No Choice but to Marry: A Historical Mail Order Bride Romance

by Stephanie Hunt

  “You know, ever since your father died,” she began. “I never thought I would be able to go out and have this much fun again. It is so refreshing to be around you young people. Thank you so much, Liam, for making this all possible.”

  “You’re welcome, Patricia,” he responded. “Just remember that the good times don’t’ stop tonight. For as long as your beautiful daughter and myself are together – which is to say, forever – I will continue to show you and your family the finer things in life. Also, once in a while these rascals might be joining in too.”

  Liam motioned at Stephan and Emilio. Emilio gave Liam a playful punch in the arm in response.

  “They’re not so bad,” said Patricia, somewhat seriously.

  “Why thank you, ma’am,” said Stephan.

  “Don’t be calling me ‘ma’am’ now, son,” said Patricia. “I don’t like to think of myself as any older than you young people. Although I know I am. Let’s just pretend we forgot, okay?”

  “Sure thing, Patricia,” said Stephan.

  That evening as everyone went to bed, Caroline lay awake for some time. It wasn’t that she couldn’t fall asleep, she just wanted to absorb everything that had been happening. Ever since Liam had proposed to her and she had said “yes”, her life had been like a fairy tale. Was it going to be this way forever? What will happen when the baby comes? These were the sorts of questions that she was considering. She was a bit nervous about becoming a mother. The good news was, she didn’t have to work, so she would have tons of time to take care of the baby. She wondered, for the first time, how big of a family she would want. She made a point of asking Liam next time they had a moment. She thought that maybe three kids would be optimal. That way they could grow up together and always have each others’ backs. Any more than that and it could be a handful. Plus, she wasn’t sure she wanted to subject herself to more than three pregnancies.

  The rest of the cruise flew by, and before everyone knew it, it was back to business as usual in the city. Liam busied himself with social events, taking Caroline with him whenever at all possible. Caroline spent a lot of time with her mother and sister, and discussed preparations for the baby. There was also a wedding to plan, so Caroline was very busy indeed.

  The wedding came and went, and the children started arriving. The Telsons became one of the best-known families in the city. It turned out that Liam had a rather large philanthropic bend, and started to occupy himself more and more with giving away pieces of his fortune. It made Caroline happy to know that she was married to a responsible, charitable man. Eventually, Alicia and Mike got married, and for their wedding gift, Caroline and Liam bought them a large house on the outskirts of the city. They couldn’t have been happier with the gift. Alicia lived out her days as happily as ever. It gave her so much pleasure to see how much her family was thriving. Of course, as for Caroline, she was always happy next to her “wealthy acquaintance.”

  *** THE END ***

  ~Not Just Another Soul Mate Book~

  My Magical Journey of 6 Soul Mate Connections

  Written and Experienced by Natalie Grove

  ~Preface~

  If you are reading or listening to this book, I'm assuming that you have either experienced a soul-mate connection or are seeking one.

  I'm writing this book for three reasons. First, I have never heard or read about anyone experiencing what I have experienced. Nonetheless, I am sure there are others out there but I haven't encountered them yet. After my first soul-mate experience, I searched endlessly for similar stories, and when I did come across any small similarity, I was excited to read about it because it gave me some validation that what I had experienced was real. I hope to have the same effect on others who might resonate with my soul-mate experiences.

  Secondly, I believe that by telling my story I will open people up to manifesting the same magic in their lives; people who haven't come across this yet. I now truly believe that you can manifest ANYTHING your heart desires if you align with that frequency and it is the right timing. It is said that anything you can imagine you can create in your life. Imagination is a preview of things yet to come. You just have to allow them to manifest. I believe and know this because of all the events following the meeting of my first soul-mate.

  I'm hoping to inspire others to create this same magic. I believe that my stories carry a frequency that will spark a resonance or a desire in you that will help you manifest what you are seeking.

  And lastly, I couldn't make up a better fictional story than the events which unfolded in my life. They are so miraculous and truly unbelievable that I had to share them with others.

  Before going any further, I should explain what a soul-mate really is. I have noticed that most people tend to believe that a soul-mate is a person you fall in love with and end up with for the rest of your life. Many people think that God created only one other soul with whom you are supposed to connect with strongly on a spiritual level. I'm not sure where this belief comes from, but I suspect that a large portion of it is from fictional movies and societal views about being with one love, one person, forever.

  I also think that the belief that we only live once has a lot to do with that thinking as well. I’m not implying that you can’t meet a soul-mate and end up with only them for the duration of your life. There is just more to it than that, but it seems to be the pervasive, romanticized version.

  People also often confuse the term soul-mate with a twin-flame. The concept of a twin-flame is that we were created as one soul that split into two souls. One soul was the masculine version and the other was the feminine version. When you come in contact with a twin-flame it is supposed to be coming in contact with the other half of your soul. I've read several books on this belief and I tend to resonate with the idea that we don't have a twin-flame, but instead many members in our soul-group who ALL feel like a reunion of souls upon coming in contact with them. Two books that discredit the twin flame theory are "Conversations With God" and "Journey of Souls.”

