Prairie Bride: (A Western Historical Romance) (Dodge City Brides Book 1)

by Julianne MacLean

  “Will do.”

  Sarah felt her hopes die a little. Perhaps he meant to see her off.

  All of a sudden, Briggs wrapped his hand around her good elbow and led her around the side of the building. “Where are we going?”

  Stopping by the depot wall, he faced her, taking both her shoulders in his firm grip. “Just now, when you told the Caldwell marshal you never intended to leave Dodge with Garrison, that you wanted him out of your life for good—was that true?”

  She gazed up at him, seeing the concern in his eyes, the tension in his forehead. Fighting the urge to reach up and smooth away those deep lines, she answered, “Of course it’s true. I told you before. I don’t love him.”

  “I was afraid you might have chosen to leave town with him.”

  She shook her head. “No. Absolutely not.”

  Briggs shut his eyes. “When I think what could have happened if we hadn’t caught the train when we did.”

  “But you did catch it,” she said, “and everything is fine now.”

  Slowly, he opened his eyes. Her gaze met with his, steady and unyielding. What was he feeling? she wondered, her stomach rolling with doubts and nervous knots. She had to know. She had to know before she told him about the child she was carrying.

  She parted her lips to ask, but her words were cut short. His mouth came down upon hers, hard and wet with desire. Her head began to whirl. He swept her off the ground and into his arms, into the place that had become a fantasy these last agonizing hours. Feeling his warm tongue mingle with hers, she moaned with pleasure.

  He broke away and gazed into her eyes. “I’m so sorry, Sarah.”

  All the possible meanings contained in that single statement swam in her head. “Sorry for what?”

  He shook his head, lowering it, as if in shame. Was he saying he was sorry to hurt her, sorry for going back to Isabelle? Or was it something else?

  “I’m sorry for not believing you about Garrison. I should have been able to trust you, and I should have been able to trust my heart, because I believe it always knew you were a good person. Even if you made mistakes in the past—we all have. But when we learn from our mistakes, we become stronger and wiser, less likely to make them again.”

  Still uncertain, Sarah tried to find the right thing to say. “It’s not your fault. I should have trusted you, too. If I’d told you everything from the beginning, things might have turned out differently.”

  “You had every reason to keep things secret from me,” he said. “I was impossible in the beginning. I shut you out when you needed me.”

  Tears formed on her lashes when she blinked, glistening, blurring her view of the man before her. She wiped at her eyes, striving to focus on him.

  “I want you to know that I never meant to hurt you,” he said. “But I think we were right to annul the marriage. When we spoke our wedding vows, they meant nothing.”

  In that moment, hearing those words, Sarah’s heart broke in two. Grasping for strength and dignity, she took a deep breath and held on. Was he about to tell her he still loved Isabelle?

  “All aboard!” the conductor called.

  Harnessing all the courage she could find, Sarah posed the question directly. “Are you going to marry Isabelle now?”

  His head drew back, as if she had swung a punch at him. “Isabelle? I don’t want Isabelle.”

  “But she came to visit you.”

  Panic whisked across his face. “Yes, she did, and I drove her straight back to town.”

  Sarah stared at him, afraid to believe it.

  “She wanted to work things out and reconcile,” he explained, “but I told her....”

  Sarah touched his face with her hand, forcing him to look at her, forcing herself to look into his eyes. “You told her what?”

  “I told her that I loved you. And that I always would.”

  “All aboard!” the conductor called again.

  “But the annulment,” Sarah almost cried. “You just said we did the right thing.”

  He cupped her face in his large, warm hands and laughed. “Yes, I’m glad we annulled it, because the second time around, our vows will mean something.”

  Her eyes filled with tears, but this time, they were tears of joy and hope. “What did you just say?”

  He dropped to one knee, holding her hand, kissing it again and again. Then he wrapped his arms around her hips, pulled her against him, and buried his face in her skirts. “I love you, Sarah. Please, marry me. For real this time.”

