“Did he tell you what happened? The morning he came back from the Pagan Stone?”
“I like to think we got a lot right with our kids, but one thing I know we got right. They know they can tell us anything. He'd spun that one about camping out in Cal's backyard, but Jo and I saw through that.”
“You knew he was going to spend the night in the woods?”
“We knew he was taking an adventure, and we gave him the room. If we hadn't, he'd've found a way around it. Birds have to fledge. You can't stop it, no matter how much you want to keep them safe in the nest.”
He paused a moment, and Layla could see him looking back, wondered what it was like to look back over the course of another's lifetime. Someone you loved.
“He had Gage with him when he came home,” Brian continued. “You could see, in both of them, something had changed. Then they told us, and everything changed. We talked about leaving. Jo and I talked about selling the farm and moving on. But he needed to be here. After the week was up, we all thought it was over. But more than that, we knew Fox needed to be here, with Cal and Gage.”
“You've seen him face this three times before, and now he's facing it again. I think it must take tremendous courage to accept what he's doing. Not to try to stop him.”
The smile was easy, the smile clear. “It's not courage, it's faith. I have complete faith in Fox. He's the best man I know.”
Brian stayed until she closed the office, then insisted on driving her home. The best man I know, she mused as she walked in the house. Was there a higher tribute from father to son? She walked upstairs to take the journal back to the home office.
Quinn sat at her desk, scowling at her monitor.
“How's it going?”
“Crappy. I'm on deadline with the article, and I can't keep my head in the game.”
“Sorry. I'll go down, give you the room.”
“No. Shit.” She shoved away. “I shouldn't have said I'd write the stupid article except, hello, money. But we've been pushing on this idea of the blood ritual, and clever words to go with it, and Cybil's snarly.”
“Where is she?”
“Working in her room because apparently I think too loud.” Quinn waved it away. “We get like this with each other if we work on a project for any serious length of time. Only
she
gets like this more. I wish I had a cookie.” Quinn propped her chin on her hand. “I wish I had a bag of Milanos. Crap.” She picked up the apple from the desk, bit in. “What are you smiling at, size freaking two?”
“Four, and I'm smiling because it's reassuring to come home and find you in this lousy mood wishing for cookies, and Cybil holed up in her room. It's so normal.”
With something between a grunt and a snort, Quinn took another bite of apple. “My mother sent a swatch for bridesmaids' gowns. It's fuchsia. How's that for normal, Sunny Jane?”
“I could wear fuchsia if I had to. Please don't make me.”
Blue eyes wickedly amused, Quinn chewed and smiled. “Cyb would look horrible in fuchsia. If she keeps crabbing at me, I'll make her wear it. You know what? We need to get out of here for a while. All work, no play. We're taking tomorrow off and shopping for my wedding dress.”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously.”
“I thought you'd never ask. I've been
dying
to do this. Whereâ”
Layla turned as Cybil's door opened. “We're going shopping. For Quinn's wedding gown.”
“Good, that's good.” At the doorway, Cybil leaned on the jamb, studied both her friends. “That's what we could call a ritualâa white one, a female one. Unless we want to take a closer look at the symbolism. White equals virginal, veil equals submissionâ”
“We don't,” Quinn interrupted. “I will, without shame, toss my feminist principles to the wind for the perfect wedding dress. I'll live with it.”
“Right. Well, anyway . . .” Absently, Cybil shoved back her mass of hair. “It's still a female ritual. Maybe it'll balance out what we'll be doing in another two weeks. Blood magic.”
FOX DROVE STRAIGHT TO LAYLA'S AFTER HIS APPOINTMENTS. She opened the door as he started up the walk, her hair swinging, her lips curved in a welcoming smile. Could he help it if that was exactly what he hoped to come home to every night?
“Hey.” He leaned down to kiss her, leaned up and cocked his head at the absent response. “Why don't we try that again?”
“Sorry. I'm distracted.” She took the lapels of his jacket in her hands, and put herself into the kiss.