  The truth, from what I’ve read and experienced, is that we were created energetically with a group of souls who carry this similar frequency or energetic imprint. Spiritual lessons are learned on the other side with members of your soul group and sometimes we choose to meet members of our soul group in certain incarnations for the purpose of soul evolution. Sometimes these encounters happen in ways that shake you up to help catapult you towards another journey, and sometimes they are just for pure joy and reconnection to Source through members of your soul group in physical form. The reasons for these meetings may not be clear to us in this lifetime, but they all serve a purpose, which we always find out in the afterlife, if not in the current life we are living.

  "Journey of Souls" by Michael Newton goes into depth about soul-groups and how they work together on the other side. Michael's findings are taken from his many years of hypnotizing his clients, during which they recall their previous incarnation, their transition into the light and the experiences on the other side, and the steps they took to be incarnated into the body they currently reside in. He even explains how souls can sometimes reach a spiritual growth that surpasses members in their soul-group and if they choose, they may join another group that has attained the same learning level.

  I discovered all of this only after coming in contact with members of my soul group. However, I felt that it was important to mention before I tell my story.

  ~Introduction~

  I grew up in a fairly poor area of Oakland, California, with my mom and brother. My parents had divorced when I was nine and my mom raised us the best she could on the miniscule secretary salary she earned. She had a slew of loser boyfriends and had married someone who also treated her horribly. My brother and I basically called him the devil and tried to be home as little as possible. I vowed to never let any man take advantage of me the way he had with her. Watching my mom’s experiences gave me the ability to discern the genuine guys from the ones who were only after sex. I could spot
the losers a mile away.

  Despite my life growing up, I felt that I was a fairly normal person up until the age of thirty-four, even though I knew I wasn't like most girls, in that I never really got lonely or needed to be in a relationship. Now that's not to say I hadn't been in love before.

  I had been extremely in love four times prior to this point and they were, for the most part, good experiences of my life with great guys. I never felt like any of them were "the one" though, and I certainly did not know that soul-mates really existed or that I could even love someone deeper than I had. I wasn't even a spiritual person and, even though I was a happy person in general, nothing in my life suggested that I was destined for miracles....all of that changed upon meeting Patrick.

  ~Chapter 1~

  The Encounter That Changed My Life

  (The Floodgates Have Opened)

  One Friday night about seven years ago at the age of thirty-four, a friend of mine talked me into going out to a few lounge clubs in San Francisco. We ended up at a place that I rarely went to, and I wasn't going out with the intention of meeting anyone but wasn't opposed to it either. I saw an attractive guy standing with his friends and our eyes met briefly. As I passed by him, I told him that I would love to talk with him when I returned. My friends were split between two clubs, so we were jumping back and forth. When I returned, he came over to where I was sitting and we talked for a long while. The conversation flowed easily and comfortably. It wasn't love at first sight or anything, but I knew there was interest on both of our parts. It was obvious since everyone around us seemed to fade away while we were talking. We both asked for each other's numbers and said good-bye.

  I hadn't heard from him after few days went by so I decided to contact him. I had no attachment to seeing him again and was simply saying hello out of boredom, really. He told me that he was moving back to Paris in a week and he wasn't sure if we should go out because there would be no point in getting close. I suggested that we go out as friends and simply have a fun night.

  So we went to a sushi bar that turned into a little club afterwards and I remember we ended up talking again for a long time. All of the music and noise of the crowd seemed distant and I felt this very intense automatic closeness that I had never experienced before. The energy REALLY shifted when we both naturally kissed each other on the dance floor. I felt like I had known him forever and the feeling could not have been more right. I could sense that he felt the same.

  When we got back to my place the energy got more and more intense. We were staring into each other's eyes the whole time while kissing and talking to each other. Now, this was something that never felt comfortable for me, to lock eyes with someone for long periods of time, but this felt so natural and compelling that I never wanted to look away. I could see his soul through his eyes and I knew he could see mine. There was also a tingly, buzzing energy on my lips when we kissed and in my hands when we touched, hand to hand. I had never experienced any energy like this before and certainly never felt as if I could see a person's soul through their eyes. I also felt like he could read my mind and vice versa. We ended up spending the night together just holding each other soooo tight and being face to face with each other. We were really tired since it was almost daylight and we didn't want to end the experience. Whenever one of us seemed to be asleep, the other would gently kiss the other's lips and there were loving moans escaping our mouths until we couldn't fight the sleep any longer.

