Josh opened his eyes and stared into the darkness, cursing softly at his inability to sleep. Here it was, the middle of the night, hours until dawn, and he was wide awake. As the weeks had passed with no sign of Ortega, Josh had found himself sleepless more nights than he cared to remember. And, of course, he was worried about Felicity, too.

Their separation had now lasted over six weeks, and he had not heard from her in the last two, not since the letter that had informed him of her grandfather's recovery. Although she and Josh had set no specific time for her return, Josh had always expected her to insist on staying as long as her grandfather stayed alive. Now it seemed he might live for a good long time.

Not only was Maxwell recovered, but he was having some sort of shindig for her, too, a party in her honor, to introduce her to all the right people. She made it sound like she had decided to settle in for life. When Maxwell's friends saw her pictures and realized how talented she was, they'd probably make her Queen of the May, too. She would certainly have no reason to even want to come home.

She hadn't mentioned anything about coming home, either, and to make matters worse, she had not written since. Letters sometimes got lost, never reaching their destinations, of course, but two weeks had passed without a word. For the first month of their separation, he had heard from her several times a week. The silence could mean only one thing: She had stopped writing.

Josh rolled over in disgust, punching his pillow into what he hoped would be a more comfortable shape, but nothing could ease his frustration. The fact that she had stopped writing was a danger sign, he knew, but there wasn't a damn thing he could do about it. He couldn't leave the ranch, not with Ortega and Jeremiah lurking out there somewhere just waiting for the right opportunity to strike. And he couldn't summon her home for the very same reasons. All he could do was wait.

Out in her cabin, Candace, too, was having trouble sleeping. Lately, her nights had been plagued by nightmares that included Joshua and her son, nightmares that involved blood and death and left her gasping, drenched in a cold sweat.

Another of these nightmares had awakened her tonight, and as she lay shivering in the darkness, a hand clamped over her mouth, stifling the scream that rose in her throat.

"Not a sound, old woman," her son's voice rasped in her ear. "Not one sound," he repeated, pressing the barrel of a pistol to her head. "Get up now, real slow," he said, removing his hand from her mouth and using it to urge her out of the bed and onto her feet.

He was using his bad hand to help her, she realized in some distant part of her brain. "What do you want this time?" she asked, keeping her voice low so she wouldn't anger him.

"Tonight's the night," he said grimly. "The night I pay the Logans back for what I owe them."

"What are you going to do?" she demanded, trembling in terror and thanking God that Felicity, at least, was out of danger.

"Don't worry, you'll see it all," he assured her, propelling her toward the cabin door. "I want you with me so you'll see everything."

Josh had been staring at the ceiling for a long time when he noticed the peculiar light. Could it be dawn already? he wondered, glancing toward the window. But it wasn't the steady light of dawn. It was the flickering glow of flames that brightened the room.

In an instant he was at the window, just in time to see the interior of the barn explode into flames. Instinct told him to call for help, and almost before the thought formed in his mind, his hands jerked up the partially opened sash. He was just about to holler to waken his cowboys when he saw the silhouette of a man moving furtively away from the burning barn.

Not toward the barn, as one of his own men would do, and not toward the bunkhouse to summon the rest of the men, but away and quickly, so as not to be seen. Someone had set the fire, and Josh had a pretty good idea who it was.

"Grady!" he called, his voice echoing across the empty ranch yard. "Grady! Wake up!" In a few seconds he heard men shouting as those awakened by his call noticed the light from the fire and aroused the others. The instant the first figure appeared at the bunkhouse door, however, Josh called out again.

"Don't come out! Stay where you are! It's a trap!" No sooner had his warning stopped the flow of men which had bottlenecked at the bunkhouse door than a shot rang out. Josh heard it thunk into the wood beside the window where he stood. He ducked instinctively and moved away from the window.

Snatching his pants and hastily pulling them on, he ran into the parlor and pulled a rifle off the gun rack. Checking the loads, he raced to the front window and hauled it open as the whine of more bullets echoed outside. He took a minute to survey the situation before taking aim.

From the flashes of gunpowder, he could tell that his men had heeded his advice and remained inside the bunkhouse. Thank God he had seen the arsonist. Under normal circumstances, the first person to notice the fire would have summoned every man on the place to fight it. Within a minute or two, all his men would have been standing in the yard, highlighted by the flames into perfect targets for Ortega's men to shoot down at will.

Now it was Ortega's men who made good targets as they moved around the eerily lit yard to positions of safety from which they could shoot into the bunkhouse. Josh took careful aim and fired at one stealthily moving figure. The figure cried out and dropped, but scrambled away before Josh had a second chance at him.

From his isolated position, Josh attracted very few shots himself, and he managed to get off several of his own before a noise behind him alerted him to a very present danger.

"Josh! Look out!" Candace cried, but as Josh jerked around to discover the source of the danger, all he saw was Candace flying toward him. He had just enough time to drop his rifle and raise his hands to catch her as she collided with him. In the next instant her weight had carried them both to the floor, but almost as soon as they hit, Candace was frantically fighting free of him so he could rise again. "He's here! He wants to kill you!" she was saying, her voice shrill with hysteria.

"Damn you, old woman!" Jeremiah shouted.

Josh struggled for a moment with Candace's clinging hands before he realized she did not want to let him go. She was shielding him with her own body. "Stop it, Candace," he ordered, using his superior strength to break her grip and set her aside. What he saw when he did made his blood run cold.

Jeremiah stood in the middle of the room, plainly visible in the brilliant light from the fire that now burned almost as brightly as day. He held a Colt.45 in his left hand, and it was pointed straight at Josh's heart. Josh glanced down to where his own rifle lay on the floor and calculated his chances of reaching it before Jeremiah's bullet stopped him.

"Don't try it, Logan," Jeremiah warned.

The tone of Jeremiah's voice pulled Josh's attention back to his half-brother. Something was not quite right, and when Josh had studied Jeremiah for another few seconds, he realized what it was. The man was trembling.

"Don't move, Logan!" he ordered again, and Josh heard the edge of panic in his voice.

But why should he be panicking? He had the gun and the upper hand. All he had to do was pull the trigger, and his revenge would be complete. Unless… unless he had suddenly realized he no longer wanted revenge.

Gambling with what he knew might very well be his own and Candace's lives, he decided to play his hunch. "Setting the barn on fire, that was a clever plan. Was that your idea, Jeremiah?" Josh asked, making his voice sound as normal as possible under the circumstances.