by Judy Baer
“Sabrina, of course! I’ve heard your father and Alfred talk about it, as well. What kind of a woman do you think I am?” Tears filled Marlo’s eyes. “I was engaged once. I’d planned to marry—and another woman came along and ruined it all. There’s no way on earth I’d do that to Sabrina. I’ve seen the way she looks at you.”
“No, I don’t know.” She was startled by his tone. “Your vision is obviously skewed by your own past experiences, skewed and wrong. I’m not engaged to Sabrina. I never was and I never will be.”
“But she said…she told me she was going to marry you!”
“Everything you’ve done is because you thought I was marrying Sabrina? Backing off, discouraging every encounter? Why didn’t you just ask me if it was true?”
“Because it all seemed so clear,” she ventured timidly. “Sabrina should know.” Shouldn’t she?
Exasperation washed over him like a scalding shower. He liked to think he was always a gentleman and in control of his temper, and he’d been particularly careful to read Marlo’s signals and move slowly, but this woman knew how to worm into every weakness he had.
“Why do you back into everything, Marlo? You’d save yourself a lot of time and heartache if you’d go at things head-on.”
“But Sabrina said…”
“That someday she and I would be married, I suppose.” Sabrina strikes again. It was his own fault for not putting a stop to her flights of the imagination years ago. It had seemed innocuous at the time—and useful. With Sabrina always playing sentry, he was never bothered with women he didn’t have time to get to know. While he’d been building the architectural firm, there hadn’t been time for dating. And when he added the work at Hammond Stables, there was barely time for sleep, let alone women.
“Marlo, that’s her fantasy. Sabrina has been in love with me since she was a child. She started ordering bridal magazines when she was sixteen. I’ve never paid any attention. I love her, but I’m not in love with her.”
Marlo thought back to her conversation with Sabrina in the hospital.
“She loves you. She told me so. And I was afraid that, the way you were acting toward me, that you were turning out to be a man like my former fiancé.” Tears flooded her eyes. “I couldn’t be a party to that.”
“It’s not the romantic kind of love she’s fantasized about,” Jake said calmly, as if he’d thought this out long ago. “It’s the way Sabrina thinks and talks, but if push came to shove, even she would admit that it’s the family kind of love between a brother and sister that she cares about now. When I was seventeen and she was eleven, she called my high-school girlfriend and told her to ‘stay away or else.’” He rolled his eyes. “It took me weeks to straighten that one out.” He ran his fingers through his hair, obviously annoyed. “It’s happened more than once over the years.
“She’s had the idea in her head because Alfred and my father always joked that a Hammond/Dorchester dynasty would exist if the two of us married. Somewhere along the line, the three of them began to take it seriously—and the more seriously they took it, the less attention I’ve paid. That conversation is a broken record that has played in the background of my life ever since Sabrina was born.”
“Why didn’t you put a stop to it?” Marlo’s face was a mask of puzzlement.
Jake had the urge to massage away her frown, but didn’t touch her. He was already in hot water and he didn’t need to be scalded. “I did, a few times. They’d be quiet for a while but then it would start up again. I just let it go, because the bottom line is that Sabrina and I won’t marry and she knows it.”
“But she told me…”
“She’s jealous and overprotective of what she considers her territory,” Jake said wearily. “Me.” He’d never felt so caught off-guard or guilty in his life. “I really had no idea that she’d put you on notice, too.”
“Why would you let her do this? You know what’s best. Make her see clearly! It couldn’t be that difficult.”
He looked at her steadily. “Have there been times in your life when you’ve seen your sister do or embrace something that you believe to be misguided? Is there anything you wanted to force her to do but couldn’t, not without destroying something special in the relationship? Just because Jenny doesn’t behave the way you want her to, do you love her any less?” He knew he’d struck a nerve, by the expression on her face.
Brady. “Well, when you put it that way…”
“Sabrina is the closest person I have to a sister. Big brothers tolerate the guff their little sisters give them. My father and Alfred have always encouraged Sabrina. Those two are the ones who really want us to marry. They actually think that it would be ‘good’ for Sabrina and me.” Jake shook his head sadly. “The fact is that it would be good for them, not for Sabrina and me.
“I can handle myself, but their expectations haven’t been fair to Sabrina. There is a fellow named Randy Wills who’s been in love with Sabrina almost as long as she’s been infatuated with me.
“After Cammi’s stroke, Sabrina practically lived at the hospital. Her relationship to Cammi is much like mine was to her—protective and tolerant, an adult sibling to a tag-along in the family. Randy was at the hospital with her almost every day. You may even have seen him there.” Marlo nodded thoughtfully as he spoke. “I don’t think Sabrina thought much about it at first, but she’s begun to realize that he is what she needs in a man—not an independent, overworked, platonic friend like me.”
“What made things change? Other than Randy’s attentiveness, I mean.”
He watched the tension in her begin to relax. He looked straight into her eyes as he spoke.
“This week, Sabrina told me that if an eight-year-old child could have her life change in an instant, then there are no guarantees for her either. She’s decided to quit playing the game Alfred and my father have encouraged, and live life on her terms.” Jake smiled fondly. “She’s a great girl, Sabrina. Confused, possessive and easily influenced, but her heart is good. She’s funny, clever and a great dinner companion. Randy’s going to have a good—if exasperating—life with her.”
