A Baby Changes Everything

All married couples went through doldrums, Savannah told herself as she silently counted off the number of times the phone rang. Discord was only natural. It was up to her to see that they carved out a little island of time for themselves, recharged their batteries, so to speak.

It wasn’t that she had less to do than Cruz. In her own way, she firmly believed that she had just as much if not more to do than the man she’d promised to give her love to for all eternity. He had the ranch to run, she had everything else to run. The house, the books, their son and any emergency that might come up.

But then, women were far more resilient than their male counterparts and capable of multitasking on top of that. Ordinarily she was that way herself, when she wasn’t pregnant. Lately, though, she kept flagging, as if she couldn’t hang on to her energy for more than a few minutes at a time.

She didn’t remember being this exhausted when she was carrying Luke.

The phone on the other end was finally picked up. She straightened, eager to set her plan in motion.

“Hello, Mama?” The woman had insisted that she call her Mama after the wedding, and in truth, Savannah felt closer to Rosita than she ever had to her own mother. The name rolled easily from her tongue.

“Savannah?” There was immediate concern in the other woman’s voice. “What’s wrong?”

Savannah did her best to sound as cheerful as possible. Anything less and Rosita would be over in a flash, thinking the worst. It was Rosita’s belief that she had far too much happiness in her life, and she was always anticipating a reversal.

“Nothing’s wrong, Mama. I was just wondering if you’d mind taking your grandson for the night?”

“You know I’d love to have Luke over here anytime, but why tonight? Are you two going somewhere?”

To paradise, I hope. Savannah gauged her words carefully, not sure just how much Cruz would appreciate her telling her mother-in-law. He was very proud and this might offend his sense of independence. “Cruz has been working very hard lately—”

She could almost see Rosita nodding her dark head in agreement. “Takes a lot to run a ranch.”

“Yes, I know, he said the same thing.” Savannah suppressed the sigh that tried to rise to her lips. “But he’s forgotten how to unwind.”

“Unwind?”

The woman was probably unfamiliar with the term. “To relax. To enjoy himself.” Savannah paused. Then, because she liked the woman and because she had a feeling that Rosita would guess anyway, she added, “To be a husband again.”

Rosita caught on immediately, as Savannah knew she would. “Ah, I see. Of course. I can have Ruben come by and pick the boy up now if you’d like. It would give me extra time with my beautiful grandson—and you extra time to do whatever it is you need to do to help Cruz…unwind.”

Savannah didn’t want to seem as if she was eager to ship her son off, but in reality, Rosita had a good point. She’d get twice as much done without having Luke in tow. “Well…”

“Consider it done,” Rosita said, taking the decision out of her daughter-in-law’s hands. “Ruben will be there in less than half an hour. Have Luke and his favorite toys ready. And, Savannah?”

“Yes?”

“Good luck.”

“Thank you.” She didn’t bother commenting that if she had to rely on luck to make Cruz come around, then her marriage really was in serious trouble.

Cruz was well pleased.

The four quarter horses he’d arranged to buy looked even better walking off the back of the transport than they had when he had first seen them running free on Eric Tyler’s ranch. All four were fine specimens of their breed. And intelligent.

He could tell that the horses he’d picked were intelligent just by moving among them, the way he was now. He was getting a bead on them and they were getting one on him. He liked that.

Nothing worse than a dumb animal, he thought, at least for what he had in mind. He trained quarter horses to become cutting horses, animals specifically intended to herd cattle. A good horse could even prevent a stampede from getting under way, separating one frightened steer from the others before the mindless pounding of hooves and the surge of escape began.

Not that he couldn’t handle an animal blessed with less than the intelligence he saw on display today. Very slowly, he wound a lariat around his arm as he eyed the newest additions to his herd.

He had a way of communicating with horses that at times surprised even him. Had he been one of the Plains Indians, he might have said he was bonding with his brothers. But no such thought crossed Cruz’s mind when he walked into the small, tight corral to transform yet another horse from a skittish, rebellious animal to one that was willing to work for its master. To bring the fruit of its abilities to the man or woman who fed and cared for him or her.

However, something happened when Cruz was alone with a horse, something he could not explain. Something that almost allowed him to form a spiritual bond with the creature, to feel what the horse was feeling, to understand what caused its distrust or its pain.

When he had worked for the Double Crown, he had been given the toughest horses to break. Horses that had long since been given up on were brought to him in hopes that he could turn them around.

He’d never had a single failure. Sometime it took weeks, even months, but the object was not to rush, rather to succeed.

That was when he’d had the luxury of working for someone else, however. Now that he was his own master, now that what he accomplished put food on his table and clothes on the backs of his family, it was a slightly different matter. There was an urgency inside of him, an urgency to succeed, to build up the ranch, as well as his reputation. To have the kind of things he had always dreamed about having, not because he wanted them—he couldn’t care less about fancy cars or pricey clothing—but because those outer trappings meant that he, Cruz Perez, was a success.

A man to respect.

A man who could not only compete in a world populated by the likes of the Fortunes, but could also carve out a sizable place for himself.

That took dedication and work, tireless work. Not an easy matter when he was far from tireless. Especially when he walked into the house and heard recriminations thrown his way. Or when he saw the disappointment in Savannah’s eyes.

She never seemed happy anymore when he did have a moment to spend with her. That meant he was failing her somehow. More than anything else, he didn’t like failing.

A fifth horse was being led off the transport. The hand was having a difficult time bringing him over to the corral. This was the horse that Tyler had thrown in for a song.

“You’ll be doing me a favor taking it off my hands,” Eric Tyler had told him. Tugging off his hat, the older man had scratched his thinning hair and shaken his head. “I purely don’t know what to do with him.”

Even though he’d seen the other four as a sound investment of his time and money, Cruz had been drawn to the last animal immediately.

There was something about the black horse, an air that separated him from the others. There was the same amount of intelligence in its eyes as the other four—more, really—but also something else. A wariness coupled with fire.

He seemed almost human.

This one, Cruz had thought, watching as several of Tyler’s hands scattered after trying to herd the horse into a smaller corral, was a prize. A warrior.

Turning him into a working cutting horse wouldn’t be easy.

But Cruz loved a challenge.

“What’s his name?” he had asked, approaching the corral.

“Diablo,” Tyler had told him.

Diablo. The devil. It fit.

Inside the corral now, Diablo shook his proud head, his deep brown eyes locking with Cruz’s across the length of the field. Cruz found himself smiling.

“You think you’ll come out on top, don’t you?” he murmured almost to himself. “You’re in for a surprise, my friend.”

But taming and training Diablo was going to take time, and right now he needed to get busy with the four he’d purchased. He had a contract with the Flying W to turn over four fully trained cutting horses by the end of the month. That meant focusing his day a little differently, but it could be done.

The July sun beat down mercilessly.