Secrets in the Sand by Carolyn Brown

            “Hey.” Angel giggled nervously. “I graduated from this place. I belong to that crowd.”

            “Yeah, like I belong at the pearly gates of heaven.” Susan’s blue eyes twinkled. “You outgrew them years ago. Don’t let these hicks make you think you still belong to their world.”

            “Thanks.” Angel pretended to slap her cheek. “I needed that.”

            “Well, I can see why you were so stuck on that Clancy. He fills out them Wranglers pretty damned good.” Patty sighed. “And those big, wide shoulders about gave me the vapors.” She fluttered her long eyelashes. “Maybe you oughta give him another chance, Angel. Lord, handsome as he is, I’d give him a chance if he wasn’t already wearin’ your brand.”

            “Hell,” Angel snorted. “He never wore my brand. He’s free for the taking if you’re interested. I don’t think he’s still married. If he is, his wife didn’t come with him. But rest assured he’s about as trustworthy as those two little devils painted on the side of this bus.”

            “No, thanks,” Patty said, putting on fresh lipstick. “You can keep him. Then tame him or kill him, but don’t give him to me.”

            “Me neither.” Mindy gulped in the hot night air and looked up at the starlit sky to see if there might be a stray cloud with a few raindrops to spare. “Hey, look up on the balcony when you come outside, Angel. Clancy’s up there staring down here like he can’t believe his little eyeballs.”

            “Yeah? That’s nothing new. He always did look down on me.” Angel was suddenly tired. Her bones ached as never before during a performance…and so did her stupid heart. “Another hour and a half and we’ll take this bus home and park it. Then I’ll forget about Clancy Morgan and get on with life. I was here for closure, and I’ve got it.”

            “Sure, you do.” Bonnie chuckled. “You’ll forget Clancy when you’re stone-cold dead and planted six feet down. Women don’t forget first loves, and they never forget a first love who did them dirty.”





Chapter 2


            Angel flipped the light switch just inside the massive doors of her office and slipped off her shoes. She padded across the thick ivory carpet and plopped down in an oversize blue velvet chair behind an antique French provincial desk. She tossed the alumni newsletter on the desk, laced her hands behind her head, and tried to calm down.

            She’d gone to the reunion to give her former classmates a dose of comeuppance. She had planned to leave with a smile on her face and never think about any of them again. Several former acquaintances had made a point of stopping by the stage between songs and saying hello to her, but Clancy left just after the last song without a word. But then, what could he say? He’d made his choice ten years ago, and there was no room for a change of heart.

            Angel got up and went to the window. Patty was the last one leaving the parking lot. The other girls had already left in the early-morning darkness. Next Friday they would be playing at a honky-tonk just south of Davis, Oklahoma, and then a new band called The Gamblers would pick up the bus and have it repainted with their logo. It was high time for the Honky Tonk Band to go out with a flourish and retire. The girls enjoyed performing, but they needed their weekends these days. Allie was married and her husband, Tyler, complained that he never saw her on weekends. Susan lived with her boyfriend, Richie, and they needed more quality time together.

            Bonnie was engaged and planning an October wedding, and Mindy was in the middle of a divorce. Besides, none of them were getting any younger. Angel sighed, thinking about how she could catch up on all the work at the farm when she stopped touring, and she had this oil business to run as well.

            She thought about Tishomingo again. Main Street had changed a little in the past ten years. The courthouse was new, and the café where she and her grandmother had an occasional burger had a different name these days, and there was a new chiropractor’s office on the corner of Main and Broadway. Blake Shelton’s businesses were where a clothing store and a drugstore used to stand. She’d looked upstream at Pennington Creek when they’d crossed the bridge over it into town and noticed that it hadn’t changed at all. The same trees still shaded the sandbar below the dam, and the memories of what had happened night after night on a blanket in the privacy of those trees were so real, she could almost smell Clancy’s aftershave.

            Angel picked up the newsletter and began to read. Each page had a classmate’s name at the top and a summary of their accomplishments in the past ten years. Apparently, almost everyone had sent in the questionnaire no matter whether they could attend the alumni banquet and the dance. She found her own bio and reread it. I’m not enclosing a bio, but my band and I—Angel and the Honky Tonk Band—will play for the dance free of charge if you would like. Let me know at the following address. Angela Conrad. She’d added a box number in Denison, Texas. But no one knew that she had rented the box for one month just for the return answer to her letter.