Nora Roberts - The Pagan Stone

She shook her head again, drank the rest of the brandy. “It wasn’t real, physically. But it felt real, physically, and every other way there is to feel. I’m not going to scream; I might never stop. I want Quinn, that’s all. I want Quinn.”

When the front door slammed open, Gage thought Quinn must have run every step. She was still running when she reached the kitchen. “Cyb.”

Cybil made a sound, a mix of moan and whimper that sliced straight through Gage’s belly. Even as she turned into Quinn’s arms, Quinn led her away. “Come on, baby, let’s go upstairs. I’ll take you upstairs.”

Quinn sent Gage one long grieving look, then they were gone. Gage picked up the glass, smashed it in the sink. Changed nothing, he thought, looking down at the shards. Just a broken glass, and that changed nothing, fixed nothing, helped nothing.

Cal came in to find him standing at the sink, staring out at the sunny afternoon. “What happened? After Quinn got your call she told me to call Layla, get her here, and she ran out. Cybil, is she hurt?”

“Christ knows.” His throat burned, Gage realized. Burned as if he’d swallowed flame. “It raped her. The son of a fucking bitch, and I didn’t stop it.”

Cal stepped up to him, laid a hand on his shoulder. “Tell me what happened.”

He began coldly, almost clinically, beginning with the blood on the walls. He didn’t stop or acknowledge Fox when Fox came in, but he picked up the beer Fox opened and set in front of him.

“About a mile, mile and a half from your place it stopped. It all went away. Except for Cybil. I don’t know if that kind of thing ever goes away.”

“You got her away,” Cal pointed out. “You got her back home.”

“Give me a medal and call me hero.”

“I know how you feel.” Fox met Gage’s hot and bitter look quietly. “It’s happened to Layla, so I know how you feel. Layla’s upstairs now. That’s going to help. And Cybil will get through it because that’s the way they’re made. We’ll get through it because it’s all we can do. We’ll all get through it because we’re going to make the bastard pay. That’s what the fuck we’re going to do.”

He held out a hand. After a moment, Gage gripped it, and Cal laid his over theirs. “We’ll make the bastard pay,” Gage repeated. “That’s what the fuck we’re going to do. I swear an oath.”

“We swear an oath,” Cal and Fox agreed, then Cal blew out a breath and rose.

“I’ll make her some tea. Tea’s the thing she likes.”

“Put some whiskey in it,” Fox suggested.

They put it together, and after some discussion and debate, put a pony of whiskey on the side. Gage carried it up, then hesitated outside the closed bedroom door. Before he could knock, Layla opened it, jumped a little.

“ Cal made this tea,” Gage began.

“Perfect. I was just coming down to do exactly that. Is that whiskey?”

“Yeah. Fox’s contribution.”

“Good.” Layla took the tray. Then studied Gage with weary eyes. “She’ll be all right, Gage. Thanks for bringing this up.” She closed the door and left him staring at the blank panel.

In the bathroom that linked the two bedrooms, Cybil lay in the tub. She’d had her jag, and that had left her exhausted. Oddly, the fatigue helped. Not as much as her friends, she thought, but some.

As did the hot water, and the fragrance and froth Layla had added to it. Quinn rose from the little stool beside the tub when Layla brought in the tea tray.

“That was really fast, like superpower fast.”

“Gage brought it up. Cal made it, so it’s probably just fine. Honey, there’s whiskey here. Do you want it in the tea?”

“Oh yeah. Thanks. God.” Shifting up, Cybil squeezed her burning eyes, breathed through the threatening flood of tears. “No, no, done with that.”

“Maybe not.” Layla doctored the tea. “I have a moment every now and again. It’s okay. We’re allowed.”

With a nod, Cybil accepted the tea. “It wasn’t the pain, though, oh Jesus, nothing’s ever hurt like that. It was feeling it in me, pounding and pushing, and not being able to stop it, or fight it. It was the boy. Why is that worse? That it made me see the boy while it-” She broke off, made herself drink the spiked tea.

“It’s a kind of torture, isn’t it? A kind of physical and psychological torture designed to break us down.” Quinn brushed a hand over Cybil’s hair. “We won’t be broken.”

“No, we won’t.” She held out a hand, and in a gesture that mirrored the one made in the kitchen, Quinn took it, and Layla closed hers over theirs. “We won’t break.”

She dressed, and took some comfort in grooming. She wouldn’t break, Cybil vowed, nor would she look like a victim. When she stepped out of the bedroom she heard the murmur of voices from the office. Not yet, she thought. Not quite ready for that. She moved quietly past, and down the stairs. Maybe after another ocean or two of tea.

In the kitchen she took the kettle to the sink and saw Gage outside, alone. Her first inclination was to back away, to slink away into some dark corner and hide. And the urge both surprised and embarrassed her. In defense, she took the opposite tact, and went outside.

He turned, stared at her. In his eyes she saw the rage and the ruin.

“Absolutely nothing I can say would sound remotely right. I thought you might want me to take off, but I didn’t want to leave until I was sure you… What?” he said in disgust. “I don’t have a clue what.”

She considered for a moment. “You’re not far wrong. I guess a part of me hoped you’d be gone so I didn’t have to talk about this now.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I don’t like that part of me,” she continued. “So let’s just get this done. It came at me, the attack that’s a woman’s nightmare. The big fear. It made me feel that violation, and the helplessness. That horror that drove Hester Deale mad.”

“I should’ve gone after it.”

“And left me? Would you, could you leave me when I was completely defenseless, completely terrorized? I couldn’t stop it; that’s not my fault. You got me away, and getting away made it stop. You defended me when I couldn’t defend myself. Thank you.”

“I’m not looking for-”

“I know you’re not,” she interrupted. “I probably wouldn’t feel as grateful if you were. Gage, if either of us feel guilty about what happened, it wins a kind of victory. So let’s don’t.”

“Okay.”

But he would, for a while yet anyway, she realized. A man would. This man would. Maybe she could do something to soothe them both. “Would it complicate our straightforward and mature relationship if you just held on to me for a minute?”

He put his arms around her with the wary caution of a man handling thin and priceless crystal. But when she sighed, laid her head on his shoulder, it was he who broke. His hold tightened. “Christ, Cybil. Good Christ.”

“When we destroy it.” She spoke clearly now, steadily now. “If it comes in a form with a dick, I will personally castrate it.”

His grip tightened again, and he kissed her hair. Complicated, he realized, didn’t begin to cover whatever was going on inside him. But right at that moment, he didn’t give a damn.

TO AVOID HAVING EVERYONE TIPTOEING AROUND her, Cybil voted for work. The small second-floor office might’ve been cramped with six people inside, but she had to admit, it felt safe.

“Gage found what may be another pattern dealing with locations,” she began, “that springs off the one we talked about before. We can look at them as hot spots and safe zones. The bowling center. While that was the location of the first known infection and violence and has seen other incidents, it’s never sustained any damage. No fires, no vandalism. Right?”