  Wonder and rapture flooded through her. She, too, dropped to her knees, drove her fingers through his thick hair and pulled him toward her for a deep, soul-reaching kiss.

  A minute later, the train whistle blew. As it chugged noisily out of the station, hissing and blowing huge clouds of black soot that quickly disappeared on the wind, Briggs and Sarah stared at each other. Sarah felt the hot sun on her cheeks. There was still one last thing to confess....

  “I have something to tell you. But I’m not sure how you’re going to feel about it.”

  “No matter what you tell me,” he replied, “I could feel nothing but happiness at this moment.”

  She appreciated his reassurance but couldn’t help feeling shaky. “I found out today that I’m....I’m...”

  How could she say it? What if Briggs couldn’t accept that the child might be Garrison’s?

  “I’m in the family way,” she said, without further hesitation.

  Briggs stared blankly at her for a moment, and Sarah’s heart stood still.

  “Is it mine?” he asked.

  Something crumpled inside of Sarah. She had hoped, fancifully perhaps, that it would not matter.

  The answer she had to give ripped her heart in two. “I’m not sure.” Ashamed and filled with remorse, she squinted through tears. Six months ago, who would have thought she would ever find herself in this predicament?

  Head lowered and weeping in silence, she was startled by Briggs’s warm finger under her chin. Gently, he lifted her face, urging her to look at him. His eyes were filled with tears.

  “Sarah, I will love this child more than any father ever could. No matter what the future brings.”

  Her body shuddered with a sob. “Oh Briggs, I’m so sorry.”

  “Sorry?” he bellowed, laughing. “You have nothing to be sorry for. You’ve just made me the happiest man in the world.”

  Sarah drew back in dismay. After everything she’d done, after all the lies, how could she be so blessed? “I love you,” she said.

  He gazed intently at her, his green eyes sparkling. “And I love you, too, Sarah Brigman. Let’s go home.”

  He took her by the hand and led her into the station.

  Epilogue

  Feet crunching over a thin coating of morning snow, Briggs paced by an upturned barrel outside the little sod dugout. He rubbed his cold hands together and blew into them. He could see his breath.

  The labor had come early. What was taking so long?

  A painful scream cut through the early morning air. He stopped, chest heaving. Please God, let her be all right. I can’t lose her, not now.

  Another cry stabbed him in the heart. He approached the door. He had to go inside. He couldn’t wait like this. He couldn’t bear to hear Sarah in such pain.

  Just then, a different cry sounded. He sucked in a quick breath. A baby. It was a baby’s cry…

  Waiting there, listening, Briggs heard Martha’s gentle laughter. Hope and wonder moved through his swirling mind. The seconds ticked by like hours as he stood there, frozen with excitement, waiting for Martha to come out. Was everything all right? Was Sarah well?

  He took an anxious step forward when the door finally swung open. “Congratulations,” Martha said, wiping her hands on a blood-stained cloth. “You have a son.”

  Briggs’s
shoulders relaxed as a paternal glow warmed him. A son. He had a son. “What about Sarah?”

  Martha smiled and nodded. “She was very brave, and she wants to see you.”

  A lump filled his throat. He rushed by Martha, touching her on the arm to give thanks. Taking two steps at a time, he reached the dimly lit interior of their warm little house. Sarah lay on the bed with the babe in her arms, smiling. Her long black hair was damp around her face, her cheeks flushed. She’d never looked more beautiful to him.

  “Hello,” she softly said.

  Briggs stood at the foot of the large bed he had built for them, just after the first snowfall. He stared in wonder at his wife and baby son. “Hello.”

  “Someone wants to meet you.”

  He walked around the bed, never taking his eyes off the two of them.The child, red-faced and gently wiggling, was wrapped in a small white quilt Martha had brought with her as a gift. Briggs raised a knee onto the bed to take a closer look.

  “Do you want to hold him?”

