I've got this notion that your band stands a chance of moving beyond this... place. You're decent musicians and, most importantly, your sound is different than everything else out there. If you'd like to talk about my agency representing you, I'll meet with you in my hotel room tomorrow before I leave. We'll see if maybe we can work something out."
"Fuckin-A," Matt blurted.
Jake gave him a sharp look. "Yes," he interjected quickly. "That sounds like a very good idea."
"Wonderful," Shaver said. "How does eleven o'clock sound?"
"Perfect," Matt said, his composure returning.
"What hotel are you staying at?" Jake asked.
"It's in what passes for your downtown area," Shaver said. "I'll send the limo to come pick you all up. Just give the address to Trina and be waiting there at 10:30. Okay?"
"Yes sir!" Jake said. "We'll be there."
"Thank you, Mr. Shaver," Matt said. "You won't be sorry."
"Oh, I probably will," he muttered. "I probably will. I'll see you gentlemen tomorrow."
They exited the limo a moment later. Matt gave his address to Trina. She didn't write it down on anything, she simply nodded and repeated it back to him. With that, she climbed in the car and the driver shut the door. He then climbed in himself and the long black car drove off into the night.
The limousine pulled up in front of Matt's house at precisely 10:30, gliding to a halt before the driveway. The driver was the same as the previous night, but his demeanor was markedly different. He did not wear his hat or call them sir. He simply knocked on the door and asked-in a rather impatient voice-if they were ready to go, his eyes looking at them with distaste. He did not open the back door for them. He just told them to wipe their feet before they got in and not to touch anything.
"Friendly guy," Jake said sourly as he settled into the rearmost seat.
"Hey, Jeeves!" Matt yelled as he looked at the bar. It was closed tightly and had a combination lock firmly affixed upon it. "What the fuck's up with the bar? I need a drink!"
The partition between front and back slid downward. "The bar is for paying customers," the driver said coldly. "You five most certainly do not fit that category."
The partition slid shut again and the limo took off, accelerating rather abruptly.
After a bouncing, jarring, twenty-minute ride full of centrifugal force and inertial changes, they pulled up before the Royal Gardens Hotel, a sixty year old, sixteen story hotel which was-until the Stovington Suites would be built in five more years-the nicest accommodations in Heritage County.
The partition came down again and the driver-who was munching on a deli sandwich and currently had a mouthful-told them, "Hop out here and go wait by the service entrance. Mr. Shaver's secretary will meet you there." He rolled his eyes a little. "If you tried going in the front looking like that, security would probably mace you."