Epilogue
Travis
I still couldn’t believe my luck, for years I had thought that I was destined to be alone, for years I had circled the globe going from one point of the world to the other, all the while, little did I know that what would be my entire universe was less than ten miles away from me at all times.
As I gazed out over our dining room table at my daughter and sons as they laughed and joked around, I realized something, my heart had never been fuller than it was at that moment.
All that I had, and all that I was, was all for the woman that was sitting right across the table from me in her Queen chair.
Sure she has aged though gracefully, her long red hair has turned silvery grey, and all too often, the women in town ask her who does her hair.
I always laugh uproariously when she gets so mad over it.
Corrine
I stood on our front porch with a liquid concoction that my granddaughter had dared me to try, after that first sip, my granddaughter Macy was now my favorite.
Who would have thought that mixing white chocolate mocha and vanilla would have tasted as well as it had? Not to mention I had even added a splash of that sweetened vanilla almond milk crème.
I stood against that white post that had held a lot of memories through the years as I allowed the crisp Wyoming air to fill my lungs. There was something calming in the crisp air that you would never find elsewhere.
This ranch had become my refuge.
However, as much as I would like everyone to believe, it wasn’t that ranch that held me here at this moment, no it was the man that I had the pleasure of walking down the aisle to.
The past thirty years have been things of dreams for me.
When I was little my parents used to read me fairytales out of those big books, I would fall asleep imagining myself as one of the princesses.
However, when I had lost my parents, all of those dreams had faded.
Only they were never too far out of my memory.
However, how was I to know that my own prince-charming would arrive when I needed him the most, and one that I had known for years, though not well, I still had known that the man was as decent as they come, if not more.
And just like all of the good that I had been given, I had still received some bad.
In which sadly, we had lost Stormy to cancer a few months ago and I was so thankful that all those years ago Travis had talked me into allowing Stormy to have babies. Champion had passed months after Stormy due to heartbreak. There was no other reason behind it.
Stormy’s daughter, son along with her granddaughter’s and grandsons were in our pasture’s.
Several of the colts had been purchased through the years and since one of the Stallions that we had rescued from a land management deal was one-of-a-kind, people wanted to have that feel of an endangered breed, something that was wild and free, one that can’t be tamed.
However, only a handful of her babies had ever been sold and they went to families that either myself or Travis knew.
The rest of the colts were gifted to our children, our grandchildren, so on and so on, that was the way it was always going to be. Our oldest son Spencer was taking over more and more of the operation.
My reverie was washed away when I felt my still strong husband’s ripped muscled arms wrapped around me from behind as he circled around my middle that had lost the firm shape it once had now, I wore a buddha belly proudly.
My middle that has housed and carried seven children. Six boys and one girl.
Every night since the first birth of our son, Travis has kissed each and every tiger scar that I have received, no matter where the placement was.
“How is it that just like our first conversation that had been more than a few words, you can still make me speechless?” He asked me.
“In town, they call me the Silver Treasure, is that what I am?” I looked up into those deep hazel orbs that held my entire life inside of them.
“That and more.” Travis said in my hair as he ran his nose through the silver locks that were piled high in a messy bun atop my head.
“Grams, hurry, Sasha Fierce is ready for a run.” Madeline our eight-year-old granddaughter said to us from out in the pasture.
Every summer for four weeks our children went on a vacation and left their children with us. It was the time of our lives.
I had all of this and more, all because Ms. Henderson had invited me to be there for Stormy’s birth. I smiled at our youngest granddaughter who was named after the older woman, Tesla.
Tesla also had a stuffed horse that was named Stormy.
And like always when I walked to the pasture hand in hand with my husband of thirty years I looked up at the sky and told Stormy thank you.
I might be Travis’s Silver Treasure.
However Stormy was my own Silver Treasure. It was because of that magnificent horse, that my husband and I had come to be. It is also Stormy’s face and neck that Travis had carved into our stable door.