скачать книгу бесплатно
Rancher Wants a Wife
Kate Bridges
A marriage to save them both…Among the responses Cassandra Hamilton receives to her advertizement as a mail-order bride, one stands out–Jack McColton's. The last time she saw him, she was a carefree girl, but tragedy has made her a cautious woman.Jack is mesmerized by his new bride–Cassandra might bear the scars of recent events, but she's even more beautiful than he remembers. They both have pasts that are hard to forget, but under the cloak of night, can their passion banish the shadows forever?Mail-Order WeddingsFrom blushing bride to rancher's wife!
‘Welcome to my valley.’
There went her nerves again. Cassandra couldn’t get enough of looking at the new Jack. Goodness. Wasn’t he handsome? Perhaps he knew it. Perhaps this new confidence she sensed in him came from being aware of how he was perceived by the women around him. And those women … they had such fine features and beautiful skin.
It hurt to remember that she’d once looked like that. That she’d once turned heads and garnered male attention.
She composed herself and tried to remain positive. Jack hadn’t asked anyone else to marry him; he had asked her. So Cassandra focused on what the future with him might bring, and gave him a cheerful nod.
‘Nice to be here finally.’
‘Yes, finally,’ he said, as if he were thinking about something more.
She swooped down to inhale the perfume of the roses, hoping the colour heating up her cheeks didn’t show.
Finally, after all these years, Jack McColton would be taking her virginity.
Kate Bridges invites you to her
MAIL-ORDER WEDDINGS
From blushing bride to rancher’s wife!
The Great Fire of Chicago might have changed
best friends Cassandra Hamilton’s and Natasha O’Sullivan’s lives for ever, but they’re determined to carve a new future for themselves as mail-order brides in the West.
Then along come their Stetson-wearing, gun-slinging, breathtaking new husbands—it seems Cassandra and Natasha have got a whole lot more than they signed up for!
Read Cassandra’s story in:
RANCHER WANTS A WIFE
And look out for Natasha’s story
WELCOME TO WYOMING
Coming April 2014
Rancher Wants a Wife
Kate Bridges
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Award-winning and multi-published author KATE BRIDGES was raised in rural Canada, and her stories reflect her love for wide-open spaces, country sunshine and the Rocky Mountains. She loves writing adventurous tales of the men and women who tamed the West. Prior to becoming a full-time writer, Kate worked as a paediatric intensive care nurse. She often includes compelling medical situations in her novels. Later in her education she studied architecture, and worked as a researcher on a television design programme. She has taken postgraduate studies in comedy screenwriting, and in her spare time writes screenplays. Kate’s novels have been translated into nine languages, studied in over a dozen colleges on their commercial fiction courses, and are sold worldwide. She lives in the beautiful cosmopolitan city of Toronto with her family. To find out more about Kate’s books and to sign up for her free online newsletter please visit www.katebridges.com
Previous novels by the author:
THE DOCTOR’S HOMECOMING
THE SURGEON
THE ENGAGEMENT
THE PROPOSITION
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS THE BACHELOR
THE COMMANDER
KLONDIKE DOCTOR
SHOTGUN VOWS
KLONDIKE WEDDING
KLONDIKE FEVER
WANTED IN ALASKA
HER ALASKAN GROOM
ALASKAN RENEGADE
Did you know that some of these novels are also available as eBooks? Visit www.millsandboon.co.uk
This book is dedicated to my family for their loving support and for always coming through with their sense of humour.
In writing this story I owe many thanks to my fabulous editor, Carly Byrne, for her talented editorial input and advice. I’d also like to thank Linda Fildew for her support, and the entire team in the UK offices for their friendliness when I came to visit and their dedication behind the scenes.
I would like to thank my marvellous agent, Erica Spellman Silverman, for her enthusiasm and guidance, and the whole team at the Trident Media Group.
It’s a great pleasure to work with all of you.
Contents
Chapter One (#uf08c2bf1-9416-5041-9437-a3efbb49ef7f)
Chapter Two (#u84f7f6cc-c947-534a-ad83-d383355c28ad)
Chapter Three (#ud46468a8-cae7-5504-8041-abab102a6796)
Chapter Four (#u7b58448d-0d49-50cb-ae47-00f6e0e81dd1)
Chapter Five (#u1b7fb197-4dc3-5094-8aa2-9f52849b21fd)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-One (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One
Chicago, February 1873 Mrs. Pepik’s Boardinghouse for Desolate Women
“What if my husband doesn’t like me? What if I don’t like him?” Cassandra Hamilton leaned forward at the crowded dining table. Her blond braid dipped over her shoulder as she lifted a stack of letters from her would-be grooms.
