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Praise for the novels of
Curtiss Ann Matlock
“This is a delicious read for a lazy summer day. It’s not overly sweet, and it has enough zing to satisfy readers thirsting for an uplifting read.”
—Publishers Weekly on Cold Tea on a Hot Day
“Ms. Matlock masterfully takes readers into a world full of quirky characters and small-town simplicity where they will wish they can stay.”
—Romantic Times BOOKreviews on Cold Tea on a Hot Day
“A wonderful cast and a perfect setting make for a gentle and reassuring story.”
—Booklist on Sweet Dreams at the Goodnight Motel
“Matlock’s down-to-earth characters and comforting plot will please many.”
—Booklist on Recipes for Easy Living
“Once again, Matlock delivers a gentle, glowing tale that is as sweet and sunny as its small-town setting. Readers will be delighted by this deft mix of romance and…slice-of-life drama.”
—Publishers Weekly on At the Corner of Love and Heartache
“With realistic characters and absorbing dialogue, Matlock crafts a moving story about a woman’s road to self-discovery.”
—Publishers Weekly on Driving Lessons
“This is simply a great read.”
—Romantic Times BOOKreviews on Driving Lessons
“This one will warm you.”
—Romantic Times BOOKreviews on Lost Highways
Curtiss Ann Matlock
Cold Tea on a Hot Day
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I am grateful to many people who sustain me
each day, in my writing and in my life:
Leslie Wainger, Dianne Moggy and Kathleen Adler,
who have encouraged me and brought my books to the bookshelves.
Writer friend Cait London, who has taught me
“Life moves on,” whether we’re ready or not.
Dear friends Lou and Barb, and my long-lost sister,
Sue, most especially on those days I would rather have stayed in bed and covered up my head.
And the readers whose kind letters embolden me
to keep writing.
Thank you all.
One never knew about the deep secrets of ordinary lives.
—Tate Holloway
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
One
Another Day in Paradise
In the hazy glow of first morning light, a gleaming red Mercedes, a Roadster with its top up, sat on the side of the blacktopped county road. The engine idled gently, and headlights shone on the patchy grass and weeds.
The driver was slumped in the seat, comfortably, as if taking a nap. He was dead.
A dog lay with his head upon the man’s thigh. He had lain there for some time, out of loyal respect to a friend.
In a nearby tree, a meadowlark gave out a shrill morning call.
The dog, perking his ears, sat up and then went over to poke his wet nose out the window, fully open because the man had been driving along in the cool spring night with the passenger window down so that the dog could enjoy putting his face in the wind.
Fairly certain the man would no longer notice being abandoned, the dog hopped through the window with graceful ease and landed on the dewy wet grass.
After a moment of the sniffing the damp, pungent air, the dog trotted off in the easterly direction that the car had been heading. It was pleasant in the cool first light. A little way along he came to a fresh armadillo run over in the road. He sniffed it, but he was yet far above the depths of eating roadkill. An owl perched on a fence post was kind enough to tell the dog that a town, where likely he could find breakfast, was just over the hill.
Sure enough, when he topped the hill, a town lay before him. The dog sat and looked at it. The morning sun was just beginning to peek over the horizon and cast its pink glow upon this world of humans. Where families of buffalo once wallowed and great herds of cattle once crossed on their way to the rowdy markets in Kansas, there now existed a place springing out of the prairie with tree-lined streets and brick buildings and clapboard houses.
The dog had come to the town in the same manner that he went everywhere and to each of his humans, following the direction led by his heart. The day he had come to the large concrete parking lot and to the man with the glasses, he had known that was the place for him and the
