Over the coming weeks Heath engaged in many loud and silent battles of will with each member of the family, who tried to take it in stride. Heath was testing the waters and wearing on everyone’s patience but not their love. He refused to rest as the doctor had ordered after his fever broke and his head stopped aching. Victoria admonished him at first but he repeatedly told he didn’t care what she said and that he’d take care of himself. She dropped the subject and Nick continued to bring him home sick, feverish and exhausted by the afternoon.

Heath craved the physical activity that filled his mind and body with purpose and kept memories at bay. After a week of set backs, Heath confined himself to the house because he wanted to be well again. Getting the rest he needed on his own was not as much fun as having his Mother chase after him to make sure he got well. He realized being a part of a caring family was a luxury he wanted back. He eased out of his absolute rule and began to relax into a more pleasant role of brother and son.

It was Heath’s choice how deeply to accept each family member back into his heart and he did to the extent that was given. He gave his Mother the job of caring for him again; Audra to tease and make him laugh; Nick to be there for him always. But other than being cordial, Heath and Jarrod rarely saw or said a word to each other.

Jarrod would greet Heath, ask how he was feeling and look deeply into Heath’s eyes then look down before walking away. There had always been a wall there. Heath and Jarrod realized it was there with everyone to some greater or lesser degree. But between them it was the greatest.

For Jarrod it was knowledge, information, experience cause and effect, action and reaction. Tangible truths that allowed him to open the gate to others. Most people never knew what was inside. Just family and a few close friends. He was not the open book Nick was. Jarrod was very much like Heath but not because he was fragile rather, because he was strong. He didn’t make mistakes. He read people. Jarrod created his life and his sanctuary discerningly. Heath spent his life trying to plug the holes in the one he’d been given. Either way they squared off and couldn’t find an opening.

Inside Heath was chaos and Jarrod predictable order. Heath didn’t trust Jarrod with his life. And Jarrod didn’t trust himself or Heath with it either. Jarrod knew if he had tried to stop Heath that day in the barn, he would have failed.

It was tearing them up and the whole family suffered the rift. Nick and Heath were riding back to the house for their evening meal when Nick broached the subject. "Heath you gotta give Jarrod a chance here. He’s almost stopped comin’ home."

Heath froze and instinctively Charger stopped. "You want me to go?"

"No, I don’t want you to go, for crying out loud, get some sense boy." Nick shouted to make that one thing clear for the umpteenth time. "You two have got to work things out."

"I don’t know how to get through. I don’t know what he expects me to say." Heath loved his oldest brother and forgave him his part in what had happened but didn’t understand it.

"I get so mad at him sometimes, but I know he loves me. You gotta watch out for him. I shoulda’ been watchin’ out for ya." Nick wasn’t pleased with the way that sounded and took off his hat to clear the dust and sweat from his brow with his shirt sleeve. "Jarrod meant well. If it had been two school boys or even two men, remember how it was with you and Barrett? He hated you once."

Heath shot up in his saddle and clenched his fists. "Barrett is not Bentell."

"Simmer down Heath. That’s not what I’m tryin’ to say." Nick looked for a little help on Heath’s part but instead saw him ready to pounce. This was the center of the wound in the family and somehow they needed to mend it. "I’m just sayin’ he doesn’t always think about individual people, he thinks of the solution, the rule. He can’t help it anymore than you can stop your nightmares."

"I haven’t had one lately." Heath snapped back

"You haven’t had a fever, concussion or bullet hole either." Nick’s voice was getting louder.

"I’m just saying he could try." Heath’s voice was rising in volume as well.

Nick took a deep breath. "You know I wanna hit you."

Heath smiled and relaxed. "Likewise."

