"Dammit, doc, don't tell me that! Tell me whether or not she is going to be okay!" Grayson yelled as he paced back and forth in the tiny room and swung his arms in rage. Doctor Mason's eyes were full of pity and guilt as he shrugged and looked down at Callie's motionless body in the bed. He had done his best to stop the blood and sew her up. He had changed her rain and blood soaked clothes and covered her with warm dry blankets to fight off the chill but he truly believed that she was going to die tonight.

"I am sorry, Grayson. I wish I could tell you that she is going to be fine but I don't know. I got the bullet out but she lost a lot of blood and her lung was hit… There is a good chance that she won't ever wake up." Grayson yelled in rage and sent his fist hard into the wall, splintering the wood and causing Annie to scream in surprise and grab at her chest from where she was sitting in a chair next to Callie's bedside. They were in the same small dusty room they'd been in not long ago after Grayson had been shot.

"Let me look at your hand." Doc Mason said. Grayson shook his head and pulled a large sliver of wood from between his knuckles gritting his teeth against the pain as blood covered his hand.

"It's fine." he replied through clenched teeth. The only sound in the room was the sound of the clock ticking on the wall for several long tense moments and then Peter, Lauren and James came into the office.

"Where's Thomas?" Grayson demanded of Peter. Peter was almost too weak to raise his head and look up at him and blood was pouring steady from the wound on his temple.

"I lost him." Peter said weakly. His eyes went to Callie and he saw that she was as pale as a ghost and had a sickly gray color to her face. "How's Callie?"

"It doesn't look good." Annie replied softly her voice raspy from all the tears she had been crying. Grayson shoved his bloody hand through his hair and Lauren felt her heart break for her brother. He looked like a lost and scared little boy. He was covered in Callie's blood and still soaked from the rain. He was pale and his green eyes were full of fear and sadness.

"How the hell did you lose him Peter?" Grayson demanded angrily. Everyone in the room shared knowing looks. Grayson was scared and sad and therefore everyone was fair game for his temper.

"Grayson, he tried. That hit to the head he got was bad." Lauren said. She tried to hug Grayson to offer him some sort of comfort but he pulled out of her reach and walked over to the far wall. He pressed his palms flat against it, kept his arms straight and looked down at the floor.

"Let me look at your head, Peter." Doc Mason said as Lauren and James helped Peter sit down in a chair.

"These are yours." James said holding out Grayson's gun belt and the Derringer.

"Just put them over in the corner or something. They aren't going to do me any good now." Grayson replied quietly. James nodded and sat them on the desk in the corner.

"Come on, Grayson, let's go wait in the main office." Lauren said grabbing her brother's arm.

"I'm not leaving, Callie." he replied planting his feet firmly and becoming as immovable as a giant oak. Lauren was about to argue when Garth Corbin came running into the room.

"What do you want? You want to kill me once and for all?" Grayson demanded turning to face him. Grayson held his hands up. "Go ahead and kill me. I won't try to stop you. I already lost the only good thing I had today."

"Callie's not dead yet, Grayson." Annie reminded him.

"No, but according to the doc she isn't going to wake up." Grayson replied. Doc Mason sighed as he wrapped a bandage tight around Peter's head.

"I don't want to give you false hope, Grayson. I've never seen anybody live after getting shot like that." Grayson growled loudly and was about to send his fist into the wall again when Garth spoke up for the first time.

"I heard what happened." he said. "I saw Thomas, Grayson. He's at the church." Grayson's entire posture and face changed instantly. The lost, scared, defeated look left him and was replaced by a mask of cold rage, hatred and anger that made the blood of everyone in the room run cold. Grayson didn't say a word as he walked over and grabbed his gun belt. He hooked it to his waist and then pulled his pistol to ensure it was still loaded. He holstered it and then walked over to Callie's bedside.

"Hi my angel." he said gently as he smoothed her light blond hair from her face. "I'm mad at you for doing what you did, Callie. You had no right to take that bullet for me. Now you are going to listen to me and you are going to listen to me good, Callie Fields. You cannot die on me do you hear me? I won't allow it…" his voice broke as he laid a large calloused hand on her pale, cold cheek.

