Family Of Convenience. Victoria Austin W.
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Mail-Order Mother
Recently widowed and pregnant, Millie Steele needs a husband to help provide for her unborn child, and becoming a mail-order bride is her only option. Thankfully, her new husband, Kansas farmer Adam Beale, only wants a mother for his two young children—not romance. Everything is going according to plan...until Millie begins to fall for Adam.
Adam had reservations about wedding another city dweller—his late wife never took to life on the prairie. But now he can’t imagine his family being complete without Millie and her unborn baby. Though they agreed to a strictly platonic partnership, can real love be blooming in Adam and Millie’s marriage of convenience?
“Are you happy, Millie?”
She stopped rocking but didn’t reply.
“Uh, Millie?” Adam sounded foolish, but what else was he supposed to say?
She blushed, and he tried not to notice how pretty it looked on her cheeks.
“Am I happy? I don’t understand.”
The bewildered tone made Adam’s heart ache. She sounded absolutely stunned that her husband would care about her happiness.
Adam leaned farther forward, resting his forearms on the tops of his thighs. He wanted to move closer to her, but made himself stay in the rocking chair. They had been living as strangers for a month. Nicely, too. But he wanted more than that. Not love. No, Adam had learned that lesson well. But friendship. Companionship. A sense of shared purpose surely wasn’t too much to ask for, was it? That was the goal, and Adam was ready to do the work.
“Millie, it’s been a month. I just want to know how you feel about things here. Are you happy with the house? The children? Your day-to-day life?” With me? He didn’t say the last part, but Adam’s heart whispered it.
VICTORIA W. AUSTIN lives in the American Midwest with her husband, children and dogs. Her kids write notes in the furniture dust and the family watches television with the closed captioning on because the house is, um, loud. She likes chocolate, peace and quiet, chocolate and silence. She gets too much of one and too little of the other. This explains the tight pants and the many, many, many gray hairs.
Family of Convenience
Victoria W. Austin
For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.
—2 Timothy 1:7
To my family—
I have everything because I have you
I have almost too many people to thank, which is a blessing in and of itself. Thank you to my family for supporting me no matter what. Thank you to Harlequin and the Manuscript Matchmaker contest for this opportunity. Thank you to Elizabeth Mazer, my incredible editor, for all the help and guidance. Thank you to my critique partners and fellow romance-writer friends for the advice and encouragement.
Contents
Kansas
1889