Love in San Francisco ; Unconditionally

by Shirley Hailstock

“It depends on your personal feelings, but charities help people. Sometimes the people are in need, maybe even dire need. For others, it could mean jobs, self-esteem or just providing them with the skills for a better future.”

  “You’re obviously very passionate about charities. How did you get into this?”

  “I’m not passionate about all of them. Some are better than others, but I happen to think girls and women don’t get enough credit for what they contribute. They’re taught to be beautiful dolls. Even with educational degrees, they’re shortchanged by insurance companies, the media, corporations, you name it.” She spread her hands, encompassing the world.

  “Are you getting personal? Did one of those somehow happen to you?”

  Ellie realized she had become passionate. Her voice rose and she leaned closer across the table, driving home her point. She relaxed. “It’s happened to every woman, whether she knows it or not.”

  “And your plan is to change the world.”

  “One girl at a time.” Ellie was serious. She regularly participated in workshops and programs to help girls realize their potential and to act on accomplishing whatever they strove to do. “Maybe you should get involved with a charity or two and see what they do and why they do it.”

  She offered it as a challenge, fully expecting him to make some excuse about how busy he was at the store.

  “All right,” he said, sitting up straight. “Where do we start?”

  “We?”

  Chapter 4

  “What do you mean we?” Ellie asked.

  Blake didn’t even recognize himself. He shouldn’t have said it, but the word was out of his mouth before he knew it was coming. Her question had given him the perfect opportunity to retract it. So why wasn’t he doing that? Why hadn’t he done it already?

  Why was he letting ten years of practice be undermined by a pair of brown eyes connected to a figure he’d like to draw his hands down? Why was he even sitting at this table? There was no need for him to be here. He’d seen Ellie through the glass doors that led to the restaurant, but he hadn’t needed to come through those doors. He could have—should have—continued to the elevator and returned to his office.

  Yet his feet had led him inside with the flimsy excuse of something she’d said Saturday night, which she probably didn’t remember. Blake had been on dates. And they all knew he wasn’t a “get involved” person. When he met someone new, he sized them up, categorized them as to their future expectations. If they didn’t coincide with his, he ended the relationship before it could start.

  He had no relationship with Ellie. But somewhere down deep, in a place Blake didn’t know or thought was hidden, there was a tiny voice screaming over an ocean, trying to be heard. He wouldn’t listen.

  “Blake?” Ellie called his name.

  “According to you, I’m a novice, so I’m going to need some instruction on where to start and what to do.”

  She gave him a sideways look. Obviously the words sounded as false to her as they did to his own ears.

  “All right,” she said, her grin saying she knew something he didn’t. She grabbed a pen and a business card from her purse and started to write. “Meet me Saturday morning—”

  “I have plans for Saturday,” he interrupted.

  “Cancel them,” Ellie said in a clipped voice. It was an order. She didn’t even look up when she delivered it. Continuing to write, she finished and pushed it across the table, toward him. “Here’s the address. Be there at six o’clock in the morning.”

  “What happens here?”

  Ignoring him, she went on, “Change out of that suit and wear something you can get dirty.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Yes, the next charity is yours. So do some research and find a group you want to support. It helps if you’re passionate about their cause.”

  She stood up, dismissing him and any further conversation. “I’m going to meet Judi in the shoe department. Pay the tab. Consider it a charitable contribution.”

  Blake watched as she walked away. He couldn’t help appreciating the sway of her hips as she put one foot in front of the other like a model. He wondered if she’d ever been a model. Then a thought came to him of someone else who’d at one time thought she wanted to be a model.

  He turned back to the table and blinked several times, trying to dislodge the image of Ellie’s walk from his brain. The waiter presented him with the check and he signed it, grateful to have something to do. The feeling that he’d been set up settled over him. His principles had been compromised, and he hadn’t even realized it.

  He admitted Elliana Hamilton was a force of her own. And he wanted to learn about that force, but he knew pursuing that avenue was like sticking his hands in fire.

  * * *

  The address was only a few miles outside the city, in beautiful country. Blake spent a lot of his time in the office and did all of his entertaining there. He used to come up to the hills more often, but it had been several years since he could look back and see the skyline. The air was fresh and slightly cooler.

  He parked his Jeep between a van and a sporty Mercedes and saw Ellie the moment he got out of the car. She was leaning against a wooden fence by the entrance to a horse farm. The sign read Purple Cloud Horse Farm. She smiled at him as he approached, and his body reacted to her as if he’d been anticipating her smile all morning. She wore black formfitting exercise pants that showed every curve of her legs. The pants were covered by a long T-shirt that stopped halfway to her knees. Blake looked at it as a tease. The clothes were begging him to lift them and see what surprises were in store for him beneath the cloth.

  “Horseback riding,” he said. “I haven’t been horseback riding in years.”

  “You’re not here to ride,” Ellie replied. “You’ve got work to do. Come on.”

  She led him to a small building. He could hear the noise of conversations coming from it long before they stepped through the door.

  “Ah, Ellie,” a short fiftysomething man greeted her. “We’re nearly ready to go out.”

