The Bartender's Mail Order Bride Read Online Free Page A

father not be ready? She couldn’t erase his final words from her mind, no matter how many times she tried. He’d actually forbidden her from having suitors, and she just couldn’t let that happen. She was sure he’d get used to the idea once he’d thought about it. After all, he’d gotten used to Clara, and Hank coming off the trail, so why should it be different for her?
    As her sisters’ voices floated on the breeze along with the scent of sage, she thought again of the conversation earlier with Sam at the Occidental. He’d put an ad in for a mail order bride and the very thought of someone else filling that role rather than her frustrated her even more.
    She reached into the pocket of the dress she’d worn to lunch and pulled out the Groom’s Gazette that she’d picked up when everyone else was looking at the letters. Opening to the page with Sam’s advertisement, she read it slowly, out loud, and her eyes grew wide.
    “I am all those things,” she said aloud. “Kind, honest, pretty enough, a hard worker, no children.”
    She drew in a quick breath when she read the last line, and hadn’t noticed it before. At least she didn’t remember anyone talking about it.
    A female with musical training or interest would be especially welcome.
    She stood and walked to the window, listening to the last of her sisters’ songs for the evening and a smile began to play on her lips.
    “I am everything he asked after,” she said, again aloud as she looked at herself in the mirror. She regarded herself carefully, deciding that she also qualified for the “pretty enough” requirement.
    With a laugh, she reached into her nightstand and pulled out a quill and paper. She tapped her chin as she stared at the blank page, wondering what she should write to her future husband, and after a while, her pen took over and she just wrote.
    Shaking the soreness from her hand, she put the pen back in the inkwell and blew on the paper to dry the ink. She smiled with satisfaction as she folded it into an envelope and wrote, “Mr. Samuel Allen, Tombstone, Arizona,” on the outside, and blew on that until it was dry as well.
    As she set it up against the mirror on the vanity, she changed into her nightdress. Her heart aflutter, she took one last look at the envelope before she got into bed, wondering what he would think—what they would all think—when they received her request. Although she’d written that she resided in Tombstone, she’d been careful to choose a name that they would not connect with her.
    As she drifted off to sleep, she realized that she had no idea how she’d explain this to her father or, for that matter, explain to Samuel when she arrived as his new bride. She just knew he would choose her, and her last thought was that she’d figure out the next part of her plan in the morning.

Chapter 6
    W ith each passing day , Meg grew more nervous about the letter she’d sent to Sam, offering to be his mail order bride. She hadn’t heard anyone mention a thing, and she knew that Clara hadn’t been out to see Sadie and Suzanne. She was beginning to wonder if it had even gotten to him—maybe lost in the mail. If it had been lost, a letter from Tombstone to Tombstone, there was no hope.
    She’d already been out to milk the cows and carefully placed the eggs Rosemary had gathered into the carriers to take into town. Her job, beyond milking the cows, was to take the extra milk, eggs and produce into town to sell, and for simplicity, she’d chosen to stick primarily with one, James and Suzanne’s mercantile. Over the course of the past year, Archer Ranch had become their best supplier, and she was happy with their arrangement, as was her father.
    “You’re awfully quiet these days,” Maria said from behind her, startling her, and she groaned as the egg she’d held slid from her hand and splattered on the table.
    “Maria, don’t sneak up on me like that,” Meg said to the longtime housekeeper who had also served