"I am not a selfish man, Callie, you know that better than anybody. You know just what I have given up for other people, but dammit, I won't give you up just because God might want you. He can't have you. You are my angel. You are the one and only person who has always believed that I was a good person. And if God takes you away from me tonight then dammit I'm going to one selfish son of a bitch because I am going to find a way to get up there to you and I am going to bring you right back down here. We haven't had enough time love. Not near enough time." Grayson kissed her colorless heart shaped lips gently and then he stood and started for the door.

"Grayson, what are you going to do?" Lauren demanded through her tears. Grayson stopped but didn't turn back to look at anyone.

"I'm going to kill that worthless bastard." he replied coldly and then he walked the rest of the way out of the office and into the rain.

"James, go with him!" Lauren said. "Garth you go and get the sheriff to go out there too." James and Garth both nodded and walked out of the office. Lauren settled down on the edge of the bed as Doc Mason walked out into the main office.

"Callie, you have to come back to my brother." Lauren said quietly as she ran her fingers through Callie's damp hair. "He won't make it without you."

The room became silent as Annie, Peter and Lauren all became lost in their own thoughts. Lauren felt like she was losing a sister and if she lost her sister then she knew she would lose her brother as well. Annie felt as if it was her daughter lying there in that bed fighting for her life and she was helpless to stop her steady flow of tears. Peter looked over at Callie and felt his heart breaking.

He couldn't lose that girl. She was his best friend. Sure he loved Peggy Sue and was going to marry her someday but Callie was like sunshine and if she died then Peter knew that every day for the rest of his life would be cloudy. He prayed that Grayson would be able to kill Thomas Whitaker and make him pay for what he'd done to Callie. And he prayed that Callie would wake up not only for Peter's sake but for Grayson's as well.

888

It was a ten minute walk through the rain to get up the hill to the church where Grayson and Callie had been married only days before. Grayson pulled his pistol and walked straight through the wide oak doors. The inside of the church was small. Ten pews lined either side of the narrow aisle. The stained glass windows didn't let in much light even on a sunny day and none tonight at dusk as the rain continued to fall.

Lanterns were lit on the walls to light the inside and there were candles glowing up around the alter. Grayson's eyes fell on Thomas who was knelt down as if in prayer on the steps in front of the alter and the giant cross on the wall behind it.

"I sure hope you're making what peace you can with God, Thomas, because you're fixing to meet him." Grayson said. Thomas stood and turned quickly and Grayson could see fear in his eyes and he could see that Thomas was unarmed.

"Grayson, what point is there in killing me?" he asked. "It won't bring Callie back."

"No but it'll make me feel a whole hell of a lot better." Grayson replied raising his pistol and cocking it.

"Before you kill me I want to get some things out in the open." Thomas said. "I killed Frank Logan and married his wife to get his money. He had changed his will without my knowledge and so I was stuck with Susannah and no money. I learned I would have to marry Callie to get the money so I began supplying Susannah with all the laudanum and alcohol I could get my hands on. It took six years but she finally died. In the meantime Callie was falling in love with you and I could tell you loved her too. I couldn't let the two of you get married and I was thinking of a plan to kill you when I was walking past the saloon that night and heard you shoot Phillip.

"It was perfect. The perfect chance to be rid of you. I killed the bartender and hid his body until I had time to dispose of it so that he wouldn't be able to vouch for you and then I told everyone about your drunken rage and the cold blooded murder of your brother. You didn't hang the way I had hoped you would but you were gone none the less so it worked.

"But you came back…. You weren't supposed to ever come back. You see my foolish stepdaughter had been waiting on you all those years you were gone. So I shot you in the back to get rid of you and again it didn't work. Sometimes I think that God sent you to earth just to be a pain in my side. You stole the will, you married Callie, you took everything that was supposed to be mine.

"But the last laugh is on me Grayson because even if you kill me now I have already taken everything from you. I killed her Grayson and I would do it again just to see that look on your face that was there as Callie's body fell to the ground at your feet."

"Are you done?" Grayson asked. Thomas smiled coldly.

"I believe so." Grayson nodded.

"Good." He aimed the pistol at Thomas's head and was about to blow that cold smile right off his face when the sheriff's voice stopped him.

"You can't shoot him, Grayson." he said.

"Why the hell not?" Grayson demanded not taking his gun or his eyes off of Thomas.

"Because he's unarmed and it would be cold blooded murder and you'd hang right next to him." sheriff Potter said matter-of-factly. "I heard everything he just said and trust me when I tell you that I'm gonna lock him up real tight and I'm sure the judge will see fit to have him swinging from the gallows in no time."

