Genevieve: Bride of Nevada (American Mail-Order Bride 36) Read Free Page A

the ranch will take three hours?”
    He nodded. “After I get the supplies loaded we will have about a three-hour ride.” He paused. “You’ll be sore, riding that long in the buckboard for the first time. I’m sorry about that, but you’ll get used to it. We come into town every couple of weeks.”
    They went to the mercantile and the feed store before heading out of town. There were more buildings than she saw from the train station. A white church with a small cross on the top of the eve, stood at the end of the street. She saw a newspaper office painted light blue, two-story hotel painted pale yellow, a gunsmith, two more saloons and a butcher.
    Stuart didn’t ask for her help buying supplies. She supposed that next time she would have some input because she’d know what was already there. At home in Lawrence, she’d gotten her milk from the milk man, her meat from the butcher, bread from the bakery. Being able to buy everything from one store was new to her.
    Genny was happy to be standing and not waiting on the wagon. She still had about three hours to go and already her behind was screaming with pain.
    Clara had all their purchases ready to load. Stuart helped pack all the grain and the groceries into the back of the wagon. With a lurch they started the trip home. A strange word to her but she really had a home now. One she could call hers and a family she was a part of.
    “Who cares for your children now?”
    “Nettie Johnson. She’s my housekeeper and married to my foreman, Pete.”
    “Why get married if you already have someone to care for your children?”
    “Nettie said she can’t do it anymore. As much as she loves my kids, she’s not a young woman and the workload is just too much to cook, clean and take care of Billy and Lucy.”
    “I can understand that. How many people do you have on your ranch?”
    “If you include Billy and Lucy twelve of us live there. Thirteen including you. There is Joe, my brother and half-owner of the ranch, Nettie and Pete, the cowboys, Tom, Cookie, he does the cooking on trail drives, Slim, Smokey, Dude and Bub.”
    Having grown up in the orphanage she’d learned to be friendly with strangers, always hoping that one of the couples that came in would want an older girl. But they always wanted the babies and toddlers. “Goodness, I’ll try to remember them all. I’m not generally very good with names, but I do recognize faces.”
    The horses walked on, trying to stop and graze every once and a while. Stuart slapped the reins on their butts to keep them moving.
    The country they traveled through was some of the prettiest Genny could ever have imagined. Grass-covered land with colorful late autumn wild flowers breaking through all over the place. A riot of color surrounded them, even this late in the year. The mountains surrounding them had their first dusting of snow, the tops a vivid white against the bluest sky she’d ever seen. This was definitely God’s country.
    They rode in silence and Genny soaked in the landscape. She decided then and there that she would live here no matter what happened. If her marriage didn’t work out and she had to scrub floors in the local hotel to make a living she would do it to stay here.
    They approached the ranch from the west. It sat in the middle of the valley they’d entered a while back. The surrounding land was lush with lots of grass and a river on the north side of the valley. She couldn’t see the river through the line of trees, but she could hear it. Lots of buildings were loosely grouped together. She’d have to learn what each one was. She recognized the barn right away as it was the largest building and was painted red. The house, which looked to be the second largest of the structures, was white as were the rest of the buildings.
    “Your home is lovely. What are all the different buildings for?”
    “Thank you.”
    He smiled at the compliment.
    “Joe and I are proud of what our family has accomplished here.