The Sign of Seven Trilogy

by Nora Roberts

  “Our specialty. Nice job with the blonde, Cal,” he added, giving Cal a one-armed hug and a wink. “About damn time,” he said to Gage, and hugged him in turn. “You guys want breakfast?”

  “We don’t have a lot of time,” Fox told him. “Sorry.”

  “No problem. I’ll take the milk in, Jo.”

  “I’ll get the eggs. Go ahead and put tea on, Bri. It’s cold this morning.” She turned back to Fox. “Let us know if you need anything, or if we can help.”

  “Thanks.” Fox gestured the group aside while his mother began gathering eggs into a basket. “How do you want to start? Inside?”

  “We know the house wasn’t here then?” Quinn looked at Fox for confirmation.

  “About a hundred years later, but it could have been built on another’s foundation. I just don’t know. That shed? Well, what’s left of that shed, the one covered with vines? That was here.”

  “It’s too small.” Layla studied the remaining walls. “Would be, even for the time period for a house. If we’re talking about a small family taking in a woman and her three babies, that couldn’t have been big enough.”

  “A smokehouse maybe,” Cybil mused. “Or an animal shelter. But it’s interesting that most of it’s still here. There could be a reason for that.”

  “Let me try the house first.” Quinn studied the shed, the land, the big stone house. “Maybe walking around the house out here. I might get something. If not, we’ll do a walk-through, since it’s okay with Fox’s parents. If nothing then . . . there’s the land, that grove of trees, the fields, certainly the little ruin there. Fingers crossed, okay?”

  She crossed the fingers of her left hand, held the right out for Cal. “The clearing in the woods, that’s sacred ground—magic spot. And the stone, it pushed those flashes right in. The attic in the library, that grabbed hold, too. I didn’t have to do anything. I’m not sure what I should do.”

  “Think about Ann,” Cal told her. “You’ve seen her, you’ve heard her. Think about her.”

  Quinn pictured Ann Hawkins as she’d seen her the first time, with her hair loose, carrying pails of water from the stream, her belly huge with her sons, and her face alight with love for the man who waited for her. She pictured her as she’d seen her the second time, slim again, dressed demurely. Older, sadder.

  She walked over the tough winter grass, the thick gravel, over stepping stones. The air was cool and brisk on her cheeks, and was tinged with the scent of animal and earth. She held firm to Cal’s hand, knowing—feeling—he gave her whatever he had so that their abilities linked as their fingers did.

  “I’m just not going there. I’m getting glimpses of you,” she said to Cal with a quick laugh. “A little guy, when you still needed your glasses. Fairly adorable. I can get zips of the three of you running around, and a younger boy, a girl. A toddler—another girl. She’s so cute.”

  “You have to go deeper.” Cal squeezed her hand. “I’m right with you.”

  “That might be the problem. I think I may be picking up on things you remember, your pictures.” She squeezed his hand in turn, then drew hers free. “I think I have to try it alone. Give me a little space. Okay, everybody? A little room.”

  She turned, reached the corner of the house, then followed its line. It was so sturdy, she thought, and as Cybil had said, so handsome. The stone, the wood, the glass. There were flower beds sleeping, and in others sweet and hopeful shoots that must have been daffodils and tulips, hyacinths, and the summer lilies that would follow the spring.

  Strong old trees offered shade, so she imagined—or maybe she saw—the flowers that shied from sunlight blooming there.

  She smelled smoke, she realized. There must be wood fireplaces inside. Of course there would be. What wonderful old farmhouse didn’t have fireplaces? Somewhere to curl up on a cold evening. Flames sending dancing shadow and light, and the warmth so welcome.

  She sat in a room lit by firelight and the glow of a single tallow candle. She did not weep though her heart was flooded with tears. With quill and ink, Ann wrote in her careful hand in the pages of her journal.

  Our sons are eight months old. They are beautiful, and they are healthy. I see you in them, beloved. I see you in their eyes and it both comforts and grieves me. I am well. The kindness of my cousin and her husband are beyond measure. Surely we are a burden on them, but we are never treated as such. In the weeks before, and some weeks after the birth of our sons there was little I could do to help my cousin. Yet she never complained. Even now with the boys to look after, I cannot do as much as I wish to repay her and cousin Fletcher.