Nick took another deep breath. "What’s he supposed to do Heath? He’s afraid he’ll say the wrong thing. He’s afraid if he does it won’t be enough, that you’ll never forgive him, that you’ll end up getting hurt or worse. He is scared to death of you. He knows about Carterson, more than I do. We have you and that is a miracle. It is Heath. Think about the odds. You oughtn’ta lived past bein’ born." Nick had Heath’s attention and Nick thought Heath looked a little sick.

"He’s staying away so much to avoid breaking what the rest of us have. He’s going after Bentell. He hired detectives. He’s getting interviews from survivors. He needs to know you like I do. He needs the whole story and he’ll get it. I hope he can handle it. I know it’s tearing him apart but he can’t pretend with you Heath. What he needs is to hear it from you, but he’ll never ask that of you." Nick worried about Jarrod’s obsession. He had dug up sealed documents and everything else and there was nothing he could do, but blame himself. And he did. Nick was afraid he might lose Jarrod and Heath if he couldn’t bring them home.

Nick knew his brothers and how much they wanted and needed the other. They were the last link to close in the family. Jarrod might not have all the right answers but he usually had the right questions. He was asking Heath to open his heart, to trust blindly for the sake of a brother’s love. He knew Heath was the one who could do it. Heath was always ready to lay everything on the line. As much as that scared Nick he used it in hopes of healing the family.

He would be there to protect both brothers from each other and themselves. With Nick’s cajoling, Jarrod agreed to join his brothers for an open week-end at their family lodge.

Epilogue

The ride up was strained but not unpleasant. Just being in each others presence softened the edges. They spent their days fishing, hiking, hunting and talking. They worked on trust by taking small chances, laughing at jokes and yelling when lines got tangled and razors stolen one by one. Days weren’t counted and scruffy faces were the only testament to time. Heath knew he needed to explain who he was deep down for Jarrod to understand him and open himself up to the relationship they both needed. It was a difficult task because part of him just didn’t seem human. It was that part of him that had tried to ride out that day. Nick had been there. If he hadn’t Heath knew what he would have done and that scared him. Now that he’d seen it, Heath didn’t think he could hide from it much longer.

One evening well into the week, the brothers gathered around the fire pit to tell stories of their lives as they had done every night. The light of the fire created an intimate space, sealed by the blackness their eyes could not penetrate. Heath began to talk, not about something that happened but about something he’d become.

"When I was a boy, I didn’t have a father or anyone who wanted to be one. I loved my Mother and Rachel and Hannah but when I was gettin’ older I needed more, a strong hand. I was tired of bein’ polite and letting people humiliate me for a few dollars every month. I got fired from a couple o’ jobs. I just turned wild. I couldn’t take it anymore. My Mama wanted me to settle down and not let their words or actions hurt me. Well they did. I didn’t believe in turning the cheek anymore. I wanted to be a man so I left and joined the army.

"Don’t get me wrong, I loved my Mama, still do like every little boy loves his Mama. I’d give anything to have her back just one more day. But love wasn’t enough. I used to think, ‘If I only knew who he was. If I knew he was dead or knew that he left us.’ I don’t know. I guess it was because there was always something missing and Mama wouldn’t give me answers and I resented that. I resented that weakness. She wouldn’t tell me Jarrod. I know if she had it to do all over again she would. She never thought I’d run to the army. She thought I’d outgrow it. Give up, stop asking. But I didn’t.

"I ’spect you know by now what really went on in Carterson. It ain’t something I want to talk about yet ’cause that’d give it place in this day and I don’t think I’m strong enough for that. When I came back from the war, I was real sick, not just my body. I couldn’t leave that place. I didn’t care anymore about anything. I just wanted Mama to stop crying. It was a bad situation. I was, well wild, like I was when you were chasin’ me on the ridge, only I was awake and knew where I was and who I was with. I fought everything and everyone. I did everything I wanted and only what I wanted. If anybody asked me ta do something I didn’t want I didn’t do it." Nick and Jarrod met with a knowing gaze. Heath cleared his throat. "I didn’t keep a steady job neither. Pretty soon no one would hire me in Strawberry and I had an excuse to leave. I lived my life. That was important to me. Too many things just happened to me. Things I didn’t want and I couldn’t stop it and no one else prevented it. I went from job to job always makin’ sure I sent some money home.

