Rodeo season. Time to get out on the road and hit the shows and sales. Travis was eager to be off. He had not been happy about the tornado, and watching Coralee struggle to deal with it was as much of an excuse as he needed to leave.

There were things that had to be taken care of first. Tornado damage had to be repaired, including the roof of the chicken coop. A shed had to be rebuilt and fences repaired. Travis would not be happy if everything on the ranch was not in order before he left.

The tornado had been hard on the cattle. They had panicked in the storm and some of them had run themselves against the barbed wire to escape from the storm. Travis had feared the tornado would trigger a stampede. A few of the steers had not made it and Travis had them butchered and put in the freezer. Barbed wire had been torn from its posts and had to be repaired, escaped cattle were rounded up and transferred to the lower pastures.

One more thing had to be taken care of. Coralee had promised to have her implant removed and she was determined to keep her promise. Travis had given her a beautiful wedding and honeymoon, as he promised, and she would keep hers.

She found the closest Planned Parenthood and was able to get an appointment. Travis came with her, it wasn't necessary, but he insisted that he should drive her. Was he afraid she would go back on her word?

The procedure itself was strange to watch. They numbed her arm and made an incision and withdrew the implant. She was surprised at what she saw, she had forgotten how small it was, no larger than a matchstick. Funny, for three years it had kept her from getting pregnant and would have worked for two more. Now it was gone.

"Finished?" asked Travis as she walked into the waiting room, and she nodded. "Let's go, then," and put his arm around her waist and led her out of the room.

He would have gone into the room with her, but she forbade him. Sometimes he was possessive, not wanting to let her out of his sight. He could be paternal, almost father-like, and very protective. Sometimes she enjoyed this, she liked the fact that he looked out for her, but she did not like to be smothered, and sometimes he almost crossed the line.

Fortunately, he was not always like that. Travis could be a lot of fun, and she enjoyed the time they spent together. So far, she had no regrets, marrying him had not been the mistake she feared it might be. She no longer felt like a child bride. He went out of his way to make sure that she was happy and comfortable, and his efforts had even won over her parents.

They went out to lunch after her procedure and talked about horse shows. She would leave Trixie and Best Boy at the ranch and bring Sadie and Hickory. Hickory was turning into an excellent reining horse and Sadie liked to show off her cutting skills. She missed Coronado, it had almost been too easy to win when on his back. With Hickory, she had to work harder, but he was proving easy to train, he was willing to learn, and that made working with him a pleasure.

Her arm hurt a little where they had removed the implant. It was an odd feeling, knowing that she would probably be pregnant within a few months. Her mother would first be disapproving, but soon she would be calling friends and family to announce that another Dutton baby was on the way.

Now she regretted being so far from her family. Fortunately, they would show up in Texas despite the distance. What hurt was that they were no longer an hour or two away. Her branch of the Dutton family was close-knit, they were always in and out of each other's business, and they liked it that way.

Pregnancies were considered a family affair. This baby would be celebrated as all the family's pregnancies were. One sibling or cousin would have a crib they didn't use anymore, and another a bassinet. She would not need to buy baby clothes, they would arrive by the box full, lovingly passed down through the family.

There would be soft baby blankets, hand-knitted and crocheted. Her mother would make a quilt as she had for every baby that had been born to the family. This baby would lack for nothing and would be spoiled, and cherished.

She knew Uncle John was envious of his brother Ben and his family. There were no rifts and divisions as there were with his. He had lost his oldest son, Lee; Beth and Jamie had become enemies. Kayce was the only one who bore no ill will to anyone. He loved his brother and his sister equally; hate was not in his nature—it was not like that for Beth and Jamie.

Monica had miscarried, but she and Kayce were trying again. Coralee hoped she and Monica could become pregnant at the same time and their children born close together. She had a few cousins who had been born within a day or two of her birthday and they were as close as a brother or sister might be.

She felt awkward that first night as she and Travis were preparing for bed. The implant had been her shield, and now she felt vulnerable. She had said yes to the possibility of becoming pregnant and it scared her a little. She knew how badly Travis wanted kids, and although she was willing, the thought scared her a little. A pregnancy would alter her life and things would never be the same.

She was still dressed and reluctant to remove her clothes. Travis, already in bed and eager to make love, asked her what was wrong, and she shook her head.

