The Pagan Stone by Nora Roberts

he looked back at Layla with an easy smile. “Hey, good morning, Layla. Did you say something about fixing breakfast?”
    She laughed. “Good morning, Gage. I believe I did mention that, in a weak moment. But since I am feeling pretty sunny, I’ll follow through.”
    “Great. Thanks. While you are, I’ll tell you guys about the visitor I had on my morning stroll.”
    Layla froze with her hand on the handle of the refrigerator. “It came back?”
    “Not it. She. Though technically maybe a ghost is an it. I haven’t given it much thought.”
    “Ann Hawkins.” Fox tossed the paper aside. “What’s the word?”
    Topping off his coffee, Gage told them.
    “Everyone’s seen her now, one way or the other, but Cybil.” Layla set a platter of French toast on the breakfast bar.
    “Yeah, I bet that’ll tick her off. Cybil, that is,” Gage added as he forked up two slices.
    “Blood and fire. There’s sure been a lot of that, in reality and in dreams. And that’s what put the bloodstone back together. That was Cybil’s brainstorm,” Fox remembered. “Maybe she’ll have one about this.”
    “I’ll fill her in when she gets here later today.”
    “Sooner’s better.” With a generous hand, Fox poured syrup on his stack of French toast. “Layla and I will swing by the house before we go to the office.”
    “She’s just going to want me to go through it all again when she gets here.”
    “Still.” Fox sampled a bite, grinned at Layla. “This is great.”
    “Well, it’s not Pop-Tarts.”
    “Better. Are you sure you don’t want me to go into the bank with you this afternoon? Being you, your paperwork’s in order, but—”
    “I’m fine. You’ve got a busy schedule today. Plus, with my two investors, I’m not applying for a big, fat loan. More of a slim, efficient one.”
    So they segued, Gage thought, from ghosts to interest rates. He tuned them out, started to scan the headlines in the paper he’d stolen back from Fox. Then caught a stray comment.
    “Cybil and Quinn are investing in your shop?”
    “Yeah.” Layla’s smile radiated like sunlight. “It’s great. I hope it’s great for them—I’m going to make it great for them. It’s just wonderful, and staggering, that they’d have that kind of faith in me. You know what that’s like. You and Fox and Cal have always had that.”
    He supposed he did, just as he supposed this was one more tangible aspect of how the six of them were entwined. Ann had said he wasn’t alone. None of them were, he realized. Maybe it was that, just that, that would weigh the odds in their favor.
    When he had the house to himself, he spent an hour answering and composing e-mails. He had a contact in Europe, a Professor Linz, whose expertise was demonology and lore. He was full of theories and a lot of verbose rhetoric, but he had come through with what Gage considered salient information.
    And the more data you tossed into the hat, the better the chance the winning ticket was in there. It wouldn’t hurt to get Linz’s take on Cybil’s newest hypothesis. Was the bloodstone— their bloodstone—a fragment of some larger whole, some mythical, magickal power source?
    Even as he wrote the post, he shook his head. If anyone outside of his tight circle of friends knew he spent a great deal of his time searching out information on demons, they’d laugh their asses off. Then again, those outside that circle who knew him, only saw what he let them see. Not one of them reached the level he’d call friend.
    Acquaintances, players, bedmates. Sometimes they won his money, sometimes he won theirs. Maybe he’d buy them a drink, or they’d stand him a round or two. And the women—away from the tables—they’d give each other a few hours, maybe a few days if it suited both of them.
    Easy come, easy go.
    And why did that suddenly seem more pathetic than a grown man wanting a Pop-Tart for breakfast?
    Annoyed with himself, he combed his hands through his hair, tipped back