Mail Order Brides of Jasper Falls Ranch

By Ann Laurel

Do you enjoy a sweet and clean western historical romance? Mail Order Brides of Jasper Falls Ranch combines all four books in the series in one download.

Jasper's Bride
The boys of Jasper Falls Ranch are grown and its high time they each found a wife. With the help of the pastor’s wife, the oldest, Jasper Winslow places out an ad in a western travel magazine for a bride.

Annette Mason happens to discover the magazine while cleaning the home of her employer. Determined to leave the city of Chicago behind, Annette answers it in spite of her parents’ disapproval.

Follow Annette’s journey as defies her parents and seeks to discover if she can find true love by answering a mail order bride ad.

Dirk's Bride
It's now Dirk’s turn for a bride. Jordan Brothwood has in mind to give his daughter a better life than caring for her ailing mother and aging father. Knowing Sadie won’t leave on her own he takes matters into his own hands.

Before Sadie knows it she’s on a train leaving war-torn Alabama and heading for the great unknown, Montana. Having never left Alabama, Sadie is in for an adventure as she travels from the only life she’s ever known, that of a Southern Belle with servants to a ranch in northern Montana to become the wife of rancher Dirk Winslow.

Will Sadie ever find peace and joy in her new surroundings? Follow along her journey as she takes a leap of faith and discovers that perhaps her papa was right in arranging this marriage for her happiness even though at first she opposed it.

AJ's Bride
Theodore Magnus felt it high time to force his twenty-year-old daughter, Bella, to move West and marry the man he hand chose from the many mail order bride ads. Though Bella was reluctant at first she finds after a perilous adventure that AJ Winslow rides in to her rescue. Bella felt she would have been just as well to stay home in Georgia an old-maid.

Follow Bella and AJ’s adventure as she struggles with moving so far from her home state of Georgia and into a life in which she has no idea how to live.

See faith and true love at work in this heart-warming story about becoming a rancher’s wife.

Henry's Bride
Henry, the youngest Winslow brother is finally up for getting a wife. Anxious and excited Henry sends off the mail order bride ad proclaiming the first answer back will be the one he’ll marry.

Ruthie Ethyl just turned eighteen and upon leaving the orphanage she goes on a journey to find her real mother. Instead, she finds herself in search of the perfect husband and she feels all else is lost.

Follow the adventure of how Henry and Ruthie Ethyl meet and walk through their struggles where faith and love ultimately wins.

Strong Christian tones contained within each of the mail order bride short stories.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Perfectly Plotted Books
• Release date: Jul 4, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370662241

Ann Laurel

Ann loves to write inspirational sweet romances. Her first series, The Cattlemen's Wives, are western historical mail-order brides. All of her books are guaranteed to make you feel good when you reach the end.Ann lives with her husband and children in the beautiful Ozark Mountains in the south. She enjoys raising Godly children, volunteering with her church, homemaking, and writing.

Book preview

Jasper’s Bride - Chapter One

I thought I didn't have to do this! I can't believe I'm going to have to follow in the same footsteps. You said you wanted more for me in life than this, Annette said to Mother as she threw herself on the bed feeling so betrayed.

Lollie Mason looked at her grown daughter throwing a fit over the job. She had arranged service employment for each one of the three before Annette. It's not up for discussion. We are a service family. We've always been a service family. You have a whole life ahead of you and beautiful family in which to serve. The Ruffords have been very good to us throughout the years. We are indebted to them for they have given us our home and enough income to live very comfortably. It's not so much to ask that you have to do your part too. Lollie looked at Annette with disappointment in her eyes.

Annette teetered on the verge of tears but she held them back for she didn't want Mother to see just how much she didn't want this kind of life. Annette had dreams of getting married and starting her own life away from Chicago. City life was all she had known, except the occasional trip that her family took as they traveled by train out west. It was such a time that her family was on vacation in the beautiful state of Colorado that Annette began to dream about becoming a rancher's wife. She loved the open outdoors and the beautiful skies with the rugged mountains in the distance. She wanted that to be her everyday life and imagined herself as the wife of a cowboy who could ride horses and plant gardens out in the soil and have babies and grow a family. But the only life she's ever known was living in Chicago in the city with her family, a service family.

Annette’s mother and father worked for the Ruffords just as her dad’s parents had been employed by the Rufford family previously. Her grandparents long gone now were very comfortable in their life as the butler and the maid of the Rufford home. Now, Lollie Mason stepped up as the head housemaid to the expensive home with the other servants underneath her with the other housemaids and chambermaids. Annette’s father, Eddie Mason, stood in as the butler and head over the stables and the gardeners. Of course, her two sisters and brother also worked for the Ruffords. Her two sisters worked in the kitchen. One of them had married the carriage driver. The other currently wasn't married and didn't have any desire to do so. That sister didn't have big plans, she did her service job without fuss.

So now I'm supposed to go to work for the Ruffords just like the rest of you? I really don't want to, Mother, please, Annette begged as she flipped her long brown hair over her shoulder.

