Molly Switches Her Man Read online

  Molly Switches her Man

  Mismatched Mail-order Bride Series, Book 6

  Copyright © 2019 by Linda K. Hubalek

  Published by Butterfield Books Inc.

  Printed Book ISBN—978-1096006596

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2019905231

  Kindle Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to the retailer and buy your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  This book is a work of fiction. Except for the history of Kansas mentioned in the book, the names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  A sweet historical romance set in 1892.

  She agrees to marry him in a thirty-second marriage to adopt five-year-old twins.

  Tobin Billings came to Clear Creek, Kansas with his five friends because they were promised three things from the Peashooter Society, a group of older church women who (kind of) ran the town.

  One. Business opportunities, one of which turned out to be the livery he bought.

  Two. A home, which also came with the livery, but the elderly owner still lived with him.

  Three. A wife, even though the six young women had no clue what the Peashooters had offered the men.

  Molly Brenner moved to Clear Creek, Kansas, with her two sisters, Maggie and Maisie, mainly so Maisie would have help and company in her new dress shop.

  Molly marries Tobin Billings after his hasty proposal for three reasons.

  One. He promised he’d buy her livestock and build her a barn if she married him to adopt five-year-old twin boys that were on an orphan train. In desperation, Tobin even offered a peacock, although Molly didn’t really care about that.

  Two. She’d secretly liked the man who recently came to town with his friends and bought the livery stable.

  Three. Those little red-haired orphans made her heart flutter too.

  They married in haste. Now, they have to make their marriage work while trying to keep track of kids and pets.

  Will the kids’ chaos cause them problems? Yes! Will they fall in love? Maybe…

  Chapter 1

  Friday

  Fall of 1892, Clear Creek, Kansas

  Good Lord in Heaven, what the heck have I gotten myself in to?

  And this was at least the hundred and tenth time Tobin Billings had that thought since he married Molly Brenner and they adopted five-year-old twin boys this afternoon.

  Talk about being tied up and hung upside down over the edge of a hayloft…

  Why did he think this was a good idea?

  Because he saw those two little red-headed orphans and thought of himself at that age. In a snap decision he asked Molly Brenner—the pretty blonde woman who towered over his short stature—to be his wife. Only a married couple could adopt the boys and get them off the train of doom—or at least the train heading back to the New York City orphanage since no one had adopted the boys on their trip from New York to Kansas yet.

  And Molly had said yes. That still floored him. Why would the beautiful woman marry him? He was unusually short in height, had bright red hair, but he owned the livery in Clear Creek, and Molly, a rancher’s daughter, loved animals.

  He’d promised to build a barn beside their house, just for her and any livestock she wanted to buy if she’d marry him.

  Tobin had even said he’d buy her a peacock if he could find one. A peacock, for heaven’s sakes. How did that bird pop in his mind in the moment of desperation? He’d never even seen a peacock in his life. Could the bird survive the Kansas weather?

  And those two little angelic boys? They had turned into two adorable little hellions as soon as they brought them home. Two. Matching. Hellions.

  Tobin thought they were deaf when he first met them, and that was one of the reasons he’d been drawn to the children. Tobin had been orphaned and then adopted by an older deaf couple when he was six years old. Tobin learned sign language from them and became their voice, so to speak, in the community. Tobin loved to talk—to people, to animals—just because he never heard a voice but his own when he grew up with Cornelius and Priscilla Billings.

  Tobin was positive; he could teach the boys to sign and become a wonderful father to them.

  But first, he had to catch them because they’d run out of his house. And Molly, his beautiful new wife? She just pointed in the direction the boys had gone.

  “Looking for your new sons, Tobin?” Marshal Adam Wilerson asked as Tobin trotted down the alley behind Main Street. He’d already looked through the two-blocks of the business district in the little town.

  “Yes, sir. Have you seen them?”

  “They were behind the hotel, but when I approached, they took off again toward the depot. I lost sight of them and thought I better come get you and Molly.”

  How could these kids be so quick to dodge and run away from him? Because they’d split up and take off in different directions while he turned around dazed at their antics. But they always got back together as soon as they’d outwitted Tobin.

  “I remember running around looking for Tate Shepard when he was about two years old or so. And, the boy was buck naked too. Millie, and her two-year-old nephew, Tate, had just moved in with me as my housekeeper, and he was a handful.”

  “Oh, my. I guess I should count my blessings if the twins are still clothed?”

  “Yes, you should, for more than one reason. I finally caught Tate after he stopped to pet a dog, but when I picked him up, he peed on me,” Marshal Adam laughed at the memory.

  Oh, dear. Now Tobin could just picture two little “fountains” he’d have to watch out for.

  “How about I go one way around the depot, and you go the other? I’m sure we can catch them with two of us working together,” the Marshal suggested.

  “I appreciate it, sir. I think they’re deaf or hard of hearing, adding to their fear of being left with strangers,” Tobin explained as he trotted beside the marshal.

