Colorado Bride (Matchmaker & Co. #4)

Chapter 1

Chapter One

Golden City, Colorado Territory

Ben Logan, wearing his best black suit, stood at the front of the church, his best man, Nathan Ravenclaw, at his side. He looked out at all of his friends, filling the pews, who just minutes ago had been smiling and were now wearing looks of concern on their faces.

“She’s just running a little late,” he said to Nathan. “Melissa will be here shortly. She does like to make an entrance.”

Nathan Ravenclaw was his best friend. The fact that he was half Arapaho Indian didn’t matter to Ben.

The fact that every woman in town thought Nathan the most handsome of men didn’t matter either.

Fortunately Nathan’s wife Ella, took the stares at her handsome husband in stride.

Ella was a beauty herself. She had a long scar on her face but she was still a very beautiful woman.

Together, she and Nathan made a striking couple.

Nathan put his hand on Ben’s shoulder and in a low tone, said, “If you say so, but she’s already more than a half hour late. I think you’ll have to call this as she stood you up. You can set another date when you find out what has happened to her.”

Ben nodded, angry and embarrassed. Melissa had used him for the last time.

“You’re right.”

He looked out at all the people filling the church. All his friends, family and business associates, some from when he was a boy growing up at the ranch outside Golden, he’d known most of his life. All of them had come to wish him well on this, his wedding day.

“I’m sorry to have kept you so long. Something must have happened to Melissa. We’ll reschedule and let you all know. Thanks for coming.”

The buzz of whispers and the shocked reaction of some people could be heard as the church slowly emptied. Several people came up and clapped him on the back.

“Sorry Ben,” said Caleb Black.

His wife Maggie, owner of the matchmaking service Matchmaker & Co. was at his side.

“I’m sorry, Ben. There’ll be another time.”

Ben’s anger and embarrassment grew with each attempt to calm him. By the time the last person had left the church, he was about to boil over.

“Don’t worry, son. Melissa will come around and you can reschedule this.”

“No, Mother.” Ben looked at his mother, her steel gray hair done up in a high knot on her head, wearing her best dress. Doris looked better than he’d seen her in a long time. She’d always liked Melissa. Knowing his mother she figured Melissa would be easy to manipulate.

“That won’t happen. Melissa can just find another sucker to marry. She’s taken advantage of my good nature for the last time.”

Ben stalked away from his mother and out of the church.

He walked to Melissa’s house, pounded on the door and when there was no answer, he turned the knob. It was unlocked. Ben stomped through the door making as much noise as possible.

“Melissa! Melissa!”

He found a note on the kitchen table with his name on it.

Ben,

I’m sorry. I can’t marry an ignorant, uneducated man such as you after all.

I can’t live in the country, and roll in the dirt.

I am a city girl and I’ve fallen in love with a professional man, someone who can actually make me happy.

His name is Richard Deveraux and we’ve gone to get married.

We’re headed to San Francisco where Richard has a business associate.

I wish you a good life.

Melissa

Ben would never be put in this position again. He vowed to never love anyone. Never be vulnerable to be hurt again like this.

Ben wadded the note into a ball with his fist and threw it on the floor.

Then he walked out of the house and never looked back.

He buried himself in his work on the ranch and tried to forget about Melissa.

Only in moments like when he was at his sister’s spread and saw how happy Jane was with her family, did he long for a wife and children of his own.

Five months after she’d left, Melissa returned to Golden sans husband. Ben had heard she never got married and that her ‘fiancé’ had run off in the middle of the night.

Ben hadn’t seen her and didn’t want to. Everyone seemed to understand that except his mother. She kept pushing him to make up with Melissa and convince her to marry him again. Why she was so adamant about Melissa, he had no idea, but she was determined that he marry the witch.

Times like this were when he missed his father most. He’d been gone for nearly ten years now.

Joseph was always able to handle Doris. Ben had promised his father on his dying bed that Ben would take care of Doris.

He felt sorry for his mother and tried to accommodate her whenever he could.

She was a bitter, angry woman, having found out her husband was cheating on her, though he couldn’t fault his father, living with Doris was enough to drive a man to drink or worse… find solace elsewhere.

But Doris kept after Ben, which was why he escaped to Jane’s house whenever possible.

There was no way he would ever marry Melissa. A city girl was she? Well he was smart enough to know that he wasn’t marrying any city girl. Ever.

