Bluegrass Courtship (12 page)

D
rew was still shaking his head over the awkwardness of his good-night to Janet when the church volunteer on “Kevin duty” led him into the parlor of the bed and breakfast. It was a scene that left him shaking his head even more.

Kevin was set up in a sleeper sofa in the first floor parlor, a bag of quickly gathered clothing and such tossed into a nearby corner. A folding tray by the bed held a glass of water, some bandages, a tube of ointment and a prescription bottle. One of Annie's trademark sticky notes clung to the bottle, with “2:00 p.m., 6:00 p.m., 10:00 p.m.” written on it. Even if he didn't recognize Annie's precise handwriting, it wouldn't have been hard to figure out who'd been tending to Kevin; the volunteer silently smiled and pointed to Annie asleep on a chair in the corner. She was out as cold as Kevin. Neither of them stirred as the volunteer gathered up her knitting and went to sit in the next room. Tonight, they'd all stay at the B and B—not only did Drew want to be close to Kevin, but he felt like he needed an hour-long shower in a real bathroom, not that plastic two-by-two closet that passed for a shower on the bus.

“Hey,” Kevin's whisper spun Drew around. “You made it in okay.” He sounded rather chipper for someone in his condition.

Drew smirked. “More than I can say for you. Does it hurt?”

“Not much right now.” Kevin nodded toward the table of medicine. “But I've got a lot of chemistry going on. Tomorrow'll be another story.” He held up the splinted finger. “I'm already turning cool colors.”

Annie shifted in her sleep, and Kevin made a tender sound. “I told her to go sleep upstairs. It's not like I'm mortally wounded here.” He got a slightly smitten look on his face, the sort of sleepy-eyed smirk produced by a good memory. “She was amazing.”

It hit him as if he'd just put on a pair of glasses—Janet was right. Those two were nuts about each other. How on earth could he have missed it? It was like a neon sign between them now that he knew. Had they figured it out themselves? Or was this one of those proverbial love-hate matches where Kevin and Annie would be the last to know? “Why don't I go upstairs, grab a quick shower, then I'll come back down and take the night shift so Annie can get some decent sleep.”

“She was amazing,” Kevin repeated, a little fuzzier this time. “Hey, what's in the bag?”

Drew had forgotten the bag still in his hands. “Medicinal cheeseburgers. Can't have my buddy taking painkillers on an empty stomach.”

“Gimme that.” Kevin reached for the bag until a wince stopped him. “You ever broken a rib before? It really hurts.”

Drew brought the bag closer and moved the tray table so that it was easily within Kevin's hampered reach. “I can only
imagine. I think you're benched for the duration. You want us to fly you back home?”

“No unnecessary air travel for forty-eight hours,” came Annie's yawning voice behind Drew. “We've got to put up with his moaning until he goes home with the rest of us.”

“I'll have you know I'm seriously injured.” Kevin called out as he dug into the bag for his burger.

Annie sat up and put her glasses back on. “Yes, you are. So take it seriously and stop moving around so much.”

Oh, those two had it bad for each other, all right. If only Drew stood a chance of surviving the crossfire.

“I'm going to go take a shower and then I'll take the night shift, Annie.”

“I think I know how much I can…” Kevin reached for something on the table and then hissed in pain. “Okay, maybe I ought to take it a bit slower. You don't give your ribs a second thought until you bust one.”

“See, you can't just go twisting around like that in your condition. You're supposed to be lying still, remember? And when's the last time you drank some water?”

She was still at it when Drew hit the top of the stairs.
Oh, Lord, I want them happy, but I liked it a lot better when they hated each other.

 

Drew sat in the bus the next morning, flowcharts spread around the table in front of him. Things were always tight the last week on the job, but now with Kevin on the disabled list, things were beyond tight. Not to mention that as landscaping guru, the last week was usually where Kevin had the most input. Now, the most he could manage was to have Kevin supervise a team of volunteers from a patio chaise longue with his foot propped up. Not exactly the optimum
scenario.
Time to be the Big God,
Drew prayed as he sank his head into his hands.
We got a heap of problems and not a heap of solutions to throw at them.
As Drew stared at the demanding timetables, a string of all-nighters seemed to stare back at him. This would be full tilt 24-7 to pull off.

Those kinds of time frames didn't faze him, however. Pulling it off at the last minute was part-and-parcel of
Missionnovation'
s excitement. The pressure always pulled new and better things out of Drew. The last-minute all-night papers were always his best in college, he often started his Christmas shopping on December 23. Drama aside, it was Drew's calm under fire that enabled
Missionnovation
to keep its nail-biter schedule. As far as Drew was concerned, there was always enough time to find a solution, even if you only had two hours. There had been episodes in some seasons where the clean-up crew had been pulling trash bags out the back door at the same moment Drew had been handing over the keys at the front door. The first time it happened, Annie stayed behind in the bus, breathing into a paper bag. By the third season, Annie was calmly distributing trash bags with one hand while handing Drew the keychain with the other. Everyone had somehow grown used to chaos as standard operating procedure.
We've done it before, Lord. Remind me we can do it again. Send me some encouragement to fuel my weary soul.

As if by divine command, Drew's cell phone buzzed in his pocket. It was still on vibrate from his all-night vigil over Kevin. Kevin's prediction that his injuries would be worse in the morning was dead on; the man woke up as a human crash site, grumpy and claiming even his teeth were hurting him. Looking at the collection of bumps, bruises and stitches that was his teammate, Drew was drawn once again
to a gush of thankfulness that Kevin hadn't been more seriously hurt.

