Rejected By Royalty But Marrying the Rancher Instead: A Mail Order Bride Romance

By Doreen Milstead

A woman who is minor royalty leaves the confines of her family home in England, to visit with a friend in America. As soon as she arrives she sees a newspaper advertisement for mail order brides and shortly after that, she’s off for the adventure of her lifetime, to a rancher who thinks she’s beautiful despite her limp and self-admitted plainness.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Dec 22, 2015
• ISBN: 9781329780064

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Rejected By Royalty But Marrying the Rancher Instead: A Mail Order Bride Romance

Rejected By Royalty But Marrying The Rancher Instead: A Mail Order Bride Romance

By

Doreen Milstead

Copyright 2015 Susan Hart

Synopsis: A woman who is minor royalty leaves the confines of her family home in England, to visit with a friend in America. As soon as she arrives she sees a newspaper advertisement for mail order brides and shortly after that, she’s off for the adventure of her lifetime, to a rancher who thinks she’s beautiful despite her limp and self-admitted plainness.

Elizabeth adjusted her skirts to make sure her feet were covered. Years ago, she had given up moaning about the accident that had caused her to walk with a limp, but certain recent events had made her conscious of the defect once more. She knew very well that she wasn't much to look at on the best of days, but plain features can be overcome to a certain degree with proper colors and styles of dress to highlight the positives and downplay the negatives.

The limp was another matter and not so easily hidden. The built up shoe on that foot helped, but it was not enough to assuage the disgust of the duke, Lord Victor of Devonshire.

She sneered at the thought of his name. Soon, she would be off to a distant land where she would no longer have to burden him with her presence on this earth. Essentially, she would cease to exist for him.

His Lordship was to fine and high minded to bother with a cripple for a wife. It mattered not to him that they had been promised since she was still in her cradle, a marriage of two royal lines that was to bring her family back to prominence in society. It mattered not to him that she had been whole and hearty up until the day ten years ago when her horse had thrown her. The short leg was the result of a poorly set break, not a genetic default.

It mattered not to him. On the very day of their formal betrothal, they had met for the first time. The ball had been months in the planning. Her parents had gone into debt to finance an event worthy of the cousin of the Queen. He was only tenth in line to the throne, but Victor was still royalty and therefore entitled to the best that her family had to offer. Elizabeth wore a gown that would have cost most men a year’s wages. Cream colored silk woven with strands of gold and studded with tiny seed pearls. Unused to the weight, her bad leg had given way and she had bobbled in her curtsy.

And, he had laughed at her.

Perhaps she could have forgiven his laughter, there were few who had not laughed. But she would never, could never, forgive the utter cruelty of his next words.

'This is the clumsy cow you would have me marry? Her face alone is a sight to make the strongest man shudder, but to have her weak kneed and clumsy as well is too much. I would not take her for all the gold in England.'

Elizabeth had fled the room in humiliation. As she stumbled away, she could hear her father explaining about her leg and how it was nerves that made her seem less than graceful. The Duke’s laughter rang through the room.

And that is supposed to make it better? An ugly chit who is too nervous to stand upright is no better than a country milkmaid.

She had heard no more, nor did she need to. Alone in her room, she had struggled out of the grand dress and into another of plain gray silk. She had agreed to