When Last We Loved Read Online Free PDF Page A

chrome frame. A hot breeze was better than none, and today promised to be another August scorcher.
    Miles of arid prairie gave way to rolling green cattle country that told Cassie she was making excellent time. She pulled off the highway shortly after noon to eat at Bad Boy's Diner. Her father had always sworn by truck stops. Judging from the number of eighteen-wheelers circling the squat adobe building, Cassie decided that Bad Boy's probably rivaled the finest restaurants in Texas.
    A dozen pairs of curious male eyes sized up the slight, blue-jean-clad figure that slipped into a red vinyl booth near the picture window. Cassie pushed her oversized sunglasses back to rest on her sleek, ink-black hair and took a long sip of the ice water that the waitress set in front of her.
    “Hi. My name's Ruthie. Whatcha gonna have today, honey?”
    Cassie watched, fascinated, as Ruthie rounded her painted lips and blew a huge pink bubble. The gummy balloon hung in midair, blocking out the pointed chin and upturned nose of the pert woman's face.
    “Red beans with cornbread is the specialty today, honey,” Ruthie offered when she noticed Cassie searching the plastic-coated menu. “It's a dollar forty-nine for all you can eat.” Ruthie snapped her gum as she spoke.
    A square giant, his mustachioed face topped by a stiff straw hat, lumbered by and slapped the waitress's bottom. “Road Runner, you cut that out!” she squealed in mock offense.
    Road Runner tucked a crisp folded bill into the breast pocket of Ruthie's V-necked uniform and planted a fuzzy kiss on her cheek.
    “Y'all come back now, hear?” Ruthie batted an awning of false eyelashes and smiled seductively at the trucker. He tipped his hat and pushed the door open.
    “Now, what can I get ya, honey?” The waitress turned her attention back to Cassie, keeping her pencil poised over a small pad of lined tickets.
    “Red beans and cornbread sounds fine.” Cassie was curious but she didn't try to second-guess the significance of Ruthie's flirtatious behavior. After her experience with Hoyt, she knew that actions didn't always speak louder than words.
    Ruthie ran from table to booth to counter, pouring another cup of coffee here, asking after a trucker's twins there, and satisfying everyone's order with an easy speed and snappy stamina that Cassie found amazing.
    “I brought you an extra portion, honey,” Ruthie whispered. “A stiff wind would knock you into the next county. Dig in and put a little meat on them bones.” She set a large white bowl of kidney-shaped beans swimming in a rich, steaming gravy on the table.
    Cassie smiled and bit into a thick slab of yellow, skillet-fried cornbread slathered with butter. She ate nonstop until she thought her stomach would burst. In her haste to get on the road this morning, she hadn't bothered with breakfast.
    “I don't think we'll sell this last piece of pie. Why don't you see if you can do any damage to it before it spoils?” Ruthie placed a wedge of chocolate pie topped with a fluffy meringue in front of Cassie. The creamy smoothness of the homemade custard melted in her mouth.
    Ruthie bantered with two truckers who lingered over a last cup of coffee while Cassie scanned a road map, trying to calculate how far she still had to go before she bypassed Dallas.
    “Where ya headed, honey?” The waitress slid into the booth opposite Cassie and leaned against the picture window with her feet propped on the vinyl seat for a well-deserved rest
    “See ya on the flip-flop,” the departing teamsters called.
    “Bye, hon.” Ruthie wiggled her fingers. She threw her order pad onto the table, then cupped her chin in her hand.
    “I'm going to Nashville,” Cassie answered.
    “You want to be a singer.” It wasn't a question. Ruthie cast a shrewd glance at Cassie as she read her startled customer's mind. Cassie wondered how Ruthie could have guessed and whether she would make fun of the ambition until the redhead murmured, “Years ago,