  We saw each other again a few nights later and had a typical date-night with eating out and renting a movie afterwards. I'm not quite sure what I had expected to happen since I knew he was leaving, but I knew I wanted to experience the same feeling with him as much as I could before he left. He told me it would most likely be the last time we would see each other before he left for Paris. Anyway, everything was the same as before with how close we were. It was like a feeling of coming home. We ended up having sex and I remember it as average, but I felt it was average because we needed to get to know each other in that way for sex to be amazing. It didn't matter to me though because of the way I felt with him, although it did seem a little odd that with a connection like that the sex wouldn't be mind-blowing from the start.

  We ate out the next morning and he wanted to come back to my place to be with me for a while more before he had to go. We ended up sitting on the couch in a hugging embrace for about a half an hour, just holding each other as tight as we could. There was no kissing, just hugging like we never wanted to let go of each other. This feeling was new to me and I didn’t know how to express it. I told him that I really liked him and he said he felt the same, but I knew that he and I were feeling more than that. I also knew he could read my mind, and that I was feeling pure love. He kept asking me if I had something else I wanted to say to him, and I knew that he wanted me to tell him I loved him, however I just said nothing. It wasn't something that was easy for me to say, especially since I knew he was moving. It was all such a whirlwind for me and I think I didn't quite process it at the time that he was really leaving.

  I walked him to the door and we ended up in another long embrace. As he walked out and stood on the walkway he just stared at me and stood there for a while until I said goodbye and finally, reluctantly closed the door.

  We contacted each other that night through text before he left and we both expressed the strong connection we had towards each other. He said that he would call me in the morning as he was boarding the plane.

  I eagerly awaited his call but to my disappointment there wasn't one. I was devastated. It was like God had sent me an angel and then took him away.

  ~Chapter 2~

  The Aftermath

  Before Patrick left, I had no expectations with him other than maybe seeing him if he visited family here again or in the future if we were meant to be, then the universe would bring us back together when the time was right. He said that he would keep in touch when he arrived and got a phone, so I at least thought that with a connection like that, he would have followed through.

  I always thought I had such good intuition and I could spot dishonest people easily, which is why I usually ended up dating guys who treated me so well. Also, with Patrick, every part of me told me that he was such a genuine person, so when the calls went silent and I had no way of getting in contact with him, I started to doubt my intuition.

  At first I thought that something had seriously gone wrong and he had gotten hurt or lost my number because none of it made sense to me. Like I stated before, I never needed a relationship to make me happy but I felt lost, as if I had no closure or understanding of what happened to him.

  I was desperate to find out if he was ok or if he’d lost my number, since I didn’t even tell him my last name. So I found an email address on a person finder and an address to his parent's house in SF and I wrote both of them saying that I just wanted to make sure that he was alright and to make sure he had my info if he had lost it. I wasn't even sure if the information was for him or another person with the same name but regardless I never heard anything back.

  I even saw a psychic and basically all she told me was that he was a soul-mate and that I would find him on a social media site. This baffled me because I had already looked on the usual social media sites.

  So to backtrack a little, from the moment I met him until about a few weeks after he left, I had this buzzing energy going from my hands and up into my arms. It was like he pushed a button in me and awakened something. My hands literally had energy running all of the time. Along with this energy and the spiritual experience I felt when I was with him, I felt like there was a reason for it.

  So I ended up taking reiki classes, meditating, and attending various healing classes. I felt so motivated to learn everything that had to do with manifesting one’s desires, healing others and myself, and connecting to spirits and source energy. It was all so exciting!

  My life changed dramatically in such a short time and all of these amazing miracles happened. Things like s
eeing and having full conversations with my spirit guides, creating huge vortexes in my room, turning myself into white light and even doing psychic readings in a clairvoyant school. This will have to be another whole book, but in short, I went from seeking out healers, teachers, and info to people coming to me for guidance and healings. It was all very exciting but overwhelming at the same time.

  By this time, about nine months had passed since meeting Patrick. I still felt confused and sad about his complete disappearance but I was soooo grateful for having had the experience because I knew that it is an extreme rarity to experience that kind of soul/spiritual connection. I also knew without a doubt that I had met him so my path would shift in the direction it had.

  One day I decided to look on FB again and HE HAD A PROFILE all of a sudden, just as the psychic had predicted! Well, he was alive and I was glad that nothing had happened to him but as I looked through his information my heart sank. It said that he was married with a toddler. I really had felt like I couldn't trust my intuition at all and I even started to doubt if the connection we had even happened. It really bothered me because it seemed like my whole amazing life transformation was based on something false. So I decided to briefly write him in a cordial manner, because I really just wanted verification that he felt what I had, even though deep down I KNEW he did. It was brief because I didn't care to ruin anything in his life, even though I felt I had been wronged.

  It simply stated that I always wondered what had happened to him and how he could've disappeared that easily after our connection. I also said that I hoped he wasn't married when we spent time together but I really just wanted to know that the connection was real for him. I desperately needed to trust my intuition!