  Unable to speak, Briggs accepted the infant into his arms. The boy held up his tiny hand and grasped Brigg’s large thumb. What joy could be greater than this? Briggs wondered, staring blissfully down at that innocent face, noticing the full head of black hair. “He has your fine looks.”

  “Not entirely.”

  Briggs raised his questioning gaze to see his wife smiling at him.

  Carefully sitting up, she folded the quilt back from the child’s tiny head. “It seems that he has your ears.”

  Briggs shouted out in laughter. “I hadn’t thought you’d noticed my ears!”

  “Your hair is beautiful, my darling husband, but it doesn’t hide everything.”

  Sinking back into the pillow, Sarah giggled for a moment, then gestured for him to sit beside her. Briggs held the child in his arms and felt his eyes fill with tears. There would never be any doubt about it.

  The boy was a Brigman.

  Author’s Note

  Dear Reader,

  Thank you for taking the time to read PRAIRIE BRIDE, and I hope you enjoyed it. You may be interested to know that this book was originally published by Harlequin Historicals in the year 2000, and it was my debut novel. For that reason, it will always hold a special place in my heart because it was a long road to publication. It took six years and four unsuccessful manuscripts that were rejected everywhere before this one hit the mark. Needless to say, it was beyond thrilling when I learned that an editor wanted to publish PRAIRIE BRIDE. (Incidentally, one of those four “unsuccessful” manuscripts is now published as book 3 in this series: A TIME FOR LOVE.)

  Because it was such a long time since the original publication of PRAIRIE BRIDE, I decided to revise the book, as I feel I’ve come a long way as a writer in the past sixteen years. While the story remains completely intact with no changes to the plot, I believe the characters are now more realistic and believable, and the writing is cleaner and smoother. I’m much happier with this new edition, and I’m grateful to have had the chance to make this book all it could be.

  On a similar note, the next book in the Dodge City Brides Series was my second published novel with Harlequin. TEMPTING THE MARSHAL was originally published in 2001 under the title: THE MARSHAL AND MRS. O’MALLEY. I’ve polished that one up, too, and you can read on for an excerpt and more information about that book.

  Also, if you enjoy historical romances with plenty of adventure and strong alpha male heroes, you might like to try my Scottish Highlander romances. A complete booklist follows, and please visit my website at www.juliannemaclean.com for more information about those books.

  While you’re there, be sure to sign up for my email newsletter if you would like to be notified about future new releases and my monthly autographed book giveaway, which is available to my newsletter subscribers.

  And if you would like to know when an ebook edition from my backlist goes on sale for 99 cents (or is occasionally offered for free), please go to my author profile on Bookbub and click the blue follow button. You’ll be sent an email whenever there’s a flash sale.

  Thank you again for reading PRAIRIE BRIDE!

  –Julianne

  Other books in the

  Dodge City Brides Series

  USA Today bestselling author Julianne MacLean delivers three breathtaking and passionate full-length novels featuring rugged alpha-male heroes of the West, all sworn to protect the women they love…

  Tempting the Marshal

  Dodge City Brides Series – Book 2

  ALL SHE WANTS IS VENGEANCE

  Disguised as a man, Josephine O’Malley strolls into a Dodge City mercantile with one thing on her mind: to even the score with the man who murdered her husband. What she doesn’t count on is Fletcher Collins—the handsome and irresistible new marshal in town—bursting through the doors of the mercantile with guns blazing…and a plan to stop her from pulling the trigger.

