Vin immediately stood and said, "what the hell is goin' on?" At the same time he was thinking to himself, "why the hell didn't any of us put our gun belts on this mornin'?"

Alan Cummings laughed. "I'm sorry to say it, but you boys managed to stumble into a big heap of trouble." Just then, Carl descended on Vin and roughly pulled his arms behind his back and tied them together. He then did the same to Vin's sleepy friends. Larabee was still awake enough to know something was going on, but he couldn't get his limbs to do anything about it. Ezra was completely out.

"Carl, go tell Maude that we will be taking our lunch to go," Alan told the big man. "Tell her that I'm going to take the boys for a walk in the garden, and we'll return in a couple of hours." Cummings had hired a fleet of gardeners a few years ago to create a beautifully-landscaped area of plants and trees. Situated on this side of the house, closest to his study, the garden ran from just outside the door all the way to the ocean-side cliff.

"What do you want?" Vin asked once Carl left the room.

"I want you boys to be quiet, and I've heard enough about you to know that there's only one way to ensure that happens."

"Quiet about what?" Vin continued, hoping to stall long enough for the drug's effects on Chris and Ezra to wear off.

"About the money, of course," Alan smiled. "You don't think I became this wealthy all by honorable dealings, now do you?"

"So, you stole the train money?" Vin struggled to put it all together.

"Hell, it was MY money to steal," Cummings continued. "I have banks in San Francisco, St. Louis, and Chicago. I set up a shipment from one of the St. Louis banks to transfer $25,000 in cash to the bank in San Francisco, and I made certain it was insured. Then I hired a group of friends from St. Louis to rob the train and take the money. I give them half, they give me half, and I still collect the insurance – 50% profit, my dear boy."

"It was just an unfortunate coincidence that you boys ended up on the same train, but in the end it worked out. I actually made 100% profit because you took out my partners and delivered the money right to me." Alan laughed. "Of course the sad part for you is that now I can't leave any witnesses."

Carl showed up with lunch bags, and Alan instructed, "let's get these men to the cliff."

"You, Mr. Tanner, maybe you can help us," Mr. Cummings stated then marched Vin at gunpoint over to where Ezra was passed out. He placed Ezra across Vin's shoulder and instructed the buckskin-clad man to walk. Carl hoisted Larabee over his shoulders, and they all exited through the back door into the garden. Alan kept his gun trained on Tanner. Vin was hoping that the fresh air would help to rouse his two friends. He had no idea what kind of poison Cummings had given them.

Chris was starting to stir just as they approached the ocean overlook. It was a vast area of rocky cliffs that shot straight down 300 feet to the water below. Vin lay Ezra on the ground, as instructed. The gambler was not stirring at all. Just as Carl made the move to lay Chris on the ground, Larabee vomited on his boots. "Ahhh!" Carl kicked the gunslinger in the stomach as repayment for his messy shoes.

"Guess our sleep medicine didn't agree with Larabee," Alan laughed.

Vin thought that was probably a good sign. Maybe most of the drug was out of Chris' stomach now. "So, now what, Cummings?" Vin asked, again trying to stall for time.

"You three are going to meet with a tragic accident, I'm afraid. You imbibed in too much drink and fell to your deaths below. Maybe one of you fell, then the others died trying to save him….don't know. I will work out the details of the story later."

Chris' head and stomach hurt. He groaned and opened his eyes briefly. Seeing the two men brought everything rushing back to him, and he decided to lie there, pretending to be asleep, until it was time to act. He gave a quick glance to Vin to let him know he was ok and ready to fight, then closed his eyes again.

Alan approached Ezra's prone form and hoisted him up on his shoulders. "Sorry we won't get to know each other better, my boy," Alan laughed as he approached the cliff edge with his bundle.

He turned for just a moment, and a loud bang sounded. He looked down to see blood pooling on his chest, and Maude Standish holding a smoking gun.

Chris leapt to his feet and jumped on Carl Winners. It surprised the associate enough that his gun flew out of his hand. Chris managed to scramble to the free weapon first, even with his bound hands.

Cummings dropped Ezra on the ground, as he sank to his knees, trying to staunch the flow of blood from the chest wound.

Maude had continued to think about her conversation with Chris and Ezra since the evening before. She was convinced that Mr. Winners was involved in the attack and thus may try to hurt her son and Alan. She had come outside today, with Ezra's revolver, with the intention of protecting the very man she just shot in the chest.

"Vin, why don't you take Ezra and Mrs. Standish into the house," Chris suggested. "I'll keep an eye on these two until you get back, then we'll tie them up and call the authorities." Larabee wasn't sure that Alan Cummings would be alive by then, but he thought it best to leave that detail out.