“So, just like that—” Marlo snapped her fingers “—it’s over between you and Sabrina?”
“There was never anything to be ‘over’ between us. She just didn’t want to let go of the fantasy. It’s been a game for her all along. I’m guilty of not putting a stop to it. Frankly, I had no idea how seriously she took her job as gatekeeper for my life. No woman has ever taken Sabrina to heart like that before.”
“Maybe that’s one of the problems with this world,” she murmured under her breath.
“Of course I didn’t take care of Sabrina as well as I thought I did, keeping her close to me, humoring her whims.” Jake’s dark eyes were beseeching. “Can you understand this, Marlo? Is your family so perfect that no one ever does anything wacky or confusing?”
“Are you kidding? How can I criticize anyone else for doing something foolish or extreme? I suppose it shouldn’t surprise me or anyone for that matter, that I even backed into love.”
“Love?”
She hadn’t meant to let that word slip from her lips, but it was out, and there was no retreating now. “I met you, fell in love with you, thought you were engaged and ran away.”
“I tried to tell you a dozen times how I felt about you, Marlo. You wouldn’t even let me get the words out of my mouth. It was as if you were moving through life with Plexiglas walls around you. I didn’t push it because you were so edgy. I’ve worked with jumpy horses and know better—I didn’t want to frighten you away completely.”
“I thought I was doing the right thing,” she said softly, “by staying away.”
“Maybe you were.” He picked up a stick and poked at the fire. It flared up and began to burn more brightly. “If you’d been the kind of woman who ran after me, I probably would have high-tailed it in the other direction.” A sheepish grin appeared on Jake’s features. “I’m still old-fashioned enough to wan
t to be the pursuer, rather than the pursued. Even my father has begun to see that. He’s begun to like you a lot, you know. He’s even begun to change his mind about ‘this Christianity business’ because of you.”
He shook his head and sighed. “I was actually about to rethink that notion of being the pursuer, the knight in shining armor who’d sweep you off your feet, when I discovered just how hard you were to catch.”
Marlo’s head reeled with what he was saying, with the possibilities it presented. Still, she didn’t move toward him. He didn’t like being pursued, but she did. It would make them both happy if he were the seeker and she the treasure.
Jake snapped his fingers and jumped to his feet. “I have some things in the car for you.” He went to the Ranger Rover and came back with a box and an envelope.
He put them on the ground in front of her. “Open the letter first. I have no idea what it says.”
Marlo didn’t recognize the handwriting. The penmanship was feminine. She tore open the envelope. Jake leaned over her shoulder and they read it together.
Marlo—
I’m sorry I gave you such a hard time. I love Jake so much that I’ve never thought anyone was good enough for him (except me, of course, ha-ha!) But you are first-rate, through and through. I realized that when we visited at the hospital. If I can’t have him, then I think you might be the one to whom I’d entrust my sweet “big brother.” If he loves you, that is. I want nothing but the best for the man who is my champion, protector and first love. Please accept my apologies for how badly I treated you. You terrified me from the first minute I met you. I suppose I knew you were a woman who could take Jake away from me. Little did I know that you were actually the one woman I could trust not to!
Randy and I are more suited to each other anyway. He’s been wonderful throughout Cammi’s crisis. I think I’m falling in love with him. Time will tell. Of course, there will never be anyone like Jake ever again. He’s definitely worth loving.
Someday I hope we can be friends—
Sabrina
She looked up. “I had no idea.”
“I didn’t either.” A soft smile graced Jake’s lips. “Sabrina’s always told me everything—until now. But you won her over.”
“You are a very tolerant man, Jake Hammond.”
“It comes with years of practice. First my father and his idiosyncrasies, then Sabrina and training unbroken horses, and now…” he hesitated “…there’s you.” He pointed at the box at her feet. “Open it. I’ve wanted to give this to you for a long time but never thought the time was right. You made it pretty clear that you didn’t want me around.”
“Shhh. I don’t want to talk about that anymore. When I back into things, I can’t see where I’m going. Like with you.”
She opened the box and her expression grew puzzled. It was a small, black plastic lump that resembled a tiny television with a cord. “What is it?”
“A navigating system for your car so you won’t get lost.”
She picked it up and a card fell out of the box. She laid the navigator on her lap and opened the card. This one was in Jake’s strong hand: “Here’s something to make your days a little easier, at least in the car. If you’d let me, I’d like to help you find your way through the rest of your life, as well—Jake.”
“It’s about time,” Marlo said softly, thinking of the List lying on the dresser in her bedroom. “I’ve been waiting for you forever.”
She couldn’t—didn’t want to—say more. She closed her eyes as Jake’s loving kiss touched her lips.
An excellent kisser. Check.
Epilogue
Marlo turned slowly in front of the mirror, again checking her sophisticated, white silk dress. Its simplicity heightened the garment’s restrained elegance and was likely be the most restrained thing about the next few hours. Jake had insisted on a wedding celebration unlike any other, and with Lucy, Tildy and Franco’s help, Marlo thought they just might pull it off.
