Shannon here: Caryl McAdoo shares a romantic excerpt from her latest contemporary romance, Sing a New Song. Comment or answer the question at the end of any post dated April 13 – 15 to enter the drawing. Deadline: April 25th, 11:59 pm central time. Here’s Caryl:
Excerpt from Sing a New Song by Caryl McAdoo:
Then like he’d gone brain dead, he turned left instead of going the long way. Oh well, turning around would be too much trouble, so he kept going. Mercy, he’d just dreamed about her.Going by her old house shouldn’t trigger another nightmare. Either way, he had the salve that could soothe his soul.
✞♥♫♪ •*•♪♫✞
Mary Esther fished in the bottom of her heavy purse looking for the house key. She balanced the bag on her knee, hopping once to keep her balance. The old door opened with the first bit of weight against it. She stepped inside.
Instead of her mother standing over the stove and her dad sitting in his chair, only cobwebs greeted her. It smelled musty. An old wooden chair with a blue vinyl padded seat and a strip across the back brought a smile.
She remembered when her father brought that dining set home from the Goodwill store in Paris. She couldn’t have been more than seven or eight then. Why did that one get left? She liked those chairs.
But then her grandmother had all her own furniture. Mary Esther didn’t even get to have her own bed go to Dallas with her. Took her weeks to get used to that hard one she slept on at Mimi Lady’s.
She poked and prodded the old farmhouse she’d grown up in. It seemed sound enough, but a hole in the floor of her parents’ old room took her back. A rabbit scurried past in its escape.
“Oh, Lord, am I crazy for even thinking what I’m thinking?”
Before any answer came from above or her heart, the deep-throated rumble of an old truck drew her around, then tires crushing gravel quickened her pulse. She ran to the kitchen and split the old blinds’ slats.
A faded blue truck filled the drive just beyond the carport. She knew that old truck. No. It couldn’t be. Twenty years ago—had it been that long?—No…please, God, don’t let it be so.
The front door banged against the living room wall. Daddy never did replace that stopper. “Hello? Whoever you are, you’re trespassing here.” The male voice sounded somewhat familiar, but surely PawPaw wasn’t still alive. Could he be?
She started trying to do the math in her head, but that was useless. She marched around to the breezeway between the kitchen and living room. The interloper headed down the hall toward the back.
“Pray tell, how does one trespass her own property?”
The guy turned toward her and stared. “Mary Esther? Is that you? Really you?” A big old grin almost cracked his face right in two.
The twelve-year-old boy who drove that same truck to her daddy’s funeral stood over six feet tall, a full grown man decked out in jeans, blue long-sleeved work shirt, and scuffed boots, but she’d know him anywhere.
He gawked. “It is, isn’t it?”
“Yes, it’s me. How in the world have you been, Samuel? How’d you know I was in town?”
“Well, I’ll be. Blessed. I’ve been blessed, but I didn’t have any idea. None. What are you doing here? Slumming?”
She refused to take the bait. “I’ll have you to know I’m moving back. Just now I was trying decide if the old girl is worth fixing up.”
“Really? What? You’re not singing anymore?”
“Of course, I am. No way will I ever stop singing, you goof, but I can sing in Clarksville same as in Dallas. I quit the band though. I’m sick of the road. If you could call it that.”
He nodded and looked around. “So what do you think?”
That he didn’t offer to give her a hello hug was just wrong, but she didn’t say anything about it. “I don’t know, but what about you? Are you married? How’s your grandfather? Y’all still living in English?”
He laughed a melodious bass that begged for a harmony. The boy’s promise had bloomed.
“Same old girl, except you got famous.”
“Oh, not so much.”
“PawPaw—thanks for asking—went home three years ago, and no, I haven’t found a lady who would have me, and yes, I’m still in English. I’ve doubled its size though, got me a right nice block of black land.”
“What are you doing? Farming?”
“Heavens no. Still trying to make a cowboy.”
She nodded. The old timers and cow punchers all told the same story. Not a one of them ever made it, but they were all still trying.
About Caryl: Christian hybrid (Simon and Schuster and Indie published) author, Caryl McAdoo is currently writing three series: her historical Christian ‘Texas Romance’; the contemporary ‘Red River Romance’; and ‘The Generations’, her Biblical fiction. The novelist loves singing new songs the Lord gives her, and she paints.
In 2008, she and her high school sweetheart-husband Ron moved from the DFW area—home for fifty-five years—to the woods of Red River County. Caryl counts four children and fourteen grandsugars life’s biggest blessings believing all good things come from God. Praying her story gives God glory, she hopes each one will also minister His love, mercy, and grace to its readers. Caryl and Ron live in Clarksville, the county seat, in the far northeast corner of the Lone Star State.
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About the book – Sing a New Song:
Mary Esther Robbins and her grade school best friend, Samuel Baylor are ripped apart by the untimely death of her father, killed fixing a stranger’s flat tire. During their twenty years apart, she fulfills her life’s dream of penning new songs and singing God’s praise with a Christian band, while he tends his growing cattle herd and shares the Good News at every opportunity.
The Lord brings her home then throws them back together when Samuel agrees to help Mary Esther move and remodel her childhood home. The two decades apart vanish, and their time together convinces both the other is their soul mate. But misunderstanding and fear keeps them from expressing their true love. Jealousy rears its ugly head, but love and commitment holds the two together. While they’re both committed to ministering the Gospel together, can they do it as husband and wife?
Purchase Links: http://tinyurl.com/NewSong
Question: Have you ever been reunited with someone from childhood as an adult? Romantic or friends?
yes I contacted with a old classmate a few years ago that had to leave country! her dad was a missionary in Hatiti
Hi Caryl. I can answer both on this question. First I wrote letters to an old beau for awhile lately. He was the one I was dating when I starting going with the man I would marry. He had wanted to marry me, but I was only 15 and thought not ready to marry. Then started dating the son of a church family that had been close friends with mine. And, changed my mind and married him just 1 week past 16. My husband had been gone for a long time when a high school friend connected Jimmy and I. It was fun to look forward to letters again in my mailbox, since hardly anyone writes letters any more. But had no desire to connect with him other than letters. We don’t write now. Also, I just connected on FB with a girlfriend who had lived on the same street I lived on in a small Texas town. We were playmates. I’m anxious to read your new book. Maxie