Avalee Exchanges Her Fiancé
Page 10
“Oh. Look at the windows, Gordon.”
Outlines of red hearts with “A+G” written inside them were smeared on the glass panes.
“I assume that’s cherry blood again?” Gordon asked as he walked to a window, studying it before taking a small bit on his finger and tasting it.
“Yep. I’m guessing the youngest Paulson girls decorated our home?”
“It might have been more than the youngest two,” Avalee hated to admit. “I might have helped decorate Iva Mae and Gabe’s home five years ago when they married.”
“Oh, really, Mrs. Miller? What else should we expect to find amiss in our new home then?” Gordon asked as he moved back to Avalee and embraced her around the waist.
“Oh, the usual. Salt and sugar exchanged in their bowls. Labels missing from the canned goods in the pantry.”
“I count at least three bouquets of fall mums in the house though. That’s a nice touch.”
“Just be sure there isn’t some poison ivy tucked in between the flower stems when you added water to the vases though.”
“Really? They’d do that to us?”
“Maybe not, but I bet there’s a frog or two in the commode.”
“They’d pick up frogs and let them loose in here? Your sisters are worse than boys!”
Gordon did drop his hold on her, head for the bathing room, and carefully lift the lid on the commode. “Looks clear of frogs or fish.”
He halted though when he stepped inside their bedroom, noticing the lump under the bed covers.
“What's in the bed? It’s not a snake, is it?”
It was about the right thickness of a reptile, but, it wasn’t moving. But didn’t Gordon notice it was in the shape of a valentine heart?
“It’s late fall. Don’t you think it would be hard to find snakes this time of year?”
“Nope. They could go out to the caves and find them.”
Gordon’s face had turned pale. Was he scared of snakes?
“I’ll ease off the covers, and we’ll see what it is,” Avalee said as she eased forward and pulled the end of the quilt.
“No! Stand back!”
“Gordon—” was all Avalee got out before Gordon lunged forward, wadded the bedding into a ball and ran for the outside stair landing of their home. He opened the door and shoved it over the railing.
They watched it float down to the puddle of water. Yes, it had rained last evening, and there were water and mud everywhere.
“Oh, oh. I shouldn’t have done that,” Gordon muttered as he raced down the steps to retrieve the bedding. Avalee watched from above, waiting to see how he’d separate the sheet—and her blue and white wedding ring quilt—from the perceived snake and mud puddle.
“I’m so, so sorry, Avalee!” Gordon snatched the wedding quilt up first, gathering the corners up, trying to keep them from getting any more soiled.
Avalee walked down the steps and reached out for her quilt. It looked like there was only one blue corner that had gotten a little wet. It wasn’t ruined after all.
“It’s all right, Gordon. There’s just one corner that needs to be washed.”
“Thank goodness,” Gordon said, but his eyes were still on the raised lump under the sheet.
“The thing’s not moving. What is it?”
“My guess is something rolled up, like towels or sheets, to look like the shape of a heart.”
Gordon turned to stare at Avalee. “You’re kidding me!”
“We’re dealing with girls decorating our place, not boys, Gordon. Hearts on the windows, a heart in our bed…”
“But you mentioned frogs…”
“Frogs are one thing. A Paulson girl is not going to pick up and transfer a snake to a bed.”
“I want some boy babies. They’re more predictable,” Gordon said as he pulled off the sheet to see the offending item.
White towels, splotched with brown stains lay half submerged in the puddle.
Gordon’s shoulder started shaking before he lifted his head to laugh.
“Your sisters got me good this time,” Gordon said as he rolled the dirty sheet into a ball, then reached into the puddle to pull out the dripping mass of towels.
“Good thing we have sheets and towels for sale in our store, Mrs. Miller.”
“And good thing the Paulsons have an account with us because those items are going to be charged to my little sisters,” Avalee replied. She wasn’t upset with them, but their prank, and Gordon’s reaction to it, kind of put a damper on the mood for their wedding night.
Gordon slowly walked up the stairs, stopped a step down from Avalee.
“I’m sorry for how I reacted, but I really hate snakes. There was one in my bedroll once when I was in the army. I pushed my feet into my bedroll, and the thing moved up my leg and—”
Avalee kissed Gordon to stop his storytelling.
“Let’s go back upstairs, and you put a new top sheet on our bed while I wash out this quilt corner. Then the only thing crawling into bed will be us.”
Gordon dropped the bedding and towel on the steps and picked up Avalee, still clutching her quilt.
“Let’s start our wedding night over, Mrs. Miller,” Gordon said as he kissed Avalee.
“Fine with me. Just don’t slip walking on the rice, Mr. Miller.”