“That's what I'm talking about.” But he saw now there was no reflection of that smile of greeting in her eyes. “What's the matter?”
“Did you get my voice mail?”
“Meeting here, as soon as I could make it. I made it.”
“We're in the living room. It'sâCybil thinks she's nailed down the blood ritual.”
“Fun and games for all.” Concerned, he brushed his thumb over her cheekbone. “What's the problem?”
“Sheâ She's waiting until you get here to explain it to the three of you.”
“Whatever she explained to you didn't put roses in your cheeks.”
“Some of the variables on the potential outcome aren't rosy.” She took his hand. “You'd better hear it for yourself. But before . . . I have to tell you something else.”
“Okay.”
“Fox . . .” Her fingers tightened on his, as if in comfort. “Can we just sit here a minute?”
They sat on the porch steps, looking out at the quiet street. Her hands clasped on her knee, one of her signsâ Gage would call it a tellâof nerves. “How bad is it?” Fox asked her.
“I don't know. I don't know how you'll feel about it.” She pressed her lips together once, hard. “I'm going to say it straight out, then you can take whatever time you need to, well, absorb it. Carly was connected. To this. She was a descendent of Hester Deale's.”
It hit him, a hard, fast punch to the solar plexus. His thoughts spun, so he asked the first question that popped. “How do you know?”
“I asked Cybilâ” She broke off, shifted to face him, started again. “It seemed that there had to be a reason for what happened, Fox, a reason she was infected so quickly, so . . . fatally. So I asked Cybil to look into it, and she has been.”
“Why didn't you say anything to me?”
“I wasn't sure, and if I'd been wrong, I'd have upset you for nothing. And . . . I should've told you,” she amended. “I'm sorry.”
“No.” The spinning stopped; the ache just under his heart eased. She'd wanted to shield him until supposition became fact and he'd have done exactly the same. “No, I get it. Cybil climbed Carly's family tree?”
“Yes. Tonight she told me she'd found the connection. She has the details of the genealogy if you want to see them.”
When he only shook his head, she went on. “I don't know if this makes it better for you, or worse, or if it changes nothing. But I thought you should know.”
“She was part of it,” he said quietly. “All along.”
“Twisse used that, and you, and her. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, but nothing you did, nothing you didn't do would have changed that.”
“I don't know if that's true, but there's nothing I can do now to change it. Maybe we found each other, Carly and me, because of this. But then we made choices, both of us, that led to the end of it. Different choices, maybe a different result. No way to know.”
After a moment, he laid his hand over hers. “There's always going to be guilt, and grief, when I think of her. But now, I know at least part of the why. I never understood why, Layla, and that twisted me up.”
“Twisse took her to hurt you. And was able to take her, the way he did, because she was of his bloodline. And because . . .”
“Keep going,” he told her when she trailed off.
“I think because she didn't believe, not really. She didn't believe enough to be afraid, or to fight, even to run. That's just speculation, and I might be overstepping, butâ”
“No.” He said it quietly. “No, you're exactly right. She didn't believe, even when she saw with her own eyes.” He lifted his free hand, studied the unmarred palm. “She told me what she thought I wanted to hear, promised to stay at the farm that night without ever intending to keep the promise. She was built skeptical, she couldn't help it.”
He closed his hand into a loose fist, lowered it. And for the first time in nearly seven years, he let it go. “I never thought of a connection. That was smart. And you were right to tell me.” He lifted their hands, slid his fingers between hers. “Being up-front with each other, even when it's hard, that's the best choice for us.”
“I want to say this one thing more before we go in. If I promise you somethingâif you ask me to do something, or not to, and I give you my promise, I'll keep it.”
Understanding, he brought their joined hands to his lips. “And I'll believe what you tell me. Let's go inside.”
He couldn't change the past, Fox thought. He could only prepare for the future. But he could prize and hold the now. Layla was his now. The people in this house were his as well. They needed him, and he needed them. That was enough for any man.
