Page 60 of The Allotment on Willow Tree Lane

Damon pulled a face. ‘It doesn’t feel right.’

‘Playing without Aiden?’

He lifted a shoulder. ‘I suppose.’

She gazed at him steadily. ‘You’re going to have to get used to it,’ she said gently. ‘He’s not coming back.’

‘I know…’

‘And you’ve got those tracks to finish,’ she reminded him.

He settled the Gibson on his knee, his fingers absently plucking out a tune as he considered how to answer. He knew he needed to focus on the new album and putting the unfinished tracks to bed, but his heart simply wasn’t in it.

‘What’s that?’ Sadie’s voice cut into his thoughts.

‘Huh? Oh…’ His fingers stilled as he realised he had been playing one of his recent compositions. ‘I’ve been messing about. It’s nothing.’

‘It’s most definitelysomething,’ she argued. ‘Go on, play it for me.’

‘It isn’t finished.’

‘Don’t care.Pleeease?’ She gave him a pleading look, and he shook his head.

Aiden’s sister had always been able to wrap him and Luke around her little finger and after she’d pouted at him and pleaded some more, Damon found himself closing his eyes as he began to play.

The music flowed through him, the notes filling his heart and his mind. The lyrics came from his soul, and he meant every single word of them. And when he strummed the final chord, his fingers reached for the next song, and the next, until he had sung every song he’d composed since the day he’d watched an ethereal woman dancing under the stars in a flower-strewn meadow.

The last note hung in the air before fading to silence, and Damon slumped back in his chair. He was done: strung out, wrung out, empty. Yet his heart was full of joy, his mind was calm, and a wonderful serenity filled his soul.

This was the first time he had played all the songs in one set, and they hung together perfectly. They were the best he had ever written.

‘Wow…’ Sadie’s whisper made him jump. He had given himself to his music so completely that he had forgotten she was there.

Sitting up self-consciously, he put the Gibson back in its case, then risked a glance at her.

To his consternation, she had tears trickling down her face. But she didn’t look sad, she looked entranced.

‘That was so incredibly beautiful,’ she said, shaking her head slowly. ‘Powerful, moving, intense.’

‘Which song?’ He caught his bottom lip between his teeth. Her opinion mattered to him.

‘All of them. Shit, Damon, they are brilliant.’ She paused. ‘But they’re hardly Black Hyacinth material.’

‘I didn’t write them for Black Hyacinth, I wrote them for…’ He hesitated.

‘Ceri?’ Sadie stared knowingly at him. ‘Are you really going to finish the album?’

‘I think I have to. I owe it to Aiden.’

‘And what about after?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Black Hyacinth will need a bass player.’

Damon inhaled sharply. The thought of bringing someone else in to replace Aiden was untenable. Ever since he had fled to Foxmore he had been shying away from thinking about it, but the time had come.

‘How about me?’ she added.

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