  HE ONLY WANTS TO PROTECT HER

  There’s a new marshal in town, but he’s fighting inner demons of his own. Fletcher Collins is a man who has known his share of heartache, and when he finds himself apprehending a gorgeous widow for murder, he begins to re-evaluate what it means to be a lawman. But if Fletcher is going to keep the widow out of prison—and figure out what’s really going on in Dodge—he’s going to have to learn how to follow his gut. Unfortunately, his gut is telling him that Josephine O’Malley is exactly the kind of woman who could make him break all the rules…

  A Time for Love

  Dodge City Brides Series – Book 3

  HERO AND PROTECTOR

  Former bounty hunter, expert gunslinger, and the toughest sheriff Dodge City has ever known, Truman Wade is a real man from the tip of his black Stetson right down to his spurs and leather boots. He’s never met his match in a gunfight, but he’s never met a gorgeous, gutsy woman from the twenty-first century either…

  TORN BETWEEN TWO WORLDS

  Newly single after a rocky breakup with her self-absorbed fiancé, newspaper columnist Jessica Delaney crashes her car in a lightning storm and soon finds herself dodging bullets in the Wild West. Before the night is out, she’s tossed in jail for a murder she didn’t commit, and if things don’t seem complicated enough, the impossibly handsome sheriff in charge of her arrest has danger written all over him. Jessica knows she needs to get home, but when Sheriff Wade’s enticing touch sets her heart on fire, she begins to wonder if fate has other plans for her, and soon she must choose between the life she longs for in the future… and the greatest love she’s ever known.

  Excerpt from

  Tempting the Marshal

  Dodge City Brides Series – Book 2

  Copyright © 2020 Julianne MacLean Publishing Inc.

  Chapter 1

  Dodge City, Kansas, 1876

  Josephine O’Malley’s stomach clenched tight with panic as she peered through the night along the dusty street, watching for potential witnesses. She couldn’t let anyone recognize her in these clothes that had once belonged to her husband, God rest his soul. Especially after she pulled the trigger.

  Fighting to keep calm, she opened her long slicker and palmed the walnut handle of her Colt .45—the handle her husband had worn smooth over the years. Her boots tapped lightly over the aging planks along the boardwalk, while her spurs chinked a slow rhythm. Music from a tinny saloon piano across the street seemed muffled beneath the erratic pulse that drummed in her ears, but she continued on, soberly watching the mannish lines of her shadow as she passed under a hanging lantern.

  When she finally stopped outside Zeb Stone’s Dry Goods Store, she took a deep breath and tried to relax. Over the past six months, raw fear had compelled her to learn how to handle her late husband’s guns, preparing for this day, should it come. Hadn’t she pictured this moment over and over in her mind, wanted it, known it was necessary? Wasn’t it supposed to be filled with righteous determi
nation?

  Instead, she looked up at the huge painted sign bearing Zeb’s name and felt only a sickening knot of intimidation and a horrible surge of dread. She’d never killed a man, never thought she could. It went against everything she ever believed in.

  But she had to do it now. Didn’t she? She couldn’t stand by and watch her son, Leo, choke to death in a noose like her husband. Leo had been poking around the finer details of his father’s murder lately, and Zeb, with his cold, black heart, was beginning to take notice.

  No, the time had come for Jo to face Zeb once and for all. The law had done nothing to help her. If she was going to protect Leo now, she had to help herself.

  Jo raised the red bandanna over her nose. As she reached for the brass doorknob, her hand trembled. She pulled it back and paused to fight the pulsing knot in her stomach, then pushed the door open. Bells clanged as she made her way quietly across the threshold.

  Zeb Stone stood behind the counter wearing a black waistcoat and starched white shirt. His black bowler hat rested on the counter. His head was down as he scrawled in a notebook.

  “We’re closed,” he said, his voice flat with disinterest. “Come back tomorrow.”

  Jo shakily drew one of her weapons and held it with both hands in front of her. Anxiety spurted through her, but this was not the time for doubt or hesitation. It would take a cool head to carry this through.

  She crossed the room in three swift strides, stopping at the glass counter and breathing fast with panic. She shoved the barrel of her gun against her enemy’s shiny forehead.

  Zeb’s fearless gaze rose to meet hers. The familiarity of those black eyes sent a hideous chill through her. “You’re out of luck,” he said, not recognizing her face behind the bandanna. “The money’s already gone to the bank.”