Book Ten 9-11

Chapter 9
Alcide changed to some boots he had in the truck, and he shed his tieand coat. Jannalynn wisely took off her spike-heeled sandals
and Annabelle her own more modest heels. I gave them both some sneakers of mine, and I offered Jannalynn an old T-shirt to
cover her shiny silver dress so it wouldn’t snag in the woods. She pulled it over her head. She even said, “Thanks,” though she
didn’t sound actually grateful. I retrieved two shovels from the toolshed. Alcide took one shovel, Eric the other. Jason carried one
of those great big flashlights called a lantern that he’d fished out of the toolbox on his truck. The lantern was for my benefit. The
vampires could see perfectly well in the dark, and the Weres could see very well, too. Since Jason was a werepanther, he had
excellent night vision. I was the blind one in the group.
“Do we know where we’re going?” Annabelle said.
“Heidi said it was due east, close to the stream, in a clearing,” I said, and we slogged eastward. I kept running into stuff, and after a
while Eric handed off his shovel to Jason and crouched so I could cling to his back. I kept my head tucked behind his so branches
wouldn’t hit me in the face. Our progress was smoother after that.
“I smell it,” Jannalynn said suddenly. She was out ahead of us all, as if her job in the pack were to make the way clear for the
packleader. She was a different woman out in the woods. Though I couldn’t see very well, I could see that. She was quick, surefooted,
and decisive. She darted ahead, and after a moment she called back, “Here it is!”
We got there to find her standing over a patch of dirt in a little clearing. It had been disturbed recently, though an attempt had been
made to camouflage that disturbance.
Eric eased me down onto the ground, and Jason shone the lantern at the earth. “It’s not . . . ?” I whispered, knowing everyone
there could hear me.
“No,” Eric said firmly. “Too recent.” Not Debbie Pelt. She was elsewhere, in an older grave.
“Only one way to find out who it is,” Alcide said. Jason and Alcide began to dig, and since they were both very strong, it went
quickly. Alexei came over to stand by me, and it occurred to me that a grave in the woods had to be a bad flashback for him. I put
an arm around him as if he were still human, though I noticed that Appius gave me a sardonic look. Alexei’s eyes were on the
gravediggers, especially Jason. I knew this child could dig the grave with his bare hands as fast as they were digging with shovels,
but Alexei looked so frail it was hard to think of him being as strong as other vampires. I wondered how many people had made
that mistake in the past few decades, and how many of those had died at Alexei’s small hands.
Jason and Alcide could make the dirt fly. While they worked, Annabelle and Jannalynn prowled around the little clearing, probably
trying to pick up what scents they could. Despite the rain of two nights ago, there might be something in the areas protected by the
trees. Heidi hadn’t been looking for a murderer; she’d been trying to make a list of who’d crossed the land. I was thinking that the
only creatures who hadn’t been tromping through my woods had been regular old humans. If the Weres were lying, a Were could
be the killer. Or it could be one of the fae, who were a violent race, as I had observed. Or the killer could be Bill, since Heidi
thought the vampire she’d scented was my neighbor.
I hadn’t smelled the body while it was under the dirt as the others had, since my sense of smell was only a fraction of theirs. But as
the dirt piles grew and the hole got deeper, I could tell it was there. Oh gosh, could I.
I put my hand across my nose, which didn’t help at all. I couldn’t imagine how the others were enduring it, since it would be so
much sharper to their senses. Maybe they were also more practical, or simply more accustomed.
Then both the diggers stopped. “He’s wrapped up,” Jason said. Alcide bent over and fumbled with something at the bottom of the
hole.
“I think I got it pulled apart,” Alcide said after a moment.
“Pass me the lantern, Sookie,” Jason said, and I tossed it to him. He shone it down. “I don’t know this man,” he said.
“I do,” said Alcide in a strange voice. Annabelle and Jannalynn were at the edge of the grave instantly. I had to brace myself to step
forward to look down into the pit.
I recognized him instantly. The three Weres threw back their heads and howled.
“It’s the Long Tooth enforcer,” I told the vampires. I gagged and had to wait a minute before I could go on. “It’s Basim al Saud.”