Epilogue
“Avalee wore a beautiful dress, Helen. Did it come from the five-trunk room, or did my granddaughters make it?” Cate Connely asked as the group of friends sat around the table in the events room of the hotel.
The newlyweds had left for their home, but there were still a smattering of people enjoying the reception. Well, they were enjoying conversation and coffee. The last of the wedding cake and finger sandwiches had been devoured by the wedding guests an hour ago.
“It was a trunk dress, but Maisie altered it and raised the hem a good three or four inches,” Helen replied.
“Back when we married, we wore a dress we’d wear again, and it was never white like the fashion is today,” Sarah Brenner, the mother of the seamstresses commented.
“Like the green dress you wore when you were supposed to marry Ethan, Sarah?” her mother, Cate Connely smirked.
All the women, including Helen, who later married Ethan, knew about the dress Sarah hated, but the elder Mrs. Paulson picked out for Sarah to wear to her wedding to her son, Ethan.
“Hey, I loved that dress,” Faye, Sarah’s sister protested. “I wore it for years after you gave it to me.”
“Think of all the dresses we’ve picked out of the trunks, quilts we’ve sewn together, and wedding receptions we’ve hosted over the past twenty years,” Lorna mentioned as she looked around the table.
“I wish my two oldest daughters Elise and Blanche, would have married here instead of back East,” Lorna added. All three of her girls had lived with their Elison grandparents in Boston while attending school there.
“But that’s where Elise and Blanche met their husbands. Is your younger daughter, Mamie, coming home for Christmas or staying with her grandparents?” Kaitlyn asked.
“Maybe Lyle and I will go to Boston for the holidays, now that I don’t have a Peashooter couple to worry about here.” Lorna was satisfied Gordon and Avalee would do fine now without any additional help.
“Which couple will be next to walk down the church aisle to wed? Tobin was supposed to be with Avalee, but that didn’t work out,” Kaitlyn admitted.
“We have to think of the housing situation too. Tobin has moved in with Lucas Boyle. Mack and Squires are going to add a section on the back of his house, if Lucas wants to stay living with Tobin. His daughter hasn’t shown any interest in helping out her father,” Lorna mentioned.
“So that leaves Squires and Wesley living with Peter,” Kaitlyn drummed her fingers against the table. “If Peter wants to marry, we need to move the two men out.”
“Wesley can move into the hotel apartment at any time,” Helen volunteered. “Squires can live with him too if Peter wants t
o marry next.”
“We had paired Peter and Molly at the first luncheon, but Molly had taken a liking to Tobin,” Kaitlyn remembered back to her notes.
“I’ve been watching Peter and Maggie this evening. I think they could develop a lasting marriage,” Millie added to the conversation.
“Hmm. My rancher’s daughter and a barber? I don’t think they have much in common,” Sarah mused.
Millie’s hesitation and then a broad smile showed she had an idea.
“It's time to implement the Peashooter Society's skills for Maggie Brenner and Peter Gehring, and it’s my turn to be a sponsor,” Millie gleefully replied.
"Here's what we're going to do..."
Here are the individual stories in the Mismatched Mail-Order Brides Series.
The Peashooter Society’s Plan (Introduction short story)
Amelia Changes her Fellow (Amelia and Barton)
Avalee Exchanges her Fiancé (Avalee and Gordon)
Maggie Shifts her Gent (Maggie and Peter)
Maisie Swaps her Groom (Maisie and Squires)
Molly Switches her Man (Molly and Tobin)
Nadine Trades her Partner (Nadine and Wesley)
Ready for the next book?
Maggie Shifts her Gent
Here’s the description
It’s 1892, almost twenty years after the first mail-order brides found love in Clear Creek, Kansas in the Brides with Grit Series.
The older members of the Clear Creek church women’s group, informally known as the Peashooter Society, decide to help the unattached women in town obtain husbands because there are more women in town than men.
Maggie Brenner, the oldest daughter in the Brides with Grit series book, Sarah Snares a Soldier, grew up on the vast Cross C Ranch north of Clear Creek. Maggie, and all her siblings were adopted by Sarah and Marcus Brenner when Maggie’s widowed mother died giving birth to her triplet brothers.
Now an adult, Maggie would have preferred to leave the area to work with young children, but she moves into Clear Creek instead when her younger sisters, Molly and Maisie, take over the town’s dress shop.
The Peashooter Society decides Maggie needs a husband to complete her life, even if Maggie longs to work in an orphanage to help children find homes.
Peter Gehring, along with five friends, left New York City on an orphan train when Peter was four years old. He was adopted by a tailor and his wife, who already had three much older daughters. Now mustered out of the army, where Peter was a barber, the group of friends gets the chance to live and work together in a small community, thanks to the plan of the Peashooter Society.
