Chapter 11

Cassandra sees Ty walk in through the back door of the clinic and says, "Hey, Ty...I expected you back earlier. I guess the foaling over at the Foster's was more of a problem than thought?"

"It was a little difficult, but the mare and her foal are doing fine now. Actually, I'm late because I went by that ranch again."

"You mean the one where you picked up the abandoned horse?"

"Yeah...I've been by there several times and never saw a for sale sign, then today it had a sold sign on it. I wasn't aware it was for sale. It's been bugging me that someone would just abandon a horse like that, so today I decided to go down to city hall and check the records to see if I could find out who use to own it."

"And what did you find out, Sherlock?"

No, luck. I mean, I did find out who use to own it, but the previous owners name is pretty common, so it would be too time consuming to try to locate them. The strange thing is though that I found out that the property was a foreclosure sale."

"What's strange about that? It seems to happen often around here."

"I thought when a bank forecloses they put the property up for auction, but in this case it looked like the bank turned around and immediately sold it to a development company."

"I suppose that happens sometimes when a buyer is willing to payoff the debt by offering whatever the bank assumes it will make at an auction. The bank probably thought it was faster and easier than going through the trouble."

"Yeah...I guess you're right."

"So, how many times are you going over to Heartland this week?"

"What do you mean?"

"I just figured the more time you spend there then the harder it'll be for you to take that job in Vancouver."

"That has nothing to with it, Cass, besides I might still take that job."

"Might?...that doesn't sound as sure as you made it sound the last time you mentioned it."

"It doesn't mean anything...anyway, since you asked, I'll be going over there later this week to pick up Georgie, so she can help out here."

"Remember...I'm not baby sitting."

"Yeah...I know. Listen, I'm going to have lunch at Maggie's. Can I get you anything while I'm out?"

"Any idea what their Monday lunch special is?"

"No...but I can call and let you know."

"Don''t bother...I'll have a grilled chicken club sandwich and hold the tomatoes."

"Okay...you got it.

...

Tim pulls up to the ranch towing his Big River horse trailer. Walking into the house, he finds Geogie making sandwiches. "Hey, where's everyone else?"

"Hi...Jack is up at the north field, Lou is at the Dude ranch, and Amy is in town."

"Lisa and Katie?"

"Lisa went back to Fairfield and Katie is playing in her room. I'm making us some sandwiches for lunch. Would you like one?"

"Sure...thank you. Can you make it to go?"

"Sure no problem. What do you want in it?"

"Same as yours. I'll be back in a bit. I have to load those horses Amy wants to rehome into my trailer."

"Why? Amy didn't say anything about it and I thought she was going to rehome them herself. Your not taking all three are you because she's still working with one."

"Amy knows about it and I'm only taking two. Jesse found a home for them."

"Are you sure Amy knows about it?"

"Don't worry...she's fine with it. I'll be back in a little while for the sandwich...Okay?"

"Sure..."

...

Ty is sitting at the counter in Maggie's, eating his lunch, when Amy walks up beside him. "Hey...you. I didn't expect to see you here."

Before taking another bite, Ty sets down his mostly eaten burger and responds with a grin. "Hi Amy."

"Mind if I join you?"

"Sure...have a seat. So...what brings you into town?"

"Jesse called this morning and asked me to meet him here. Remember the other night when he asked me to look at the new plans he had drawn up? Well, he's going to bring them by to show me so I can give him my opinion. I couldn't very well say no since I told him I would look at them."

Amy pauses to sigh, "I wish dad hadn't brought up the whole thing...I haven't spoken to him since. I think he's avoiding me now."

"So, I guess then that you're still thinking about going to work for Jesse."

"About that..."

Jesse walks up to the counter next to Amy and suddenly interrupts before Amy can finish, "Borden...what are you doing here?"

Trying not to appear fazed by Jesse's rude interruption, Ty looks around the diner before answering, "This is the only diner in town, Jesse. Its lunchtime and I'm eating lunch like everyone else here."

"Well, Amy and I have some business to discuss, so if you don't mind..."

"No...not at all. Don't let me stop you...go ahead and have a seat. I'm almost finished here anyway and just waiting now for a take-out order for Cassandra."

During this, Amy knows what Ty is doing and tries not to smile.

"C'mon Amy...I see an empty table over there." Holding up a long cardboard tube, he continues, "I think you're really going to like what I have to show you."

Amy turns to Ty and says, "Sorry, but I have to get this out of the way."

"No problem...Go ahead. I need to get back to the clinic pretty soon anyway."

