Chapter One
NEW YORK CITY, NEWYork - 1878
“Absolutely not.” Roy Stout slapped his hand down on the newspaper. “It’s too dangerous, and your father would never approve.”
Cordelia Elliott bit back the frustrated words she wanted to say. Instead, she laced her hands together and leaned forward as she cast a winning smile toward the editor. “It isn’t dangerous, and my mother thinks it’s a grand idea.”
Never mind that danger was precisely what brought in readers. And never mind that her mother was too preoccupied with Delia’s eight younger siblings to have much of an opinion at all about what her eldest, unmarried, strong-willed daughter chose to do. If Delia wanted to answer an advertisement for a mail-order bride for the purposes of writing a series of articles about the struggles and hardships—and perhaps the joys?—women faced in such situations, it was her decision and hers alone.
Provided she could convince Roy to print the articles she wrote.
He was glaring at her from beneath bushy salt-and-pepper brows with an expression that indicated he didn’t believe for a second her mother approved of this idea. “I pay you to give advice to ladies about hats and dances and . . . and . . . ladies’things.” He tossed out an arm to encompass every possible topic that could interest a woman.
“Exactly.” Delia gave him a wide smile. “What’s more of a lady’s interest than marriage?”
“Surely you can find any number of men willing to marry you here in New York.”
Delia scrunched her lips together to keep from laughing. Not a single eligible man she’d ever met had shown any interest in a woman who spoke her own thoughts, and that was without them knowing that all she wanted was a career in the newspaper business. “It will be far more interesting to readers to learn about life as a wife on the frontier, don’t you think?”
Roy sighed, the air twitching the ends of his mustache. It was clear he agreed with her, but he wasn’t about to say so out loud.
“I have an idea,” Delia said, leaning forward. “How about if I follow through with this, and you can decide whether or not to print the articles once I send them to you? And if you choose not to, I’ll return home and continue to pen stories about weddings at Trinity Church and the ideal menu to serve at a dinner party.”
Roy held up a hand. “You’ll return home? How will you do that if you’ve gotten yourself married to a cowboy?”
Delia ran her tongue across the back of her front teeth. This was the stickiest part of her plan. But she’d spent hours upon hours thinking about it, and she’d come up with something of a solution. “First, Mr. Foster is not a cowboy. He works in a hotel.” She tapped the advertisement on Roy’s desk. “Second, I will request a divorce after I convince him he’s madly in love with someone else.”
Roy blinked at her.
Emboldened by her plan, Delia smiled. “I chose Mr. Foster because not only does he seem to be a gentleman, but also because he lives in a growing town. That town must have some eligible ladies—there should at least be a schoolteacher. Aschoolteacher would be perfect for a man with a child like Mr. Foster. I won’t let him fall in love with me and will instead nudge him toward some other lady of my choosing. He’ll be grateful when I suggest parting ways. And I don’t care a fig about being a divorced lady.”
Roy stared at her a moment longer before he burst out in laughter. “I know I should expect the unexpected from you by now, Delia. What if the man doesn’t do as you wish?”
Delia crossed her arms. “I won’t be cruel to him, if that’s what concerns you.”
Roy leaned back in his chair, his amused smile fading into something more serious. “How wouldn’t it be cruel to marry a man under false pretenses only to pawn him off on some other unsuspecting woman?”
“Because I’d do it as kindly as possible. I’m not a villain.”
Roy eyed her, shaking his head. “Your plan is so preposterous that I almost want to see if you can set it into motion.”
Delia clenched her hands together to keep from shrieking in joy. “I have your approval?”
“Of course not.”
Her shoulders sank. “What do you mean?”
“I mean there is nothing that would ever persuade me to send you—or any other lady—unaccompanied on a train out west to marry a fellow no one knows. It’s far too dangerous. If you want to marry, find a gentleman in New York. If you want to continue writing for my newspaper, call on my wife and let her tell you about the appalling fashions she saw at Mrs. Roederer’s daughter’s birthday celebration yesterday. Goodness knows I heard enough about it at supper last night.”
Delia pressed her lips together in a line, murmured something polite to Roy, and left the office. She nodded at the men in the newsroom before sweeping down the stairs and out onto the bustling street. Not until she was several blocks awayat her favorite park did she sit down on a pretty wrought iron bench, open her reticule, and remove an envelope.
As she opened it, a determined smile crossed her face. She’d kept one little fact to herself at her meeting with Roy.
She’d already written to Mr. Foster, the man from the advertisement. And she’d received a promising letter in return. Delia wasn’t such an amateur newspaperwoman that she’d propose a story without doing some preliminary research first. In this case, that research was ensuring the fellow she had her eye on for marriage would be interested in the same.
It turned out that hewasinterested.
In fact, as she scanned his letter again, the poor man sounded almost desperate. He’d recently learned he had an eleven-year-old daughter named Anna—Delia didn’t care to question how he’d only just discovered the child’s existence—who was giving him all ends of worry. He was forthright in his letter, indicating he wished for his new wife to be a mother to Anna. Apparently the little girl was short with him and enjoyed making a nuisance of herself in town. With a pile of younger siblings she’d helped to mother, Delia thought one little girl would be easy enough to handle.