The passage of days had made a great difference, but I knew him instantly. Those corkscrew curls I’d envied, the muscled body.
“Shit,” screamed Jannalynn, when the howling was done.
And that about summed it up.
When the Weres had calmed down, there was a lot to talk about.
“I only met him the once,” I said. “Of course, he was fine when he got in the truck with Alcide and Annabelle.”
“He told me what he’d smelled on the property, and I told him to tell Sookie,” Alcide told Eric. “She had a right to know. We
didn’t talk about anything in particular on the way back to Shreveport, did we, Annabelle?”
“No,” she said, and I could tell she was crying.
“I dropped him off at his apartment. When I called him the next day to go with me to a meeting with our representative, he said he
had to pass because he had to work. He was a website designer, and he had a meeting with an important client. I wasn’t too happy
he couldn’t go, but of course, the guy had to make a living.” Alcide shrugged.
Annabelle said, “He didn’t have to work that day.”
There was a moment of silence.
“I was at his apartment when you called,” she said, and I could tell the effort she was expending to keep her voice calm and level. “I
had been there a few hours.”
Wow. Unexpected revelation. Jason had hopped out of the grave, and he and I gave each other big eyes. This was like one of
Gran’s “stories,” the soap operas she’d watched religiously.
Alcide growled. The ritual howling for the dead had brought out the wolf in him.
“I know,” Annabelle said. “And we’ll talk about it later. I’ll take my punishment, which I deserve. But Basim’s death is more
important than my bad judgment. This is my duty, to tell you what happened. Basim got a phone call before yours, and he didn’t
want me to hear it. But I heard enough to understand his conversation was with someone who was paying him.”
Alcide’s growl intensified. Jannalynn was standing close to her pack sister, and the only way I can put it was that she was aimed at
Annabelle. She was crouching slightly, her hands curved as if they were about to sprout claws.
Alexei had edged close to Jason, and when the tension kept ratcheting up, Jason’s arm slung around the boy’s shoulders. Jason
was having the same problem separating illusion and reality that I was.
Annabelle flinched at the sound coming from Alcide, but she kept on going. “So Basim made up an excuse to get me out of the
apartment, and he took off. I tried to follow him, but I lost him.”
“You were suspicious,” Jannalynn said. “But you didn’t call the packmaster. You didn’t call me. You didn’t call anyone. We took
you in and made you a member of our pack, and you betrayed us.” Suddenly, she hit Annabelle in the head with her fist, actually
leaping into the air to land the blow. Just like that, Annabelle was on the ground. I gasped, and I wasn’t the only one.
But I was the only one who noticed that Jason was straining to hold Alexei back. Something about the violence in the air had sent
the boy over the edge. If he’d been a little bigger, Jason would’ve been on the ground. I punched Eric in the arm, jerked my head in
the direction of the struggle. Eric leaped over to help Jason restrain the boy, who fought and snarled in their arms.
For a moment there was silence in the dark clearing as everyone watched Alexei struggle with his madness. Appius Livius looked
profoundly sad. He worked his way into the knot of limbs and wrapped his own arms around his child. “Sshhhhhh,” he said. “My
son, be still.” And gradually Alexei grew quiet.
Alcide’s voice was very close to a rumble when he said, “Jannalynn, you are my new second. Annabelle, get up. This is pack
business now, and we’ll settle it at a pack meeting.” He turned his back on us and began moving.
The Weres were simply going to walk out of the woods and drive away. “Excuse me,” I said sharply. “There’s the little matter of
the body being buried on my land. I think there’s something pretty damn significant about that.”
The Weres stopped walking.
Eric said, “Yes.” The one word carried a lot of weight. “Alcide, I believe Sookie and I need to sit in on your pack meeting.”
“Only pack members,” Jannalynn snapped. “No oneys, no deaders.” She was still as small as ever, but with her field promotion to
second, she seemed harder and stronger in spirit. She was a ruthless little thing, no doubt about it. I thought Sam was mighty brave,
or mighty foolish.
“Alcide?” Eric said quietly.
