By KATIE GILBERT
Excerpt reprinted with permission from LOVE, CANTER, ACTION Katie Gilbert © 2025. Published Union Square & Co.
The horses know something’s wrong.
That probably explains why Ethel has four hooves fully planted on the ground, refusing to take the last step into her stall, no matter how hard Jess pulls at her lead.
I bite down a smile while I watch Jess struggle.
“Come on,” she says, her voice thick with irritation.
She thinks Ethel can’t hear it—can’t tell how much she hates her. But horses can sense irritation and anxiety. And today, there’s enough of that around here to power a small village.
“Move, you big. Stubborn. Monster.” Jess yanks the lead after each word, like she thinks if she pulls hard enough, her tiny five-foot frame can overpower the horse. Hell, even at five-eight I wouldn’t be able to do it. A grown man couldn’t force Ethel somewhere she didn’t want to be.
I let her pull for another thirty seconds, enough time to suffer for calling my favorite horse a monster. Then I walk over and hold my hand out, eyebrows raised.
Jess huffs—sending her long bangs flying up in the air then back down on her forehead—before she hands the lead over.
“Good luck. She’s stubborn as can be today. Swear she knows I have a date and wants to make sure I don’t have time for a shower.”
“She’s nervous. They all are.”
Jess rolls her eyes. “No she’s not, Nora. She doesn’t know we’re all out of a job or that the ranch will be empty next week. The only thing she knows is if she plants her feet long enough, she’ll get a sugar cube before going in for the night.”
Ethel’s ear flicks at the word sugar. I run my hand along her favorite spot, the one on her neck. She nickers and nudges my chest.
“Long day, huh?” I ask Ethel. She lets out a little sigh and nudges me again. “Why don’t we get you in your stall so you can have some rest?” I pull gently at her lead and she follows right along. I’m proud of myself for resisting the urge to stick my tongue out at Jess as she steps in front of us to open the stall door.
I get Ethel settled, slipping her a sugar cube from the front pocket of my jeans. Once her lead is off, I take my time brushing her, hoping that if I take long enough, Jess will leave. But despite the fact that she was whining about being late five minutes ago, she leans up against the side of the stall and watches me.
I’d already told Ethel goodbye this morning, mainly because I was only supposed to work until noon and thought I’d be gone by the time they took her in for the day. But I couldn’t bear to leave, knowing it’d be the last time I set foot on Shep Farm, the last time I got to help new riders in and out of the saddle, watch as they went from terrified and stiff to relaxed and amazed. If Jess wasn’t here, I’d say another, better goodbye. A longer one. But with her watching, I simply finish my brushing, rub Ethel once more on her neck, and whisper, “Be good.”
Jess follows me out, locking the door behind us. The horses sigh and whinny as we walk by, some sticking their heads over the stalls as we pass, hoping for a quick scratch or pet. I don’t stop, knowing full well if I do, I’ll spend another ten hours here.
Without speaking, we both walk straight to Mrs. Shep’s office. The AC hits us when we walk through the door and I realize how hot I’ve been all day. I wipe at the hair stuck to my forehead, and, with the dirt all over my hands, it’s probably more black now than dirty blonde.
Mrs. Shep looks over her cat-eye lenses at us. Those glasses and the chain attached to them–the kind that keep you from putting them down somewhere and losing them are the only things about her that look old. I mean, her skin is wrinkling around the eyes, and she’s slower than she was ten years ago when I met her for the first time. But she once mentioned she married her husband in 1980 something, which was a long time ago, so she has to be old. Still, she doesn’t have any trouble hopping up in the saddle or cleaning the stalls.
But she does have trouble paying to run the ranch, which is why she’s been selling it off little by little over the years. And even though she tried real hard to keep it from happening, she finally let her son sell off all the rest. He convinced her to leave Georgia and live in Nevada with him putting me out of a job and costing me the only place that had ever felt like home.
She smiles a little when she sees me, and I crumble at the thought that it may be the last time I get to see the lines that pop up around her mouth when she grins. Her eyes dart down to the desk she’s standing behind. She licks her fingers, combs through a stack of envelopes, hands one to me and then to Jess.
“Thanks,” Jess says. I wait for her to say more, to tell her how sorry she is that the ranch is gone, how much she’ll miss it. But she waves, sticks the envelope in her back pocket, and walks out the door we came in through.