Mother, exasperated, set the laundry down that she had been folding and looked at her daughter. You've been raised knowing that you had a job ever since you were born. I was a mere chambermaid when your father was one of the stable boys and we fell in love. Annette, it doesn't mean that you can't have a family. You can even venture out possibly and marry into another service family. But for right now, you don't have any prospects and you've got to pull your weight. That's just the way it is. The Ruffords need a new chambermaid so you are becoming one of them. I'm going to start training you tomorrow. Your uniform is on your cedar chest and we'll make adjustments as we need to. Mother shut her mouth keeping tight-lipped as she finished folding the family's laundry.

Annette wanted to cry as this went against every hope and dream she'd ever had. She thought maybe her parents would understand how she wanted different things in life than to do the same work they had done and their grandparents had done. But Mother, I don't want to do this kind of work. I’ll work until I go elsewhere, though if you need me to. But please don't force me to do this. I'd much rather figure out a way to have the life that I really want to have, Annette said sadly.

"This is your life Miss Annette," mother said.

The young lady didn’t like being called that because she wanted to be called just Annette. She lifted her eyes and stared back at Mother. I want to marry a cowboy. I want to live in the West and I want to have chickens and a garden and cattle to tend. I want to walk outside and smell the fresh air and see the beautiful mountains in the distance. I want my husband to come in from the fields every night after a hard day’s work while I fix his supper. I want to live in a house where there are no servants. I don't want to be a servant nor do I want a maid, Annette said.

Mother chuckled sarcastically. Well you're not going to have servants, that's for sure. You were born to be a servant. There will be no more discussion about this. If you meet a young man while doing your job and fall in love and wish to marry, then we'll discuss it. But sending you out West to find a husband or a cowboy or a rancher, that's just plain silliness, Mother said as she chuckled again shaking her head and dismissing her youngest daughter. Annette, you are a silly and foolish girl instead of a young lady with real dreams.

Annette blinked as Mother laughed uncontrollably at Annette's silliness. Her older sisters laughed too when she brought up the desire to marry a cowboy. They, too, thought she was silly.

Just be patient and God will send you the right husband at the right time, Beverly, Annette’s oldest sister, said.

Naw, forget about getting married and just do your job and do the best you can. Perhaps we can travel West together someday, Sabrina said with a snort.

Annette looked at her sister glaring at her as she walked away. Travel with you as a spinster. No, thank you, Annette said to herself.

Jasper’s Bride - Chapter Two

The next day Annette showed up at the Ruffords wearing the black uniform dress with the white apron and the matching white hat. Madge Rufford came to her with her chin lifted looking down her nose happy to have yet another servant to boss around.

You make quite a little chambermaid, Annette. Glad to have you aboard. Mrs. Rufford continued walking by as Annette looked at her and nodded forcing a small smile for she knew that Father would beat her if she weren't polite to the Ruffords. It wasn’t that she disliked the Ruffords, it was that they had no idea what it was like to be anything but extraordinarily rich. They had no clue what it was like to have to continually work for someone who had nothing more to do than to sit around and plan garden parties and discuss new decor for a house that was already extravagantly decorated.

Madge’s granddaughter, Felicia, had been visiting the family during one of her holidays, a girl of seventeen. The girl hardly recognized the servant for she also came from an expensive home on the other side of Chicago. Annette shook her head when the girl was around and when she had to clean up after her in the guest rooms when she left. For the guest rooms in the north wing were a part of Annette’s territory as far as cleaning the rooms.

Annette strode into the guest bedroom with clean linens and proceeded to make the bed when she noticed the girl had left a few magazines lying on the bedside table. The magazines were about guns and gardens and living in the West. Annette couldn't imagine what Felicia wanted with such reading material, except for the garden parts would show the extravagant garden parties of the upper class around the country. Annette picked up the pile of magazines as one slid off and fell open on the floor. After wiping the night table, she bent down and plucked the magazine to add back to the stack, but what she saw made her stop and smile and think.

Annette gingerly kept it open as her eyes scanned over the pages. There were about a dozen mail order bride ads in the back of this magazine. All from men who were cowboys, ranchers, cattleman, and hunters of the West. Annette couldn't help but be very intrigued by what she read. She proceeded to set the magazine down when Mrs. Rufford happened by and turned her head to see the pile of magazines left on the night table by her granddaughter.

You can just throw those in the burn heap. I don't know why she brings some here and then just leaves them. Mrs. Rufford had her say and then turned to leave. Annette smiled for this was her opportunity. She carefully put all but one magazine into the trash bin with which she would take out to the burn heap. But the one with the ads, she folded over and placed in her pocket in her apron and she would take it home and read more about it later.

The rest of the afternoon Annette happily did her chores cleaning and working hard. Then, at home, she changed out of her maid uniform and carefully placed the magazine under her mattress where no one would find it. She set about doing her chores at their little house which sat on the edge of the land within walking distance of the Rufford mansion. Part of her tasks were to help with the supper and clean up afterward. It was a ritual for her family for they did the same thing every single day. They would wake up and go to work all day and then they would come home and cook dinner while the men went outside and did the yard work. After the women would clean up while the men finished their outdoor chores. Then after that, if they wanted to they could sit around lamplight reading the papers or the magazines, chat, play a game or turn in early. On this particular night, Annette chose to turn in early.

