AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Chapter One
Charlotte Watkins walked into her home, pulled off her work gloves and sat down, only then checking to be certain her five-year-old son, Walt, was with her. He followed her everywhere, rarely speaking, so she didn’t have to worry much. “Are you hungry?” she asked, knowing he had to be. They’d been on the range working since before sun-up with only a couple of sandwiches for lunch. It was like that every day since her husband had passed.
At Walt’s nod, she smiled, removing his hat from his head. “Remember, good manners say that we need to take our hats off in the house.” Sometimes she wondered why she bothered teaching him the right way to do things when it would be so much easier to just keep him at her side, but she knew the way she was raised wasn’t the right way for Walt.
She stood up, aching in every inch of her body, but it couldn’t matter. She had work that had to be done, and she was going to do it. “How about eggs and bacon?”
Walt didn’t answer, but she didn’t let it bother her anymore. Before her husband, Howard’s death, she’d been obsessed with the words Walt didn’t speak. Now? She was obsessed with keeping the ranch running and putting food on the table.
It wasn’t that she was lacking funds. She’d tried to hire men, and they’d all given her lewd looks. Unfortunately, her reputation preceded her, and no man would work for her unless he was looking for something more than a paycheck.
She quickly heated up the stove, which was welcome on the cool spring evening, and she made the eggs and bacon she knew her son would eat. He was a finicky eater, but it didn’t bother her. Charlotte simply didn’t have time to let anything bother her anymore. There was work, and there was more work. She and Walt made it into town every Sunday morning for church, and then they returned home, she put on her trousers, and got right back to work.
Thankfully, Walt seemed to think working with her was the best thing he could possibly do. He never complained, and he always had a smile on his face for her.
Branding was coming up though, and she couldn’t handle it on her own. She had about two months to find someone who would help her. For a moment, she thought about asking some of the other ranchers if they would loan her their men, but she knew better. The men would expect to warm her bed and not just help with the calves.
After supper she was going to have to break down and write a letter—a letter asking for a mail-order man. One who wouldn’t look at her as if she was a piece of meat. Hopefully anyone she married would treat her as well as her dear Howard had. He’d never minded that she’d spent the first sixteen years of her life pretending to be a boy. He was the only one who hadn’t minded or thought less of her as a result.
Later, once Walt was sound asleep, she sat down at the dining table, and she wrote her letter, wishing for the umpteenth time it wasn’t necessary.
To whom it may concern:
I need a husband…
*****
Elizabeth Tandy turned the letter over in her hand before opening it. This was her favorite part of her job—savoring each letter and each story that came with the letters. As she read the first lines of this one, she knew this wasn’t her usual kind of job. No, this one would involve sending a man instead of a woman, which was very rare for her. She tended to just send her brothers out because there were so many of them, and not one of them cared to spend his time doing anything but hard labor. Ranching and farming were perfect fits for them.
As she read through the entire letter, she knew exactly whom she should send to the widow Watkins—now the hard part would be convincing him that he needed to go.
She put the letter into her reticule, and she called out for her husband, Bernard. Bernard had started as her butler and man about town, but now he was so much more. They’d only been married two years, and they had a beautiful little boy.
Bernard popped his head into her office, his face serious, but when he saw she was alone, he joined her in the room, his arms going about her. “Yes, my love?”
“I have to convince Earl to move to Montana to marry.”
“Your brother? A widow?” he asked, always understanding her.
Earl had fallen in love not three full years before, but his fiancée had met with a terrible accident, and she’d lost her life. Elizabeth nodded. “A widow with a little boy who doesn’t speak.”
“I see. Yes, it sounds as if Earl is the man for the job. He’s been asking around for some farmland, but no one is selling anything he’s interested in.”
“The Widow Watkins is a rancher, and though it’s not farming, I have a feeling Earl won’t mind. She lost her husband a few months back, and due to her reputation, none of the men in town will work for her without expecting a great deal more than a paycheck.”
“Oh, dear! Where did she get her reputation?”
“I don’t know, but I have a feeling Earl won’t mind whatever it is.”
“I’ll get the baby. You get the pram ready.”
Elizabeth smiled, standing on tiptoe to kiss her husband. “You know my life is only wonderful because you’re a part of it, right?”
“I feel the same about you, my love.”
*****
Earl Miller was dreaming again. Daydreaming about land that was his that he could plant whatever he wanted on. For instance, he was certain that they’d make the most money from potatoes, while his father clung to what his father had done before him—dairy farming, and only planting enough crops for your animals for the year. It felt so short-sighted to Earl.
