Tears of an Angel

Chapter Nineteen

*Tissue warning…I tried more than once to stop this only to be told, in essence, 'you're not doing any such thing'. I have to admit, when I finally stopped fighting it, the muse knew what she was doing.

~oOo~

Heath was stood inside Coco's stall checking the horse to see how the animal which had received what turned out to be a minor injury was doing. Heath still felt as if he was just going through the motions of living when Jarrod entered the building, walked up to the stall and leaned on it. Neither one of them spoke for a solid ten minutes. Both had their minds on the first few minutes after Heath and Maggie had made it back to the ranch after the trouble with her cousins and the men they'd hired.

Jarrod and McColl turned when they heard the horses. They were more than relieved to see it was Heath and Maggie, though the look on their faces told the two men that no one had told them about Nick. They stayed silent, as Heath and Maggie flew off their horses and ran toward the wagon that sat not two feet from Jarrod and McColl, the wagon where Nick lay.

Heath reached the wagon first. McColl and Jarrod watched as Heath's eyes fixed themselves on his hot tempered brother, who lay in the back with his eyes closed. It didn't take a genius to see that he was no longer among the living. Heath looked at Jarrod with a mixture of disbelief and severe pain in his eyes. "I…it can't be. H…he came to us at the Hamilton's cabin. H…he said he owed us a race home. W…we were doing just that! He reached the barn and went around it just seconds before we did!"

Lightning would have had less of an effect on Jarrod and McColl than Heath's words did at that moment. For a few seconds all they could do was stare at Heath, and at Maggie, who now stood next to Heath repeating, basically, the same thing.

"How? When? Who?" Heath managed to ask through the shock he was in.

"It was those friends of Paul and Tyrell's… the ones who were coming to force Maggie down to Mexico…they shot Nick and gave Coco a slight wound before me and the other men could kill them." The anger McColl had towards the men spilled out as he explained. Nick, he and the others had come upon the men Tyrell had hired to guard the area."Before taking them down, Nick heard the guards talk about the plans the Hamilton brothers had for Maggie. He became enraged and insisted on tracking the men the Hamiltons meant to sell Maggie too down once the guards were no longer a threat. He said." McColl paused, his voice cracking before he continued, "Nick said… he said he wasn't just going to stand aside and watch his brother lose the woman he loved the way he'd lost Iris. I tried to get him to listen to reason. I told him we needed to get to the cabin and that, once the Hamilton's were caught, the threat from those men wouldn't be a problem. He wouldn't listen!" McColl looked at Heath, who was in the back of the wagon by this time holding Nick in his arms close to his chest, tears streaming down his face. "Afterwards, before he crossed over, he made me promise to take care of Coco and begged me to ask you to forgive him, but to please understand. He said the men had to be stopped."

Jarrod broke the silence as he asked quietly, "He really raced you home?" He'd been trying to get a handle on that one ever since his blond brother and sister in law's arrival back at the ranch.

Heath nodded slightly, his brain still trying to wrap his mind around the fact that it was his brother's spirit that had been the one to race him and Maggie home. "I wish Adam had just given the land to his family. It's not worth the price we've paid to keep it," Heath answered as fresh tears ran down his cheeks.

Jarrod sucked in his breath as a few tears of his own escaped; he couldn't agree more. Still, they had the land and now, with Nick's blood spilled to keep Maggie safe for Heath, there was no way any of the Barkleys were going to let it go. "It's over, Heath…." Jarrod went to do what he could to comfort Heath only to have the two of them get the shock of their lives as a gust of wind blew through the yard and into the barn. They hurried to the doors to shut them; the wind had blown them wide open. However, before they do just that, Nick appeared not twenty feet from them, sitting on the same stallion he'd used to race Heath and Maggie home…and with Iris next to him. She was on a similar looking horse and smiling from ear to ear as she reached out and laid her hand on top of Nick's. At that moment, Heath realized just why he'd seen such joy in Nick's eyes when he'd shown up at the cabin. Though, at the moment, Nick had a more serious look in his eyes, as he leaned forward in his saddle and startled his brothers by actually speaking to them.

"Grieve for me if you must, but don't let it consume you. Tell the family the same thing." Nick spoke with his usual sternness, but with love in his voice as he looked at Heath and Jarrod, who had just as much pain in his eyes as Heath did. "And, most of all, stop blamin' yourselves!" He knew Jarrod was blaming himself for being in Washington while Heath was blaming himself for agreeing to split up. "I," Nick said thrusting his thumb into his chest, "made the choice, ya hear me! There was nothing you, McColl or anyone else could have said to stop me, and you know it! Blame it on the Barkley stubbornness in all of us!"

In spite of their shock at seeing and hearing the dark haired rancher speaking to them from the other side, Heath and Jarrod had to chuckle. What Nick said was true, and they knew it. However, their chuckling stopped when Iris looked at Heath and spoke, a few tears running down her face as she did. "Thank you, thank you for everything. You never doubted me either. Whether or not you know it, it helped Nick and me immensely. I'll be forever grateful to you for that. If it will help, on the bad days remember that Nick and I will never be separated again."

After Iris had stopped talking and taken her hand off Nick's, Jarrod and Heath watched amazed as Nick tipped his hat, bade them goodbye telling them he suggested they get back to work as the ranch wouldn't run itself and then turned to Iris. "Come on, dear. We've got work to do ourselves!" The two turned their horses around and disappeared before Heath and Jarrod could blink their eyes, leaving the two brothers to talk about what they'd just seen and heard.

Epilogue

Heath hurried to get into the barn, put Charger into his stall and give Coco a few sugar cubes; he and McColl took turns making sure Nick's aging horse was well taken care of. Heath had been up since the crack of dawn, and it was past dark now. He just knew he was going to get an earful from Maggie for being so late…only he couldn't help it. There had just been too much work to do…and he'd had a visit to make. Once he had taken care of his horse, Heath made his way into their house.

Upon entering the home he and Maggie shared, he was surprised, but not shocked, to see Maggie sitting in the rocking chair Nick and Jarrod had given to them the day he and Maggie married. She was feeding their four month old son, Nicholas Morgan while their three year old daughter, Hope, lay on the couch sleeping soundly.

"About time you made it home," Maggie looked at Heath as he sat down in the chair and began pulling his boots off. "I was beginning to wonder if I had cause to worry."

Heath sighed and apologized. "I didn't mean to be so late." He told her of the events of the day and then paused before quietly adding, "I was out taking care of the graves." After Nick and Iris had disappeared from his and Jarrod's sight, Heath had promised himself he'd make sure he took care of Nick and Iris' final resting place, and it had been awhile since he'd been out to do just that.

Maggie sucked in her breath and then let it out slowly. The majority of the time her husband was just fine now. Still, at times like this, when he'd been out "there" and had a faraway look in his eyes, she wondered if he had really come to terms with the loss of his brother. "He'd want you to be happy, Heath. I know he would."

Heath gave her a crooked smile as he took his son, who had finished feeding, from Maggie and leaned back in his chair. Running his finger down the side of the infant's face, Heath couldn't help but chuckle, as he gazed into his son's eyes and then looked back at Maggie and Hope.

"I am happy. In fact, I couldn't be happier." He turned his attention to the living room windows as rain drops began to hit the glass. His mother had always told him the rain was the tears of an angel. Thinking of how happy Nick had looked when Heath had seen him at the cabin and, later, how happy his brother and Iris had looked, Heath was absolutely sure that if his mother was right…the rain that was now falling were tears of happiness…and they belonged to Nick and Iris.