I've cleaned all the dishes and I need to go clean myself. May I be excused for the evening? Annette asked Mother, who had just sat down with her needlepoint.

What? You're not going to come in here and join us for the sparkling conversation? Mother asked with a bit of sarcasm in her voice. Generally, Annette would join the family in the living room in the evenings. Very rarely did Annette excuse herself to the sanctity of her room for she just wasn't that kind of a brooding teenager. So now she had to feign being tired and then Mother nodded knowingly.

Oh, I get it! I know why you're going to your room, Mother said with a grin on her face.

Annette froze in her tracks for the fear that Mother had discovered the magazine and the plan to read the mail order bride ads. She held her breath until Mother spoke again.

This was your first full day of working at the Ruffords mansion. And Mrs. Rufford can be a bit harsh with the help sometimes. She likes to see what kind of grit you're made of. I'm sure you are tired so I will see you in the morning, Mother said.

After Father bid her a goodnight, Annette turned and went to her room and quietly shut the door. Feeling giddy with excitement she dressed in her night clothes just in case someone came to the door so she would look like she had gone to bed.

Reading through the mail order bride ads and finding so many that sounded interesting Annette had to settle on one to answer because she knew she shouldn't answer every single one. She almost wanted to ask her parents opinion about which one to answer, but she knew better because she knew that Mother felt she had to stay there and work for the Ruffords regardless.

Annette did the process of elimination thinking about the kind of life she wanted to live and what sounded appealing to her, she went through the ads and narrowed it to the five best ones. Then she chose the top three contenders.

One was on a ranch in Idaho, which sounded absolutely beautiful. The man was a potato farmer and had very little time to court a bride. That seemed to be the theme of all the ads, very little time to court. But she didn't mind. The next ad was for a ranch in sunny Arizona. The man raised horses and cattle and he and his brother co-owned the ranch. He looked for a wife who was a Christian girl and someone who loved the outdoors. But he said that he lived in the desert and there weren’t many mountains around but there were a lot of cacti. The third one was from a man in Montana at the Jasper Falls Ranch. The ad seemed more like a plea for some young lady who wanted to come and live in the great outdoors in Big Sky Country and in an area that was far from civilization. In fact, he said that he could only come and answer posts once every other week. He was the oldest and was looking for a wife who would be willing to live there. And since it was so far out and away from everything he desired to have a wife who would love that kind of life. Annette read through the three ads again and noticed that her heart jumped the most when she read the ad from Jasper Falls Ranch. And so she chose that one.

Jasper’s Bride - Chapter Three

Annette placed a parchment in front of her and began to pen the letter to the man from Jasper Falls Ranch.

Dear Sir,

My name is Annette Mason and I live in Chicago, Illinois. I just turned eighteen-years-old and my family has placed me in service work. My parents, my grandparents, and my great-grandparents have worked for the Rufford family of Chicago, Illinois. At present, I am a chambermaid. My mother is the head housemaid and my father is the head groundsman and butler. I have two brothers and two sisters who are also working for the Rufford family. It seems that my family believes that just because I’m a Mason, I should work for the Ruffords. While I do not shy away from hard work, however, I do not feel this is where I am supposed to be. When I was younger, our parents took us to Colorado for vacation. We stayed on a ranch where I learned how to ride horses and we had the pleasure of experiencing ranch work. After a couple of weeks, our family would come home and I would be sorely disappointed being back in the city.

You see, I feel that my heart and my destiny should be on a ranch in the West and not work in service in Chicago. I long for the great outdoors. I'm not afraid of hard work and I know that working on a ranch is hard work. Since my father is the groundskeeper, I've had the opportunity to work alongside him as a child as he tended the grounds, the flower gardens, and even the vegetable gardens. Now I'm in training in the area of cleaning. In the evenings, I help my mother in our own home with the cooking and cleaning there as well. So you can see, I have a lot of experience with being a housekeeper.

We are Christian, we do attend church every Sunday. I put my faith in the Lord above everything else which is why I have been so faithful to follow with what my parents have told me to do all these years. But now that I'm grown, I feel I must go against some of their wishes if I’m to make my heart happy. I hope you don't think it too forward of me that my parents would rather I stay here in Chicago and work for the Ruffords and marry another service worker. I just can't see that happening. When I discovered the magazine that my employer’s granddaughter had left behind with the mail order bride ads in the back, my heart did a flip flop for I realized it is what I’m meant to do. I am doing this behind my parents back, but I am eighteen and this is a free country so I can make up my own mind. Your ad stood out among all the others that I read. I narrowed it from a dozen down to five, and then down to three, and then yours. I hope me saying this means something to you.

I hope to hear back from you and I hope you will describe yourself and the work that you do. I would also like to hear descriptions of the ranch and of your everyday life.

I am five feet four inches tall. Since my family is hard working, we are more thin than plump. Because, like I said, we're not afraid of hard work. I have long brown hair that I wear loose and free flowing. The Bible talks about a woman's hair being her crown and glory, which is why I wear my hair down and hope that my presence pleases the Lord as well. I've been told I'm a pretty girl but I really