Romance: Mail Order Bride "The Ideal Bride" Clean Christian Western Historical Romance (Western Mail Order Bride Short Shorties Series) Read Free Page B

neat with an inviting bed and curtains billowing in the breeze. She fixed her stare on a box resting against the mattress when the sound of his voice echoed in her brain.
    “ My room,” she said. “Aren’t we going to share?”
    “Yours until we make it official,” he said. “Of course I hope that happens sooner rather than later.”
    Henry fell to one knee and reached into his pocket. He flipped the lid of a small velvet box, and Nora gasped at the sight of a silver band with a perfect diamond at its center.
    “You honor me with your presence,” he started. “And your courage. I don’t quite know how, but I’m going to give you everything that you said you wanted in your letters.”
    Nora fought back a few tears as the ring became one with her hand. Longing to kiss him, she joined him on the ground and cradled his chin.
    “It’s like a fairytale,” she mused.
    “Does that make me a prince?” Henry asked.
    “My prince.”
    Their lips met, and any doubts fell away as he eased her back to her feet and pointed towards the box on the bed.
    “Open your present,” he said.
    “Another one?” she squealed. “I could get used to this.
    “That’s the idea, Nora.”
    She tore into the box and gasped at the sight of an orange dress lined with ebony leaves and flowers. Nora pressed the gift just under her chin and turned around to see his expanding smile.
    “It’s calico,” he said.
    “It’s so special, Henry.”
    “Put it on.”
    Nora laughed when Henry backed away with his hands in the air.
    “I’ll wait for you in the other room.”
    Nora was left alone and looked at her reflection in the mirror. No one had ever presented her with such a gift, and she changed quickly to find him rearranging the roses as she uttered his name.
    “It’s a perfect fit,” she said. “How did you know?”
    “A lucky guess,” he said. “Come closer.”
    Obeying the order, she let his hands move down her neck, and she felt her hair starting to spill through his fingers.
    “You said it was a dull brown,” he said.
    “That’s what my mother always called it.”
    “The woman knows nothing of color,” he said. “And I like it looking like this.”
    Nora leaned into his arm and savored his warmth as he guided her back to the porch.
    “The barn is a few paces off,” he started. “Mornings are for tending to the livestock. Crops are farther away.”
    “I want to see all of it,” Nora said. Henry leaned into her lips, and she wanted to live out the rest of her life around his kiss when he hurried her back to the wagon as he gripped the reins.
    “A princess deserves a kingdom.”
    Nora drank in the view of the rolling fields and listened to Henry ramble on and on about his best season ever when the wagon stopped and she just held his hand.
    “Thank you for answering my letter.”
    He tightened his grip and moved towards her lips.
    “You don’t have to wander anymore,” he promised. “I’ll keep you happy. And safe."
    They made their way back to the house, and Nora became acquainted with every corner. So many rooms were unfurnished, and when she asked why, Henry just shrugged his shoulders.
    “You’ll figure out what to do with them,” he said. “To make it a home.”
    She sat him down before the roses and wanted nothing more than to make him dinner when he patted his lap and asked if he could hold her.
    “A good wife makes her man a proper dinner,” Nora said as she nuzzled his neck and felt his hands running up and down her back.
    “Let me do it,” he said. “I’m a sad excuse for a cook. But if a sandwich is enough?”
    “You are enough, Henry.”
    They munched on bits of cheese between two crusts of bread. Did it really only take one day to fall completely in love? Nora brushed the crumbs from his lips and accepted his languid kisses until the need for sleep took over.
    “To bed with you now.”
    Henry carried her into the room and removed the dress. Hiding her body under the blankets, he fondled