  “Everyone, meet Blake Thorn. He’s never worked on a horse farm, so we’ll have to show him the ropes.”

  “I’ll show him,” a ponytailed teenage girl spoke as if she were submitting a bid. The room laughed. Blake did, too.

  “You all know what to do. Let’s get out and do it.”

  The group dispersed. The short man came over to them and Ellie introduced him to Jim Nolan, area director of the horse-farm project, an organization that takes first-offender teens and gives them community service to show them a different way of life.

  “How long have you been doing this kind of work?” Blake asked Jim.

  “Twenty-three years,” he answered. “And many of the kids have gone on to lead productive lives.”

  “I’ll show Blake around and give him a partner to work with,” Ellie said.

  The two left and headed toward the barn.

  “Why is it called Purple Cloud? There are no purple clouds here,” Blake said, checking the sky for confirmation.

  “The owners are Edna and Claude Eastwood. Edna’s ridden all her life. Her first horse was named Purple Cloud.”

  Blake nodded. He liked the way Ellie told the story, as if it were a Hallmark movie and there was more behind the horse and rider than had yet been revealed. Blake had no stories like that. Growing up had its ups and downs for him, as it did for any normal kid. He and his brothers had tried and discarded many projects. Their parents believed they should try whatever interested them and rule it out if they discovered they had no taste for it. However, they had to stay in it long enough to make that decision. And their parents had to concur.

  He’d tried the trumpet, ice-skating, mountain climbing and a myriad of other things, keeping up with his brothers. But other than his interest in the store, he’d hung in there with sw
imming and the piano.

  They rounded a corner, and Blake saw a horse barn in front of them. “Please don’t tell me we have to clean out the barn,” he said.

  The look she gave him said that was exactly what they were going to do. She showed him around the place, going in and out of several barns and riding a golf cart around the grounds.

  “Who’s that kid?” Blake asked, glancing over his shoulder.

  “What kid?”

  Ellie looked around, but the kid was gone. “He was tall and lanky, with brown hair, and he’s been following us around since we left the entrance.”

  “I haven’t noticed anyone. But I’ll be more observant from now on.”

  Back at the barn, she introduced him to Aaron Knight, a fourteen-year-old with dirty-blond hair, bright red cheeks and one crooked tooth.

  Blake offered his hand.

  “Call me Apple,” he said, shaking hands. He had a surprisingly strong grip.

  “Apple?” Blake questioned.

  “It’s because of the rosacea, the red cheeks. And it’s better than being called Aaron.” His smile was friendly and welcoming.

  “Well, Apple it is.”

  “Follow me and I’ll show you what we do.”

  As they walked, Apple gave him the fundamentals of where they were going and how to clean the stalls. They worked together, but in different stalls, cleaning out the horse residue. Blake hated the smell, but he was the only one who seemed bothered by it. On the other side of the farm were horseback-riding lessons and people coming out for a day of fun with the animals.

  “Here. I almost forgot to give you this,” Apple said. He handed Blake a cloth that looked like a surgical mask. “Most of us are so used to the smell that we don’t notice it, but I see it’s getting to you.”

  Blake could smell it and taste it in the back of his throat. It wasn’t pleasant. He wondered if Ellie had gotten him assigned here because it was the worst place to be. Then he saw she was doing the same task but at a different barn, and he felt ashamed of himself.

  The job took two hours, including hosing down the place, before Apple said they were done. Blake’s sneakers were soaked, and he needed a shower. He couldn’t imagine getting into his car with its soft, buttery seats and leaving it smelling like horse manure.

  “Next time, wear rubber boots,” Apple told him as they walked back toward the original building. Blake’s shoes squelched with each step. “Hungry?”

  “Thirsty,” Blake said. He couldn’t imagine eating anything in his present state. The smell was bad enough, and the back of his throat itched with the sensation. Apple grabbed a bottle of cold water from a cooler when they entered the building and handed it to Blake. He drank the entire bottle in one long gulp, then took a second one and downed half of that.

  The same kid he’d seen staring at him earlier sat in a corner, his back to the room. Yet, surreptitiously, he glanced at Blake. Blake wondered why. He didn’t recognize the kid—at least what he’d seen of him. He hadn’t seen his full face yet.

  Apple waved at a young girl sitting near the front. He bobbed his head. Blake had only seen her use her hand, but apparently there was some silent communication between them. He remembered those days, when life was both easy and hard. Girls were new to him and he was afraid of being rebuffed by them, but he was also grateful that he attracted so many of them.

  “Is she someone special?” Blake asked.

  Apple smiled and hunched one shoulder in a shy “I like her” gesture.

  “Ellie—Ms. Hamilton—told me that all these kids are here doing community service,” Blake said.

  “Most of them,” Apple agreed.

  “You seem like a very nice kid. And you obviously love horses. How’d you end up doing community service?”

  Apple looked uncomfortable. He turned his face away and stared at the floor.

  “You don’t have to answer that,” Blake said. “I apologize. It’s none of my business.”

  “I fell in with some guys who were committing robberies. I got caught,” Apple said after a moment.

