One Hit Wonder

by Kristi Rose

Lockett sighed. “Can you call someone?”

  Sure, I could. But I didn't want to. I was in no hurry to have the conversation about my lying, cheating not-really-my-husband with anyone.

  I had three options. None of them were good. There was my sister Rachel. She lived on the east coast, was an active duty nurse in the US Navy, and a single parent. She liked to boss me around, like older sisters do, especially when she was worried. I considered my parents next. This was going to rip them up, especially my dad. He loved Carson and Carson loved him. Or maybe that last part was a ruse, too. I couldn't tell my dad that. Last was my best friend, Precious, but with her came more drama, and I didn't have the energy for that.

  Lockett shuffled away, grumbling, and I was glad. I continued to hold the steering wheel, rubbing my thumbs over the stitching of the leather as I tried to put the pieces together. How had I judged so poorly? Even now, I couldn't pick out the clues.

  I must have done this for some time because when Lockett returned, he had a friend.

  “I can’t get her to leave,” Lockett said. From the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of the man’s gray pants, his hand in his front pocket.

  Lockett’s face appeared at the window. “You left me no choice. I’m not trying to cause you more trouble.”

  Another face came into my periphery, pushing Lockett out of view. “Hey, Samantha. How’s it going?” Asked the cop at my window.

  I closed my eyes, hoping that when I opened them he'd be gone.

  “She’s not had a good day,” Lockett whispered. “Maybe not ask her that.”

  The cop cleared his throat. “Samantha, it’s Leo. Wanna tell me what’s going on?”

  As if.

  I said nothing.

  “Want me to call Hue, and you can talk to him?” Leo held up his phone.

  Hue was Leo’s kid brother and one of my closest friends. Leo was not one of my closest friends. In fact, we had a past heavy with mutual irritation for each other.

  He’d been the star quarterback for our high school team while I’d been the photographer for the school paper. Every time I tried to get a shot, he’d turn away. But only for me. He’d let others take his picture. He was that sort of butthead. To add fuel to the fire, Leo Stillman had borne witness to my most embarrassing life stumbles. Or contributed to it, depending on who was telling the story.

  Besides my current one, that was.

  I’d gone to college for photography with high hopes of becoming a forensics photographer. During the intern phase in my year, I was asked to photograph an auto collision for insurance purposes. The scene included a dead deer. Trouble was, I had the flu—body chills, clammy skin, queasy stomach, and double vision. One look at the deer’s beady black eyes and twisted body, and I’d upchucked everywhere, including Leo’s still-being-processed scene. The night had gotten worse from there as the cops had taken a call to respond to a second scene, one where a woman I’d grown up with had been chained to a pole and hit by a car following a robbery.

  Seeing the dark underbelly of the criminal world had left me uncertain of my life’s plan. Sensing this, Leo told me to give it up and go take pictures of babies dressed like peas in a pod. Sadly, for the last ten years, I’d done just as he suggested. And, no lie, there was a dark side to women and their unbendable determination to have their precious little ones captured just right.

  “Go away, Officer,” I said and stuck the key in the ignition.

  I bet Leo Stillman would never marry a polygamist.

  Perfect people didn’t do stupid things. He stood well over six feet with the wide shoulders of a warrior. His dark skin and steely gray eyes were enhanced by his broad features and the high cheekbones passed down through his Native American roots. He was the walking epitome of the word strong.

  “Wanna tell me what’s wrong? You need to talk to someone.” He spoke to me like I imagined he would a person on a ledge, contemplating jumping. Like I'd lost my marbles. Asking a jumper to share their woes wasn’t a good place to start. It was where you want to go eventually, sure. Even I’d learned that in Criminology 101. What more was there to make a person carry out their plan than to rehash their failures?

  I turned the key over one click so the SUV had power then raised the window up, closing it in his face.

  Leo ducked his head and sighed so loudly it briefly fogged the window. Then he straightened and walked around to the passenger side, Lockett with him.

  “You can’t sit here, Samantha. You need to move on.” Leo again with his commands.