Vin hoisted Ezra on his shoulders, carried him into the parlor and laid him on the sofa. Maude lifted her son's head, sat down, and lay it back in her lap. She hadn't said a word since she had pulled the trigger.

"I'll be back soon," Vin said. He grabbed a knife from the kitchen to cut his bonds and hurried back outside to help Chris with the two prisoners. Larabee was sitting on a bench with Winners' gun trained on the two men. He was still a bit woozy from the lingering drug effects.

"Everything ok, Chris?" Vin asked when the saw the gunslinger sitting down.

"Just fine," the blond man answered and stood up. "Let's get these pieces of crap tied up and ready for prison." Vin cut the rope holding Chris' hands and bound the other two. A few of the grounds' workers had shown up as well. Two of them helped haul the two men around to the front of the house. Another servant summoned the local police and a physician who lived a couple of houses away.

Vin took charge of the arrest and interviews with the law. Fortunately, none of the officers recognized Vin's likeness from wanted posters. Tanner had been the only one awake enough to hear the confession. He relayed that information and gave the sheriff good suggestions about where to look for the missing money and personal belongings from the train. He did it all under the name of JD Dunne. Vin wondered what the youngster would think about his name ending up in the San Francisco newspapers. Chris had suggested they check out whether Mr. Winners had a brother, and if so – he should have some bruises from their fight earlier. There should also be an associate of the family with a badly broken nose that was a third accomplice. Mr. Cummings had expired on the front porch during the questioning, so that left his home and bank business to his one and only beneficiary – Mrs. Maude Standish.

Ezra's mother would be set for life. She hadn't decided whether she would stay in San Francisco and keep the house or sell it and the business and move on. There were restitutions to make from the bank business, to the train passengers' families and insurance companies, but that still left plenty of money to live out the rest of her years more-than-comfortably.

Ezra had taken longer than expected to awaken from the sleeping drug/wine combination. When the doctor arrived, Standish was starting to stir but still heavily under the effects of the drug. It made no sense to the physician, but the patient kept rambling incoherently about how he was destined to be poor forever and how he would never run out on someone again.

Much to Ezra's chagrin, the physician administered a liberal dose of ipecac as his poisoning remedy of choice. Standish was horrified that he had no choice but to vomit violently in front of his friends and his mother, but he recovered quickly thereafter. The boys remained in San Francisco for another three days, and then boarded a train for Four Corners.

They had to stop off for a few hours in San Diego to change trains. This gave them just enough time to make a visit to Elizabeth's grave. The three men felt terrible about what happened to the young lady from the train. Chris and Ezra said a few, short words at her gravesite and then gave Vin some privacy.

"Hope Heaven is a nice place, Ms. Elizabeth. You shouldn't be there, and I'm so sorry. I shoulda never gotten you involved with us. You really were beautiful…inside and out, and I know a lot of folks, including me, are real sad that you're gone."

Vin placed a flower on her grave and jumped when a voice said, "Elizabeth loved Irises."

It was her older sister, Katherine.

"I was just leavin.' Didn't mean to intrude…."

"I'm glad you came," Katherine looked up into the sad blue eyes.

"You are?"

"I know you probably think that Elizabeth and I spent all of our time arguing. We did do a fair amount of that, but she was my sister. I loved her, Mr. Tanner, and all I ever wanted was for her to be happy. I do think she could have been happy with you." Katherine's eyes filled with tears, and she simply turned and walked away.

Vin took a deep breath to collect himself, tipped his hat to the clouds and sky above, then turned to meet his two friends at the bottom of the hill.

Within the hour, they were on a train heading east.

Even Ezra had to admit that he was looking forward to getting back home. "Home," Ezra was shocked that is what he considered the little town these days. He found that he missed his arguments with Nathan, his deep conversations with Josiah, and the practical jokes of Buck and JD. The two men sitting next to him on the train were the quietest of the seven, but their actions of late spoke of a kinship that Standish had never before experienced.

As the stagecoach pulled into the dusty little town, one word kept coming to the forefront of Ezra's mind: family. Maybe the Indian had called it right; these men were his brothers. No matter how much they teased or argued or fought, they were always there when one brother needed help.

Nathan and Buck greeted them, or maybe it was more accurately said that Buck greeted them and Nathan scrutinized them. But, for once, they had all made it home with no serious injuries.

Nathan noticed that Ezra no longer wore his sling. He would check out the gambler's arm later. Ezra had a scabbed-over cut on his face but otherwise looked well.

Vin had an old bruise around his right eye, but it was mostly shades of yellow and green now. Nathan was impressed; no new holes or injuries that he could detect. Tanner's hat was covering the healing wound on the back of his head. "Like Chris had said a few days earlier, what Nathan didn't know wouldn't hurt him," Vin thought.

