More Than Words Volume 4 Read online

  Dear Reader,

  At Harlequin we are proud of our long tradition of supporting causes that are of concern to women. The Harlequin More Than Words program, our primary philanthropic initiative, is dedicated to celebrating and rewarding ordinary women who make extraordinary contributions to their community. Each year we ask our readers to submit nominations for the Harlequin More Than Words award, from which we select five very deserving recipients.

  We are pleased to present our five 2008 award recipients to you in this, our annual More Than Words anthology. These real-life heroines provide great comfort to those they help. And we hope that by sharing their stories with you, we will give you comfort in knowing that these women are working so hard for those who need it most. With the help of some of our most acclaimed authors—Linda Lael Miller, Sherryl Woods, Curtiss Ann Matlock, Jennifer Archer and Kathleen O’Brien—we are pleased to publish these five inspiring stories. These authors have donated their time and creativity to this project, and all proceeds will be reinvested in the Harlequin More Than Words program, further supporting causes that are of concern to women.

  I hope you enjoy this book as much as we enjoy publishing it! The women highlighted in these pages, and the fictional novellas penned by our authors, are truly inspirational.

  Please visit www.HarlequinMoreThanWords.com for more information, or to submit a nomination for next year’s book.

  Sincerely,

  Donna Hayes

  Publisher and CEO

  Harlequin Enterprises

  More Than Words

  VOLUME 4

  LINDA LAEL MILLER

  SHERRYL WOODS

  CURTISS ANN MATLOCK

  JENNIFER ARCHER

  KATHLEEN O’BRIEN

  TORONTO • NEW YORK • LONDON

  AMSTERDAM • PARIS • SYDNEY • HAMBURG

  STOCKHOLM • ATHENS • TOKYO • MILAN • MADRID

  PRAGUE • WARSAW • BUDAPEST • AUCKLAND

  CONTENTS

  QUEEN OF THE RODEO

  Linda Lael Miller

  Inspired by Jeanne Greenberg

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  BLACK TIE AND PROMISES

  Sherryl Woods

  Inspired by Ruth Renwick

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  PLACE IN THIS WORLD

  by Curtiss Ann Matlock

  Inspired by Dr. Ricki Robinson

  PART ONE

  PART TWO

  PART THREE

  EPILOGUE

  HANNAH’S HUGS

  by Jennifer Archer

  Inspired by Aviva Presser

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  STEP BY STEP

  by Kathleen O’Brien

  Inspired by Sally Hanna-Schaefer

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Jeanne Greenberg

  SARI Therapeutic Riding

  Parents faced with the challenge of caring for a child with a physical, cognitive, social or emotional disability such as Down syndrome or autism know all too well the engulfing feelings of helplessness and inadequacy that often threaten family life. Without help and support, the task they face can be frustrating and overwhelmingly lonely.

  For forty-seven years—more than half her life—Jeanne Greenberg has worked to turn a burden into a blessing, giving both help and hope to families who, in her words, “have been blessed with special-needs children.”

  When her daughter Sari was born with Down syndrome in 1959, there were few facilities for so-called “handicapped” children, and Jeanne was advised to put Sari into foster care. Five agonizing months later, Jeanne, who had four other children at home, got her back. When Sari was three, Jeanne established a nursery school in her southwestern Ontario community to help Sari integrate with other children with special needs. She also began visiting and counseling parents in hospital following the birth of a child with Down syndrome.

  The Greenberg family lost their beloved Sari when she was only fifteen, but even in her sorrow, Jeanne already knew that the rest of her own life would be devoted to helping families like hers. Jeanne, her husband and their four other children wanted a special way to honor Sari. It took a few years to give shape and substance to that desire, but in 1978 the nonprofit organization SARI (Special Ability Riding Institute, now known as SARI Therapeutic Riding) was set up in Sari’s memory. The idea for it had come from Sari’s enjoyment of riding lessons with one of her siblings on the farm where the family was then living. The donation of the five-acre farm to make the land and buildings available for the riding program was an important step in putting the dream into action.

  They started with the two horses their children had used; today, the barn houses up to thirteen. In 1980 an indoor heated arena was built with community and government lottery support, providing needed office and classroom space and a lounge/viewing area for parents and visitors. Classes, formerly held in the barn and outside, could now be held year-round.

  The program consists of three sessions per year—each accommodating seventy children, some with Down syndrome, autism and cerebral palsy, others with disabilities or hearing or sight impairment—and a summer camp that siblings can also attend, giving them the opportunity not only to participate, but to witness and experience firsthand their sibling’s accomplishments. In addition to riding lessons, there are opportunities to groom horses or help with tack.

  Classes—limited to four riders—are held every afternoon and evening and all day Saturday. Stretching exercises are part of the therapy—reaching toward a horse’s ears, for example. One mother of a nine-year-old Down syndrome child says just learning to hold the reins was a big challenge for her daughter. “She couldn’t do that at first. Now she steers, trots, and posts. She has made gains socially and emotionally, too. It’s such a happy place.”

