Amy was laughing as she rode Spartan in the warm sunshine, the perfect day, not cold enough to need a coat but not hot enough to be uncomfortable. She could feel him enjoying himself too as he stretched his legs for the first time since the winter. Ty and Lyndy were riding together on Harley, but they'd fallen behind. She stopped and turned, waiting for them to catch up, but they never seemed to make any progress towards her. It didn't make sense, not at first, not until she saw her mother on Pegasus. Amy dismounted immediately, running to hug her mother as she hadn't gotten to in over a decade.

"Mom." Amy whispered softly as Marion hugged her back, holding her, stroking her daughter's blonde hair.

"So this is Spartan." Marion smiled, stroking the horse's nose gently. "You've done well with him, Amy."

"He's done well with me too." She admitted openly, honestly. "If I hadn't had him, Ty, and Grandpa after…" She stopped. "Am I dead?"

"Who is that?" Marion asked instead of answering, indicating Ty and Lyndy who seemed to have stopped, looking across a fence at them. What was that fence doing there? Amy didn't remember jumping it with Spartan.

"It's the boy from the loft," Amy said proudly, obvious love and pride in her voice. "Ty Borden. He was your last 'special project' as Grandpa called them."

"I remember." Marion looked at her daughter and back at Ty.

"I married him. That's our little girl, Lyndy Marion." Amy waved at them, wishing they'd come closer, but there was no gate and Ty wouldn't jump the fence, especially not with Lyndy with him. "She's your granddaughter. Well, one of them."

"One of them?" Marion seemed amused at that.

"Lou has two little girls, Katherine Marion Minnie and Georgina. Katie and Georgie." She paused. "Come meet them, Mom. Lou misses you so much…we all do."

"I can't do that, sweetheart." Marion said honestly. "I wish I could." She watched her daughter, not ready to go yet. "Let's go for a walk."

"Aren't you the one that always used to say why walk when you can ride?" Amy teased, but nodded. "Okay." There was so much she wanted to tell her.

Ty had just drifted off when he heard the heart monitor flatline. He jumped up and pressed the button for the nurse, again and again, shaking with fear. "Amy. C'mon, Amy, stay with me. Stay with me," he begged.

Lou ran out into the hallway, still in full hospital garb, to get anyone she found, not caring if it was someone assigned to her sister or not. She managed to get someone in to check and then a code was sounded, waking up Jack and Tim who had managed to sleep through the circus. "What is it? What's happening?" Tim asked frantically, getting frustrated when he got no answer.

Lou and Ty got left at the wayside, moved back to where Jack and Tim were in the small viewing area again. Lou found herself glad that Georgie had finally consented to go home with Peter, not wanting her daughter to witness this. All she could think about was the pain of losing her mother; she couldn't lose her baby sister too. She'd made a promise at her mother's grave all those years ago that she would watch out for Amy and Jack. She didn't always do the best job of it, but she couldn't lose her, not now.

"Damn it, someone tell me what's going on with my daughter!" Tim roared, holding Lou close as if to reassure himself that she wasn't going anywhere.

"Her heart stopped," Ty whispered, feeling like his own had stopped too, right alongside hers. This moment was what he'd feared. Amy had been his best friend longer than they'd been together. In fact, there were times when they couldn't make it work together that they were still best friends. She was more than just a piece of his life; she and Lyndy were his whole entire life. Amy had the biggest heart he'd ever known. How could it just stop?

Eventually the doctors wouldn't even let them stay in the viewing area and they got moved to the hall. Jack found a phone and dialed the number he'd learned by heart long ago, but when he heard his wife's voice, he couldn't say anything. All he could do was hold the phone in his hand and listen.

"Hello?" Lisa had a sixth sense that something was wrong even before she picked up the phone. "Jack?" The number was from the hospital; it had to be him. "Is it Amy?" Still no response, not good. "I'll call the others. We'll be there." As much as she hated to, she hung up so that she could call the ranch and reach Peter, then Caleb and Cass.

Within an hour, they were all there, including Katie and Lyndy. Ty held his daughter, his eyes closing, trying to keep the tears at bay. She was scared enough waking up at the middle of the night, not understanding anything that had gone on since the accident. Her tiny footie pajamas smelled like the detergent Amy always used and she was clinging to the stuffed pony again. He had no words to comfort his daughter or himself.

Lou and Peter sat together with the girls, as a family, Katie curled against her mother for comfort. Like Lyndy, she didn't understand why they were awake or what was wrong with her aunt. She knew her family was sad, especially her mom and grandpa, but didn't know how to make anybody feel better. Peter felt much like Tim did, frustrated beyond belief. All the people any of them knew, all the contacts any of them had, would never make this right. There was nothing they could do to protect their family.

Tim paced, wanting so badly for something to do, someone to be angry at, some way to fix what was happening. He'd lost Marion twice, once when he walked out on her and the girls, once when she passed away. Was he doomed to keep reliving his mistakes until he fixed them? How on earth could he fix this?