This wedding was definitely the most untraditional, the members of the Bridesmaid Club agreed, as they primped and preened in the women’s restroom facility in Hammond Stables’ indoor arena. Each attendant had chosen her own brightly colored garment, and Marlo felt as though she were surrounded by a cluster of beautiful flowers, each more rich and vibrant than the last.
“Ready, ladies?” Tildy poked her head into the room where the group had gathered. “Everybody is waiting.”
Obediently, they trooped into line and to the strains of Bach’s “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” exited one by one into the wide-open space of the riding arena filled with people seated in white wooden chairs. Marlo, hanging back, peeked through the door at the scene of her wedding. The fence surrounding the riding area was trimmed with sparkling white lights and miles of white netting. Lavish bouquets of flowers flanked both sides of the pastor’s podium, and a white carpet was being rolled down the aisle through the sandlike compound on the floor by two architects-turned-ushers from Jake’s firm. His friends in the wedding party were wearing tuxedos that were a little dusty at the hems, but no less elegant. Off to the side waited two restless white horses, hitched to a white carriage, waiting for their moment to carry the bride and groom to the reception hall.
She glanced at one section of chairs, those set aside for the families of children who rode in Jake’s program, and was gratified to see they were full. Many of the My Own Pony participants were in attendance. They were family to her and Jake now. Jake’s relatives, professional associates and friends had also come out in full force, as had almost everyone who had ever bought or sold a horse at Hammond Stables.
In the front row, her mother looked both pleased and confused. The arena was a far cry from where she’d expected her daughter to marry, and she didn’t take her eyes off Feather and Lovey, as the two horses meandered free in the arena. Not only beautiful and bomb-proof, the horses were also snoopy, and more than once had to be shooed away as they investigated the flowers and some of the guests. It wouldn’t seem right, Jake had said, to marry in the arena without any horses present, and Marlo had agreed. Still, she’d burst out laughing when she and Lucy drove to the ranch to find every horse in sight festooned with a wedding-white bridle with white carnations woven into the buckles.
Sabrina was with Randy, and the glow on the young man’s face was as bright as the one Marlo felt growing in her. A time to love… Then the only face she could see was Jake’s, suffused with happiness and anticipation.
As she stepped out and linked arms with her father to walk down the aisle, she glanced at her bouquet where she’d placed a folded piece of paper among the roses. The Cinderella List would walk down the aisle with her today, and then be tucked away until she had a daughter of her own. When her daughter had questions about how her mother and father had met, she would bring it out and tell her the story of how she got her prince.
Dear Reader,
I think horses are some of the most beautiful and amazing creatures created by God. Intelligent, graceful and sensitive, it is no wonder they can be used as a means of therapy for the disabled as well as teamwork training, teaching and coaching. The Greek name for horse is hippos and hippotherapy means treatment or therapy assisted by a horse. I am trained and certified in equine-assisted psychotherapy and teaching so it was a special delight to create a hero who shares an interest of mine. Jake Hammond is a handsome, successful architect but his real passion is Hammond Stables, his family’s business. As a successful horse breeder, Jake wants to see the stable facility used for something more—as a venue for disabled children and therapists to meet and work.
Marlo Mayfield becomes a volunteer at the facility. Since childhood, Marlo and her sister, Jenny, have played a game they refer to as the Cinderella List, which inventories all the desirable qualities of a true Prince Charming. She believes Prince Charming doesn’t exist—until she meets Jake Hammond.
I hope you’ll enjoy compassionate, easygoing Jake, bighearted, quirky Marlo and the h
orses (and food) that bring them together. I’d love to hear from you. Feel free to write to me c/o Steeple Hill, 233 Broadway, Suite 1001, New York, NY 10279.
Warm wishes,
QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
Marlo cheerfully accepts her imperfections, believing that because God made her (and He doesn’t make mistakes) that she is perfectly designed for the job God has for her. What is your attitude toward your own imperfections, limitations, foibles and idiosyncrasies?
Marlo persists in being pleasant to Sabrina and Randall even though they don’t necessarily reciprocate. Are there people in your life like that? How do you handle it? What is your motivation?
Consider the main characters. Who was your favorite? Why? Did you relate personally to any of them? Why?
After hearing the story of Cinderella as children, Marlo and Jenny play a game listing all the qualities they want in their own Prince Charmings. Have you ever made a mental list of the qualities you’d like in a mate? What are the most important to you?
Because of her own life experiences and disappointments, particularly concerning her first fiancé, Marlo made decisions that changed her behavior and ultimately the course of her life. What experiences have you had that have made you a different person?
Marlo is a free spirit who likes to have fun. Consider her beach party. Would you have a party similar to that one? Or are you more like Jake, who gives elegant, sophisticated parties? What would a party that expresses your personality be like?
Jake’s father is a bit of a curmudgeon but Jake is unfailingly polite and courteous to his dad, the epitome of the commandment to honor one’s father and mother. Have you spent much time around a parent or grandparent like Jake’s? How have you handled the situation? What works for you? What helps?