Because of Gordon’s tall, bulky stature, his benefactors think he’s built to run the blacksmith shop, even though he knows nothing about the craft. Luckily, he gets to take over the barbershop instead, enjoying cutting hair and visiting with anyone who stops by.
Peter and Maggie start a friendship which grows into love, but they aren’t sure they want the same thing when it comes to marriage and life in Clear Creek. Then a chance meeting of a group of orphans on a train cements their future.
Sounds like fate? Maybe. A happy ever after? Definitely!
Dear Reader:
I hope you enjoyed reading one of the stories in the Mismatched Mail-Order Bride Series. Please help other readers discover my books by either recommending them to family and friends by word of mouth or writing a review. I’d appreciate it.
For more information on this series, you can go to www.LindaHubalek.com, or go online to your favorite retailer, or ask your local library to order them for you. These are standalone stories, but I recommend reading the books in order to get the full benefit of the storyline.
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Many thanks from the Kansas prairie!
Linda K. Hubalek
Books by Linda K. Hubalek
Historical Romance Series
The Mismatched Mail-Order Bride Series
The Peashooter Society’s Plan
Amelia Changes her Fellow (Amelia and Barton)
Avalee Exchanges her Fiancé (Avalee and Gordon)
Maggie Shifts her Gent (Maggie and Peter)
Maisie Swaps her Groom (Maisie and Squires)
Molly Switches her Man (Molly and Tobin)
Nadine Trades her Partner (Nadine and Wesley)
Brides with Grit Series
Rania Ropes a Rancher (Rania and Jacob)
Millie Marries a Marshal (Millie and Adam)
Hilda Hogties a Horseman (Hilda and Noah)
Cora Captures a Cowboy (Cora and Dagmar)
Sarah Snares a Soldier (Sarah and Marcus)
Cate Corrals a Cattleman (Cate and Isaac)
Darcie Desires a Drover (Darcie and Reuben)
Tina Tracks a Trail Boss (Tina and Leif)
Lorna Loves a Lawyer (Lorna and Lyle)
Helen Heals a Hotelier (Helen and Ethan)
Faye Favors a Foreman (Faye and Rusty)
Amy Admires an Amish Man (Amy and Eli)
Grooms with Honor Series
Nolan’s Vow (Nolan and Holly)
Elof’s Mission (Elof and Linnea)
Angus’ Trust (Angus and Daisy)
Fergus’ Honor (Fergus and Iris)
Gabe’s Pledge (Gabe and Iva Mae)
Mack’s Care (Mack and Pansy)
Jasper’s Wish (Jasper and Julip)
Cullen’s Love (Cullen and Rose)
Seth’s Promise (Seth and Lily)
Adolph’s Choice (Adolph and Poppy)
Tully’s Faith (Tully and Violet)
Kiowa’s Oath (Kiowa and Mary)
~*~*~*~
Contemporary Romance Series by Linda K. Hubalek
The Clear Creek Legacy Series features descendants of the Brides with Grit and Grooms with Honor families (available and future titles)
The Saddler’s Legacy (featuring the Shepard families)
The Rancher’s Birthright (featuring the Reagan families)
The Marshal’s Gift (featuring the Wilerson families)
The Cowboy’s Heritage (featuring the Hamner families)
The Soldier’s Bequest (featuring the Brenner families)
Historical Fiction Series by Linda K. Hubalek
Trail of Thread Series
Trail of Thread
Thimble of Soil
Stitch of Courage
Butter in the Well Series
Butter in the Well
Prairie Bloomin’
Egg Gravy
Looking Back
Planting Dreams Series
Planting Dreams
Cultivating Hope
Harvesting Faith
Kansas Quilter Series
Tying the Knot
About the Author
Linda Hubalek has written over forty books about strong women and honorable men, with a touch of humor, despair, and drama woven into the stories. The setting for all the series is the Kansas prairie which Linda enjoys daily, whether by being outside or looking at it through her office window.
Her historical romance series include Brides with Grit, Grooms with Honor, Mismatched Mail-Order Brides, and the Clear Creek Legacy. Linda's historical fiction series, based on her ancestors' pioneer lives include Butter in the Well, Trail of Thread, and Planting Dreams.
When not writing, Linda is reading (usually with dark chocolate within reach), gardening (channeling her college degree in Horticulture), or traveling with her husband to explore the world.
Linda loves to hear from her readers, so visit her website to contact her or browse the site to read about her books.
www.LindaHubalek.com/
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
&nbs
p; Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Epilogue
Maggie Shifts her Gent
Books by Linda K. Hubalek
About the Author
The End