The Sign of Seven Trilogy (36 page)

He leaped. The water was viciously, brutally cold. He dove down, searching until his burning lungs sent him up to gulp in air. A storm raged in the woods now, wild red lightning, cracking thunder, sparking fires that engulfed entire trees. He dove again, calling for Layla with his mind.

When he saw her, he plunged deeper.

Once again their eyes met, once again she reached for him.

She embraced him. Her mouth took his in a kiss that was as cold as the water. And she dragged him down to drown.

HE WOKE GASPING FOR AIR, HIS THROAT RAW AND burning. His chest pounded with pain as he fumbled for the light, as he shoved up and over to sit on the side of the bed and catch his laboring breath.

Not in the woods, not in the pond, he told himself, but in his own bed, in his own apartment. As he pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes he reminded himself he should be used to the nightmares. He and Cal and Gage had been plagued by them every seven years since they'd turned ten. He should be used, too, to pulling aspects of the dream back with him.

He was still chilled, his skin shivering spasmodically over frigid bones. The iron taste of the pool's water still coated his throat. Not real, he thought. No more real than bleeding trees or fires that didn't burn. Just another nasty jab by a demon from hell. No permanent damage.

He rose, left the bedroom, crossed his living room, and went into the kitchen. He pulled a cold bottle of water out of the fridge and drank half of it down as he stood.

When the phone rang, he felt a fresh spurt of alarm. Layla's number was displayed on the caller ID. “What's wrong?”

“You're okay.” Her breath came out in a long, jerky whoosh. “You're okay.”

“Why wouldn't I be?”

“I . . . God, it's three in the morning. I'm sorry. Panic attack. I woke you up. Sorry.”

“You didn't wake me up. Why wouldn't I be okay, Layla?”

“It was just a dream. I shouldn't have called you.”

“We were at Hester's Pool.”

There was a moment of silence. “I killed you.”

“As attorney for the defense, I have to advise that's going to be a hard case to prosecute, as the victim is currently alive and well and standing in his own kitchen.”

“Fox—”

“It was a dream. A bad one, but still a dream. He's playing on your weakness, Layla.” And mine, Fox realized, because I want to save the girl. “I can come over. We'll—”

“No, no, I feel stupid enough calling you. It was just so real, you know?”

“Yeah, I do.”

“I didn't think, I just grabbed the phone. All right, calmer now. We'll need to talk about this tomorrow.”

“We will. Try to get some sleep.”

“You, too. And Fox, I'm glad I didn't drown you in Hester's Pool.”

“I'm pretty happy about that myself. Good night.”

Fox carried the bottle of water back to the bedroom. There, he stood looking out the window that faced the street. The Hollow was quiet, and still as a photograph. Nothing stirred. The people he loved, the people he knew, were safe in their beds.

But he stood there, watchful in the dark, and thought about a kiss that had been cold as the grave. And still seductive.

"CAN YOU REMEMBER ANY OTHER DETAILS?” CYBIL wrote notes on Layla's dream as Layla finished off her coffee.

“I think I gave you everything.”

“Okay.” Cybil leaned back in the kitchen chair, tapped her pencil. “The way it sounds, you and Fox had the same dream. It'll be interesting to see if they were exact, or how the details vary.”

“Interesting.”

“And informative. You could've woke me, Layla. We all know what it's like to have these nightmares.”

“I felt steadier after I'd spoken to Fox, and he wasn't dead.” She managed a small smile. “Plus, I don't need to be shrink-wrapped to figure out that part of the dream was rooted in what we talked about last night. My fear of hurting one of you.”

“Especially Fox.”

“Maybe especially. I'm working for him, for now. And I need to work with him. You and I and Quinn, we're, well, fish in the same pool. I'm not as worried about the two of you. You'll tell Quinn about the dream.”

“As soon as she's back from her workout. Since I assume she dragged Cal to the gym with her, she'll probably talk him into coming back here for coffee. I can tell them both, and someone will fill Gage in. Gage was a little rough on you last night.”

