“I thought you were all gung-ho on getting married and having kids,” Bart teased as they sat around in the living room after supper drinking second cups of coffee.

“I was,” he replied somberly. “Then I started looking for the perfect woman and I discovered that they were all looking for the richest man.” He gave Bart a droll look. “A woman who puts money before anything else isn’t going to want to settle down with a husband and babies who need changing.”

“Good point.”

Cort’s eyes were wistful. “My illusions left jet trails taking off,” he said. “I was sure it would be easy to find a nice woman who wanted a family. The problem was that every woman I dated saw me as a walking checkbook.”

“You’re rich.”

“I noticed,” Cort said, glowering at his cousin.

Bart grinned. “That’s my great advantage. I’m not rich. Any woman who wanted to settle down with me would know she wasn’t looking at diamonds and Ferraris.”

Cort nodded. “Believe me, that’s a real advantage.”

“A week from Friday night, there’s a square dance in town at the civic center. You going?” he asked.

Cort stuck his hands in his pockets. “I might take Ida.”

Bart felt a sense of relief, although it was going to mark his cousin as a man with few morals in a town the size of Catelow. Everybody knew about Ida.

Cort noticed his companion’s expression. “She isn’t quite what she seems,” he said.

Bart just smiled. “It isn’t what people really are in small towns, Cort. It’s what people think they are. Ida has a scarlet reputation.”

“Don’t worry,” Cort chuckled. “Nobody’s going to say bad things about you because I date her.”

“I know that.”

He cocked his head and his eyes narrowed. “Your neighbor. She has a real issue with men.”

Bart nodded. “She’s had a hard life. At least her cousin kept the ranch going. Her mother tried several times to sell it for ready cash. Rogan stopped her.”

“What was her mother like?” he asked.

He smiled. “Like Ida, except that she didn’t have Ida’s looks.”

He scowled. “She was divorced?”

“Her husband never divorced her. He just left. A visiting socialite fell in love with his uniform and seduced him into leaving Anthea. So Anthea took it out on Mina. We all lost count of how many men moved in with them. Mina used to hide out in the woods…well, that’s all in the past.”

“She’s afraid of men.”

“Yes.”

“No hot dates?” Cort asked with a faint smile.

“No dates. Ever.”

He scowled. “Ever?”

“She doesn’t want to take the risk,” Bart told him. “She said some of her mother’s boyfriends seemed nice until the doors were closed.”

He was recalling that Ida had said that about her second husband. Cort had never raised his hand to a woman. Neither had his father or any of his brothers. But there had been such a man, a neighbor, whose wife had run screaming into the road, bleeding and horrified. A passing motorist had stopped and given her a ride into town, to the sheriff’s office. The husband had been arrested and charged, and ended up in jail.