I raise my eyebrows and look back at Mrs. Shep, who’s sporting a full-blown grin now.
“Devastated, isn’t she?” Mrs. Shep says. I snort.
“I found her trying to wrestle Ethel into the stalls. She was here almost a year, and I don’t think she learned a thing.”
“Well, we can’t all be the horse whisperer.”
“I wasn’t expecting her to take over for you one day,” I say, grabbing a candy from the bowl in the middle of the desk and sticking it in my front pocket for later. “But she could have at least learned all the horses’ names.”
Mrs. Shep shakes her head and slips her glasses off her nose. They fall to her chest. “Not everybody has the kind of passion you do.”
“What you really mean is-other people have a life outside of this place.”
She smiles. “Have a seat. There’s something I’ve been meaning to talk to you about.”
I settle into the leather chair that sits opposite her tiny walnut desk. It’s worn and faded in some places, but beautiful. She told me once that her husband made it for her, before he passed. I never got to meet him. By the time Mama and I showed up on Mrs. Shep’s doorstep, he had been gone for three years.
She rifles through a pile of papers on her desk, squinting a little at the words on each one before she remembers to slide her glasses back on. Once she comes to whatever she’s looking for, a small smile creeps back onto her face. She folds the paper. Her chair squeaks a little as she leans back in it.
“Now,” she says, settling into whatever it is we’re going to talk about. “You’re sure you haven’t changed your mind about going to college?”
I force myself not to roll my eyes. Mrs. Shep thinks that because my mama’s gone now, she has to take over the college talk. Mama never went, and she wanted me to be the first in our family to go. I never wanted anything more than what I had found here at the ranch-horses and fresh air and hard work. After Mama died, I realized there wasn’t anyone around to disappoint if I didn’t go. So, I won’t.
I had planned to spend the rest of my life here, helping Mrs. Shep. That plan, unfortunately, has gone to crap.
But I still know I don’t want to go to college. I just have to figure out exactly where I’m going next.
“I’m positive,” I say, making sure not even a single note of doubt creeps into my voice. I really don’t want to have to talk about this again after today.
I brace myself for an argument, but surprisingly, she nods.
“And your daddy’s all right with that?”
I bristle. “Daddy’s a strong word.”
That’s a lot milder than what I want to say-that the man who didn’t know I even existed a year ago would never really be a father to me. I don’t know how the courts found him after Mama died, when I was a ward of the state there for a hot minute, but they did. And both he and I have regretted it ever since.
Not as much as his wife, Cecelia, though.
They think I’m just taking a gap year, that I’ll see my friends leaving for college and change my mind.
I won’t.
“Well, he is your father, Nora. How does he feel about you not going to college?”
I shrug. “He’s okay with it.”
She stares at me until I give in.
“Fine,” I say. “He wants me to go. But I’m seventeen. Almost eighteen. The man has known me a total of five months. He doesn’t get a say. So I told him I was taking a gap year.”
“I think you’re more stubborn than the horses sometimes.”
“Thank you.”
She purses her lips and takes another deep breath in through her nose. “It wasn’t a compliment, Nora. But if you haven’t changed your mind about college, then that makes what I’m about to tell you a little less complicated.”
I lean back in my chair and watch as she fiddles with the folded paper in her hands. She’s looking up at the wall behind me, her lips pursed, small wrinkles appearing around the outside of them. “I’ve done something. And I think it’s a good thing-I hope you will, too. But you might not. And if you don’t, feel free to tell me to go to hell.”
“You’re headed to Nevada. That’s the same thing, isn’t it?”
Her eyes narrow at me, but I see the whisper of a smile playing around her lips.
“You know there’s a world outside of backwoods Georgia, don’t you?”
“Of course I do.”
She stares at me, the hint of a smile gone. “And would you ever be willing to leave Georgia? Or are you set on staying in this tiny town for the rest of your life?”
I freeze, breath caught.
Is she asking me to come with her?
“I-” My voice catches. Is that what I want? “Well …” I hesitate. “Yeah. I’ve thought about it.”
She relaxes, her shoulders dipping an inch. When she leans forward to hand me the paper she’s been toying with, I take it. But I don’t open it.
Is it a plane ticket? Apology tickets to Disney World?