  Mending I do. Honor and I made soap and candles, enough for Fletcher to barter.

  This is not what I wish to write, but I find it so hard to subscribe these words to this paper. My cousin has told me that young Hester Deale was drowned in the pool of Hawkins Wood, and leaves her infant daughter orphaned. She condemned you that night, as you had foreseen. She condemned me. We know it was not by her will she did so, as it was not by her will the motherless child was conceived.

  The beast is in the child, Giles. You told me again and again that what you would do would change the order,clean the blood. This sacrifice you made, and I and our children with you was necessary. On nights like this, when I am so alone, when I find my heart full of sorrow for a girl I knew who is lost, I fear what was done, what will be done so long from this night will not be enough. I mourn that you gave yourself for nothing, and our children will never see their father’s face, or feel his kiss.

  I will pray for the strength and the courage you believedlived inside me. I will pray to find them again when the sun rises. Tonight, with the darkness so close, I can only be a woman who longs for her love.

  She closed the book as one of the babies began to cry, and his brothers woke to join him. Rising, she went to the pallet beside her own to soothe, to sing, to offer her breast.

  You are my hope, she whispered, offering one a sugar teat for comfort while his brothers suckled.

  WHEN QUINN’S EYES ROLLED BACK, CAL LIFTED her off her feet. “We need to get her inside.” His long, fast strides carried her to the steps leading to the side porch. Fox rushed ahead, getting the door, then going straight into the family’s music room.

  “I’ll get some water.”

  “She’ll need more.” Cybil hurried after him. “Which way’s the kitchen?”

  He pointed, turned in the opposite direction.

  Because Quinn was shivering, Layla whipped a throw from the back of a small couch as Cal laid Quinn down.

  “My head,” Quinn managed. “God, my head. It’s off the Richter scale. I may be sick. I need to . . .” She swung her legs over, dropped her head between her knees. “Okay.” She breathed in, breathed out as Cal massaged her shoulders. “Okay.”

  “Here, try some water. Fox got you some water.” Layla took the glass he’d brought back, knelt to urge it on Quinn.

  “Take it easy,” Cal advised. “Don’t sit up until you’re ready. Slow breaths.”

  “Believe me.” She eyed the brass bucket Gage set next to her, then shifted her gaze to the kindling now scattered over the hearth. “Good thinking, but I’m pretty sure I’m not going to need that.”

  She eased up until she could rest her throbbing head on Cal’s shoulder. “Intense.”

  “I know.” He pressed his lips lightly to the side of her head.

  “Did I say anything? It was Ann. She was writing in her journal.”

  “You said plenty,” Cal told her.

  “Why didn’t I think to turn on my recorder?”

  “Got that.” Gage held up her minirecorder. “I pulled it out of your purse when the show started.”

  She took a slow sip of water, glanced at Fox out of eyes still blurry in a pale, pale face. “Your parents wouldn’t happen to have any morphine around here?”

  “Sorry.”

  “It’ll pass.” Cal kissed her again, rubbed gently at the back of her neck. “Promise.”<
br />
  “How long was I gone?”

  “Nearly twenty minutes.” Cal glanced over when Cybil came back in carrying a tall pottery mug.

  “Here.” Cybil stroked Quinn’s cheek. “This’ll help.”

  “What is it?”

  “Tea. That’s all you have to know. Come on, be a good girl.” She held the mug to Quinn’s lips. “Your mother has an amazing collection of homemade teas, Fox.”

  “Maybe, but this tastes like—” Quinn broke off when Joanne walked in. “Ms. Barry.”

  “That blend tastes pretty crappy, but it’ll help. Let me have her, Cal.” Brushing Cal aside, Joanne took his place, then pressed and rubbed at two points at the base of Quinn’s neck. “Try not to tense. That’s better. Breathe through it. Breathe the oxygen in, exhale the tension and discomfort. That’s good. Are you pregnant?”

  “What? No. Um, no.”

  “There’s a point here.” She took Quinn’s left hand, pressed on the webbing between her thumb and forefinger. “It’s effective, but traditionally forbidden for pregnant women.”