“Sookie can bring Jason, since he’s two-natured,” Alcide growled. “She’s a oney, but she’s a friend of the pack. No vamps.”
Eric glanced at my brother. “Jason, will you accompany your sister?”
“Sure,” Jason said.
So it was settled. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Annabelle stagger to her feet and reorient herself. Jannalynn packed a wallop.
“What are you going to do with the body?” I called after Alcide, who was definitely moving out. “Do you want us to cover him
back up or what?”
Annabelle took a hesitant step after Jannalynn and Alcide. That was going to be a happy ride back to Shreveport. “Someone will
come get him tonight,” Jannalynn called over her shoulder. “So there’ll be activity in your woods. Don’t be alarmed.” When
Annabelle glanced back, I noticed she was bleeding from one corner of her mouth. I felt the vampires come to attention. In fact,
Alexei stepped away from Jason and would have followed her if Appius Livius hadn’t kept his grip on the boy.
“Should we cover him back up?” Jason said.
“If they’re sending a crew to get him, that seems like wasted effort,” I said. “Eric, I’m so glad you sent Heidi. Otherwise . . .” I
thought hard. “Listen, if he was buried on my land, it was so he could be found here, right? So there’s no telling when someone’s
going to get a tip to come looking for him.”
The only one who seemed to follow my reasoning was Jason, who said, “Okay, we got to get him out of here.”
I was flapping my hands in the air, I was so anxious. “We’ve got to put him somewhere,” I said. “We could just set him in the
cemetery!”
“Naw, too close,” Jason said.
“What about the pond behind your house?” I said.
“Naw, dammit! The fish! I couldn’t ever eat those fish again.”
“Aaargh,” I said. Really!
“Is your time with her usually like this?” Appius Livius asked Eric, who was smart enough not to answer.
“Sookie,” he said. “It won’t be pleasant, but I think I can fly carrying him if you can suggest a good place to put him.”
I felt like my brain was running through a maze and hitting all the dead ends. I actually smacked myself on the side of the head to jog
an idea loose. It worked. “Sure, Eric. Put him in the woods right across the road from my driveway. There’s a little bit of a
driveway left there, but no house. The Weres can use the driveway as a marker when they come to retrieve him. Causesomeone’s
coming to find him, and coming soon.”
Without further discussion, Eric leaped into the hole and rewrapped Basim in the sheet or whatever the wrapping was. Though the
lantern showed me his face was full of disgust, he scooped up the decomposing body and leaped into the air. He was out of view in
a second.
“Damn,” said Jason, impressed. “Cool.”
“Let’s fill in this grave,” I said. We set to work, with Appius Livius watching. It obviously didn’t occur to him that his help would
make the job go much faster. Even Alexei shoved in piles of dirt, and he seemed to be having a pretty good time doing it. This was
probably as close to a normal activity as the thirteen-year-old had come in some time. Gradually, the hole filled in. It still looked like
a grave. The tsarevitch tore at the hard edges with his small hands. I almost protested, but then I saw what he was doing. He
reconfigured the grave-shaped dent until it looked like an irregular dent, maybe created by rain or a collapsed mole tunnel. He
beamed at us when he’d finished, and Jason clapped him on the back. Jason got a branch and swept it over the area, and then we
tossed leaves and branches around. Alexei enjoyed that part, too.
Finally, we gave up. I couldn’t think of one more thing to do.
Filthy and frightened, I shouldered one of the shovels and prepared to make my way through the woods. Jason took the other
shovel in his right hand, and Alexei took Jason’s left hand, as if he were even younger than the child he looked. My brother, though
his face was a picture, kept hold of the vampire. Appius Livius at last made himself useful by leading us through the trees and
undergrowth with some assurance.
Eric was at the house when we reached it. He’d already thrown his clothes into the garbage and gotten into the shower. Under
other circumstances, I would have loved to join him, but it just wasn’t possible to feel sexy at the moment. I was grimy and nasty,
but I was still the hostess, so I heated up some more TrueBlood for the two visiting vampires and showed them the downstairs
bathroom in case they wanted to wash up.
