Alma's Mail Order Husband (Texas Brides Book 1) Read online

Alma led the way around the house and her father limped after her, dragging one leg in the dust. Alma sat down on a tilting wooden bench against the back of the house and waited for him to join her. The trees clustered more thickly over the bench, making a canopy of rustling shade.

  Clarence sat down heavily on the bench. “What do you want to talk to me about?”

  Alma took another deep breath. “I’ve made a decision. I’m going to get married.”

  The silence that followed sounded more terrible than all the accusations or recriminations Alma expected.  She waited for him to say something, but he didn’t.

  In the end, she had no choice but to start talking herself. “I wrote into that mail-order matrimony service they have going. They’re matching up men and women all over the country who want to get married. A cowboy from Amarillo is meeting me at the church in Eagle Pass at the end of the month. We’ll get married, and then we’ll come back here to live.”

  Her father still didn’t say anything. Had he heard her? How could he fail to? Alma waited another long time. Then she saw the weathered old hand resting on the knee of his pants.

  She covered it with her own smooth fingers. “I know you probably aren’t happy about this, but I wanted to do it, and I did it. I told Amelia and Allegra today, so now you all know and we can start making plans.”

  He didn’t move a whisker. Did he approve? Would he ever speak to her again?

  He didn’t take his hand out from under hers, but he didn’t congratulate her, either.

  A heavy sigh came out of his dry old lungs. “Where will you live?”

  Alma started in surprise. “Here in the house.”

  “Here?” he asked. “With all the rest of us?”

  “Why not?” she asked.

  “You’ll be newly married,” her father reminded her. “You’ll want privacy.”

  “If we want privacy,” Alma told him. “We can get it. There’s a million miles of empty desert in every direction. If we want to be alone, we’ll find a way to do it. Don’t you worry about that.”

  “So what did your sisters say when you told them?” he asked.

  Now Alma took her turn to sigh. “Just what you’d expect. Amelia told me I should have asked your permission first like a dutiful Mexican daughter. And Allegra laughed at me and said I’d ordered a new hot water bottle from a catalog.”

  That brought a hollow chuckle from Clarence. “She would say something like that. She’s a wild one, that girl.”

  Alma gladly turned the conversation away from herself to her sisters. “I’m worried about her. She’s so thoughtless about everything. She’s really reckless sometimes.”

  “You always worry too much about both of them,” her father reminded her. “You worry about them for opposite reasons. You worry about Allegra for not thinking enough, and you worry about Amelia for thinking too much. You should think about yourself once in a while.”

  “I can’t help it,” Alma replied.

  “You worry about them,” Clarence continued. “And your way of handling it is by mothering them.”

  “Mothering them?” she repeated. “I don’t mother them.”

  “You do so,” he shot back. “You order them around, and you take charge of the work around the ranch.”

  “Is that so bad?” she asked. “Someone has to do it. And they don’t seem to mind me taking the lead. Amelia does whatever I tell her to do without question, and Allegra just goes along for the ride. I wish they wouldn’t go along so easily. I wish they’d stand up to me every now and then.”

  Clarence Goodkind closed his eyes. “So they didn’t mind about you getting married? That’s good. I’d be more concerned about their reaction than mine, if I was in your place.”

  “I didn’t say they didn’t mind,” Alma corrected him. “I just said they reacted the way I expected them to. They reacted—how shall we say? They reacted in character for both of them.”

  “And that should concern you,” her father told her. “That should concern you more than anything. That they reacted in character only proves they could be displeased about it. They’re hiding it below the surface, like they usually do, each in her own way.”

  “I understand that,” Alma replied. “And I agree with you. A strange man will be joining us on the ranch. Believe me, I’m as worried as anyone else about how this will affect all our lives.”

  “I’m glad you’re thinking about that,” Clarence returned. “Because your new husband could be the ruination of all our plans and hard work.”

  “I know, Papa,” Alma assured him. “Believe me, I know, and I haven’t thought about anything else in all the time I’ve been writing to him. I told him all about it. He knows I’ve been working the ranch with my sisters for five years, and we worked with you for another five years before your accident.”

  “And don’t forget,” Clarence reminded her. “I built this ranch from nothing over fifteen years before that.”

  Alma smiled to herself. “I haven’t forgotten, and I told him that, too.”

  “It isn’t just us and the ranch that could be ruined,” he continued. “This husband of yours—what did you say his name is?”

  “I didn’t say,” Alma replied. “His name is Jude McCann. He comes from Amarillo.”

  “Right,” Clarence snapped. “Jude McCann from Amarillo. He’s coming out here to live and get married. He’ll have a stake to defend in this ranch, too, just like the rest of us. You’re walking a tightrope with this plan of yours.”

  “I know I’m walking a tightrope,” Alma insisted. “And I’m ready to walk it. I know as well as anyone that this family contains nothing but strong personalities and raging egos. Just one of them could bring the ranch crashing down.”

  “Then why do you want to do this?” Clarence sighed. “I shouldn’t even ask that.”

  “Good,” Alma exclaimed. “Then you understand that we can’t go on this way forever. You can’t have three adult daughters without at least one of them getting married sometime. We won’t stay here, single and childless, for the rest of our lives. We need husbands and children. Otherwise, all our work to build this ranch and keep it going will be wasted.”

  Clarence took another deep breath and opened his eyes, but he didn’t see the desert landscape around him. Did he see anything at all, even when his eyes were open? “I know. The truth is, I’ve expected this for a long time now. I knew it would come some day. I just comforted myself with the knowledge that there weren’t any men around for you to get mixed up with. I didn’t count on Nature finding a way around that, too.”

  Alma patted his hand. “I’m glad you aren’t upset about it. Now I have to get inside. It’s my turn to cook supper.” She stood up. “Are you coming in?”

  “You go ahead.” He turned his bleary old eyes to the eastern skyline. “I’ll sit here a little while longer.”

  Alma patted him one more time on the shoulder and vanished around the corner of the house, leaving her father sitting alone on the bench.

  Chapter 4