The Hollow Page 0,33

what you might know about after the settlers came here."

"When the Hollow was settled," Jo said. "When Lazarus Twisse arrived."

"Yeah."

"I know the land was farmed then, that the area was known as Hollow Creek. I have some paperwork on it. Why, Fox? We're not close to the Pagan Stone, we're outside of town."

"We think Ann Hawkins might have stayed here, had her sons here."

"On this farm?" Brian mused. "How about that?"

"She wrote journals, I told you about that, and how there are gaps in them. We haven't found any from the time she left-or supposedly left-the Hollow until she came back a couple years later. If we could find them..."

"That was three hundred years ago," Jo pointed out.

"I know, but we have to try. If we could come by in the morning, first thing in the morning before I have any clients coming in-"

"You know you don't have to ask," Brian said. "We'll be here."

Jo said nothing for a moment. "I'll get the famous cobbler." She rose, stroking a hand over her son's shoulder on her way to the cupboard.

HE'D WANTED TO KEEP ALL OF IT AWAY FROM HIS family, away from home. When he drove the familiar roads back to the farm at the first break of dawn, Fox told himself this search didn't, wouldn't, pull his family in any further. Even if they proved Ann had stayed there on their land, even if they found her journals, it didn't change the fact the farm was one of the safe zones.

None of their families had ever been infected, none of them had ever been threatened. That wasn't going to change. He simply wouldn't allow it to change. The threat was coming sooner, and harder, that was fact. But his family remained safe.

He pulled in front of the farmhouse just ahead of Cal and Gage.

"I've got two hours," he told them as they got out. "If we need more, I can try to shuffle some stuff. Otherwise, it has to wait until tomorrow. Saturday's clear."

"We'll work it out." Cal stepped aside so that Lump and the two host dogs could sniff each other and get reacquainted.

"Here comes the estrogen." Gage lifted his chin toward the road. "Is your lady ready to ante up, Hawkins?"

"She said she is, so she is." But Cal walked to the car, drew Quinn aside when the women piled out. "I don't know if I can help you with this."

"Cal-"

"I know we went over this last night, but I'm allowed to be obsessive about the woman I love."

"Absolutely." She linked her hands around his neck so that her bright blue eyes smiled into his. "Obsess me."

He took the offered mouth, let himself sink in. "I'll do what I can, you know that. But the fact is, I've been coming here all my life, slept in this house, ate in it, played in it, ran the fields, helped with chores. It was my second home, and I never got a single flash of the past, of Ann, of anything."

"Giles Dent wasn't here, neither were the ones-the guardians that came before him. Not so far as we know. If Ann came here to stay, she came here without him, and stayed on after Dent was already gone. This one's on me, Cal."

"I know." He touched her lips with his again. "Just take it easy on yourself, Blondie."

"It's a wonderful house," Layla said to Fox. "Just a wonderful spot. Isn't it, Cybil?"

"Like a Pissarro painting. What kind of farming, Fox?"

"Organic family farming, you could say. They'll be around back this time of morning, dealing with the animals."

"Cows?" Layla fell into step behind him.

"No. Goats, for the milk. Chickens, for the eggs. Bees for the honey. Vegetables, herbs, flowers. Everything gets used, and what's surplus we-they-sell or barter."

The scent of animals wound through the morning air, exotic to her city-girl senses. She spotted a tire swing hanging from the thick, gnarled branch of what she thought might be a sycamore. "It must've been great growing up here."

"It was. I might not have thought so when I was shoveling chicken manure or hacking at bindweed, but it was great."

Chickens clucked in their busy and urgent voices. As they rounded the house Fox saw his mother casting feed for them. She wore jeans, her ancient Wellingtons, a frayed plaid shirt over a thermal pullover. Her hair was down her back, a long, thick braid.

Now it was his turn for a flash from the past. He saw her in his mind, doing the