A dozen other chattering young women jostled around her to read the names and notes.
All these men, thought Cassandra, interested in her?
“Don’t worry so much, my dear. Wedding jitters are normal. Especially since you’ll be our first mail-order bride.” The landlady, plump Mrs. Pepik, peered down her spectacles at Cassandra and patted her hand.
A nearby fireplace sizzled with the last of the ice-covered logs they had rationed for this evening. The warmth penetrated Cassandra’s cracked leather boots.
“You’re pleasant and...and wholesome.” The landlady’s eyes flickered over the scar on Cassandra’s cheek before she politely gazed away from it. “He’ll like you.”
Cassandra ran her hand along her right cheek, wondering if she’d ever be comfortable again with her own looks. Sometimes when she was alone and immersed in a task, she blissfully forgot about the burn injury, but in the presence of others, their curiosity and sympathy rarely allowed her that freedom.
“And as for you liking him,” the landlady continued on a cheery note, “fortunately, you get to make the selection.”
Giggles of excitement erupted at the table. The sound was much nicer to listen to than the sadness and despair when Cassandra had first arrived.
They were all survivors of what everyone now, nearly a year and a half later, was calling the Great Chicago Fire. A catastrophe that had caused over three hundred deaths and had left a hundred thousand people homeless. The fire had stolen the only two people Cassandra had loved—her beautiful younger sister, Mary, and their fearless father—and had made Cassandra silently question in the horrible months that followed whether she wished to go on without them.
Once, on what would’ve been Mary’s nineteenth birthday, Cassandra had walked quietly to the railroad depot and had almost leaped onto the tracks before an oncoming locomotive. The only thing that had stopped her were the nearby voices of two children—a brother and sister arguing over a hopscotch game they were chalking on the pavement. It was then that Cassandra had realized what her little sister would desire, more than anything: for her to live a full life.
And so ever since Mrs. Pepik had come upon the idea of advertising “her young ladies” as mail-order brides in the Western newspapers, the boardinghouse had become a sanctuary of laughter and amicable debates.
Cassandra, good with geography, logically minded and possessing a surprisingly natural skill with investigation, had helped track down some missing persons in the aftermath of the fire. She’d found intervals of employment for herself and some of the other women, and she’d gone to the records office to follow up on lost documents for others. She had comfortably and voluntarily dealt with lawyers, bankers and jailers. Due to her meticulous uncovering of lost people and papers, some of the workingmen she’d encountered had jokingly nicknamed her “That Lady Detective.”
Now, Mrs. Pepik stretched closer, eager to hear of the decision at hand. “Cassandra, which man will it be?”
A slender young woman in the corner spoke up. “I’d take the jeweler in Saint Louis.”
“Oh, no,” said another, “My vote is on the reverend in Wyoming Territory.”
Cassandra’s dearest friend and roommate, dark-haired Natasha O’Sullivan, offered her perspective. “Which man stands out for you, Cassandra? Which one does your heart point to?”
Cassandra took a moment, pressed back against her chair and decided. “The man from California.”
She shuffled through the letters till she found his again. The one she’d been rereading ever since she’d received it three days ago.
“But he sounds as if he works too hard,” someone said.
“California,” Cassandra repeated. Of all the replies to her carefully worded advertisement, his clearly stood out.
“Because of all the sunshine,” Mrs. Pepik assumed.
“Because you’d like to find employment as a detective,” said Natasha. “And California would allow you that as a woman.”
“That is true,” said Cassandra. “But mostly it’s because I know him.”
Feet stopped shuffling. Women stopped talking. Hands froze on correspondence.
Cassandra peered down at his signature. Jack McColton. She was besieged with a torrent of emotions. How could she express to her friends all that she felt? Jack was a link to the loving past, a tender link to Mary and Father, a link to pleasurable times and heart-thrilling memories. Yet, he was also a link to painful times, to an explosive night and accusations she never should have made, to a time when her skin had been perfect and her looks had been whole. She’d behaved so shamefully when she was younger, assuming her good fortune would last forever.
Mrs. Pepik glanced at his name and cleared her throat. “How is it that you know this man, Jack McColton?”
Trying to ignore another wave of apprehension, Cassandra proceeded to explain.
Four Months Later Napa Valley, California
“I urge you to reconsider.”
“Is this why you called me to your office? It’s too late. She’ll be here any moment.” Jack McColton removed his Stetson. He ran a hand through his black hair as he stood by the door, exasperated at the contrary advice he was receiving from his attorney.