  Learning letters of the alphabet is often an integral part of the exercise, as well as picture and color recognition (“Stop your horse at red”). An army of volunteers assist—some 150 each week. Usually three people are needed just to help a single child, one leading the horse and the other two walking on each side.

  Instruction is adapted to meet individual needs. Jeanne supported an educator, and past executive director, in developing the Achievement Rainbow Program (now distributed to therapeutic riding stables all over the world), a curriculum that allows the children to have fun learning while achieving therapeutic goals associated with the rainbow colors.

  SARI would be a remarkable accomplishment by any measure, but Jeanne, now 84, remains a dedicated board member and a fund-raiser who works tirelessly to help raise the nearly $300,000 a year that it costs to operate SARI Therapeutic Riding. Four major fund-raising events are held each year, including a night at the theater in March (Jeanne invariably has all the tickets sold by Christmas, says SARI’s executive director), and the popular Bowling for Ponies event. Through Jeanne’s extensive contacts, support comes fr
om corporations, associations and community clubs, as well as individuals. “When I phone someone now, sometimes they don’t even say hello, just ‘What can I do for you?’” she laughs.

  Clearly, an enterprise on this scale involves crucial health and safety issues. In the eighties, Jeanne helped form two associate bodies: the Canadian Therapeutic Riding Association (CanTRA), responsible for insurance matters and a certification program for instructors, and the Ontario Therapeutic Riding Association (OnTRA), which provides networking, community education and fund-raising support for SARI and other therapeutic-riding facilities in Ontario.

  Jeanne is now so deeply involved with SARI that she can’t imagine life without it. “I guess I’ll have to turn over the reins at some point,” she says, “but it’s not easy.” Then she adds, in classic understatement, “Not that others couldn’t do it, but perhaps they don’t have my drive!” Indeed. The mere contemplation of her activities and energy would floor most people half her age. And she’s not done yet. She looks forward to SARI’s thirtieth-anniversary celebrations in June 2008, by which time, she reveals, the barn is to come down and the arena extended. She is already engaged in a campaign to raise the million dollars these plans will cost.

  For Jeanne, the work is energizing—and endlessly rewarding. She is buoyed by the children’s achievements, and the miracles that occasionally occur: One child whose parents were told he would never walk is now walking, after just two years at SARI. And a former student, wheelchair-bound and now in his thirties, told Jeanne he has never forgotten the thrill, when first placed on a horse, of being able to look down at people instead of always seeing them looking down at him. Memories of Sari, and of children like these, Jeanne says, have enriched her life beyond measure.

  For more information, visit www.sari.ca or write SARI Therapeutic Riding, 12659 Medway Road, R.R. #l, Arva, Ontario, Canada N0M lC0.

  LINDA LAEL MILLER

  QUEEN OF THE RODEO

  LINDA LAEL MILLER

  The daughter of a town marshal, Linda Lael Miller is a New York Times bestselling author of more than sixty historical and contemporary novels that reflect her love of the West. Raised in Northport, Washington, the self-confessed “barn goddess” now lives in Spokane, Washington. Her most recent New York Times bestsellers include McKettrick’s Luck, McKettrick’s Pride, McKettrick’s Heart and The Man from Stone Creek. Dedicated to helping others, Linda personally finances her Linda Lael Miller Scholarships for Women, awarded annually to women seeking to improve their lot in life through education. More information about Linda, her novels and her scholarships is available at www.lindalaelmiller.com. She also loves to hear from readers by mail at P.O.Box 19461, Spokane, WA 99219.

  DEDICATION

  To Jeanne and Syd Greenberg,

  with the greatest of admiration

  CHAPTER

  ONE

  The old horse stepped through a shimmering curtain of angled rain, stately as a unicorn for all its diminutive size, muddy hide, overgrown hooves, tangled mane and too-prominent ribs.

  Callie Dorset stood in front of her tilted rural mailbox, one of a row of them jutting from the ground like crooked teeth, a sheaf of bills and flyers clasped in one hand. She stared, momentarily transfixed, heedless of the downpour.

  Cherokee?

  It couldn’t be. Her childhood pony had been sold off years ago, along with most of the family ranch. Taken somewhere far away, in a gleaming horse trailer from an auction house, never to return.

  And yet here he was.

  Callie stuck the mail back into the box, slogged down one side of the grassy ditch separating her from the horse and up the other, then stood close to the rusty barbed-wire fence, spellbound.

  “Cherokee?” she said, aloud this time, the name barely audible over the fire-sound of the relentless spring rain.

  He nickered, nuzzled her shoulder.

  Callie felt almost faint, stricken with a hopeless joy. Her hand shook as she reached out to caress his soft, pink-spotted nose.

  She repeated his name, wonderstruck.

  Blinked a couple of times, in case she was seeing things.

  Somehow, he had found his way back.

  But how?