Jason came into the kitchen to tell me that he was going to shove off.
“Let me know when the meeting is,” he said in a subdued way. “And I gotta report all this to Calvin, you know.”
“I understand,” I said, weary to death of politics of all kinds. I wondered if America knew what it was in for when it considered
requiring the two-natured to register. America was really better off not having to go through this crap. Human politics were tedious
enough.
Jason went out the back door. A second later, I heard his truck roaring away. Almost as soon as Appius Livius and Alexei had had
their drinks, Eric came out of my bedroom in fresh clothes (he kept a change at my house) and smelling very much like my apricot
body wash. With his maker around, Eric could hardly have a heart-to-heart with me, assuming he wanted to. He wasn’t exactly
acting like my honey now that his dad was in the house. There could be several reasons for this. I didn’t like any of them.
Soon afterward, the three vampires left for Shreveport. Appius Livius thanked me for my hospitality in such an impassive way that I
had no idea whether he was being sarcastic. Eric was as silent as a stone. Alexei, as calm and smiling as if he’d never gone mad,
gave me a cold embrace. I had a hard time accepting it with equal calm.
Three seconds after they were out the door, I was on the phone.
“Fangtasia, where all your bloody dreams come true,” said a bored female voice.
“Pam. Listen.”
“The phone is pressed to my ear. Speak.”
“Appius Livius Ocella just dropped in.”
“Fuck a zombie!”
I wasn’t sure that I’d heard that correctly. “Yes, he’s been here. I guess he’s your granddad? Anyway, he’s got a new protégé with
him, and they’re heading for Eric’s to spend the day.”
“What does he want?”
“He hasn’t said yet.”
“How is Eric?”
“Very tightly wound. Plus, a lot of stuff happened that he’ll tell you about.”
“Thanks for the warning. I’ll go to the house now. You’re my favorite breather.”
“Oh. Well . . . great.”
She hung up. I wondered what preparations she would make. Would the vamps and humans who worked at the Shreveport nightclub
go into a cleaning frenzy at Eric’s? I’d only seen Pam and Bobby Burnham there, though I assumed some of the crew came in
from time to time. Would Pam rush some willing humans over to act as bedtime snacks?
I was too tense to think about going to bed. Whatever Eric’s maker was doing here, it wasn’t something I was going to like. And I
already knew Appius Livius’s presence was bad for our relationship. While I was in the shower—and before I picked up the wet
towels Eric had left on the floor—I did some serious thinking.
Vampire plotting can be pretty convoluted. But I tried to imagine the significance of the Roman’s surprise visit. Surely he hadn’t
shown up in America, in Louisiana, in Shreveport, just to catch up on the geezer gossip.
Maybe he needed a loan. That wouldn’t be too bad. Eric could always make more money. Though I had no idea how Eric stood
financially, I had a little nest egg in the bank since Sophie-Anne’s estate had paid up the money she’d owed me. And whatever
Claudine had had in her checking account would be coming to join it. If Eric needed it, he could have it.
But what if money wasn’t the issue? Maybe Appius Livius needed to hole up because he’d gotten in trouble somewhere else.
Maybe some Bolshevik vampires were after Alexei! That would be interesting. I could always hope they’d catch up with Appius
Livius . . . as long as it wasn’t at Eric’s house.
Or perhaps Eric’s maker had been courted by Felipe de Castro or Victor Madden because they wanted something from Eric that
he hadn’t given up yet, and they planned on using Eric’s maker to pull his strings.
But here was my most likely scenario: Appius Livius Ocella had dropped by with his “new” boy toy just to mess with Eric’s head.
That was the guess I was putting my money on. Appius Livius was hard to read. At moments he seemed okay. He seemed to care
about Eric, and he seemed to care about Alexei. As for Eric’s maker’s relationship with Alexei—the boy would have died if Appius
Livius hadn’t intervened. Given the circumstances—Alexei’s witnessing the murders of his entire family and their servants and
friends—letting the tsarevitch die might have been a blessing.