Lisa and Jack had walked around the corner so that no one could see or hear, knowing one of the others would come get them if a miracle happened. Jack buried his head against his wife's shoulder, her shirt getting wet with his tears. Jack Bartlett never cried, but tonight he couldn't stop. He'd lost Lyndy in her fifties, Marion in her forties, but Amy wasn't even thirty yet. Ty needed her, Lyndy needed her, they all did. He was used to being able to fix things that were wrong but lately there was so much that he couldn't fix. For the first time, he felt old, ancient. He would do anything if he could trade places with his granddaughter, but he knew from experience life just didn't work that way.

Marion looked at her daughter, not wanting to do this any more than Amy did, but there was no other way around it. They'd talked about everything: Lou and Peter, Jack and Lisa, Ty and Lyndy, even Tim. There was nothing else left to discuss. "You have to go back."

Amy nodded. "I know." They were standing in front of the headstones of Lyndy and Marion. A stone for her was nowhere to be seen and she could hear her family calling for her. "Mom?" Amy wiped tears away. "What hurt the most…was that I never got to say goodbye."

"Oh, sweetheart," Marion whispered, brushing a strand of Amy's hair out of her face. "This isn't goodbye."

"What?" Amy looked puzzled and rightly so. "I thought…"

"I knew this. All of this. I've never left your side, not once. Or Lou's or your grandpa's…Even your dad's. I see my grandbabies playing, riding their horses." She paused. "You know that feeling, when you do really well with a horse, you're able to help them, and your heart is busting. You want someone to tell and you're just at peace?" Amy nodded. "That's me. I'm so proud of you. All of you. You with your horses, Lou with her businesses, the families and the lives you're getting to have. I get to experience it all, because I get to watch it unfold. I saw you and Lou on your wedding days. I was there, sweetheart, and I always will be." Amy smiled at that, slowly nodding in acceptance. "Do me a favor."

"Anything."

"She's waking up," Lou said, coming and finding her grandfather, reaching for his hand as she exchanged a worried look with Lisa. "C'mon, Grandpa. She's waking up."

Caleb and Cass watched the girls, both asleep again, as the rest of the family went back to Amy's room. Her eyes were open and she looked pale, weak, but more like herself than she had in days. Ty was no longer trying to hide his tears as he kissed her gently, almost afraid she would break. Jack stood behind him and Tim stood behind Lou on the other side. Georgie and Lisa stood in the viewing area, not wanting to overwhelm her. The doctors hadn't used the word miracle, but it was obvious to all the adult family that it had been one.

"Grandpa?" Amy whispered, her voice as weak as the rest of her.

"I'm here." Jack whispered back, his voice slightly shaky from the tears earlier, feeling the lump in his throat.

"Mom says that she and Grandma miss you and they both tell Lisa welcome to the family and thanked her for taking care of you." Jack smiled at that as Lisa bit her lip, tears finally sliding down her own cheeks.

Amy had to rest a little bit, obviously tired, wanting to get this done as she'd promised. "Lou, she says she's proud of you. The businesses, the girls, and, yes, she was there." Lou had always said that two days she missed Marion the most were her wedding day to Peter and the day Katie was born.

Tim lay his hand on Lou's shoulder. Even he knew what those words meant to both his girls. He wished that it worked the other way around too, that he could send a message to Marion that he was sorry for everything he'd put her through, for throwing away what they'd had.

"Dad?" Amy was able to speak again, still softly, and it was easy to tell she was running out of whatever strength she had at the moment.

"Yeah?" Tim looked up, not daring to hope that Marion had sent a message to him. He could only imagine what message she might have and was a little scared to even contemplate it.

"She said she was proud of you. And that she loves you." That was one thing that wasn't past tense. Love was eternal.

Ty looked up at Tim and knew it was the closest he would ever come to seeing Tim Fleming shed a tear or show much emotion. His father-in-law was best in action scenes, drama, but not really great at putting what he felt into words, something they had in common at times.

"Georgie." Georgie walked to her aunt tentatively, staying beside her mom. "She said that she loves you and Katie." Georgie couldn't help but smile at that. Although she'd never known her adopted grandmother, her birth family had been anything but love.

"We should get out of here. Let you rest." Lou whispered, stroking her little sister's hair after reluctantly letting go of her hand. "Ty will be here. The rest of us will take shifts." She blamed herself for what had happened, thinking that maybe they'd tired Amy out too much or overwhelmed her.

"I'm first shift and I'll be right outside in the hall," Tim said to Ty, the fight earlier forgotten completely by both. The only thing that seemed to matter at the moment was Amy.

Ty nodded, watching the others leave, staying in the chair instead of on the bed as before. "I'm glad you got to see your mom." He whispered. "But I'm even happier that you came back."

"You were there, Ty. And Lyndy. But there was a fence with no gate. You couldn't get across. I showed you to Mom though. Both of you." She smiled tiredly, resting her eyes for just a moment.

Ty waited to make sure that she wasn't asleep before asking, "What did she say?"

"She said she's glad she took a chance on the boy in the loft. Glad I did too." Amy's smile got bigger as she fell asleep again.