  “The Adjoining Valley,” Cybil said.

  “You know acupressure?”

  “She knows everything,” Quinn claimed, and took her first easy breath. “It’s better. It’s a lot better. Down from blinding to annoying. Thank you.”

  “You should rest awhile. Cal can take you upstairs if you want.”

  “Thanks, but—”

  “Cal, you ought to take her home.” Layla stepped forward to pat a hand on Cal’s arm. “I can ride into the office with Fox. Cybil, you can get Gage back to Cal’s, right?”

  “I could do that.”

  “We haven’t finished,” Quinn objected. “We need to move on to part two and find out where she put the journal.”

  “Not today.”

  “She’s right, Blondie. You haven’t got another round in you.” To settle the matter, Cal picked her up off the couch.

  “Well, hard to argue. I guess I’m going. Thanks, Ms. Barry.”

  “Jo.”

  “Thanks, Jo, for letting us screw up your morning.”

  “Anytime. Fox, give Cal a hand with the door. Gage, why don’t you take Cybil back, let Brian know everything’s all right? Layla.” Jo put a hand on Layla’s arm, holding her in place while the others left the room. “That was smoothly done.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “You maneuvered that so Quinn and Cal would have time alone, which is exactly what they both need. I’m going to ask you a favor.”

  “Of course.”

  “If there’s anything we can or should do, will you tell me? Fox may not. He’s protective of those he loves. Sometimes too protective.”

  “I’ll do what I can.”

  “Can’t ask for more than that.”

  Fox waited for Layla to join him outside. “You don’t have to go into the office.”

  “Cal and Quinn need some space, and I’d just as soon be busy.”

  “Borrow Quinn’s car, or Cybil’s. Go shopping. Do something normal.”

  “Work is normal. Are you trying to get rid of me?”

  “I’m trying to give you a break.”

  “I don’t need a break. Quinn does.” She turned as Cybil and Gage came out. “I’m going to go into the office for the day, unless you need me back at home.”

  “I’ve got it covered,” Cybil told her. “Other than logging in this morning’s fun and games, there isn’t much else to do until we find the journal.”

  “We’re putting a lot of stock in a diary,” Gage commented.

  “It’s the next step.” Cybil shrugged.

  “I can’t find it.” Fox spread his hands. “Maybe she wrote them, maybe she wrote them here—it seems clear she did. But I lived in this house and never got a glimmer. I went through it again last night, wide open. Walked around inside, out, the old shed, the woods. I got nothing.”

  “Maybe you need me.”

  His eyes latched on to Layla.

  “Maybe it’s something we need to do together. We could try that. We’ve still got a little time now. We could—”

  “Not now. Now while my parents are here in case . . . of anything. They’ll both be away tomorrow, all morning.” Out of harm’s way, if there was any harm to be had. “At the pottery, at the stand. We’ll come back tomorrow.”

  “Fine with me. Well, cowboy.” Cybil gestured to Quinn’s car. “Let’s ride.” She said nothing else until she and Gage were inside, pulling out ahead of Fox’s truck. “What does he think might happen that he doesn’t want his parents exposed to?”

  “Nothing’s ever happened here, or at Cal’s parents’ place. But, as far as we know, they’ve never been connected before. So who the hell knows?”

  She considered as she drove. “They’re nice people.”

  “About the best.”

  “You spent a lot of time here as a boy.”

  “Yeah.”

  “God, do you ever shut up?” she demanded after a moment. “It’s all talk, talk, talk with you.”

  “I love the sound of my own voice.”

  She gave it another ten seconds of silence. “Let’s try another avenue. How’d you do in the poker game?”

  “Did okay. You play?”

  “I’ve been known to.”

  “Are you any good?”

  “I make it a policy to be good, or learn to be good, at everything I do. In fact—”

  As she rounded the curve, she saw the huge black dog hunched in the middle of the road a few yards ahead. Meeting its eyes, Cybil checked the instinct to slam the brakes. “Better hang on,” she said coolly, then punched the gas instead.