  Apparently, this was his be-stern-with-the crazy-person voice. I raised the passenger window while simultaneously lowering the driver’s. I might be in shock, but I wasn’t ready to roast in my car.

  Leo slapped his leg in frustration and strode around to the driver’s side. I reversed the position of the windows. Eventually, he would get the hint and, hopefully, it would make him go away. How did he like having someone always turn their back to him like he’d done to me? I wanted to point this out, but that would require me to look at him.

  We did this song and dance three more times before he lost his cool.

  “Dammit, Samantha,” Leo said. His words were muffled by the closed driver’s window. He banged his hand against the roof of my car and stepped up onto the sidewalk where Lockett waited. I left the windows up and cracked my sunroof. I picked up bits of their muted conversation but couldn't decipher it. I needed to figure out what to do next. Exhausted from the power play with the windows, I let my head fall back against the headrest and my eyes shutter closed, fatigue pulling me into a dark abyss.

  The earsplitting trill of a coach’s whistle ripped through the air.

  I jumped and banged my head on my car’s ceiling. My heart raced like a pony out of the gate.

  Standing outside my car, purple coach’s whistle between her lips ready for another blow, was the large-breasted, big-haired, amazon of a woman known as Precious. Her real name was Erika Shurmann, and she also happened to be my best friend since second grade. We’d discovered being sent from class for extra help—me because I’m dyslexic and her because of a stutter—that we were stronger as a tribe. We brought Hue Stillman, who also had dyslexia, into the fold. And we’d stuck together for our entire school career and after. Until Hue joined the Marines and shipped off to foreign lands.

  The nickname Precious came when another kid asked her what was so special about her that she didn’t have to read in front of the class, and she’d responded with, “Because I’m P-p-precious.” Yeah, the moniker stuck, likely because it was used a lot to tease her, but over the years that had shifted. She embodied the nickname. The girl treated everyone like they had a gift to give to the world and, in return, she was treated the same.

  As a best friend, she was loyal and had the biggest heart. As a professional life coach, her no-nonsense, frank-speaking ways and honesty came in handy. It also didn’t hurt that she always looked as if she stepped out of a fashion magazine. Today, she was immaculately dressed in a figure-fitting plum dress with matching nails and lip gloss.

  She had one impractical weakness. A deep love for all things Bigfoot. She spent her off-time on the Washington Bigfoot Research Team.

  I clicked the key and lowered my window.

  “Holy cripes, Precious, I think I wet my pants,” I said and squirmed in my seat as a way to check.

  “Samantha Jane True, just what in the h-e-double-hockey-sticks are you doing sitting here in this car? According to this tall drink of water over here”— she gestured to Lockett— “you’ve been here two hours. I get a call from Officer Hot Pants who says he thinks you’re high or drunk or something.”

  I glared at Leo through the windshield.

  “I told him he was being ridiculous. But you don’t really look so good. You’re pasty, almost sickly.” She reached into the car and put her hand on my forehead. “Clammy, too.”

  “This must be the legendary Precious,” Locket said to Leo. “Her reputation precedes her.”


  “Precious,” I said. Tears burst forth and ran streaks down my face. Grief? Humiliation? Both?

  “Jumping flying crickets, what’s happened?” She bent forward and studied me, the purple coaches whistle swinging on the lanyard around her neck.

  “Carson,” I said hoarsely. Too humiliated to say the words, I picked up the manila envelopes Lockett gave me and waved them in her face. “Lawyer,” I forced the word out and pointed to Lockett.

  Precious’s eyes narrowed. “Are you telling me that slick son of a gun you married has filed for divorce? I will skin him alive. I will flay him to the bone.”

  “That’s the same thing,” Lockett said.

  “Hush,” Precious said and pointed a long finger at him. She returned her attention to me. “I’m sorry, Sam. I always knew he was too good to be true. Men like him are in romance novels, not real life.”

  Leo crossed his arms and cleared his throat.

  “Oh, please,” Precious said. “In high school, the only constant in your life was your jock.”