I was sure Appius Livius was having sex with Alexei, but it was impossible to tell whether Alexei’s passive demeanor came from the
fact that he was in an unwanted sexual relationship or from his being permanently traumatized from seeing his family shot multiple
times. I shuddered. I dried off and brushed my teeth, hoping I could sleep.
I realized there was another phone call I should make. With great reluctance, I called Bobby Burnham, Eric’s daytime guy. Bobby
and I had never liked each other. Bobby was weirdly jealous of me, though he didn’t have the hots for Eric sexually at all. In
Bobby’s opinion, I diverted Eric’s attention and energy away from its proper focus, which was Bobby and the business affairs he
handled for Eric while Eric slept the day away. I was down on Bobby because instead of silently disliking me, he actively tried to
make my life more difficult, which was a whole different kettle of fish. But still, we were both in the Eric business.
“Bobby, it’s Sookie.”
“I got caller ID.”
Mr. Sullen. “Bobby, I think you ought to know that Eric’s maker is in town. When you go over to get your instructions, be careful.”
Bobby normally got briefed right before Eric went to ground for the day, unless Eric stayed over at my place.
Bobby took his time with his reply—probably trying to figure out if I was playing some elaborate practical joke on him. “Is he likely
to want to bite me?” he asked. “The maker?”
“I don’t know what he’s going to want, Bobby. I just felt like I ought to give you a heads-up.”
“Eric won’t let him hurt me,” Bobby said confidently.
“Just as general information—if this guy says jump, Eric has to ask how high.”
“No way,” Bobby said. To Bobby, Eric was the most powerful creature under the moon.
“Way. They gotta mind their maker. This is no lie.”
Bobby had to have heard that news item before. I know there’s some kind of website or message board for vampires’ human
assistants. I’m sure they swap all kinds of handy hints about dealing with their employers. Whatever the reason, Bobby didn’t argue
or accuse me of trying to deceive him, which was a nice change.
“Okay,” he said, “I’m ready for ’em. Was . . . What kind of person is Eric’s maker?”
“He’s not much like a person at all anymore,” I said. “And he’s got a thirteen-year-old boyfriend who used to be Russian royalty.”
After a long silence, Bobby said, “Thanks. It’s good to be prepared.”
That was the nicest thing he’d ever said to me.
“You’re welcome. Good night, Bobby,” I said, and we hung up. We’d managed to have an entire civil conversation. Vampires,
bringing America together!
I changed into a nightshirt and crawled into bed. I had to try to get some sleep, but it took its own sweet time coming. I kept seeing
the light from the lantern dance across the clearing in the woods as the dirt mounded up around the edges of Basim’s grave. And I
saw the dead Were’s face. But eventually, finally, the edges of that face blurred and darkness slid over me.
I slept late and heavily the next day. The minute I woke, I knew someone was in the kitchen cooking. I let my extra sense check it
out, and I found that Claude was frying bacon and eggs. There was coffee in the pot, and I didn’t need telepathy to know that. I
could smell it. The perfume of morning.
After a trip to the bathroom, I stumbled into the hall and made my way into the kitchen. Claude was sitting at the table eating, and I
could see there was enough coffee in the pot for me.
“There’s food,” he said, pointing to the stove.
I got a plate and a mug, and settled in for a good start to my day. I glanced over at the clock. It was Sunday, and Merlotte’s
wouldn’t be open until the afternoon. Sam was trying Sundays again in a limited way, though the whole staff half hoped it wouldn’t
be profitable. As Claude and I ate in a companionable silence, I realized I felt wonderfully peaceful because Eric was in his day
sleep. That meant I didn’t have to feel him walking around with me. His problematic sire and his new “brother” were out of it, too. I
sighed with relief.
“I saw Dermot last night,” Claude said.
Crap!Well, so much for peace. “Where?” I asked.
“He was at the club. Staring at me with longing,” Claude said.
“Dermot’s gay?”
“No, I don’t think so. It wasn’t my dick he was thinking of. He wanted to be around another fairy.”
“I sure hoped he was gone. Niall told Jason and me that Dermot helped kill my parents. I wish he’d gone into the fae land when it
was closing up.”