Amy joins Jesse at a table, seating herself so she can easily see Ty at the counter. Jesse asks her if she's hungry, wanting to know if he should order something for her. She declines, stating that she grabbed something to eat at the house before she left. She glances over at Ty occasionally while Jesse is talking, wishing that Jesse hadn't shown up when he did, so she could have told Ty that she has no intention of accepting Jesse's job offer.

With Jesse's architectural drawings laid out on the table in front of her, he explains, "So you see, Amy, this will be a state of the art facility. I did some checking and there's nothing like this in the area. It'll be a gold mine."

"That's great, Jesse...but..."

"Hold on. Before you say anything, let me finish. I know you want to work at Heartland, so I gave it some thought and decided to change my offer to accommodate that. Instead of working for me, how about working for yourself. We can be partners in this part of the expansion. You'll be your own boss, setting your own hours, and have your own staff. You'll still have time to continue working with horses at Heartland just as you've wanted all along.

Intrigued by the offer, she replies, "Jesse, there's no way I can afford to invest in something like this."

"So, I have your interest then. I'm glad to hear that. I'll make you a deal...I'll cover your investment until you can pay me back with your part of the profits. In the meantime, you'll also have the freedom to use the facility for the horses you work with."

"I don't know. It does sound tempting, but..."

"C'mon Amy...this is a great opportunity for you and you'll still be able to do what you're doing now. Just to show you how great an arrangement this can be, I even found homes for two of your rescue horses."

"You did?"

"Yeah, like I told you the other night...I managed to find a couple of clients who would be more than happy to adopt them. As a matter of fact, I think Tim is picking up the horses right now."

"He is? Without checking with me first?"

"He knows what great homes they'll be going to, so he didn't think you would mind."

"Well, as long as they're going to good homes, I guess it's alright. It'll give me more time to work with the one I got from Ty. I just wish dad had spoken to me first."

"So, do we have a deal then? You know there's no one else out there who can run this part of the operation as well as you."

"Like I said, it does sound tempting, but I still need to think about it."

"I would appreciate it if you didn't take too long. We've already started construction on the expansion based on the first set of plans and I need an answer, so they can incorporate any changes you want. Once you've agreed, I will need you to sign off on the additional plans so everything is to your specification."

"How much time do I have?"

"As much as you need, but if you want to make sure everything is to your liking then I'll need to know very soon. Tell you what, how about I leave this copy of the plans with you, so you can look it over some more. Feel free to make whatever notes on it you wish and then get back to me next week."

"Thank you..I'll do that, but I can't make any promises right now. I still have to sleep on it."

"That's fine. I'm sure once you've looked them over again and given it more thought, you'll realize it's a great opportunity and something you'll definately want to do."

Glancing again over at the counter, Amy notices that Ty has already left. She regrets paying so much attention to what Jesse was telling her that she missed the opportunity to at least acknowledge him with a smile as he left.

...

Later that afternoon, Ty is sitting in the office looking over his schedule for the rest of the week when Cassandra tells him that Jesse Stanton is there to see him. He tells her to let him in and thinks to himself, "This should be interesting...I wonder what that jerk wants?...I'm sure it has something to do with Amy."

Jesse walks in and Ty offers him a seat. "What can I do for you, Jesse."

Setting himself down in chair across from Ty, he answers, "I thought I'd come by and talk to you about Amy."

"Okay...what's up?"

"I know you're only here for a couple more weeks and I would appreciate it if during that time you wouldn't discourage Amy from joining up with me at Briar Ridge. You see, I've made her a new offer...one that she's now seriously considering. She knows it's a good deal for her, she said so, and probably would have said yes right on the spot if not for the fact that you're here. She even asked if she could hold onto the plans for awhile so she could look them over more closely and make a few notes about what she wants. There's no doubt in my mind that once you leave she'll come on board.

Listen, Ty...I care about what happens to Amy and I think the less you see of her while you're here then the easier it'll be for her once you're gone."

"What are you saying, Jesse?"

"I'm saying that Amy needs to look forward. She knows she has an amazing career waiting for her at Briar Ridge and you being here is distracting her from making the commitment right now that's best for her future. I heard what happened after you left last time and she doesn't deserve to have that happen to her again."

"I understand that and I have no desire to repeat the past."

"Good...we have an understanding then."

"I suppose we do. I'm not here to interfere in any decision Amy needs to make. We're friends and that's all, but even though we're friends, if she asks for my opinion, I can assure you that I have no intention to sway her one way or the other. As far as I'm concerned, she's on her own when it comes to what she wants to do."