  “Got to be confused little boys then, but we’ll find them.”

  Tobin sure hoped so, because he felt like a fool in front of Molly, and his five friends, who he was sure would hear about it.

  Tobin Billings, Peter Gehring, Wesley Preston, and the Miller brothers, Barton, Gordon, and Squires had been together since the six of them left New York City on an orphan train nearly twenty years ago.

  They had been adopted by different families in the same neighborhood in eastern Kansas and stayed in contact as they grew up. When the youngest of the boys, Squires and Peter, reached eighteen, the group enlisted in the army, serving their five years together at Fort Riley.

  Wanting to stay close to each other, they answered an advertisement which needed six men to fill jobs in Clear Creek, Kansas. The draw, besides the jobs available, was that each man would have his own housing… and a wife.

  The older church women who thought up this idea, and were informally called the Peashooter Society, hadn't let the women they'd pegged as the wives know about their scheme, but so far it had worked out well.

  Barton Miller took over the blacksmith shop, which had comfortable living quarters in the back section, and had married Amelia Shepard. Her family owned Shepard and Sons Saddlery, and Amelia still worked right along with her father and brothers in the family businesses.
r />   Gordon Miller had bought the mercantile store from the retiring Taylors and lived upstairs with his new wife, Avalee Paulson. Avalee was Doctor Pansy Reagan's assistant, but also working part-time in the mercantile now. Avalee's family managed the Paulson Hotel.

  Squires Miller was a carpenter, working with Mack Reagan and courting Maisie Brenner, who owned the dress shop in town.

  Wesley Preston, the other still single man in their group, worked and lived in the Paulson Hotel. Even though Wesley liked Nadine Paulson, there had been no courtship between them.

  Peter Gehring took over the barbershop and lived above it. He married Maggie Brenner this afternoon to adopt three orphaned siblings who had been taken off the train a week ago when their agent, Ann Beasley, had been hurt in a train accident. The woman was currently living in the rooms behind the barber’s room while recovering from her two broken arms.

  And then there was himself.

  Tobin acquired the livery and the former owner's home behind it, from Lucas Boyle. Besides letting the elderly man stay in the home with him, Mack and Squires were repairing the home. He enjoyed his work, and the companions in his home, Lucas, and two kittens. Tobin had an occupation and a home, but no wife, until today.

  But when the orphan agents arrived to pick up the three orphan children and his friends adopted them instead, the idea of a wife and family made his heartache.

  Then the two little boys who were traveling with the agents ran off the train. They were red-haired, reminding Tobin of himself at that age. When caught and brought back to the depot, it turned out they were deaf too. Tobin just reacted in panic.

  Tobin begged Molly Brenner to marry him to adopt the twin orphans, and she said yes. After a thirty-second wedding ceremony of one question and them saying “I do” at the same time, they were married and had two adorable boys.

  Until they ran away, not an hour after Tobin brought them home. Molly hadn’t had time to bring her clothing and belongings from the dress shop apartment she’d shared with her sisters to his home yet either.

  Hunting for his children was not how Tobin envisioned his new roles as husband and father.

  Tobin peeked around the back corner of the depot, not wanting to scare the children into running off again. From the other corner, the Marshal waved and pointed to the benches against the back wall of the building.

  Yep, he could see the two boys trying to remain still, hiding underneath one of the benches. Tobin nodded to the Marshal, and the man held up three fingers, meaning to run and catch the boys on the count of three. Tobin watched the marshal’s fingers count off and then Tobin raced to the bench the same time as the other man.

  Each grabbed a boy as they tried to scoot from under the bench to run again. Tobin sighed with relief but still had to convey to the boys that they were now safe living with him and Molly.

  Tobin leaned over to look into the sullen eyes of the boys. He patted his chest, saying “Papa” at the same time, trying to get through to them that he was now their father.

  “Let’s get your boys home. You have a long day and night ahead of you,” Marshal Adam commented as he lifted the boy he caught on his hip. The man was comfortable with children, raising his own, besides having nephews and nieces.

  Tobin tried to lift the other boy onto his hip, but the boy bucked and pushed away instead of settling against his side. Tobin ended up holding him against his chest, pressing the little boy’s head against his shoulder. That seemed to calm down the child, and Tobin sighed, hoping the day would end with a happier note that what it had begun.

  Chapter 2

  What have I gotten myself into?

  Molly paced the porch steps, waiting for Tobin Billings to return with the twin boys they’d just adopted…after meeting them barely an hour ago. Tobin asked her to marry him so he could adopt the boys and keep them from returning to the New York City orphanage. She’s said thirty-second wedding vows to Tobin Billings to be his wife forever.

  What in heaven’s name was I thinking?

  Molly was thinking back to when she and her brother, Moses, were rescued from a Cheyenne village, and Marcus Brenner brought them to the Cross C Ranch. Molly was only five years old when she’d lost her parents on a wagon train going through western Kansas, but she remembered the panic of being in a new place around people she didn’t know.

