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They married as soon as Brad graduated and passed the bar exam. He told her he just wanted to get more experience before they left Denver to live at the ranch her uncles still ran. To have more experience under his belt would give him a better chance of earning a partnership in their new town.
    “That worked out okay at first, but after six years of hearing ‘just another year’ I started to get impatient. My uncle Roy had passed on and uncle Bud was ready to retire. He was willing to hold the ranch for only so long.”
    There were other buyers ready to take over the ranch. The money from her father’s estate was just about enough to buy the ranch he had grown up on. Her uncle Bud told her over and over he’d be willing to take a lesser amount to keep the 2Cs in the family. So she decided to not wait. She bought the ranch and began making plans to set up her wilderness survival training school. Her uncle’s men could run the day-to-day things while she spent the weekdays in Denver and some weekends out at the ranch. Brad got busier and busier with the firm he worked for, and less willing to accompany her out to the ranch.
    Tami leaned down to scratch under Freedom’s ragged mane. “You know, I ended up spending more time in the mountains on my own or tracking for the sheriff than in the townhouse in Denver. It was a good thing to do. When skiers or hikers were lost in the mountains, the sheriff called me.”
    She loved being called on to help with a fierceness Brad couldn’t seem to understand.
    “Of course I’m glad you were able to find that girl who was lost,” he’d say patiently. “Of course I’m glad she’s safe. But you can’t be the only one they can call. Can’t someone else go?”
    They didn’t fight about it, exactly. He never yelled or told her he didn’t want her to do it. He was just disappointed when he had to go alone, again, to another charity dinner or social thing. He reveled in putting on a tux and going to those kinds of events. She hated putting on any kind of formal clothes. They’d ended up spending so few hours together it was almost like not being married at all. She and Brad went from spending all their nights together in hot passion to the occasional lovemaking session.
    “The first three or four years we were married we couldn’t keep our hands off each other,” Tami told the horse in a confidential tone. “We tried just about every position you can think of, and some that you, being a horse, can’t imagine.” Okay, she really was crazy, telling her horse this stuff. “Never mind the details, boy. The important thing is we were crazy in love, and we made crazy love to each other every chance we got. I don’t know what happened. We were apart so much that last year I don’t think we even slept in the same house more than ten times. We sure didn’t make love. We were friends, not lovers. I missed that.”
    Now, after Greasy Butte, the thought of a man even getting too close to her made her want to throw up. When she tried to imagine making love, she shuddered. A tsunami of hatred welled up in her. How she would laugh when Tom, Steve, and Dwight were arrested. She remembered reading that some rape victims hesitated to take the stand at rape trials. She wouldn’t hesitate. She would look those men in the eye and spit in their faces.
    Nothing had been good since she’d gotten on the plane. The plane crashed, which had been the most terrifying experience of her life. Not having any help come had been horrible, with people dead and dying all around. Being captured by a dozen dirty men on horses had been galling. Being sold to a group of men who had “married” her and then raped her had been … Tami couldn‘t find words to describe her helpless fury. Tom Leach kept saying he only wanted her to love him. Asshole. Running away with little food and inadequate clothing was necessary. Being forced to admit she might really be in the future was crazy. All the emotions