Sorry I’m abandoning you here, but at least you can ride the teacups and throw up overpriced popcorn afterward.
“Good,” she says. “I’m glad to hear it. Because there’s a big world out there, and I think you need to see a little more of it.” She nods at the paper. “Open it.”
I still don’t, fiddling with it instead, trying to sort through my thoughts.
Do I want to go to Nevada? I look at Mrs. Shep’s face, trying to remember when she became more like a grandmother than an employer to me. My heart skips, because even though I love her, and appreciate everything she’s done for me since Mama died, I do not want to tag along with her as a charity case.
“Mrs. Shep-”
“Open it, Nora, before I die of old age.”
I grit my teeth. How much did she pay for this ticket? Maybe it’ll have the price on it and I can reimburse her. My bank account is embarrassingly low after I had to repair Mama’s old, half-rusted pickup last month, the only thing she had left to give me when she died. But I can probably scrape together enough-
My mind stalls when I finally open it and read the words embossed on the top of the page. There’s no barcode, no destination or departure city. No gate number or price, because it’s not a plane ticket at all. It’s-
“What is this?”
I read the words EQUINE STUDIES DIRECT PATH PROGRAM, BILLINGS, MONTANA on the top of the page over and over again, like they’ll tell
me something new. I skip down to the first paragraph, the words We are pleased to accept you jumping out at me, and I fold the paper in on itself again without reading any more.
“I don’t want to go to college,” I say reflexively. But the words Equine Studies are stuck in my head, begging me to open the paper again and see what else it says.
Mrs. Shep holds her hands up. “Calm down. It’s not a college.”
“Then what is it?”
“It’s a program, out in Billings.”
“A program?” I ask, and even I can hear the skepticism lacing my voice.
“Yes, a program. It’s a one-year advanced course on how to care for horses. How to break them, how to deal with small injuries, that kind of thing. It is not college,” she says, eyebrows raised, waiting for me to interrupt. I don’t, so she goes on. “It’s not in a classroom. It’s hard work and hands-on and all outside. I know that’s important to you.”
I thumb the paper again, and I want to read the whole thing so badly I can barely stand it. But I don’t.
Not yet.
“I didn’t apply for this.”
“I know,” she says, steepling her fingers and looking down at the top of her desk. “I did it for you.”
I’m speechless for the space of three breaths.
“Why?”
Her eyes travel my face before she answers. “I know you thought you’d be working here forever. I thought so, too. When things started to go downhill, when the payments got harder and harder to make, I held off on selling this part of the ranch as long as I could.” She sighs. “Once I saw the truth, that this place was too big and too expensive for me to keep on forever, I started looking for a contingency plan for you. This was what I found.”
I meet her gaze, hearing what she doesn’t say. That she’s worried about what might happen to me after she’s gone. That she wishes it didn’t have to be this way.
That she loves me.
“It’s a very prestigious program,” she says, leaning forward, her arms on the desk. “I wasn’t sure my recommendation would be enough, so I didn’t want to say anything. You were wait-listed at first.” She gestures at the paper. “But someone dropped out, and you were next on the list. Figured it was high time to let you know.”
I push at the feeling that’s welling in me, one that I haven’t felt in so long I almost don’t recognize it. Hope. But hope is dangerous as hell-it builds you up and takes you higher and higher. Then it disappears, nowhere to be found as you fall and fall with nothing there to catch you.
The paper is heavy, expensive, and opens stiffly as I unfold it once again, a large crease running down the middle. There’s a congratulations. A start date. An address. Notes about the housing on-site.
And a price.
I almost choke.
“I can’t,” I say, my voice coming out strangled. “This is-” I fold the paper and push it back toward her. “There’s no way.”
She puts her hand down on the paper and pushes it back. “I’ve already paid half of it. Called and put down a deposit when the letter came in.”
“You what?” I all but shout. “How? Where did you find the money?”
“I finally sold Ethel.”
“And instead of using the money on something useful, like moving across the country, you spend it on me?”
“She was your horse as much as mine,” Mrs. Shep says, waving me off. “You and I both know you spent more time raising her than I did. You were there when she was born. And I’ve got enough money to be going on with.” I try to interrupt, but she beats me to it. “Just because I don’t have enough to run a ranch doesn’t mean I don’t have enough to live off of. Now, do you want to go or not?”