"Come here," he said and held out his arms. She went to him, letting him pull her to him. "Why are you still wearing clothes?" he asked. He pulled off her shorts and tank top, "There, that's better, this is how I like you."

He began to kiss her, caressing her, his strong hands moving over her. He felt her stiffen but knew he must not stop. He could read her fear and knew he had to help her move past it. "Come on, Mrs. Wheatley," he teased, "Let's try and make a baby."

Sometimes she resented the fact that he was older and more experienced sexually. He knew how to seduce her, knew how to coax her into doing what he wanted without forcing her. She knew how to have sex, but he had taught her how to make love—and there was a difference. So now she let him take the lead and her resistance melted slowly; she loved being in Travis's arms, loved the way he made love to her. Giving in could be so easy so why not give in?

The next morning she joined him in the shower. She let him wash her hair knowing that he loved doing it. They dressed and went downstairs where Elena had breakfast ready. The next stop was the bunkhouse so they could see how the repairs were proceeding.

Coralee had found some old lumber and plastic roofing and with the help of one of the hands constructed a secure, rainproof roof for the chicken coop. The tornados were mostly past, and she hoped that the roof would hold up for at least a year. The hands promised to take care of the chickens while she was gone, in exchange for any eggs the hens aid. Farm-fresh eggs were worth their weight in gold.

That night at dinner they began to discuss the trip and Travis surprised her by asking, "Do you want to sell some of your horses? I think you should keep Hickory and Sadie, but we could get a good price for Trixie and Best Boy."

"I don't want to sell any of them. I've had Best Boy for so long I can't see parting with him and Trixie's in foal. Do you want me to sell them? Do I have more horses than I should?" She couldn't believe what he had just told her.

"Well, no, but if you want the money you might want to sell your palomino. Some people will buy mares in foal, she's a good-looking mare and might even produce a palomino foal, someone would find that appealing."

"No, how could you even suggest it?" She glared at him, "I don't want to sell any of my horses." She went back to eating her dinner but would not talk to him for the rest of the meal.

Eventually, however, she started to calm down and thought about what he said. She didn't need four horses. Best Boy had not been cheap but he was a fun horse to ride and she enjoyed using him as a saddle horse. Sadie and Hickory were her show horses, and each was good at their specialty. Sadie was cowy and made a good cutting horse; Hickory was improving by the day and had taken well to reining. She couldn't ride four horses, five if you counted the coming foal.

Travis would do his best to get a good price for Trixie. Selling her would be a compromise she could live with, and the more she thought about it the more it made sense. It just felt strange, that was all.

She was brushing her hair in front of the mirror when he came into the bathroom. "Travis," she called out to him, "Could you come here?"

"What?" he asked, he put his hands on her shoulders, messaging them.

"I want to keep Best Boy, but I think selling Trixie makes sense. I like to ride the other two, but I don't want to play cowboy with them. Best Boy may have more shows in him, but I don't need him for that. Are three horses too many?"

"Sweetheart, if you wanted thirty it wouldn't be too many. We got the insurance money for Coronado and I'm going to put it in the bank, along with your winnings. You've got two nice show horses, a nice saddle horse and that should do you. If you want to start a broodmare band, let me know. You have two stallions that might be good for breeding, I may look for a couple of broodmares and see what we can get."

She sighed thinking about Coronado. He was the best reining horse she'd ever owned. She'd mapped out a future for him—using him for stud and competing. She'd wanted to earn enough money to pay Travis back, but she also saw past that. Coronado could have helped make her fortune.

"I was hoping to breed Coronado, I think I could have booked enough mares to make up for what he cost," She put her brush down and leaned her head back against him.

"Sweetheart, between his winnings and his stud fees he'd already paid for himself. I bought him with you in mind, I just needed a year to see if he would be good enough and he was. If we're going to be a broodmare facility, I need to build another barn for the dams and their foals. We'll start small, of course, but we already have two potentially good studs. Horse breeding is wait and see. You have to wait for the mares to come into estrus, then you have eleven months' gestation, then you wean them at six months and start to train them."

"Then you have to decide how often you want to breed your brood mares, I know," she said, "Having a small operation will give us a chance to find out if it would work. In the meantime, I'm ready to get back on the road."

Travis pushed himself against her, "I want to find out how long it takes for you to breed. We'll raise babies and horses; how does that sound Mrs. Wheatley?"