“He was.”

“You needed it.”

“Maybe I did.” No point in whining about it, Layla thought. “Let me ask you something. You and Gage are going to have to work together, too, at some point. How's that going to work?”

“I'll cross that bridge when. And I think we'll figure out a way to handle it without shedding each other's blood.”

“If you say so. I'm going to go up and get dressed, get to work.”

“Do you want a ride in?”

“No, thanks. The walk'll do me good.”

Layla took her time. Alice Hawbaker would be manning the office, and there would be little to do. With Alice there, Layla didn't think it would be wise to huddle with Fox over a shared dream. Nor would it be the best time to have a lesson on honing and, more important to her, controlling her ability.

She'd handle busywork for a couple of hours, run whatever errands Alice might have on tap. It had taken her only a few days to understand the rhythm of the office. If she had any interest or aspirations toward managing a law office, Fox's practice would have been just fine.

As it was, it would bore her senseless within weeks.

Which wasn't the point, Layla reminded herself as she deliberately headed to the Square. The point was to help Fox, to earn a paycheck, and to keep busy.

She stopped at the Square. And that was another point. She could stand here, she thought, she could look at the broken or boarded windows straight-on. She could tell herself to face what had happened to her the evening before, promise herself she would do all she could to stop it.

She turned, started down Main Street to cover the few blocks to Fox's office.

It was a nice town if you just overlooked what happened to it, in it, every seven years. There were lovely old houses along Main, pretty little shops. It was busy in the way small towns were busy. Steady, with familiar faces running the errands and making the change at the cash registers. There was a comfort in that, she supposed.

She liked the wide porches, the awnings, the tidy front yards and bricked sidewalks. It was a pleasant, quaint place, at least on the surface, and not quite postcardy enough to make it annoying.

The town's rhythm was another she'd tuned to quickly. People walked here, stopped to have a word with a neighbor or a friend. If she crossed the street to Ma's Pantry, she'd be greeted by name, asked how she was doing.

Halfway down the block she stopped in front of the little gift shop where she'd picked up some odds and ends for the house. The owner stood out front, staring up at her broken windows. When she turned, Layla saw the tears.

“I'm sorry.” Layla walked to her. “Is there something—”

The woman shook her head. “It's just glass, isn't it? Just glass and things. A lot of broken things. A couple of those damn birds got through, wrecked half my stock. It was like they wanted to, like they were drunks at a party. I don't know.”

“I'm so sorry.”

“I tell myself, well, you've got insurance. And Mr. Hawkins'll fix the windows. He's a good landlord, and those windows will be fixed right away. But it doesn't seem to matter.”

“I'd be heartbroken, too,” Layla told her, and laid a hand on her arm for comfort. “You had really pretty things.”

“Broken now. Seven years back a bunch of kids—we think—busted in and tore the place up. Broke everything they could, wrote obscenities on the walls. It was hard coming back from that, but we did it. I don't know if I've got the heart to do it again. I don't know if I have the heart.” The woman walked back to her shop, went inside behind the broken glass.

Not just broken glass and broken things, Layla thought as she walked on. Broken dreams, too. One vicious act could shatter so much.

Her own heart was heavy when she walked into the reception area. Mrs. Hawbaker sat at the desk, fingers clicking away at the keyboard. “Morning!” She stopped and gave Layla a smile. “Don't you look nice.”

“Thanks.” Layla slipped off her jacket, hung it in the foyer closet. “A friend of mine in New York packed up my clothes, shipped them down for me. Can I get you some coffee, or is there anything you want me to get started on?”

“Fox said to ask you to go on back when you got in. He's got about thirty minutes before an appointment, so you go ahead.”

“All right.”

“I'll be leaving at one today. Be sure to remind Fox he's in court in the morning. It's on his calendar, and I sent him a memo, but it's best to remind him at the end of the day, too.”

“No problem.”