“He would have been killed on sight.” Claude took the time to sip some coffee before he added, “No one in the fae world
understands Dermot’s actions. He should have sided with Niall from the beginning, because he’s kin and because he’s half-human
and Niall wanted to spare humans. But his own self-loathing—or at least that’s all I can imagine—led him to take the side of the
fairies who really couldn’t stand him, and that side lost.” Claude looked happy. “So Dermot has cut off his own nose to spite his
face. I love that saying. Sometimes humans put things very well.”
“Do you think he still means to hurt my brother and me?”
“I don’t think he ever intended to hurt you,” Claude said, after thinking it over. “I think Dermot is crazy, though he used to be an
agreeable guy a few score years ago. I don’t know if it’s his human side that’s gone batshit, or his fae side that’s soaked up too
many toxins from the human world. I can’t even explain his part in killing your parents. The Dermot I used to know would never
have done such a thing.”
I considered pointing out that truly crazy people can hurt others around them without meaning to, or without even realizing they’re
doing it. But I didn’t. Dermot was my great-uncle, and according to everyone who’d met him, he was nearly a dead ringer for my
brother. I admitted to myself I was curious about him. And I wondered about what Niall had said about Dermot having been the
one who’d opened the truck doors so my parents could be pulled out and drowned by Neave and Lochlan. Dermot’s behavior, the
bit that I’d observed, didn’t gibe with the horror of that incident. Would Dermot think of me as kin? Were Jason and I fae enough
to attract him? I had doubted Bill’s assertion that he felt better from my nearness because of my fairy blood.
“Claude, canyou tell I’m not entirely human? How do I register on the fairy meter?” Fae-dar.
“If you were in a crowd of humans, I could pick you out blindfolded and say you are my kin,” Claude said without hesitation. “But if
you were in the middle of the fae, I would call you human. It’s an elusive scent. Most vamps would think, ‘She smells good,’ and
they’d enjoy being close to you. That would be the extent of it. Once they know you have fairy blood, they can attribute that
enjoyment to it.”
So Bill really could be comforted by my little streak of fae, at least now that he knew how to identify it. I got up to rinse off my plate
and pour another mugful of coffee, and in passing I grabbed Claude’s empty plate, too. He didn’t thank me.
“I appreciate your cooking,” I said. “We haven’t talked about how we’ll handle grocery expenses or household items.”
Claude looked surprised. “I hadn’t thought about it,” he said.
Well, at least that was honest. “I’ll tell you how Amelia and I did it,” I said, and in a few sentences I laid out the guidelines. Looking
a little stunned, Claude agreed.
I opened the refrigerator. “These two shelves are yours,” I said, “and the rest are mine.”
“I get it,” he said.
Somehow I doubted that. Claude sounded like he was simply trying to give the impression that he understood and agreed. There
was a good chance we’d have to have this conversation again. When he’d left to go upstairs, I took care of the dishes—after all,
he’d cooked—and after I got dressed, I thought I’d read for a while. But I was too restless to concentrate on my book.
I heard cars coming down the driveway through the woods. I looked out the front window. Two police cars.
I’d been sure this was coming. But my heart sank down to my toes. Sometimes I hated being right. Whoever had killed Basim had
planted his body on my land to implicate me in his death. “Claude,” I called up the stairs. “Get decent, if you’re not. The police are
here.”
Claude, curious as ever, came down the stairs at a trot. He was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, like me. We went out on the front
porch. Bud Dearborn, the sheriff (the regular human sheriff), was in the first car, and Andy Bellefleur and Alcee Beck were in the
second. The sheriff and two detectives—I must be a dangerous criminal.
Bud got out of his car slowly, the way he did most things these days. I knew from his thoughts that Bud was increasingly a victim to
arthritis, and he had some doubts about his prostate, too. Bud’s mashed-in face didn’t give any hint about his physical discomfort as
he came up to the porch, his heavy belt creaking with the weight of all the things hanging from it.
“Bud, what’s up?” I asked. “Not that I’m not glad to see you-all.”
