Free Dad's E-Mail Order Bride by Candy Halliday - Alaska Bound 01 - Dad's E-Mail Order Bride

was a New York icon—with a past people found as intriguing as her accomplishments.
    Graham had been hearing the story for years. How Lisa Woods had been disowned by her wealthy advertising king father when she turned up pregnant by a farm kid from upstate New York—a boy who was killed in Vietnam before they had the chance to marry.
    New York society hadn’t been shocked that a powerful man like Walter Woods would disown his disobedient daughter. The shock came when Walter died unexpectedly of a heart attack and left his entire fortune and his advertising agency to the very daughter he’d disowned.
    The rest was history.
    Lisa not only took over the agency, she doubled the fortune her father had left her in the first ten years. Today she was considered one of the most successful businesswomen in the nation. And she’d been featured on the cover of Time magazine to prove it.
    Graham shook his head.
    No wonder several of the e-mails mentioned Courtney being on the outs with her mother. Graham could only imagine what a woman like Lisa Woods would think about her daughter carrying on an Internet relationship with some hick from Alaska.
    But did Courtney think he was a hick?
    Graham didn’t think so.
    A woman like Courtney wouldn’t have continued the correspondence without doing a background check first. When you had money, you knew who had money. And Graham’s father had made his wealth in land development, so the family name wasn’t exactly secret.
    Is that why Courtney had made it a point to tell him who her mother was? Had Courtney wanted him to know up front that they came with similar financial pedigrees?
    Flipping through the e-mails, Graham decided he would look for more minutia-type information about Courtney later. What he wanted to see was Courtney’s initial reaction when she’d received Rachel’s invitation to come to Alaska. He finally found the one he was looking for.

    You aren’t going to believe this, but less than thirty minutes after I learned I had landed the biggest account in the agency’s history, I received your card and the invitation to your birthday party in the mail. I can’t think of a better way to celebrate my success than by taking a break and rewarding myself by coming to Alaska. Thanks so much for inviting me, Graham. I’m really looking forward to finally meeting you and Rachel in person.
    Graham closed the folder.
    So, Courtney had told the truth.
    Her only goal in coming was to meet them in person. From what he’d read so far, there was no indication Courtney ever had any starry-eyed notion about coming to Alaska for love.
    Graham repositioned his pillows, placed the folder on his bedside table and switched off the light. But as he lay there in the dark, Graham kept waiting for relief to set in that the woman in his upstairs suite had never seen him as anything more than just a friend she’d met on the Internet.
    Thirty minutes later, Graham was still waiting.

    A FTER FINALLY CLEARING the table and cleaning the kitchen, Rachel was propped up in bed, the phone to her ear, Broadway curled up on the bed right beside her.
    “And you really think your dad and Courtney like each other?”
    “I don’t know, Tiki,” Rachel said, “but I’ve never seen anything so romantic. Dad twirling Courtney around the room in the candlelight. Them dancing so close together. Listening to the music they both love. And Dad actually dipped Courtney. Just like on Dancing with the Stars. ”
    “Wow,” Tiki said.
    “I could tell Courtney was completely into it,” Rachel said. “She had this dreamy look on her face the whole time they were dancing.”
    “Falling-in-love dreamy?”
    Rachel thought about it. “I sure hope so.”
    “Did your dad kiss her again before she went upstairs?”
    “No.” Rachel sighed. “He almost kissed her, but at the last minute he changed his mind. But he kept smiling at her all weird like.”
    “Will-you-marry-me weird like?”
    “I wish. Do you have