I stare her down, prepared to kick up a fuss until she calls and begs for the money back.
But after a second, I can see clear as day that she’s made up her mind and there’s no talking her out of it. So, I sit back, letting the fight drain out of me.
I think for a minute before I answer her. No, I don’t want to go to college. But this isn’t college. It’s spending all day outside with horses, learning how to care for them. It’s training that will make me invaluable on a ranch somewhere else, somewhere far away from my father and Cecelia.
That last thought makes my decision for me. I swallow once before answering.
“Yes. I want to go.”
She smiles, pleased with herself and my answer. “Good.”
“But there’s no way I can pay for the rest of this. Not by the start date they put on the letter. And how am I supposed to get myself out to Montana? And—”
“That’s the second thing I wanted to talk to you about.”
“I’m not taking any more of your money.”
“I don’t have any more to give. If I did, I would pay for it today. But I can’t.” She looks me over before going on. “I assume your daddy can’t help?”
“Can’t or won’t?” I ask, but before she answers, I go on. “It doesn’t matter. I wouldn’t take his money, either. It’s bad enough having to live with him.” The perils of having a late summer birthday-I had to wait until I was eighteen to move out, according to the state.
“Well, I think I’ve got a solution to that, too. You know how they filmed that TV series here a few years back? The one about the vampires? Well, there’s another crew coming in, for a movie this time. A man in a suit showed up with a check and took all the horses we had left, including Ethel. Overpaid, if you ask me. But I wasn’t going to tell him that.”
“Okay,” I say.
“They need someone to wrangle horses on set. Asked if I knew anybody.” It takes me a second before I realize what she’s saying.
“I don’t know anything about working on a movie set,” I say. “I’m sure there’s someone more qualified out there.”
“More qualified to work with Ethel? Who else knows when she’s irritated or upset or about to buck off a rider who hasn’t done more than watch somebody mount a horse on television?”
“I guess not,” I say reluctantly.
“You could say I’m right, you know. It wouldn’t kill you.”
I smile. “It might.”
She rolls her eyes. “You should take the job, Nora. It’s a big budget film. They’re paying enough to cover the rest of your tuition.”
My breath catches. “That’s …”
‘’A lot of money,” she finishes for me.
“A lot.”
“I’ll email you the location and time. I’ve got it around here somewhere.” Someone knocks on her office door. “Be with you in a minute,” she hollers, then looks back at me. I stand as she walks around her desk, mortified to feel tears creeping at the corners of my eyes.
“Don’t,” Mrs. Shep says, her calloused hands rubbing up and down my arms. I look up at the ceiling to keep the tears from falling, a trick I learned after Mama died. The tears would come out of nowhere, then, and I had to find a way to keep from breaking down ten times a day at work. It helps. A little.
When I look back at Mrs. Shep, she’s only a little blurred around the edges. I blink away the few rogue tears, and she’s clear again.
“Take the job,” she says, her face serious and concerned. “Take the job, take the money, and get out of here. Your mama would want more for you than this town. I want more for you than this town. Don’t make me spend my golden years floating around a pool worrying over you.”
I nod once.
“So you’ll take the job? And the spot in Montana?”
“Yeah. I’ll take it.”
She smiles. It’s happy and sad and excited all at once. “Good.”
“Thank you,” I say. My voice trembles, making it clear that I’m about a second away from crying, again. “For doing all of this. Arranging the spot and paying for so much of it. The job. All of it.” I think of all the things I want to say: that I love her, that she’s the only thing close to family I have left, that she saved me from floundering around, looking for somewhere to be other than in a home that suffocates me more each day. But before I can find the words to say, someone knocks on her office door again.
She pulls me into a fierce embrace. I tense when her arms wrap around me, but after a breath, I hug her back. When Mama and I showed up here, Mrs. Shep didn’t just give us jobs, she gave us a home. We lived in one of the guest suites for free, no privacy and no space, but a roof over our heads and a safe place to stay. She was like family, and I’m not sure where I’d be without her.
“Be good,” she says. “Don’t embarrass me out there.”
“No promises,” I say, pulling away and smiling. I follow her out of the office and nod at Charles, one of the ranch hands. Then I’m outside again in the scorching Georgia sun, and when the heat hits me like a ton of sun-soaked bricks, so does one question:
What did I just agree to?