“Sookie, we got an anonymous phone call,” Bud said. “As you know, law enforcement couldn’t solve much without anonymous
tips, but I personally don’t respect a person who won’t tell you who they are.”
I nodded.
“Who’s your friend?” Andy asked. He looked worn. I’d heard his grandmother, who’d raised him, was on her deathbed. Poor
Andy. He’d much rather be there than here. Alcee Beck, the other detective, really didn’t like me. He never had, and his dislike had
found a good foundation to settle on—his wife had been attacked by a Were who was trying to get to me. Even though I’d taken
the guy out, Alcee was down on me. Maybe he was one of the rare people repulsed by my trace of fairy blood, but more likely, he
just didn’t care for me. There was no point in trying to win him over. I gave him a nod, which he did not return.
“This here is my cousin Claude Crane from Monroe,” I said.
“How’s he related?” Andy asked. All three of these men knew the skein of blood ties that bound together practically the whole
parish.
“It’s kind of embarrassing,” Claude said. (Nothing would embarrass Claude, but he gave a good imitation.) “I’m from what you call
the wrong side of the blanket.”
For once, I was grateful to Claude for taking that weight. I cast my eyes down as though I couldn’t bear to talk about the shame of
it. “Claude and I are trying to get acquainted since we found out we were related,” I said.
I could see that fact go into their mental files. “Why y’all here?” I asked. “What did the anonymous caller say?”
“That you had a body buried in your woods.” Bud looked away as if he were a little ashamed to say something so outrageous, but I
knew different. After years in law enforcement, Bud knew exactly what human beings could do, even the most normal-looking
human beings. Even young blondes with big boobs. Maybe especially them.
“You didn’t bring any tracking dogs,” Claude observed. I was kind of hoping that Claude would keep his mouth shut, but I saw I
wasn’t going to get my wish.
“I think a physical search will do it,” Bud said. “The location was real specific.” (And the tracking dogs were expensive to hire, he
thought.)
“Oh my gosh,” I said, genuinely startled. “How could this person claim not to be involved if they knew where the body was exactly?
I don’t get it.” I’d hoped Bud would tell me more, but he didn’t bite.
Andy shrugged. “We got to go look.”
“Look away,” I said, with absolute confidence. If they’d brought the dogs, I’d have been sweating bullets that they’d scent Debbie
Pelt or the former resting site of Basim. “You’ll excuse me if I just stay here in the house while you-all tramp through the woods. I
hope you don’t pick up too many ticks.” Ticks lurked on bushes and weeds, sensing your chemicals and body heat as you passed,
then making a leap of faith. I watched Andy tuck his pants into his boots, and Bud and Alcee sprayed themselves.
After the men had disappeared into the woods, Claude said, “You’d better tell me why you’re not scared.”
“We moved the body last night,” I said, and turned to sit down at the desk where I’d installed the computer I’d gotten from
Hadley’s apartment. Let Claude put that in his pipe and smoke it! After a few seconds, I heard him stomp back up the stairs.
Since I had to wait for the men to come out of the woods, I might as well check my e-mail. A lot of forwarded messages, most of
them inspirational or patriotic, from Maxine Fortenberry, Hoyt’s mother. I deleted those without reading them. I read an e-mail
from Andy Bellefleur’s pregnant wife, Halleigh. It was a strange coincidence, hearing from her while her husband was out in back of
my house on a wild-goose chase.
Halleigh told me she was feeling great. Just great! But Grand-mama Caroline was failing fast, and Halleigh feared Miss Caroline
wouldn’t live to see her great-grandchild born.
Caroline Bellefleur was very old. Andy and Portia had been brought up in Miss Caroline’s house after their parents had died. Miss
Caroline had been a widow for longer than she’d been married. I had no memory of Mr. Bellefleur at all, and I was pretty sure
Portia and Andy hadn’t known him that long. Andy was older than Portia, and Portia was a year older than me, so I estimated that
Miss Caroline, who’d once been Renard Parish’s finest cook and had made the best chocolate cake in the world, was at least in
her nineties.