  “I feel like saying I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. It was a good thing.”

  “Good that you got caught?”

  Apple nodded. “If I hadn’t, I might be on my way to juvie or worse. When I got sent here, I hated the place, but eventually I discovered a love of horses and that I could make a living caring for them.”

  “But you’re only fourteen.”

  “And if I continue to work, I can get a job soon.”

  “Two years from now.”

  “I can wait. I’ll work here until then.”

  “Apple, how long is your community service?”

  “Oh, it ended six months ago.” He smiled widely. “Now I volunteer. And when my work is done, I get to ride the horses. You wanna ride with us?”

  Blake smiled at the enthusiasm of youth. His back and legs were already protesting from only two hours of work. “Us?”

  “Yeah, Ms. Hamilton always rides.”

  Blake looked across the room. Ellie looked as fresh and clean as she had standing at the fence when Blake arrived. He, on the other hand, looked as if he’d been wallowing in mud.

  She flashed him a smile and everything changed. He no longer thought of the pain or the dirt.

  “Shall I saddle you a horse?” Apple asked.

  Blake was surprised to hear himself agreeing. “I’ll come with you and saddle my own.”

  “So, you ride?” Apple appeared surprised.

  “I haven’t done it in years, but I hear it’s like riding a bicycle. Once you learn how, you never forget.”

  “Guess we’ll find out today,” Apple laughed.

  * * *

  The air in the room seemed to change the moment Blake and Apple came in. And Ellie wasn’t thinking of the smell of horseflesh. She smiled at her group and detached herself, going to meet the two men.

  “Hi, Ms. Hamilton,” Apple said.

  “How’d Mr. Thorn do?” she asked.

  Apple turned to Blake and put his hand on his shoulder. Despite Apple being only fourteen, he was just a head shorter than Blake.

  “He’s a natural,” Apple said. “And he’s up for the ride.”

  “Really?” Ellie raised her eyebrows.

  “I’ll go get the horses ready,” Apple said. “I’ll saddle yours, too,” he told Blake.

  “How was your day?” Ellie asked when they were alone.

  “I don’t see how mucking out stalls helped a charity,” Blake said, but there was no hint of complaint in his voice. Ellie still wondered if he thought she’d brought him here to challenge his beliefs on how well charities worked.

  “Come with me,” she said.

  Blake followed her. They walked around the barns and across the field to a pony track. Ellie propped her arms up on the rural fence. “Look,” she said, using her hand to encompass the kids riding ponies. There were ten of them, and each one had an adult walking beside the small horse.

  Blake took in the scene, then homed in on individual kids. All were smiling or concentrating hard on the task.

  “They’re special kids,” Ellie said. “This is not only a farm. It’s a training camp for special-needs children. They learn daily tasks by taking care of animals. Not full-grown horses, but gentle ponies or smaller animals. As a reward, they get to ride.”

  Blake sighed at his lack of understanding. “Lifting hay and cleaning out the stalls is too heavy for them,” he said.

  “In most cases. Some of them are able-bodied, but maybe not mentally ready.”

  “Hi, Ms. Hammy.” A small child mounted on a pony waved vigorously.

  Ellie waved back.

  “You must come here often,” Blake commented.

  “I used to work here,” she said, looking at the buil
ding ahead. “I was one of them.”

  Ellie wanted to laugh at the expression on Blake’s face.

  “You have a juvie record?” he asked.

  “Did my esteem just plummet in your eyes?” Ellie tried hard not to let the smile she felt inside blossom on her face.

  “No, but you can’t just drop a comment like that and stop.”

  “I didn’t stop.”

  “All right. Tell me the story.”

  They were back in the main building. Half the group was outside, so there were plenty of places to sit and talk. Ellie took a seat on one of the benches and Blake straddled it. He looked to her for an explanation.

  “First, I have no record. It was expunged when they discovered the mistake.”

  “Mistake?”

  “I was fifteen, and as with a lot of teenagers, I traveled in groups.”

  “Safety factor.”

  “Are you going to let me tell this story?”

  He shrugged, opening his hand and gesturing for her to go on.

  “We were shopping that day, looking for anything we could find. We’d been in costume jewelry stores, makeup stores, dress shops—all over the mall. When I got home that night, the police came and arrested me.”

  “For what?”

  “Stealing. They said I took several necklaces from one of the stores.” She waited for him to interrupt again, but he only looked at her. “No, I didn’t take anything, but they searched the house and found jewelry in my room. It was legitimate. I’d bought and paid for it weeks earlier, but I hadn’t worn it.”

  “Didn’t you have receipts?”

  “I threw them away. Two of the necklaces were going to be gifts for a friend’s birthday. I didn’t want the price tag on it. I knew she wanted them. She’d admired them several times, dropping gentle hints that she’d love those for her birthday.”

  “What happened next?”

  “No one believed me. I was sentenced to do community service and brought here.” She took a moment to look around the hall. It had been years, but Ellie remembered her first day here. She was so angry. She was innocent, and she had to do community service for something she hadn’t been guilty of.