Chapter One

Nick laid in his bed listening to the noises drifting into his bedroom; actually, he was propped up by numerous, fluffy, white pillows. He sighed; at least it was better than being flat on his back. The noise he was listening to was that of his three-year-old son Nicolas and his cousins, Charity and Thomas, playing in Nicolas's room. Nick's son's room was next to his and Jenny's.

When he heard his one-year-old daughter, Amanda Rae-or Mandy as they called her, begin to cry across the hallway; Nick silently cursed. Not because the child was crying, but because he was lying in the bed helpless, unable to do a blasted thing. The small child's cries were soon silenced when he heard six-year-old Charity run into her cousin's room. It made Nick smile as his niece came into the room carrying her small cousin. For a six-year-old, the girl was as bright as a whip and handled her infant cousin amazingly well.

"I think she wants to see her father." Charity smiled as she walked over to her uncle's bed and held out her cousin.

"Oh you think she does?" Nick smiled and, reaching out, took his daughter from his niece. He then watched as Charity pulled a chair away from the wall and pushed it up against the bed. Within a matter of a minute, the young child was sitting Indian style by his feet.

"Yep," Charity nodded vigorously, "She started saying 'da-da' when I walked into her room."

Nick felt his heart skip a beat. No one had heard Mandy say anything before, and now Charity was telling him that his daughter's first word was da da? He started beaming as he held his daughter close. It made the sour mood he'd woken up with disappear. If he could have he would have frozen that moment, only no one could do that. He was brought out of his thoughts when his wife appeared in the doorway.

"I wondered why Mandy had stopped crying." Jenny smiled at her niece, who had moved and was alongside her uncle and holding Mandi's small hand. It still amazed Jenny that her niece could so easily get Mandi out of her crib and carry her the way she did.

"She wanted Uncle Nick." Charity beamed and then asked if her father was home yet. Jarrod had gone into Stockton earlier that day.

"He should be here any time. Now, why don't you go back to playing with Thomas and your cousin." Jenny stepped inside the room and, walking up to the bed, took Mandy from her father.

Charity did as she was told, while Jenny walked over to the small changing table she had asked Jarrod to move into the room six weeks ago; it made is so she could take care of the baby and still keep an eye on Nick. It wasn't long before Charity could be heard playing with her brother and cousin again.

While Charity played and Jenny changed Mandy, Nick's mind rolled back in time-back to the day that had started out so well and ended up so very badly.

"If we don't hurry, Mother is going to tan our hides. Remember, we promised to help with the fund raiser for the orphanage." Heath grinned at Nick as they started up a hill; the last one they'd have to deal with before they started on the last leg home. The two brothers had been helping out some new neighbors and had lost track of time. That being the case, they had taken another route home, thinking it would be quicker. Now, with a steep slope on one side of them and rocky hill on the other, they had started thinking they had made a mistake by switching routes.

"I don't even know why we agreed to be there. That's her and Audra's…" Nick started talking only to shocked as the ground began to rumble.

Jenny, who had finished changing her daughter's diaper, glanced over towards her husband. She saw the pain in her husband's eyes, along with the faraway look. Inwardly she sighed; she pretty much knew what he was thinking. Sitting their daughter up, Jenny let her mind go back to the same day, though her memory was one much later of that same day.

Jenny stood outside on the porch looking around. Boards that came from the nearby corral lay on the ground, as did a part of the barn. There was glass alongside the house, it had come out of the windows as the ground shook. There were also cracks in the patio. The earthquake that had hit was the worst they'd ever experienced. Brydie and Victoria were standing with her. As Jarrod and the men who had left rode away with him returned and starting passing through the gate, both Jenny and Brydie looked for their husbands.

"I'm not likin' this; where's our Heath? Where's our Nick?" Brydie turned and looked at Jenny and Victoria with fear in her eyes.

Jenny picked Mandy back up and walked over to Nick, remembering how Jarrod and the other men had not found Nick until the next morning, pinned underneath a boulder and near dead. In fact, Jarrod had said if it wasn't for the fact that there had been a rut in the road where Nick had fallen, giving the dark haired rancher a place to land, he'd most likely been crushed to death. As it was, it had taken a whole month of tending, sitting around the clock and countless doctor visits before her husband had regained consciousness.

"He's alive." Nick, who had been staring straight ahead, turned his head towards Jenny; his eyes begging her to believe him. "I know what Jarrod said; what he and the men found; I know what they believe, only Heath isn't buried under those boulders near the bottom of that steep hill. I would feel it if he were." He took Mandy from Jenny as his wife sat down on the bed.

For a moment Jenny said nothing. She knew how badly she wanted to agree with Nick, for his sake and for Brydie's. Her sister-in-law was merely existing. Every night Jenny found the Irish gal, who had stolen Heath's heart, standing on the porch keeping an eye on the gate. Only, what else could she believe? If Heath hadn't found his final resting pile under the boulders that had rolled down the hill they'd been on, crossed the road and then rolled down the steep hill on the other side, where was he?

"Jarrod said he wanted to talk to you once he gets home." Jenny broke the silence that had fallen between her husband and herself and stood up. "I need to get Mandy and the other children fed. I'll send your brother up when he gets here."

"Jenny," Nick called out as his wife walked towards the door.

"Yes," She turned and looked at Nick, not surprised to see his eyes still asking her to believe.

"He'll come home; you'll see." Nick then turned his attention to the book his mother had left on the night stand for him just that morning; he had to do something until the doctor okayed him getting out of bed and moving around the house in the new wheelchair Jarrod had bought for him.