Several hours later, when they reached the driveway to her property, there was moment's confusion over whether they were at the right place.

"I don't remember there being a gate here," Eli was the first to point out.

They'd been there only once. She looked around.

"No," she said, "this is the right place. And there wasn't a gate here last time."

"You spoke with a lawyer, right?"

"I even had him send out a surveyor. This is the right driveway, and I have the right to use it."

The gate was padlocked. She looked around again. The ground was somewhat uneven on either side of the gate, but there was no fence over which they needed to drive. It took her a few seconds to notice Eli was out of his seat. Then there was a clunking of metal at the rear of his truck. Looking back, she saw him walking again toward the front of the vehicle with some sort of long-handled tool in his hands. It took him but a moment to clip the lock and open the gate. After he did, he pulled another padlock from his back pocket and attached it to the clasp on the open gate. When he returned to his seat, he handed her a ring with four shiny new keys.

"Should we have done that?" she asked as he put the truck into gear.

"You have an easement, don't you?"

"Yeah, but ...."

"I think your new neighbor is being a dick."

"Maybe I should call Mrs. Munson," she said reluctantly. The nice woman had taken her decision not to sell the land philosophically, despite all the effort her firm previously put into trying to market it for Otto. 'I wouldn't sell, either' had been her friendly reply. "She said she knows this joker."

"Making local friends is always a good idea," said Eli. "Your neighbor obviously put that in just to screw with you, but if he complains, just offer him one of those keys. What was his name again?"

"Phil ... no, Phelps."

"I wouldn't fret about it too much. There are a dozen padlocks in the toolbox in back and a spare set of bolt-cutters."

Having Eli there was reassuring, but she'd dealt with dicks before. Still, putting up a gate on the driveway was perplexing. It was about a quarter of a mile from the public road to her new home, but most of that was on her property. It had surprised her to find out the easement was less than seventy yards long, and no one else seemed to need or use the driveway. It dawned on her, though, that having a gate there was a very nice idea. As her friend had pointed out, the place was isolated. Maybe that was her neighbor's intent? She voiced her idea to Eli.

"Nah," he drawled, "I think he's screwing with you. But I admire you thinking that."

"Why?"

"I'm not real optimistic about people, but I wish I were."

In less than a minute, they were at her new home.

"The gate's been up less than five days," she commented as they reached the barn.

"How's that?"

"That stuff I ordered was delivered five days ago."

Sure enough, stacked in a neat pile beside the barn were enough rails to put in a modest-sized paddock for her horses. No, a corral, she reminded herself. She'd been out West for more than half her life but still slipped sometimes. The horses were coming down the next day, so putting in a corral, even a rail corral, was a bare minimum. Fencing off five or six acres of grass for a pasture was also a must but could wait a few weeks. She hoped Eli could help her figure out the best and most affordable way to do that.

It wasn't like she was poor, but cash was tight at the moment. In fact, she calculated money would never be a major concern for her if the sale of the houses went well and, most importantly, if she was frugal. Hence moving the horses. Even after paying a local girl to feed and muck them, bringing the horses to her new home was cheaper than stabling them another few months in LA. The days of first-class, roundtrip to Istanbul were behind her for good.

The first thing was to unload the groceries they'd picked up on the way. Despite her promises, she was once again tapping into Eli's time and energy, so she wouldn't let him go hungry. While he went outside to inspect her deliveries, she put on some food to cook and took a quick look around the tack room and apartment. She'd had a few odds and ends delivered from LA, a bedframe she liked, a few other pieces of furniture, and her favorite kitchen utensils. The mattress she ordered online was there as well. Everything seemed accounted for. As sparse as it was, she now had all she needed to live there.

Cell phone service was sketchy, so she'd ordered a land line that would also provide her Internet and cable service. That would be up and running within the week. And after they ate, she couldn't help but think how easy everything had been.

And then they put up the corral. It took them just over an hour to move and fit the rails, but the rails were heavy, and it was a hot day. Kate was fit, went to the gym or otherwise worked out nearly every day, but that hour nearly wiped her out as she strained to keep up with her helper, who appeared to work at a leisurely pace.

"There's a difference between working-out in an airconditioned gym and working in a field," he told her afterward, while he plied her with yet more water. "Just keep hydrated, you'll be fine in a few minutes."

She looked over at the completed corral and felt somewhat better. It was temporary, but it was an affordable option until she could build something permanent.

