Tumbleweed Weddings
Read Tumbleweed Weddings Online
Authors: Donna Robinson
For the Love of Books
© 2009 by Donna Robinson
The Thing About Beauty
© 2010 by Donna Robinson
No One But You
© 2011 by Donna Robinson
Print ISBN 978-1-62836-177-3
eBook Editions:
Adobe Digital Edition (.epub) 978-1-63058-061-2
Kindle and MobiPocket Edition (.prc) 978-1-63058-062-9
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted for commercial purposes, except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without written permission of the publisher.
All scripture quotations are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.
Published by Barbour Publishing, Inc., P.O. Box 719, Uhrichsville, Ohio 44683,
www.barbourbooks.com
Our mission is to publish and distribute inspirational products offering exceptional value and biblical encouragement to the masses
.
Printed in the United States of America.
Dear Readers,
In Tumbleweed Weddings, you’ll meet the Brandt siblings—Callie, Tonya, and Derek—who live on a sheep ranch with their parents near Fort Lob, Wyoming. That part of the country has rolling hills, a sparse population, and tumbling tumble-weeds when the wind blows.
Callie thinks she’s going to live her life as a spinster librarian, like old Miss Penwell.
Tonya dreams of marrying a handsome man, but she doesn’t know what her secret admirer even looks like.
Derek doesn’t plan to marry at all—at least, not until he’s forty.
But the Lord has a plan for each of their lives, as well as a special someone. They might be single at the beginning of their stories, but each finds their one true love by the end. I hope you enjoy getting to know the Brandt family.
I love to hear from my readers! Please write to me at
[email protected]
, or through the post office at P.O. Box 963, Eastlake, Colorado 80614. You can also visit my website at
DonnaRobinsonBooks.com
.
May the Lord bless you abundantly as you follow Him.
Donna
OR THE
L
OVE OF
B
OOKS
Dedication
This book is dedicated to my wonderful husband, Richard, who always knew I would get published, and to my Savior, Jesus Christ, who called me to write according to His own purpose.
A special thanks to my JOY Writer critique partners: Kathy Kovach, Paula Moldenhauer, Holly Armstrong, Margie Vawter, Bonnie Doran, Lynnette Horner, Heather Tipton, Jill Hups, and Marla Benroth. Also, thanks to Nancy Jo Jenkins for your prayers. And thank you, JoAnne Simmons, Rachel Overton, and April Frazier, for your hard work in making this book a reality.
I
loved this book when I was your age.” Callie turned over a worn copy of
Go, Dog. Go!
and ran the bar code under the computer’s scanner. “It’s due back in two weeks, on Friday, August fifteenth.” She smiled at six-year-old Tiffany as she handed her the slim volume.
“Thanths, Callie,” Tiffany lisped. One of her front teeth was missing.
Callie watched the girl’s braids bounce as she skipped out the front door of the Henry Dorsey-Smythe Memorial Library.
That was me twenty years ago
. She sighed. Her love of books had probably ruined her eyes—just as Grandma had warned her—and now she wore thick glasses. But she still read every chance she could get.
Pulling the tail of her green Dorsey-Smythe polo shirt over her jeans, Callie perched on the tall stool behind the checkout counter. The library was housed in an old Victorian mansion, and the wooden front door had a beveled oval window that Callie loved. She often gazed through it at the main street of Fort Lob, Wyoming.
The door closed behind Tiffany and opened a moment later as Agatha Collingsworth stepped inside. Agatha was tall, and her pink-tinted beehive hairdo barely cleared the horizontal beam of the door frame. She wore her usual outfit—stonewashed jeans, which puffed out at her thighs, and an oversize T-shirt. D
ON’T
M
ESS WITH
T
EXAS
was emblazoned across her ample bosom.
“Howdy, Callie!” Agatha’s husky voice resounded against the high ceiling as she approached the checkout counter. “How ya’ll doing, sugar? I’m here to collect my book.”
“Okay, Aggie.” Callie turned to the shelf of reserved books behind her. “Your order came in yesterday.”
“Yeah, Lucille called last night after I got home from the Beauty Spot and told me to pick up that booger as soon as possible. She don’t like folks leaving their books.”
“Here it is.” Callie pulled it off the shelf and glanced at the title—
Fixing Big Hair the Texas Way
. The model on the cover, who had hair bigger than Aggie’s, must have posed for that picture in the mid-1960s. “Looks like your kind of book.”
“Oh, I was so excited when I noticed this book in an old catalog.” Aggie’s gold bangle bracelets clinked as she handed Callie her library card. “Folks around here have such flat hair, and I never could get anyone interested in real style. When I saw this little gem, I had Lucille call the Casper library right away. Wouldn’t you know it? They had a copy in their old books section.”
Callie ran the bar code under the scanner. Not many people could get away with calling the head librarian
Lucille
. A person had to be at least sixty. “I’m glad Miss Penwell found it for you.”
“Lucille can find anything.” Aggie took her book. “I have to hustle back to the Beauty Spot. I left your sister minding the store all by her lonesome, and we usually have a crowd on Friday afternoons.”
Callie tried to keep a straight face. “I bet you’ll have two or three customers wanting their hair done for the weekend.”
Aggie’s dark eyes danced as she let out a throaty chuckle. “Oh, Callie! Sometimes we have eight! And that’s almost more than Tonya and I can handle in one afternoon.” She strode back outside, her big hair safely clearing the doorway.
Smiling, Callie placed her chin in her hand. She loved working at the library. When she was a little girl, she’d pretended this mansion was her home. Mildred Dorsey-Smythe, the maiden daughter of Henry, had willed the house to the town of Fort Lob for the specific purpose of providing a library for the residents. The front entrance alcove made a perfect place for the tall wooden counter that served as a checkout desk. It was tucked next to the sweeping staircase that accessed the reference rooms upstairs.
But Mildred had died almost fifty years ago, and now the house was over a hundred. The wooden stairs, scuffed by generations of children, competed with the old chipped banisters, which had been repainted a dozen times.
Grabbing the cart laden with books to be reshelved, Callie wheeled it past the staircase into the main room of the library. She glanced up at the ceiling molding that ran around the perimeter of the room. A chunk had fallen out last week. Even though Chance Bixby, the janitor, had cleaned it up, he had not fixed the hole yet. If only the town council would spend some money on this place, they could restore the mansion to its former glory.
Passing several rows of bookshelves, she counted seven patrons. Miss Penwell’s voice played through Callie’s mind.
“You should know how many people are in the library at all times.”
Mrs. Anderson looked up from her reading. “Hello, Callie, dear.”
Callie smiled and waved at the older woman then moved her cart to the gigantic fireplace. The white limestone hearth had been blackened with soot when the fireplace was used years ago, but now skeletal radiators heated the room in the winter. Those radiators sometimes clicked and hissed alarmingly, making more noise in the library than a group of excited schoolchildren.
Callie selected a book from the cart called
Cowboys of the Old West
and displayed it on the wide mantel. She had just finished it last night.
Such a great read
. No wonder the author, Herbert Dreyfuss, was so famous. Of course, having a weekly syndicated newspaper column that was read all over the nation helped his fame, too.
She glanced at the other volumes on display. Two history books and three fiction, all published years ago. She sighed. If only she could fulfill her dream of owning a bookstore, she could have new books all the time.
And I would read every single one of them
.