"I'm glad to hear that."

Jesse is about to get up and leave, but stops when Ty says pointedly, "One more thing...since Amy and I are friends, its up to us to decide how much we see of each other...Don't forget that Amy was once your girlfriend too and you were a jerk in the way you treated her. She doesn't deserve to be treated like that again. So, do we have an understanding?"

While Ty was talking, Jesse shift uncomfortably in his seat. He begrudgingly answers briefly, "Yeah."

Wanting to put an end to the conversation, Ty tells him, "Good...Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to get back to work."

"What an ass!" Ty thinks as Jesse walks out of the office. Sitting back in his chair, he wonders, "How can Amy still let guys like that roll right over her..."

A few moments later, Cassandra appears in the doorway and ask, "What was that all about?"

"Nothing really. Why do you ask?"

"Well, he brushed right past me without saying a word and stormed out the door."

"I'm not surprised...he was just letting me know how big a jerk he is."

...

Amy's sitting in the barn office with Jesse's architectural plans laid out on the desk in front of her. She had looked them over again and again, but found it difficult to concentrate with something else occupying her thoughts. Lou walks in and, seeing the drawings spread across the top of the desk, she asks, "I suppose those are the plans Jesse spoke about?"

"Yeah...they are. Jesse gave them to me to look over."

"I thought you were going to tell him you weren't interested in the job?"

"I was, but then he changed his offer..."

Amy explains the offer to Lou, adding, "It is a very good offer and he made it sound tempting. Actually, it's difficult to turn down and I was thinking that when he told me."

"So, what are you going to do?"

"First of all, now I'm really going to let dad have it! You know what he did?...He picked up two of the horses I was going to rehome and took them over to Briar Ridge."

"I know...Georgie told me."

"He must have known I was meeting with Jesse and took advantage of the opportunity to take them while I wasn't here. He knew I wanted to rehome them myself, but he did it anyway. The only reason I'm not driving over there right now and bringing them back is because Jesse told me that he already found good homes for both of them."

"That's dad for you...you can tell him something a thousand times right to his face, but he's still going to do what he wants."

"I'm tired of him telling me what I should and shouldn't do. He went too far this time. I'm not going to let him get away with it any longer and I'm going to make sure he knows that!"

"You're right...it's long overdue. I've mentioned it to him several times in the past, but he just brushes it off like he doesn't know what I'm talking about." Wanting to bring the conversation back to what Amy is going to decide about Jesse, Lou asks, "So...what about Jesse's offer? Are you going to think about it some more?"

Amy rolls up the plans and says, "No...there's nothing more to think about. I've made up my mind. I'm turning him down. Its a very good idea and I'm sure it'll be successful, but he doesn't need me to run it and its not what I want to do."

"What made you decide that?...was it the job, Jesse, or Ty?"

"The job is great and Jesse made it sound like we could work well together, although Ashley warned me not to trust him."

"Ashley told you not to trust him? Why?"

"I guess she's feeling some animosity towards Jesse because he was chosen to run Briar Ridge instead of her. Anyway, I was sitting here thinking about Ty and something that happened, but it's more about what happened. He convinced me that I can still fix a horse and I know I can now with a little more time. That's what I want to do...the same thing I did before. I don't want to be just another horse trainer."

"I'm glad you said that and I think you made the right decision. I was hoping you made it for the right reason and it sounds like you have, but you kinda lost me. So, how was it that Ty was able to convince you that you can still fix a horse? What happened?"

Amy tells her about what Victor Whitetail had written, along with what Ty had told her, and what happened when he placed his hand on hers. She goes on, explaining, "...They both told me basically the same thing, but when Ty explained it I realized it was for fixing two different things. I don't think Ty knew he was doing that, but it helped me understand what needed I needed to do."

"I'm guessing you mean when he placed his hand on yours?"

"I know it sounds weird, but yes. Something happened, I don't know what...it's hard to explain. It was almost like when I went to see Victor that time and I felt something in me shift. This time it was a little different though and afterwards I began thinking..."

...

The next day, at the rodeo grounds, Ty runs into Caleb. "Hey..Caleb."

"Ty...what brings you by?"

"I was vaccinating a couple of horses. Listen, since your here, I have a question."

"Sure...What is it?"

"Last night I remembered something you mentioned to me and I was wondering if you ever heard of Calgary Investment and Developement Company?"

Caleb pauses for a moment in thought before answering, "No, I don't think I have. Why do you ask?"

"It's nothing I guess...just curious..."

...

To be continued...