It took her close to thirty minutes to recover from the heat, and when she did, she and Eli went out to the meadow to look around. Her research and limited experience had told her she needed an acre of pasture for each horse, so a six-acre pasture would be the minimum. It would provide ample space for her two horses, and boarding a few additional animals would help defray her own expenses. Frugality, frugality, frugality.

"Is this the kind of thing I could do myself?" she asked him after he took some measurements and jotted a few notes.

"Put in a fence? Kate, you can do anything you set your mind to, but it would be a lot easier with at least one person helping."

"I've looked into having a crew do it. They said they could have it done in just over a day." She pursed her lips. "If I hired one spare set of hands, how long would it take us to do it?"

"Goofball, I'm perfectly willing to help you. There's no need to bring in a hand."

A deep discomfort swept over her. She didn't want to find herself relying on someone else, another man, especially one to whom she was growing so emotionally attached. And he already had given so much of his time and trouble. Just driving up with her twice to Lompoc was more than any other person she knew would have done for her.

There must have been something in her face, because he spoke again.

"Kate," he said in his reassuring voice. "I like doing this kind of stuff. It's sort of my profession. The zillionaire doesn't need me for the time being, and other than few odds and ends I need to finish up, the only thing I'm working on is a proposal for a project in San Francisco. It'd give me a thrill to help you out."

"You'll have to let me make it up to you somehow."

"Just promise to keep the horses away from me, and we'll be even."

"Are you afraid of horses?" For fuck sake, she thought, her feeling of discomfort from moments before already gone.

"They are kicking and biting machines. I'm not going to die trampled to death."

The two idiots goofed around the meadow a while longer, taking measurements and badgering one another, before they headed back to the house for a break and something cool to drink. Next, they discussed some options on fencing. On an impulse, she decided she wanted board fencing irrespective of the cost, and Eli volunteered to keep any eye out with his suppliers for bargains. He'd never used board himself, but the wholesalers with whom he worked in five different western states traded in all manner of items. Bargain hunting would be worth the effort, even if it meant putting off fence building for an extra month or more.

Walking the property later, she pointed out a spot she'd like to put in a garden, and Eli showed her a section along her spring-fed stream that would be good for a natural swimming pool. She hadn't intended to do anything that day beyond placing in the corral, taking some measurements, and doing some house organizing, so much of their time was spent idling around in that fashion. The capstone of the day was driving lessons from Eli, who spent more than an hour in his truck teaching her to drive a manual transmission. It was another idyllic day, the kind that all too sadly people don't recognize as such until the day has passed. But she saw that day for what it was and tried to hold onto it.

Until buzz-kill showed up, that is. Near the time they began thinking of dinner, Kate heard the rumble of the engine coming, not from the driveway to the south, but across the meadow to the north. It took the large, late-model pickup a few minutes to approach, and when it did, the driver pulled up within feet of where she and Eli were sitting on an old log near the stable. From what she could see, the sixty-something man was thick and balding and didn't trouble himself to shut off the engine or to exit the vehicle.

"I see you're making yourselves to home."

"I am," she replied. "You wouldn't be Mr. Phelps, would you?"

"I am." He nodded curtly. "Welcome to the neighborhood. How'd you get in?"

"Through that lovely new gate. That wasn't you, was it? ... Eli, could you be a dove and fetch Mr. Phelps a spare key for that?"

"My understanding with Simmons was only he'd have use of that driveway." She didn't need lessons in body language to see the man's hostility. He'd turned and looked away as he veritably flung his words at her.

"The easement on the title deed says differently," she returned in her most pleasant tone. "And you don't have to trouble yourself driving cross country. Feel free to use the driveway whenever you come to visit. In fact, I insist."

"Stay off my property," he barked as he put the truck in gear and began to drive away.

"Thanks for the gate!" she called with a friendly wave to the man's retreating vehicle.

Eli returned with the key as her neighbor departed.

"That was pleasant," she observed. She'd dealt with a lot of such people in her life but still was surprised this episode hadn't upset her more.

"You should call your lawyer first thing tomorrow."

"Oh, I will ... Dove," she said with a wink. "Don't worry. And I'll talk to Leona Munson, too."

Without a further word, they repaired to the kitchen to begin dinner. It was still a while until dark, but she was excited ... excited like a young child. She had Eli to herself all night, with no phone, TV, or Internet, so she knew there would be stories.