Chris was the only one who tempted Nathan a bit. He had a number of new bruises on his face, and he moved the most rigidly. He had just gotten off of a 4-hour stagecoach ride though, so Nathan would expect the man to be a little stiff.

He would let Buck test them out.

The tall, broad ladies' man was so happy to see his friends that he engulfed each one in a big bear hug. "Welcome back, Ezra," Buck squeezed the smaller man.

"It is good to see you too, Mr. Wilmington," Ezra smiled.

"How're you doin' Vin?" Buck again squeezed with all his might.

"Just fine, Buck, so long as you let my lungs expand soon," Vin too smiled.

Chris grinned as Buck approached him. He knew what was coming. "It's real good to see you, Old Dog," the taller man wrapped his long arms around Larabee.

"Ah ha!" Nathan exclaimed, as he saw Chris wince with Buck's embrace. "I knew I'd get to work on at least one of ya."

Buck backed up, holding Chris' shoulders at arm's length and took a long look at him. Buck could see that Chris had been in a fight, but a bruised Larabee wasn't an unusual sight to Wilmington. It took him back to the good ol' days and bar fights that he and Chris used to get into.

"Really," Chris looked to Buck and Nathan, "I'm fine. We're all fine."

"If you boys would humor me just for a minute, I'd like to take a quick look at Ezra's arm and Chris' ribs," Nathan smiled. He really wasn't worried about finding any serious trouble.

The three travel-weary men and Buck climbed the steps to Nathan's clinic.

"You know the routine by now," Nathan grinned.

Ezra just had to take one arm out of his shirt, so Nathan could look at his healing forearm. Chris disrobed to the waist and Buck exclaimed, "Damn Chris, you really know how to piss people off don't ya?" when he saw the massive bruising on Larabee's back and ribs.

Nathan approached and looked wide-eyed at Chris. "Was this from a fight or did the train run over ya?"

"Just a fight," Chris answered without volunteering any additional information.

"We got jumped in an alley in Frisco," Vin explained. "Chris fought with a couple of large fellers and got slammed into a brick wall."

Nathan shook his head. The bruises did fit with being pummeled against a hard wall. He didn't miss a beat though when he turned to Vin and remarked, "did you just say WE got jumped? Were all three of ya in the fight?" Nathan couldn't imagine Vin and Ezra just standing there watching Chris get the crap beat out of him.

"I was with Mother at the time. It was just Vin and Chris," Ezra spoke up, and Vin glared at him.

"I shoulda known you boys couldn't stay out of trouble," Nathan said but without any hint of animosity. He walked over and pulled up Vin's shirt to take a peek – all clear. Nathan looked at Vin puzzled, "now, how'd you get off bruise-free?"

Vin just shrugged his shoulders, but as Nathan started probing on Chris' sore ribs Larabee blurted out, "shit, Nathan. Maybe you should check out Vin's head. He didn't do much fightin' because he was out cold the whole damn time."

Nathan stepped away for a minute, yanked off Vin's hat, and very quickly found the cut and goose-egg on the back of the tracker's head. Chris was thankful for the reprieve, as Nathan began questioning Vin. "Any pain, dizziness, or nausea?"

"For the first day or two," Vin answered, "but it's fine now, Nate. Get back to proddin' that traitor over there." Buck and Ezra laughed, and Nathan did just that.

"Chris, you're gonna be sore as hell for a week or so, but I don't feel anything broken," Nathan finished and helped Larabee back into his black shirt. "Let me know if you have trouble sleepin', and I'll give you somethin' to help with the pain." Chris dipped his head in thanks and was grateful to pass Nathan's boney fingers off onto Ezra.

After a quick exam, Nathan said, "alright, get out of here and get some real food. Ezra, your arm looks good; think we'll be able to take the splint off sooner than I thought."

The five men headed down the steps and towards the saloon. Ezra knew they were going to have to tell the full story someday, and that Buck and the others would have to catch them up on the town's happenings over the last few weeks. As his eyes adjusted to the darkness of the saloon, he witnessed big smiles from JD and Josiah. Josiah stood up and put out his arms. Chris was first in-line, and immediately yelled, "don't you dare!" Josiah just shrugged his shoulders in confusion as Buck, Nathan, Vin, and Ezra bust out laughing.

Chris stuck out his hand for a shake instead, and Josiah accepted it then immediately pulled the gunslinger into a tight bear-hold. "Damnit, Josiah!" Chris yelled and laughter erupted once again.

Ezra stepped back and smiled as he took in the sight of all of them together again…one big, crazy, dysfunctional family indeed.

THE END!

Thank you for reading and to those of you who took the time to comment!