  Behind her, snug in the ancient Blazer, Callie’s seven-year-old daughter, Serena, rolled down the passenger-side window. “Mom!” she shouted, in her sometimes slurred, always exuberant voice. “You’re getting wet!”

  Callie turned, drenched with rain and tears, and smiled. Nodded. “Shut the window,” she called back. “You’ll catch cold.”

  Serena’s round face clouded with concern. Her exotic, slanted eyes widened. “Doesn’t that horse have a house to live in?” she asked, scanning the pasture, which was empty except for a few gnarled apple trees, remnants of an orchard planted so long ago that only ghosts could recall it as it had once been, green-leaved and flourishing with fruit. An old claw-footed bathtub served as a water trough, and someone had dumped a bale of hay nearby.

  “Serena,” Callie said, trying to sound stern and not fooling the child for a moment.

  Serena closed the window, but she watched from behind the silvery sheen of steam and water droplets, troubled.

  Callie turned back to Cherokee. Stroked his coarse forelock, trying to find it within herself to leave him—again—here in the cold gloom of an ordinary afternoon, and failing utterly.

  But she had to do it.

  She had to take Serena home. Start supper. Try to figure out how to pay all those bills, lying limp and soggy in the mailbox.

  As if he understood her dilemma, Cherokee nudged her once more in the shoulder, then turned and plodded slowly away to stand, distant, hide steaming with moisture, under one of the lonely apple trees.

  Callie ran the sleeve of her denim jacket across her face and oriented herself to Serena, her North Star. She retrieved the bills and the flyers from the mailbox, sniffling, and got behind the wheel of the Blazer, cranking up the heat.

  “You’re wet, Mom,” Serena reiterated sagely, visibly relaxing now that Callie was back in the car.

  Callie tried to smile, wanting to reassure the child, but fell short. She’d seen so much loss in her thirty-one years—her parents, most of the homestead, Denny—and Cherokee. There were times when it was impossible to pretend it didn’t matter, all that sorrow, even for Serena’s sake.

  Callie looked back once more, knowing she shouldn’t, and saw her old friend watching her. She bit her lower lip, then shoved the Blazer into gear and made a wide turn in the mud of the road, headed for home.

  The house was small, its shingles gray, its porch slanting a little to one side, like the mailbox she’d just left. The roof needed patching, and the yard was overgrown, but the windows glowed with warm welcome, because Callie had left the lights on when she drove to town to pick Serena up after school. It was an extravagance, burning electricity that way, but she was glad she’d done it.

  Inside, she tossed the mail onto the antique table beside the front door and peeled off her wet jacket. Though considerably drier than Callie, Serena shook herself like a dog just climbing out of a lake, laughing.

  She was such a happy child, in spite of so many things.

  “Cocoa!” Serena crowed. “Let’s have cocoa, with marshmallows!”

  “Good idea,” Callie agreed, bending to kiss the top of her daughter’s head. Serena’s hair was chestnut-brown, just like Denny’s had been. She had his green eyes, too. “Just let me change.”

  She helped Serena out of her pink nylon coat, hung it on the peg next to the jean jacket.

  Five minutes later, wearing slippers and a bathrobe, her blond, chin-length hair toweled into disarray comical enough to make her daughter point and laugh, Callie met Serena in the tiny kitchen at the back. Serena had already got the milk out of the refrigerator, taken the marshmallows from a pantry shelf and placed two mugs carefully on the table.

  “Who does he belong to?” Serena asked.

  Callie, busy measuring cocoa powder in
to a saucepan, stopped, turned to look at her only child, now sitting in her usual chair at the table, legs swinging.

  “The horse,” Serena clarified.

  Callie’s throat thickened painfully. “The Martins, I guess,” she said. She didn’t know her neighbors well; they were renters, according to the local grapevine, and not the sort to mix. When they’d moved in a few months ago, at the tail end of a long, ragged winter, Callie had made a chicken casserole, and she and Serena had gone over to welcome them, wending their way between U-Haul trucks to knock at the front door. No one had answered, and Serena, hoping for a playmate her own age, had been gravely disappointed.

  “He’s lonesome,” Serena said sadly.

  Callie’s eyes burned. She was standing in a warm kitchen, with her daughter, the person she loved most in all the world, but her heart was still out there in the rain, under the dripping limbs of an apple tree. How had Cherokee come to belong to those people? What hard, winding, convoluted road had led him back, so close, but not-quite-home? He must have arrived recently, or she’d have seen him as she drove to town.

  She couldn’t speak, so she merely nodded, acknowledging Serena’s remark, and went back to her cocoa-making. After the hot chocolate came supper, the beans-and-franks combo Serena loved, and “homework.” Serena attended a special education program, with only six other children at the local elementary school. Two, including Serena, had Down syndrome; the others were mildly autistic. Callie was grateful for the program and the people who ran it, under-funded though it was. It gave Serena a place to go, something to be part of, in the larger world, and made it possible for Callie to earn a living.