Mail Order Bride - The Journey (Western Mail Order Brides: Book 1)
By Leah Wyett
3.5/5
()
About this ebook
Historical cowboy western mail order bride romance.
Maggie and Eliza's mother wants them both to pick husbands and go to San Francisco as Mail-Order Brides. After they write to their prospective husbands for six months they venture out to meet them.Their excursion is filled with adventure and difficulty. Will they both be married or not?
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Reviews for Mail Order Bride - The Journey (Western Mail Order Brides
6 ratings1 review
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5very good twist to a romance . Thank you for making it different. I really liked the change.
Book preview
Mail Order Bride - The Journey (Western Mail Order Brides - Leah Wyett
LEAH WYETT
Mail Order Bride
The Journey
Western Mail Order Brides: Book One
Copyright
Copyright © 2014 by Leah Wyett
All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced in any format, by any means, electronic or otherwise, without prior consent from the copyright owner and publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, places and events are the product of the author's imagination or used fictitiously.
First Printing, 2014
Dedication
To YOU, The reader.
Thank you for your support.
Thank you for your emails.
Thank you for your reviews.
Thank you for reading and joining me on this road.
Contents
Copyright
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
Recommended Reads
Connect With Leah
Chapter One
Eliza gathered her skirts in her hands and followed her older sister down the wooden ramp that led away from the ship. They were in Panama, and from just the little bit Eliza could see from where she stood now, it looked like a dirty, uncivilized place, and it smelled really bad. She had already spent over a week on this steamship and she needed to stretch her legs on dry ground. The best she could hope for would be that the boat taking them to San Francisco would be on time. She couldn’t imagine having to spend the night in this hellhole.
She knew if she could see Maggie’s face right now, in spite of the evidence of rot all around, her sister would be grinning from ear to ear. She was so positive sometimes that it almost made Eliza nauseous.
Smile, Eliza May Berry,
she would say every morning as soon as Eliza opened her eyes. We’re on our way to our new life.
Eliza was sorely tempted to be sarcastic and thank her older sister for stating the obvious…again. But it wasn’t Maggie’s fault, and Eliza had to make herself remember that. Maggie had been stomped on by a horse when she was only ten years old. It had done nothing to mar her beauty but it had caused irreversible damage inside her head. She was still capable of doing all of the things she had done before, but it left her forever a child when it came to her outlook on life. Eliza was five years younger and had adjusted to taking care of her older sister. She loved Maggie, and a lot of the time as the war raged on and their way of life eroded, she wished that she too could see only the good. Right now, however, she wasn’t in the mood.
Are you coming, Eliza? Isn’t this place grand?
Maggie turned around half way down the ramp to ask her this with one of her brilliant smiles. Eliza smiled indulgently at her and said, Yes, it’s just wonderful, Maggie.
If you like being surrounded by swamp, bugs, and the stench of human filth.
Eliza…wait up….please!
Eliza slowed and looked over her shoulder. She had forgotten to add to her tirade the incessant whining of Lily Parker. Lily was traveling with their group and Eliza had just spent the past week stuck rooming between what she believed had to be the best example of the original optimist, which was Maggie, and the original pessimist, who would be Lily. The only thing worse was that after six nights of listening to her cry about how mean her husband was to her, and five days of What if the one I’m going to meet in California treats me even worse?
, she now thought that she and Eliza were friends. An acquaintance was as far as Eliza would go. She kept her friends few and far between. It made life less complicated. Between taking care of Maggie and going three thousand miles from her home to meet her husband
, Eliza’s life was complicated enough.
I’m waiting, Lily, but Maggie is way ahead of us, so come along.
Eliza prompted.
What she would really like to tell Lily is that she thought she was a spoiled, impetuous pain in the ass who was never going to make it out west. But her mother had raised her to be a lady, so she was trying hard to be nice.
She could hear Lily panting as she approached from behind, skirts in hand. Eliza told her that she needed to stop wearing the crinolines that made her skirts stick out so far. Right now, she was dashing down a wooden ramp, headed toward a veritable jungle, in a skirt that had to be at least six feet in diameter. She looked ridiculous.
I just don’t think I can give it up,
Lily, who had been born to Irish parents in New York and had never been out of the city, also had an annoying way of trying to make herself sound like a southern belle when she was in distress. Mama bought me one of those crinolines when they first came out, and although I did bring it with me, I feel a bit self-conscious carrying around such a large amount of material in my back side.
Eliza, who had gotten dressed for the past week in front of Lily, and who had seen her put on her own crinolette daily, was not so much insulted as she was annoyed. Lily had a way of being rude so that if you pointed it out, she could say her words were just misunderstood
. It was like spitting in the wind, so Eliza just left it alone.
Maggie, have you seen Mr. Marshall?
Eliza asked her sister. Or any of the rest of our group?
They were traveling with Heath Marshall of San Francisco, eight other women, and two men.
Not yet, Eliza. Don’t you just hope we get to spend the night here in this lovely place?
Eliza and Lily looked at each other. Maggie was the one person Lily would never insult, at least in front of Eliza. But there were those times that even Eliza had to forgive a person for the confused look that one of Maggie’s statements brought to their face. Before Eliza had to respond, she was saved by the sound of Mr. Marshall’s voice.
There you are, ladies. Follow me to the group, please. I have an announcement to make and I’d like to only have to do it once.
Heath Marshall was the leader of their group. He had come to the Berry’s church one Sunday and spoke to them all about the need for real ladies
out west. It was met with a lot of enthusiasm. The war had caused wounds to the city and their way of life that were likely never to heal.
As was the norm, however, there were those who strenuously objected as well. Marshall was ready for it though. When one of the women, a known feminist in town, had protested him trying to round up a parcel of mail order brides
, he had told her that was a very small portion of what proper ladies could do for the west. They needed nurses and teachers, and men just weren’t cut out to set up and bring civility to a town. He did admit that the ratio of men to women was probably close to nine to one at that time, and, yes, the men would also be looking for brides. He had even brought catalogs
for the ladies to look at. He did his best to convince them that most of these men were Eastern born and bred and educated as well. He had convinced Eliza and Maggie’s mother, for sure. She had taken the paper he offered at once. It was a book of pictures of men who were looking for brides. Marshall had thought doing it that way would make the ladies feel more at ease, rather than thinking they would go there and a stranger would choose them. Eliza shook off her thoughts about that for now. She wasn’t happy with her mother’s choices, but Mama had scraped together the two hundred and fifty dollar travel fee for both of them somehow, so she intended to make the best of it.
Eliza took Maggie’s arm and they followed Marshall across the docks as Lily, once again, struggled to keep up. Once he’d gathered their entire group—ten ladies and two men, not counting himself—he said,I have…news. I’m afraid it will be upsetting to some of you, and although I am sorry for the inconvenience this will cause you, I have no choice but to go along with what the captain of the steamboat has told me.
Which is?
Luke, one of the men along on the trip, asked.
Luke was headed out West to join his brother, who had hit it big
in the gold mines. Luke