  She saw that look in the two boys and knew she had to help them.

  But to marry Tobin Billings?

  On the plus side, Tobin recently bought the town’s livery and a two-story home that was being renovated. And Tobin promised her horses and any other kind of pet she wanted if she’d marry him. Including a peacock, but she could think of many other animals and fowl she’d rather have than a showy bird.

  Tobin was a sweet man, but so different from Molly, and it wasn’t just the fact that she towered over him in height. Or that his red hair was brighter than a ripe tomato compared to her light blonde locks.

  Tobin talked constantly…to anyone, or just to himself. He was always polite with his words, didn’t interrupt conversations while talking with others, but there was never silence if a thought was in the man’s head.

  When the church ladies thought of their harebrained idea to lure grooms into town for six unsuspecting women, Molly never thought her grandmother, Cate Connely, would suggest she be one of the candidates.

  But her little sister Maisie wanted to take over the dress shop from Mary Jones, and guess who needed to move into town with her? Sisters Maggie and Molly.

  Was that a coincidence or planned since Maggie, Molly, and Maisie were three of the women matched up with the six new men in town? There really wasn’t enough sewing orders to keep three of them busy.

  Maggie spent her time sewing children’s clothing to donate to needy families. Molly spent her time helping old Lucas Boyle with his horses and mules in his livery. Not the proper job for a young lady in town, but she missed the ranch animals.

  But then Molly’s life instantly changed when she agreed to marry a man and adopt two boys. The thought that the boys’ red hair matched their new father tugged at her heart, just as it had Tobin’s.

  Molly sighed with relief when she saw that her Uncle Adam carried one boy on his hip, and Tobin had the other boy hugged up against his chest.

  Time to start over with her boys and her husband.

  “They're home safe and sound, Molly,” her uncle told her as he set the boy on the porch.

  “Thank you, Uncle Adam. One moment, the boys were sitting on the settee, and the next, they were gone. I think it's going to take both of us to keep track of them at all times.”

  “Boys will be boys, though. I remember my nephew triplets at that age,” her uncle shook his head. “Your little brothers were more than a handful for a few years.”

  Molly was ten years old when her baby brothers were five. But at least her other brothers, Marty and Moses, at ages eleven and nine, could handle them, or tackle them anyway and make them mind as only brothers could do.

  “I didn't catch what their names were?” Uncle Adam asked.

  “Well, we're not quite sure of their given names, because they were left tied to the orphanage's door without a note on them,” Tobin answered while Molly cringed at his description and the vision it made.

  “Oh, my word. No wonder the boys are confused,” the older man shook his head.

  “The agents were calling them Tim and Tommy, but if they can't hear their new names...” Tobin shrugged at the pitiful situation.

  “You'll manage and help them understand this is now home,” Uncle Adam stepped up on the porch and gave Molly a hug before he stepped back down to the ground. “Meantime, I'll be praying for you both,” her uncle said with a wink.

  “Any suggestions, Marshal? Besides locking them up in your jail?” Tobin asked, desperately.

  “For now? Feed them, take them to potty, and then take the boys to their bedroom for a nap. Once they wake up in their new room, that might help set up a routi
ne. Oh, and keep the doors locked and barricaded when you are home. It will save you looking for them until they learn this is their permanent home.” Her uncle saluted them and left.

  “We don't have a room ready for the boys,” Molly said as she looked down at...which boy was this one? They were identical, down to their clothes and shoes.

  She was going to have to make some shirts in different colors to tell them apart. How did her parents tell them apart when the triplets were newborns? But they were different weights and looked slightly different if she remembered what her mother had said about their first year. Then everyone in the family could tell the triplets apart by their personalities.

  It would be the same with Tim and Tommy eventually, but not the first couple of days, at least.

  “Food, potty, bed. We can do that,” Tobin was talking to himself as much as Molly. “What do we feed them?”

  “What's in your pantry, Tobin? I've only visited here, not cooked in your kitchen yet,” Molly tried to ask without being petty. Besides taking care of clueless boys, she had to move her things from the dressmaker's apartment.

  And to what room? She'd never been upstairs in Mr. Boyle's house. Had Tobin cleaned out any of the upstairs bedrooms, or were they just the way Mrs. Boyle had left them when she died last year? Knowing a little about these two men, she'd say nothing had been touched, nor cleaned, looking at the state of the downstairs rooms.

  Molly thought of how clean she and her sisters had kept their apartment. Once they moved in, it only took an occasional dusting and cleaning of the floors to keep their home ready for company at a moment's notice.

  Now, moving in with Tobin, the elderly man, and two deaf boys? Nothing would ever stay clean and tidy with these four males living here.

  But looking at Tobin’s and the boys’ expectant faces, she needed to take care of this house, and their needs. Molly felt a bit of pride in her heart, along with panic as she swallowed before she tried to speak.

  “Let's go into your kitchen and see what we find, okay?” Molly said brightly and smiled at the boys.