"I wrote Mama but didn’t see her too much after that. I passed through a couple o’ times. Then she died. She was so young. I thought I had time to sort things out but they just kept getting worse. All I had was a piece of paper and I decided to take one more chance. Things couldn’t get any worse. And they didn’t. They got better." Heath’s eyes lit up and his brother’s were graced with a smile. "It took me a long time to get strong. I began to let go on the inside. Trust you all. I wanted something I never had. Security. You remember how it was in the beginning. Nick an’ I fought all the time. He kept tryin’ to tell me what to do. He didn’t know that was the one thing that set me off most. Maybe he did?" Heath shrugged, smiling. "It was all that fightin’ and the fact that I didn’t up and leave and he didn’t fire me that I finally saw it was okay to let someone else be in charge of me. A part of me I hadn’t known in a long while came out. It was a lost, heartsick boy and I didn’t know how to make him better. Two lives, a past and a present that had nothing to do with the other. I didn’t know what to do. I wouldn’t let anybody near that boy, I protected him but I couldn’t make him better and I couldn’t hide him either.

"Somehow Nick drew that boy out in to the open and let him play. I I felt better, safer, happier. Then you, Mother, Audra, Gene .....You became family. I didn’t have to protect him any more and he just started to be a part of me. I let go, I felt more alive than I had in a long time. I trusted you, I thought I was whole."

Heath looked to see if his brothers could understand his strange story. Nick kept quiet whatever needed to happen, needed to happen between them. Jarrod heard his brother’s voice, saw the nervous posture, and watched busy hands writing in the dirt. He felt Heath’s presence. He needed the whole story. The documents and interviews described horrors that suddenly became too real to the lawyer’s mind. Horrors that he was sure Heath blamed him for ignoring. Horrors that they now both held inside and needed to share. "It’s alright Heath we saw you change. The more you show us of yourself the more we have to love."

Heath chuckled in a way that sent spikes racing down both older brothers backs.

"It’s true Heath. I don’t want you to take that away from anyone Heath. Every time I come home you pull farther inside. I don’t want to lose you, even if that means staying away." Jarrod dared reveal his own demons.

Heath shook his head. "There’s something else got loose that night on the ridge. Something I tucked so far inside I could forget about it. It was born in Carterson. Only time it could escape was when I was weak or sick. I got real good at pushing it back away like it was nothing. But it’s not."

Jarrod moved closer to his younger brother, kneeling in front of him and lifting his face. "No, it is something and you need to face it." Heath turned his face away. Jarrod was right but how could he understand what he was asking. Heath looked in Jarrod’s eyes and saw determination. Not fear. Jarrod knew what happened.

"Jarrod, you don’t…"

"I do know and you think that weakens you. I won’t do that to you Heath, that’s why I stay away. I would much rather help you face this."

"I can’t."

"Yes you can!" Nick bellowed unable to let Heath give up. "It’s been doing its damndest to kill you, and you been lettin’ it!" Nick’s anger abated quickly. "Why?"

"It ain’t human." Heath barely forced the words out but his tears ran easily.

Jarrod embraced his brother without a warm return Heath remained inert and was losing strength to fight his beast.

"It is human, Heath. Just a boy who had to fight very hard for his life. Let that boy out now to fight for your life."

"No!"

"Shhhh Heath, he’s a brave boy."

"No."

"He’s very brave and he beat Carterson and Bentell before and you need to let him out so he can beat them now, once and for all."

"Jarrod…. please."

"Heath you have to share him with us too. He deserves our love too, maybe most of all." Jarrod held tightly. He could feel Heath falling apart. Nick was at their side completing the circle that would bind them forever in forgiveness and love.