He settled into his usual spot on the floor with Lump. Whatever was in the air, Fox thought, was something between nerves and fear. That was from the women. From Cal and Gage he sensed both interest and impatience.
“What's going on? And whatever it is, let's get on with it.”
Cybil took the stage.
“I've talked with a number of people I know and, for the most part, trust, regarding performing a blood ritual, the object being to re-form the three pieces of Dent's bloodstone into one. We're assuming that's something we need to do. There are a lot of assumptions here based on bits and pieces of information, on speculation.”
“The three separate pieces haven't done us much good up till now,” Gage pointed out.
“Well, you don't know that, do you?” Cybil tossed back. “It's very possible that those individual pieces are what's given you your giftsâyour sight, your healing. Once whole, you might lose that. And without those gifts in your arsenal, you'll be all the more vulnerable to Twisse.”
“If you don't put them back together,” Cal pointed out, “they're just three pieces of stone we don't understand. We agreed to try. We
have
tried. If you've found another way, that's what we'll try next.”
“Blood rites are powerful and dangerous magicks. We're dealing with a powerful and dangerous force already. You need to know all the possible consequences. All of us need to know. And all of us have to agree because all of us need to be part of it for the ritual to have any chance of working. I'm not going to agree until everyone understands.”
“We get it.” Gage shrugged. “Cal may need to dig out his glasses, and the three of us will be susceptible to the common cold.”
“Don't make light of this.” Cybil turned to him. “You could lose what you have, and more. It could all blow up in our faces. You've seen that possibility. The mix of blood and fire, the stone on the stone. Every living thing consumed. It was your blood that let the demon out. We need to consider that performing this rite could loose something worse.”
“You have to play to win.”
“He's right.” Fox nodded at Gage. “We risk it, or we do nothing. We believe Ann Hawkins or we don't. This was the time, that's what she told Cal. This Seven is the all or nothing, and the stoneâwholeâis a potential weapon. I believe her. She sacrificed her life with Dent, and that sacrifice led to us. One into three, three into one. If there's a way, we go.”
“There's another three. Q, Layla, and me. Our blood, tainted if you will, with that of the demon.”
“And carrying that of the innocent.” Layla sat with her hands folded, as if she held something delicate inside them. “Hester Deale wasn't evil. Innocent blood, you said, Cybil, innocent blood is a powerful element in ritual.”
“So I'm told.” Cybil let out a sigh. “I was also warned that the innocent can be used to give the demon strain more power. That a ritual such as we're suggesting could be an invitation. Three young boys were changed by a blood rite on that ground. It could happen again, with us.” She looked at Layla, at Quinn. “And what's diluted, or dormant, or just outweighed in us by who we are, could rise.”
“Not going to happen.” Quinn spoke briskly. “Not only because I don't consider horns and cloven feet a fashion statement but”âshe ignored Cybil's annoyed oathâ “because we won't let it. Cyb, you're too goddamn hard-headed to let a little demon DNA run your show. And you're not responsible. Don't even,” Quinn ordered when Cybil started to speak. “Nobody knows you like I do. If we vote go, we're all in it, we're all making the choice. And whatever happens, thumbs-up or -down, it's not on you. You're just the messenger.”
“Understand if it goes wrong, it could go seriously and violently wrong.”
“If it goes right,” Fox reminded Cybil, “it's a step toward saving lives. Toward ending this.”
“More likely we'll lose a little blood and not a damn thing will change. Any way you look at it, it's a long shot,” Gage added. “I like a long shot. I'm in.”
“Anyone not?” Quinn scanned the room. “That's a big go.”
“Let's get started.”
“Not so fast, big guy,” Cybil said to Gage. “While the ritual's pretty straightforward, there are details and procedure. It requires the six of usâboy-girl, boy-girlâlike any good dinner party, in the standard ritual circle. On the ritual ground at the Pagan Stone. Cal, I don't suppose you have the knife you used before?”