Blood Brothers Page 0,64

Opening her eyes again, Quinn gave Layla a sympathetic look. "Inside this sphere, there's logic. It's just not the kind we deal with, or most of us deal with, every day. The past, the now, the yet to be. Things that happened, that are happening, and that will or may are all part of the solution, the way to end it."

"I think there's more to that part." Cal turned back from the window. "After that night in the clearing, the three of us were different."

"You don't get sick, and you heal almost as soon as you're hurt. Quinn told me."

"Yeah. And I could see."

"Without your glasses."

"I could also see before. I started-right there minutes afterward-to have flashes of the past."

"The way you did-both of us did," Quinn corrected, "when we touched the stone together. And later, when we-"

"Like that, not always that clear, not always so intense. Sometimes awake, sometimes like a dream. Sometimes completely irrelevant. And Fox...It took him a while to understand. Jesus, we were ten. He can see now." Annoyed with himself, Cal shook his head. "He can see, or sense what you're thinking, or feeling."

"Fox is psychic?" Layla demanded.

"Psychic lawyer. He's so hired."

Despite everything, Quinn's announcement made Cal's lips twitch. "Not like that, not exactly. It's never been something we can completely control. Fox has to deliberately push it, and it doesn't always work then. But since then he has an instinct about people. And Gage-"

"He sees what could happen," Quinn added. "He's the soothsayer."

"It's hardest for him. That's why-one of the reasons why-he doesn't spend much time here. It's harder here. He's had some pretty damn vicious dreams, visions, nightmares, whatever the hell you want to call them."

And it hurts you when he hurts, Quinn thought. "But he hasn't seen what you're meant to do?"

"No. That would be too easy, wouldn't it?" Cal said bitterly. "Has to be more fun to mess up the lives of three kids, to let innocent people die or kill and maim each other. Stretch that out for a couple of decades, then say: Okay, boys, now's the time."

"Maybe there was no choice." Quinn held up a hand when Cal's eyes fired. "I'm not saying it's fair. In fact, it sucks. Inside and out, it sucks. I'm saying maybe it couldn't be another way. Whether it was something Giles Dent did, or something set in motion centuries before that, there may have been no other choice. She said he was holding it, that he was preventing it from destroying the Hollow. If it was Ann, and she meant Giles Dent, does that mean he trapped this thing, this bestia, and in some form-beatus-has been trapped with it, battling it, all this time? Three hundred and fifty years and change. That sucks, too."

Layla jumped at the brisk knock on the door, then popped up. "I'll get it. Maybe it's the delivery."

"You're not wrong," Cal said quietly. "But it doesn't make it easier to live through it. It doesn't make it easier to know, in my gut, that we're coming up to our last chance."

Quinn got to her feet. "I wish-"

"It's flowers!" Layla's voice was giddy with delight as she came in carrying the vase of tulips. "For you, Quinn."

"Jesus, talk about weird timing," Cal muttered.

"For me? Oh God, they look like lollipop cups. They're gorgeous!" Quinn set them on the ancient coffee table. "Must be a bribe from my editor so I'll finish that article on-" She broke off as she ripped open the card. Her face was blank with shock as she lifted her eyes to Cal. "You sent me flowers?"

"I was in the florist before-"

"You sent me flowers on Valentine's Day."

"I hear my mother calling," Layla announced. "Coming, Mom!" She made a fast exit.

"You sent me tulips that look like blooming candy canes on Valentine's Day."

"They looked like fun."

"That's what you wrote on the card. 'These look like fun.' Wow." She scooped a hand through her hair. "I have to say that I'm a sensible woman, who knows very well Valentine's Day is a commercially generated holiday designed to sell greeting cards, flowers, and candy."

"Yeah, well." He slid his hands into his pockets. "Works."

"And I'm not the type of woman who goes all mushy and gooey over flowers, or sees them as an apology for an argument, a prelude to sex, or any of the other oft-perceived uses."

"I just saw them, thought you'd get a kick out of them. Period. I've got to get to work."

"But," she continued and