Free Mail Order Bride: Love On The Line: A Mail Order Brides Western Romance by Catherine Harper

her running across the rail tracks with her bags—I'm sorry son, but she's gone. Now if you don't mind."
    "Huh? Oh I'm so sorry," Tom said, letting go of the man's coat and getting out of his path. "Thank you, for telling me."
    Smiling in return the man stopped and turned. "Been married forty years and still don't understand women. But that one, she seemed like a keeper. If I was you, I wouldn't stop looking until I found her." Leaving it at that, he tipped his hat and walked away.
    Seeing a wooden trolley nearby, Tom sat on it and looked in the direction they'd came. Wondering if it was worth his while going back to where they'd stopped, he didn't think he'd be able to compete with her twenty minute head-start. By now she could be in a taxi and headed to any part of the city. Looking to the ground and lost in a world of despair, he felt a strong hand slap him on the back.
    "Hey little brother."
    Tom looked up and found John look him over.
    John said, "This is the part where you say, 'Hi John. Yes, it's good to see you too.' I think that's how you'd say hello to a brother you hadn't seen in two years." Slapping him playfully on the shoulder, he added. "Why the long face? You think you'd found a gold mine and lost it all in a card game."
    "You could say that," Tom mumbled.
    Taking a seat beside him he asked, "And what was all the shouting about? Were you calling out a woman's name-?"
    "Elizabet."
    "Yeah, that was it. Elizabet. Funny that, that's the same name as the woman I'm marrying," John said and slapped him on the thigh. "Small world."
    "Too small," Tom mumbled and walked away.
    "Hey, where are you going to sourpuss?"
    Tom turned and stopped. "To a bar, to drink my brains out—oh and by the way, you can wipe that smile off you face. After you hear what I've got to say you'll be joining me.”

Chapter 17
    "Two of your finest whiskeys please," Tom said to the bar tender and made his way to a nearby table. Sitting in silence, he watched John join him with a quizzical look on his face.
    "What's going on, Tom?"
    Tom held his hand up for silence and waited until the two whiskeys were brought over. Taking the first one off the table and downing it in one go, he called for two more. Slapping John's hand away he downed the second one as well. "Yours are in the next round."
    "OK. I take it these whiskeys aren't for celebration then. What's going on, Tom? Are you drowning your sorrow?"
    "You could say that," Tom said and took a whiskey from the next round. Throwing it back he added. "That and trying to find the right words."
    "Well, keep it up and you wouldn't be able to find them. That's three whiskeys you've had-"
    "Two more," Tom gestured to the barman.
    John held up his hand to cancel the order. "He'd had enough." Turning back to Tom he said. "Whatever is going on, Tom, I'm not carrying you out of here, you hear me?"
    "Can I ask you a question?" Tom asked feeling the first of the whiskeys do its job. "What if you fell in love with-?"
    "So this is about a woman," John laughed and picked up the last full glass at the table. Saluting his brother he added, "So my little brother's in love—what happened, she ran off?"
    Tom ignored the remark, "What if you met the most amazing woman and fell in love with her. I mean a woman like you've never met before. Beautiful, witty, courageous-"
    "Sounds like a keeper."
    Tom slumped back in his seat. "That's what the old guy said."
    "So, what happened?"
    "She's due to marry someone else."
    John took a drink from his glass. Putting it down, he said. "So she's not married yet?"
    "No."
    "Well then, there's no harm done then is there. I'd go after her. I take it, she feels the same way?"
    Tom picked up a shot glass and rolled it around in his hand. Looking at it as if he'd never seen one before, he said. "That's why she ran away, she didn't want to see me or the other guy get hurt. She didn't want to come between us."
    "So you know this guy she's marrying?"
    Tom nodded his head.
    "Someone I