From her observations, Layla thought as she walked down the hall, Fox wasn't nearly as forgetful or absent-minded as he and Alice liked to think. Since the pocket doors to his office were open, she started to knock on the edge as she entered. Then she just stopped and stared.

He stood in back of his desk in front of the window in his no-court-today jeans and untucked shirt, juggling three red balls. His legs were spread, his face absolutely relaxed, and those tiger eyes of his following the circle as his hands caught and tossed, caught and tossed.

“You can juggle.”

She broke his rhythm, but he managed to catch two balls in one hand, one in the other before they went flying around the room. “Yeah. It helps me think.”

“You can juggle,” she repeated, dazed and delighted.

Because it was rare to see her smile just that way, he sent the balls circling again. “It's all timing.” When she laughed, he shot them high, began to walk and turn as he tossed the balls. “Three objects, even four, same size and weight, not really a challenge. If I'm looking for a challenge I mix it up. This is just think juggling.”

“Think juggling,” she repeated as he caught the balls again.

“Yeah.” He opened his desk drawer, dropped them in. “Helps clear my head when I'm . . .” He got a good look at her. “Wow. You look . . . good.”

“Thanks.” She'd worn a skirt and a short, cinched jacket and now wondered if it was too upscale for her current position. “I got the rest of my clothes, and I thought since I had them . . . Anyway, you wanted to see me.”

“I did? I did,” he remembered. “Wait.” He crossed to the doors, slid them closed. “Do you want anything?”

“No.”

“Okay.” His juggling-clear head was fogged up again thanks to her legs, so he went to his minifridge and took out a Coke. “I thought, since there's some time this morning, we should compare notes about the dream. Let's sit down.”

She took one of the visitors' chairs, and Fox took the other. “You go first,” she told him.

When he'd finished, he got up, opened his little fridge, and took out a bottle of Diet Pepsi. When he put it into her hand and she just stared at it, he sat again. “That's what you drink, right? That's what's stocked in the fridge at your place.”

“Yes. Thanks.”

“Do you want a glass?”

She shook her head. The simple consideration shouldn't have surprised her, and yet it did. “Do you keep Diet Sprite in there for Alice?”

“Sure. Why not?”

“Why not,” she murmured, then drank. “I was in the woods, too,” Layla began. “But it wasn't just me. She was in my head, or I was in hers. It's hard to tell. I felt her despair, her fear, like they were mine. I . . . I've never been pregnant, never had a child, but my body felt different.” She hesitated, then told herself she'd been able to give Cybil the details. She could give them to Fox. “My breasts were heavy, and I understood, I
knew
, I'd nursed. In the same way I'd experienced her rape. It was that same kind of awareness. I knew where I was going.”

She paused again, shifted so she could look at his face. He had a way of listening, she thought, so that she knew he not only heard every word, but also understood what came behind them. “I don't know those woods, have only been in them that one time, but I knew where I was, and I knew I was going to the pond. I knew why. I didn't want to go. I didn't want to go there, but I couldn't stop myself. I couldn't stop her. I was screaming inside because I didn't want to die, but she did. She couldn't stand it anymore.”

“Couldn't stand what?”

“She remembered. She remembered the rape, how it felt, what was in her. She remembered, Fox, the night in the clearing. He—it—controlled her so that she accused Giles Dent of her rape, denounced him and Ann Hawkins as witches, and she assumed they were dead. She couldn't live with the guilt. He told her to run.”

“Who?”

“Dent. In the clearing, just before the fire, he looked at her—he pitied her, he forgave her. He told her to run. She ran. She was only sixteen. Everyone thought the child was Dent's, and pitied her for that. She knew, but was afraid to recant. Afraid to speak.”

It pierced her as she spoke of it. That fear, that horror and despair. “She was afraid all the time, Fox, and mad with that fear, that guilt, those memories by the time she delivered the child. I felt it all, it was all swimming inside her—and me. She wanted to end it. She wanted to take the child with her, and end that, too, but she couldn't bring herself to do it.”