Page 1 of Guitars and Mistakes
PROLOGUE ONE
On the Road, with Colin Cravers
My people! I’m baaaaaaaaack!!!
And on the off chance that you don’t remember me—although who am I kidding, of course you remember me—I’ll reintroduce myself. The name’s Colin Cravers and you know me as your favorite music blogger. You may also know me from that little single that some stations are playing right now, but that’s neither here nor there.
The last time we talked, I’d just been signed to a new contract.
I’d also just been covering one of the most amazing tours of all time, ie, the tour that put Olivia Johns and Connor Wheating on the map.
If you know, you know.
And that pretty much catches you up on everything that’s happened up to this point.
Actually.
No, I’m wrong about that. There’s more. Like, a lot more.
I came back from signing the above contract (for more on that, check out my website) and found myself once again called into action. Because my sweetheart, that girl who owns my heart, was going on tour again. That’s right, Olivia Johns was going out on the road and taking Connor Wheating with her, as well as The Global Authors and The Leathers.
Rivers Shine and Olivia Johns on the same tour?
Be still, my rock-and-roll heart.
But here’s where things get interesting.
You may know of Rivers Shine. You may have heard of his—ahem—night time activities. The drinking. The drugs. The tattoos.
The heartbreak.
What you probably don’t know is that his agent decided that he needed to clean up his act. Particularly if he was going to be on tour with the darling of country music and her equally charming husband.
Said agent decided to throw a girl into River’s life to try to get him to behave. She found another country music darling—one Lila Potter—and put her right into River’s path. And the rest, as they say, is history.
Or at least... Well, it should have been.
Because Lila’s as talented as she is beautiful, and has a smile that will light up an entire room. She’s got the magical hands on guitar and the equally magical laugh. She traveled out to see Olivia and Connor to try out for the music contract they’re offering and she’s bedazzled everyone she meets.
Including, as it turns out, our very own Rivers Shine.
Fam, when I tell you that he’s smitten, I mean he’s doe-eyed, woozy-faced, drop-down-on-one-knee in love with the girl. She can’t go anywhere without him watching her. He stopped an entire show when he thought she was leaving, just to beg her to stay. Their chemistry onstage is scorching, and I’ve heard rumors that they’re flat out combustible when they’re alone together.
Our boy, it seems, has fallen in love.
And if you’d asked me two weeks ago, that would have been all I had to say on the matter.
But since that little incident when he stopped the show to keep her with him—to literally run into the audience and beg her to stay—something’s happened to him. All the brightness we saw over the week before disappeared and he’s back to the dark, brooding Rivers we’ve all known for so long. He’s drinking. He’s staying up all night. He’s not talking to fans.
He’s got several new tattoos, and I have to say, they’re not great.
In short, Rivers Shine looks like he’s on his way down the drain, despite his agent’s best-laid plans, and not even his new paramour is able to keep him afloat. We all thought that when she almost walked out she might have reached into his black heart and taught it to love again, but those of us on the tour are second-guessing our hopes, these days.
Because it sure does look like he’s back to his old tricks.
No one knows why. No one knows what happened.
But we all have the same question.