“God caught him when he fell,” Annie said when Drew told her at breakfast how thankful he was that Kevin hadn't been more seriously injured. Now that he realized it, Drew felt like those two were wearing their hearts on their sleeves—it was surely only a matter of days if not hours before they figured it out for themselves, in which case the bus was going to feel like a rolling valentine.

Not exactly the best place for a particular guy trying to forget what he was feeling for a particular lady.

Drew flipped open the phone to see Charlie Buchanan's office line on the screen. A little good news from the west coast might be just the ticket to an energizing day. “What's up, Charlie.”

“I've got great news, but first, how's Kevin?”

“Much better when the pain medicine kicks in. He's banged up, but it could have been tons worse given how far he fell. So let's hear the good news.”

“We got 'em. HomeBase is formalizing a sponsorship offer for the next three seasons of
Missionnovation.
An outstanding offer. If we can get you out here soon, they're ready to ink a very sweet deal. Are you ready to become a household name, Drew? Because if they take it as far as they're talking, you will be. You know that line of eco-friendly products you've been thinking of? I happened to mention it to them after you left the other time, and they're showing lots of interest. They're talking about a whole promo on native wildflowers like Kevin always insists on using. And they're one hundred percent behind keeping the emphasis on faith. The whole
Missionnovation
vision—they've caught it.”

Drew sank back in his chair. Full funding, somebody behind his vision—including the God part—and no budget worries for three years. That was serious expansion. “That's…incredible. Amazing. I knew you could do it, Charlie.” Drew hoisted the mug he was holding. “Well, hello and God bless 'ya, HomeBase.”

“Use that line a lot when you get out here. They want to announce it at their annual shareholders' meeting on the twentieth. If we get all the
i'
s dotted and
t'
s crossed by then.”

Something at the very edge of Charlie's tone caught in Drew's ear. “Meaning?”

“Well, we've got a bit of fine print to iron out on this one. When the deals get this big, the details get complicated.”

And that, without a doubt, was “Charlie-speak” for
You may not like what I say next.

“Meaning?”

“They've actually offered above and beyond what we proposed, Drew. We'll go from a well-done minor show to a very big league major network sensation. And they're not asking us to water down the faith, Drew. Not a bit. Do you understand how big that is? What kind of visibility they're handing us? Even in all my planning, I never thought we'd get this far.” Charlie paused before he continued. “They're demanding an exclusive, Drew. But we won't need anyone else's backing with this offer. This is it. This is our shot. It's a whole new world from here on in.”

“Wow.” How was it supposed to feel, to
arrive?
To achieve something he'd worked so long to obtain? Drew stood up and paced the bus, unsure how to feel. Exhilarated? Scared? Blessed beyond his imagination? At the moment, Drew felt like he'd just been shot out of a cannon. But God's
eye was on the sparrow, right? And that could always be trusted.

“Exclusive, huh?”

“Exclusive. Only one phone call to get whatever you need, whenever you need it.”

“Wow,” he said, unable to come up with a more creative response. “That's huge.”

“It is, Drew. Enormous. Think of it—God just did something so enormous even
I'm
not able to take credit for it.”

“Just when I thought I couldn't find a way to describe how big it is,” Drew teased. He imagined Charlie'd been dancing in his office, celebrating. “Maybe I should crack open four boxes of Dave's for breakfast instead of my usual two.”

“Yeah,” said Charlie, a bit nervously. “You might want to eat up your supply this season.”

Drew practically pulled the phone away from his ear to stare at it in disbelief. “No Dave's?”

“That's what exclusive means, Drew. It means nobody else's products appear but HomeBase's.”

“But HomeBase doesn't make cookies, Charlie. I'm fine with using all their tools and appliances and stuff, but I don't know how to run a show without Dave's cookies.”

Drew heard Charlie sigh on the other end of the phone. “Nobody says you have to stop eating Dave's. You'll just have to buy your cookies and eat them off-camera from now on—and believe me, you'll have a big enough budget to keep yourself in cookies.”

“But at the end of the show…the milk and cookies…”

“Look, there's a lot of creative minds in on this. I'm sure we can find an alternative that'll make everyone happy.” He paused again, and Drew heard some papers shuffling in the
background. “Keep the big picture in mind here. This is worth it. A full eighteen episodes
and
a Christmas special, not to mention print advertising in more magazines than you and I could read in a lifetime. For a
Christian
show.”

Annie had always wanted to write a home-organizing column. Maybe now they'd have the leverage to make that happen. And Kevin would get all the native species plants he wanted. The whole team would never have to make do again—and they all had jobs for the next three years. With that kind of job security, maybe even Kevin and Annie could end up at the altar.

“Drew?” Charlie's voice pulled him back. “About that shareholders' meeting?”

“Yeah, I heard you say something about that.” Drew ran his hands through his hair, thinking he might need to shake his head to clear the tangle of thoughts going through it right now.

“It's on the twentieth. I need you to commit to it today. Now, if you can. You'll have the season wrapped by then, won't you?”

Drew glanced at the pile of production schedules he'd been scouring when Charlie called. “Um…it's a bit tight with Kevin out of commission, but…” he flipped through two more pages, checking half a dozen deadlines “…yeah, we can do it. Tell 'em we're on. You've got legal on all the paperwork?”

“You'll get a package by this afternoon to look over, another one for your signatures on Monday. Did I mention you've still got full control of the cast and crew?”

“No, but I'm glad to hear it. What about the bus? Am I going to live in a HomeBase delivery truck now or something?”

“Bus
es,
my good man.
Plural.
Three. One for you, two for the expanded team.”