  It leaped. A mass of black, the glint of fang and claw. The car shuddered at impact, and she fought to control it with her heart slammed in her throat. The windshield exploded; the hood erupted in flame. Again, she fought the instinct to hit the brakes, spun the car hard into a tight one-eighty. She prepared to ram the dog again, but it was gone.

  The windshield was intact; the hood unmarred.

  “Son of a bitch, son of a bitch,” she said, over and over.

  “Turn around, and keep going, Cybil.” Gage closed a hand over the one that clamped the steering wheel. It was cold, he noted, but rock steady. “Turn the car around, and drive.”

  “Yeah, okay.” She shuddered once, hard, then turned the car around. “So . . . What was I saying before we were interrupted?”

  Sheer admiration for her chutzpah had a laugh rolling out of him. “You got nerve, sister. You got nerves of fucking steel.”

  “I don’t know. I wanted to kill it. I just wanted to kill it. And, well, it’s not my car, so if I wrecked it running over a damn devil dog, it’s Q’s problem.” And at the moment, her stomach was a quivering mess. “It was probably stupid. I couldn’t see anything for a minute, when the windshield . . . I could’ve run us into a tree, or off the road into the creek.”

  “People who are afraid to try something stupid never get anywhere.”

  “I wanted to pay it back, for what it did to Layla yesterday. And that’s not the sort of thing that’s going to work.”

  “It didn’t suck,” Gage said after a minute.

  She laughed a little, then shot him a glance and laughed some more. “No, now that you mention it, it really didn’t.”

  Seven

  FOX’S FRIDAY SCHEDULE DIDN’T GIVE HIM MUCH time to think, or to brood. He went from appointment to meeting, back to appointment and into phone conference. At midafternoon, he saw a clear hour and decided to use it to take a walk around town to give his brain a rest.

  Better yet, he thought, he’d walk up to the Bowl-a-Rama, grab a few minutes with Cal. He’d get a better sense of how Quinn was doing, how they were all doing if he talked with Cal.

  When he stepped into reception to tell Layla, he found her talking with Cal’s great-grandmother Estelle Hawkins.

  “I thought we were meeting at our usual clandestine rendezvous.” He walked over to kiss her soft, thi
n-skinned cheek. “How are we going to keep our secret affair secret?”

  “It’s all over town.” Essie’s eyes twinkled through the thick lenses of her glasses. “We might as well start living in sin openly.”

  “I’ll go up and pack.”

  She laughed, swatted at him. “Before you do, I was hoping you’d have a few minutes for me. Professionally.”

  “I’ve always got time for you, in any way. Come on back. Layla’s going to hold my calls.” He winked at her as he took Essie’s arm. “In case our passions overwhelm us.”

  “Should I just lock the outside door?” Layla called out as he led Essie away.

  “It’s a wonder you can keep your mind on your work,” Essie told him as they moved into his office, “with a pretty girl like that around.”

  “I have Herculean power of will. Want a Coke?”

  “You know, I believe I would.”

  “Two seconds.”

  He got a glass, ice, poured. She was one of Fox’s favorite people, and he made sure she was comfortable before he sat with her in the sitting area of his office. “Where’s Ginger?” he asked, referring to Cal’s cousin who lived with Essie.

  “She went on to the bank before it closes. She’ll be coming back for me. This won’t take long.”

  “What can I do for you? Want to sue somebody?”

  She smiled at him. “Can’t think of anything I’d like less. I wonder why people are forever suing each other.”

  “Blame the lawyers. Still, it’s a better alternative than beating the hell out of each other. Mostly.”

  “People do that, too. But I’m not here for either. It’s about my will, Fox.”

  It gave him a little pang. She was ninety-three, and he certainly understood and appreciated the value of having your affairs well in order long before you approached Essie’s age. But it still gave him a little pang to think of his world without her in it.

  “I updated your will and your trust a few years ago. Do you want changes?”

  “Nothing big. I have a couple pieces of jewelry I wanted to earmark for Quinn. Right now, my pearls and my aquamarine earrings are going to Frannie. She understands I want to leave them to her future daughter-in-law. I’ve talked to her about it. And I know I can leave it like that, I can trust her to give them to Quinn. But, as I recall, you told me it’s easier on those left behind if everything’s spelled out.”