"With all due respect sheriff, I don't give a damn what you say. I want to kill the man." Grayson replied. Thomas was looking from Grayson to the sheriff and rubbing his hands excitedly. Looks like he wasn't going to die just now after all.

"Grayson, Callie isn't dead yet son. If she wakes up she's gonna need her husband and you won't be able to be there for her if you kill Thomas and I have to lock you up. She'll need you, Grayson." sheriff Potter said knowing that if anything could break through to Grayson it would be the thought of Callie needing him.

Grayson's mind was racing. On one hand he wanted nothing more then to pull this trigger and splatter Thomas's brains all over the church altar he'd been praying at but on the other hand he knew that he had to be there for Callie if she woke up… When she wakes up, not if. He argued to himself.

Grayson let the hammer down slowly and slid the pistol back in his gun belt. Thomas breathed an audible sigh of relief and Grayson closed the distance between them. He grabbed Thomas by the collar of his shirt and lifted him in the air so that their eyes were level.

"I'm going to tell you something right now." Grayson said his green eyes flashing. "You had better hope that my wife wakes up and lives Thomas because if she doesn't, there is nowhere that sheriff Potter can hide you that I won't get to you. There is no corner of hell I won't chase you too. If my wife dies I will march right to wherever you are and I will blow your good for nothing brains out and I will kill anyone who tries to stand in my way." Thomas nodded and Grayson threw him to the floor.

Grayson turned and saw that both sheriff Potter and James were standing just inside the church.

"I meant what I said sheriff. If Callie dies, I will kill Thomas and you'd be wise to just stay out of my way when I do or else I'll just have to kill you too." Grayson warned. Sheriff Potter knew the look of a desperate, angry man when he saw one and that is the look that Grayson had right now. Sheriff Potter knew that Grayson was being honest and he knew that if Callie died Grayson would kill whoever he had to in order to get to Thomas.

"I understand, Grayson." sheriff Potter said with a nod. Grayson nodded as well and then started walking toward them.

Thomas's mind was racing as he stood watching Grayson walk away. He was a dead man. Either way he was a dead man. There was no way that Callie was going to live through taking that bullet to her chest and if she died then Thomas would die slowly at Grayson's hands. That was not an option for Thomas. He was going to end Grayson now. The sheriff would more then likely put a bullet in him for it but at least then Thomas knew he was taking Grayson with him.

He pulled the derringer pistol from his shoe and aimed it at Grayson's back. Grayson heard the pistol cock and he dropped to his knee and spun as four gunshots filled the air.

Thomas grabbed at his shirt and looked down surprised at the blood flowing freely from the three holes in his chest. He looked up at Grayson, James and sheriff Potter who were all holstering their pistols.

"Did I miss?" he managed to gasp. Grayson looked down at his uninjured body and nodded.

"Yeah you missed, you son of a bitch." Thomas took a small step forward then fell face first onto the dark green rug in the aisle.

"Come on, Grayson, let's go back to Callie." James said. "We'll leave this mess to the sheriff."

"You boys take care now." sheriff Potter said. Grayson and James nodded and walked out the door of the church.

"Everything is going to be okay ,Grayson." James assured him. Grayson shook his head and cursed at the rain that was still falling. He shoved his hand through his wet hair and looked down at the grass as he walked.

"Not if I lose her, James. If I lose her then nothing will ever be okay again."

888

The rain was still falling the next day as Grayson stood beneath the blooming dogwood tree and watched the caretaker throwing dirt down on the wooden casket in the cemetery below. Everyone else had already left but Grayson could not bring himself to.

The last time he had been beneath this tree he had been asking Callie to be his wife. He had been happier than he had ever been in his life. Now standing beneath this tree and thinking of Callie filled him with a sadness so deep and profound he was afraid it would cause his heart to stop beating.

With shovel full after shovel full of dirt the caretaker buried the casket deep under the ground. Grayson waited until he was nearly done and then he turned to his buckskin. He scratched the horse on the side of the head.

"You ready boy?" he asked. He swung himself up into the saddle and sniffed. This rain was quickly giving him a cold. He hadn't seen the sun since yesterday and now he was fairly certain that the sun would never shine again. He pointed the horse in the direction of his and Callie's house. He had promised Callie that one day that house would be just as beautiful as it had been when her father was alive and he planned to keep his word even if Callie never would get to see it.