Saturday, August 7, 1875

Ben loved his niece and nephew. He didn’t mind playing dolls with little three-year-old Jenny and was more than happy to hold six-month-old Henry while Jane prepared dinner.

Jane looked up from the stove where she stirred gravy to accompany the roast sitting on the counter.

She could have been Ben’s twin. She had the same sable brown hair and blue eyes, though her hair lacked the golden streaks he’d gained working outside in the sun busting broncs for the army or putting up fence around the perimeter of the 1000 acres he and Jane had inherited when their father died.

He and Jane both took after their mother.

His father had blond hair which had turned beautiful silver as he grew older.

When she wore an apron over her blue dress like she was now, she reminded him of their mother. He’d never tell her that though, she would think it the greatest insult.

“Why have you been so quiet today?”

Ben set down the coffee cup he’d just drank from out of Henry’s reach. The baby tried to get it anyway and pounded the palms of his hands on the table in excitement.

“Just thinking how much I envy you and Curt. You have this beautiful family, a successful ranch and I find myself more and more wanting the same thing. I’ve got the ranch, now I just need the wife and kids.”

“Lots of women in town would love to marry you. Melissa just wasn’t one of them. You shouldn’t let that stop you from finding happiness.”

Ignorant, uneducated. Her words run through my mind. I need to get rid of her. It’s time I married.

He handed Henry a spoon and let him pound on the table with it. “Six months have passed and I haven’t found anyone suitable. Besides, I don’t want someone who marries me out of pity. I think I’ll talk to Maggie Black.”

Jane came to the table and took the metal spoon away from her son and gave him a wooden spoon instead.

“It’s quieter,” she said, pointing at the spoon. “A mail-order bride? Why? We have women here?”

“I don’t want to have to do the courting. It doesn’t work anyway, so why bother. I want to just get married and be done with it.”

She lifted her eyebrows and rolled her eyes.

“How romantic.”

Ben grimaced at the sarcasm that dripped from his sister’s mouth.

“I don’t want another Melissa. I don’t want to have to bring gifts every time I see her. I don’t want to have to take her to the opera. I hate opera. Is that too much to ask?”

“Of course, not. But don’t let what she did color your perception of all women. There are many, many good women both here and out in the rest of the world.” She turned back to the gravy and began stirring in earnest.

“I know that. I want one who doesn’t know me or Melissa or anyone here. I want to start fresh.”

“Then I guess you’re right and you should go see Maggie. She’s done very well with the matches she’s made here. Just look at the Atwoods and the Ravenclaws, not to mention Caleb and Maggie themselves.”

Taking the skillet she’d been working with from the stove, she emptied its contents into the gravy boat on the counter.

“I know. That’s why I thought of going through her.”

“Well, whatever you do, don’t tell Mother. You know she still thinks that you and Melissa will get back together.”

His muscles tensed. “Over my dead body.”

“I know and remember you have my baby in your arms. Don’t get too…emotional.”

“I’m careful. Henry loves me.” He held the baby aloft and jiggled him. “Don’t you, Henry? You love Uncle Ben.”

He grinned at the baby.

The baby giggled and drooled on Ben’s face.

Jane laughed.

“Sorry about that. He’s teething and drooling on everything,..including his uncle, it appears.”

She tossed a dish towel at her brother.

Ben caught it with one hand, dried his face and Henry’s, as well as Henry’ fist, which the baby promptly put back in his mouth.

“I don’t know how you do it. Keeping track of Jenny and Henry is enough of a job, but then you take care of the house and cooking and cleaning, how do you manage?”

“Naps.”

“Naps?” He was definitely confused.

“Yes, while they take their naps, I do a lot of the cooking and cleaning.”

“Makes sense.”

“Put Henry in his high chair. You can feed him.”

She set a bowl of cooled mashed potatoes in front of Ben and handed him a spoon.

He put the baby in the high chair, tied the tapes around his tummy to hold him still and brought the tray over his head and down in front of him.

“Okay, Henry, are you a hungry boy?”

He loaded the spoon with a small amount of potatoes and fed the baby.

“Thanks for having me over. I’m tired of listening to Mother about how I should try to get Melissa to come back and marry me.”

Jane shook her head.

“Mother’s attitude concerning Melissa disgusts me. Why she would still want that woman in the family after what she pulled is beyond my understanding.”