Broken Strings

Four

"Me too." He forced a smile and wondered how many others he'd have to fake over the course of the day.

They all took their seats and Brock was just starting to feel his hands clam up when Julio said, "I'd expect that you're a bit nervous about being here."

Brock didn't see the point in denying it. "Just a bit."

"Well, I hope by the end of our conversation today, you're a little bit more relaxed so we can continue on making this a beneficial partnership for us all."

"Your agent told us that Frontier selling your contract came as a bit of a shock last week," David added. "I have to say, though, that we are exceptionally glad to have you as an Eclipse artist."

"You might be the only two people in all of country music who are glad to have me right now," Brock said and immediately regretted the words. Oh well. Might as well air all of the dirty laundry out first.

He watched as Julio and David exchanged a quick look that spoke volumes. Brock's chest tightened. It was an effort to swallow the lump in his throat.

"Well," Julio started slowly, "we do know that there has been some, um, bad press surrounding you this weekend. We know about the stories that broke on Friday from your former bandmate."

"None of it is true. Trace and I used to be friends and, to put things bluntly, he's angry because his career went nowhere after our band broke up and mine has done okay."

Though it had been better than okay for a long time. It had only been within the last year that things had started to turn south. Since Trace had re-emerged and started running his damned mouth.

"Be that as it may," David interjected as he drummed his fingers against the tabletop. "It's important that we repair your public image as we integrate you into Eclipse Records. Before we get into how we'd like to do that, there's someone we would like you to meet.

"As Julio and I are based here in Los Angeles, we brought in a third partner into Eclipse Records who is based solely in Nashville. Cierra Ortega has a background in business and music and she spent six years with Visage Entertainment before we managed to convince her to jump ship and join us at Eclipse. She's going to be connecting with us on a video call in a few moments but we wanted to know if you had any questions for us before we got started?"

Brock looked between the two men and said, "No questions here, but I do want to thank you for buying my contract. Music is what I love and when I got the news that Frontier was selling my contract, I was worried about my future and about being forced into a new label. Then, I talked to a few of your artists here at Hype Records and they all sang your praises. I just hope that I can make great music here."

"That's the plan," Julio said. "Great music, creatively satisfied artists, and a fun place to come to work. That's what we try and preach."

"That's something I can get behind." Brock meant it.

Perhaps for once, he'd even get to have some semblance of control over his craft – something that he'd never had in the past. Frontier had always been restricting, telling him what he could and couldn't put on a record. It would be freeing to make decisions for himself. If Julio and David trusted him enough to do that.

"Cierra is ready and waiting for us whenever we're ready to go," David murmured.

Julio affirmed that they were. They took a moment to adjust their chairs so that they could see Brock at his end of the table and look at the woman who flared to life on the screen on the western wall of the room.

Cierra Ortega was not quite what Brock expected – then again, so far nothing about Eclipse Records was what he had expected. At Frontier, all of the label owners were strict, grim-faced people in suits who cared more about the bottom line of the company than the happiness or creativity of the artists. Julio and David were definitely not cut from that cloth and it appeared that Cierra wasn't either, if her open face and kind blue-gray eyes were any indication.