  “No,” I said shaking my head. “Not divorce. Dead.” On the last word, I let the tears flow freely. I covered my face with my hands.

  “Aw, jeez,” Leo mumbled.

  The door jerked open. Precious pulled my hands from my face. “Are you kidding me?”

  I shook my head and sucked in a ragged breath. “That’s not all. Turns out Carson isn’t his name. He has a whole other life and a whole other wife. I married a polygamist.”

  Lockett stepped forward. “Who has some powerful enemies. The sooner you can get her out of here and away from me, the safer she’ll be,” Lockett said, making shooing motions with his hands.

  “Care to explain that?” Precious asked.

  “I can’t.” Lockett gave a sheepish shrug.

  “Can’t or won’t?” she asked.

  He shrugged again.

  She faced Leo. “Why are you here?”

  He jerked a thumb toward Lockett. “He called Wind River PD and asked for assistance, requested someone who knew Samantha. DB sent me.”

  DB Louney was our police chief, another jerk I’d gone to school with. Only he’d been a dweeb who puberty had been kind to. He’d gone from skinny dork to buffed-out meathead over the course of one summer. Personally, I thought his change was a regression.

  I groaned and pointed to Leo. “You can’t tell Dweebie what’s happened. He’ll blab everywhere, and I haven't told my parents.”

  Leo gave a brief nod. He didn't have a reputation for being a gossip, and I was counting on that.

  Precious mumbled something about people being useless. She pushed me over into the passenger seat. “I'll text Bob to come pick up my car," she said and quickly tapped something into her phone. Bob was Precious's neighbor and a lovestruck Lothario who’d do anything for her. This was the life of Precious. No man would play her for a fool.

  "Let’s get out of here,” she said. “Clearly. no one here is going to help you except me. We’ll stop and get several gallons of ice cream and some wine. We’ll sort this out.” She grabbed my hand and squeezed, her eyes moist with unshed tears. “Hold on to your titties, kitty, we’re in for a long ride.”

  I wish I knew then how huge of an understatement her words were.

  Ready to read more? Click here get the details. Thanks :-)

  Books by Kristi Rose

  Samantha True Mysteries

  One Hit Wonder

  All Bets Are Off

  Best Laid Plans

  The Wyoming Matchmaker Series

  The Cowboy Takes A Bride

  The Cowboy’s Make Believe Bride

  The Cowboy’s Runaway Bride

  The No Strings Attached Series

  The Girl He Knows

  The Girl He Needs

  The Girl He Wants

  The Meryton Brides Series

  To Have and To Hold (Book 1)

  With This Ring (Book 2)

  I Do (Book 3)

  Promise Me This (Book 4)

  Marry Me, Matchmaker (Book 5)

  Honeymoon Postponed (Book 6)

  Matchmaker’s Guidebook - FREE

  The Second Chance Short Stories can be read alone and go as follows:

  Second Chances

  Once Again

  Reason to Stay

  He’s the One

  Kiss Me Again

  or purchased in a bundle for a better discount.

  The Coming Home Series: A Collection of 5 Second Chance Short Stories (Can be purchased individually).

  Love Comes Home

  Meet Kristi Rose

  Hey! I’m Kristi. I write romances that will tug your heartstrings and laugh out loud mysteries. In all my stories you’ll fall in love with the cast of characters, they’ll become old, fun friends. My one hope is that I create stories that satisfy any of your book cravings and take you away from the rut of everyday life (sometimes it's a good rut).

  When I’m not writing I’m spinning (riding a stationary bike- I’m obsessed with having smaller calves. Mine Are HUGE- and not in a good way, ya'll), repurposing Happy Planners, or drinking a London Fog (hot tea with frothy milk).

  I’m the mom of 2 and a milspouse (retired). We live in the Pacific Northwest and are under-prepared if one of the volcanoes erupts.

  Here are 3 things about me:

  I lived on the outskirts of an active volcano (Mt.Etna)

  A spider bit me and it laid eggs in my arm (my kids don’t know that story yet)

  I grew up in Central Florida and have skied in lakes with gators.

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