“ I meant to ask about your neighbor, Sylvie. I hear he’s really hot.”

      “Who said that, Kay?” Sylvie Shea stopped cold.

      “You mean he’s not?”

      Sylvie shrugged. “I suppose, if looks are all you care about. He’s a bit of a grouch. Which you’ll discover if I don’t get out there and save his daughter’s cat. He’ll yell at me through an upstairs window and order me to corral my dog.”

      “ Joel Mercer has a daughter? Wow, I don’t think the gals at the nail salon know he’s married.

      A couple of them are drawing straws over him already.”

      Sylvie didn’t mention that she hadn’t seen a wife show up next door. Nor would she admit that Joel Mercer was better to look at than a chocolate fudge sundae. The last thing Sylvie needed was her mother or her sisters to get wind of the fact that she considered her neighbor worthy of a second glance. If Mercer was separated, as she’d begun to suspect, the last thing he needed was to get flattened by the Shea freight train—aka the wedding express.

      Dear Reader,

      Ideas for stories come to writers in different ways. We don’t have (as some people seem to think) warehouses brimming with plots and characters. Ideas pop into my head at odd times—like when I sleep, or travel, or I’m reading a funky weekly newspaper I found in an airport. I never know if a setting will grab me first or a character will. But I’ve learned to take whatever I get, in whatever form it arrives.

      Sylvie Shea and Joel Mercer kicked around in my brain for months. She’s a woman of eclectic talents who once left a small town nestled in the Smoky Mountain foothills and went to the big city, when she imagined fulfilling a lifelong dream. Her hopes dashed, she returns to Briarwood, North Carolina, a changed person.

      He’s a city guy who made his mark in his career, failed at marriage, but wants to raise his daughter in the warm, small-community environment he remembers fondly from boyhood summer visits. That place, too, is Briarwood, North Carolina.

      I confess that it took me too long to see that Sylvie and Joel were meant to find each other. I always knew, however, that Joel’s six-year-old daughter, Rianne, needed the unconditional love and acceptance of an extended family. A family just like Sylvie’s.

      I hope readers reach the same conclusion—that Joel and Sylvie belong together. Sylvie’s sure that after being a bridesmaid thirteen times she’ll never find a love of her own. And Joel, a confident man, a good father, a successful comic strip artist, is equally sure he’s insulated against falling in love. I hope you’ll enjoy discovering that they’re both wrong!

      I love to hear from readers. You can drop me a line at P.O. Box 17480-101, Tucson, AZ 85731. Or e-mail me at [email protected].

      Roz Denny Fox

      The Secret Wedding Dress

      Roz Denny Fox