“Anyway,” Halleigh went on, “she wants to find the family Bible more than anything else on this earth. You know she’s always got a
bee in her bonnet, and now it’s finding that Bible, which has been missing for umpty-ump years. I had a wild thought. She thinks
way back our family was connected to some branch of the Comptons. Would you ask your neighbor, Mr. Compton, if he would
mind very much looking for that old Bible? It seems like a long shot, but she hasn’t lost any of her personality though she’s
physically weak.”
That was a nice way of saying that Miss Caroline was bringing up that Bible real often.
I was in a quandary. I knew that Bible was over at the Compton house. And I knew after she studied it, Miss Caroline would find
out that she was a direct descendant of Bill Compton. How she’d feel about that was anybody’s guess. Did I want to screw with
her world-view when the woman was on her deathbed?
On the other hand, did . . . Oh, hell, I was tired of trying to balance everything out, and I had enough on my plate to worry about. In
a reckless moment, I forwarded Halleigh’s e-mail to Bill. I had come late to e-mail, and I still didn’t entirely trust it. But at least I felt
I’d put the ball into Bill’s court. If he chose to lob it back, well, okay.
After I’d messed around a little on eBay, marveling at the things people were trying to sell, I heard voices in the front yard. I looked
out to see Bud, Alcee, and Andy brushing dust and twigs off their clothes. Andy was rubbing at a bite on his neck.
I went outside. “Did you find a body?” I asked them.
“No, we did not,” Alcee Beck said. “We did see that people had been back there.”
“Well, sure,” I said. “But no body?”
“We won’t trouble you any further,” Bud said shortly.
They left in a cloud of dust. I watched them go, and shivered. I felt like the guillotine had been descending on my neck and had been
prevented from cutting off my head only because the rope was too short.
I went back to the computer and sent Alcide an e-mail. It said only, “The police were just here.” I figured that would be enough. I
knew I wouldn’t hear from him until he was ready for me to come to Shreveport.
I was surprised that it took three days to receive a reply from Bill.Those days had been remarkable only for the number of people I
hadn’t heard from. I hadn’t heard from Remy, which wasn’t too extraordinary. None of the members of the Long Tooth pack
called, so I could only assume they’d retrieved the body of Basim from its new resting place and that they would let me know when
the meeting would be held. If someone came into my woods and tried to find out why Basim’s body had vanished, I didn’t know
about it. And I didn’t hear from Pam or Bobby Burnham, which was a little worrisome, but still . . . no big.
What did gripe me in a major way was not hearing from Eric. Okay, his (maker, sire, dad) mentor Appius Livius Ocella was in
town . . . but geez Louise.
In between sessions of worrying, I looked up Roman names and found that “Appius” was his praenomen, his common name. Livius
was his nomen, his family name, handed down from father to son, indicating that he was a member of the Livii family or clan. Ocella
was his cognomen, so it was meant to indicate what particular branch of the Livii had borne him; or it could have been given as an
honorific for his service in a war. (I had no idea what war that could have been.) As a third possibility, if he’d been adopted into
another family, the cognomen would reflect his birth family.
Your name said a lot about you in the Roman world.
I wasted a lot of time finding out all about Appius Livius Ocella’s name. I still had no idea what he wanted or what he intended to
do to my boyfriend. And those were the things I needed to know the most. I have to say, I was feeling pretty sulky, pugnacious,
and sullen (I looked up a few words while I was online). Not a pretty posy of emotions, but I couldn’t seem to upgrade to dull
unhappiness.
Cousin Claude was making himself scarce, too. I glimpsed him only once in those three days, and that was when I heard him go
through the kitchen and out the back door and got up in time to see him getting into his car.
This goes to explain why I was delighted to see Bill at my back door when the sun had set on the third day after I’d sent him
Halleigh’s e-mail. He was not looking appreciably better than he had the last time I’d seen him, but he was dressed in a suit and tie
and his hair was carefully combed. The Bible was under his arm.
I understood why he was groomed, what he meant to do. “Good,” I said.
“Come with me,” he said. “It will help if you’re there.”
“But they’ll think . . .” And then I made my mouth shut. It was unworthy to be worrying about the Bellefleurs’ assuming Bill and I
were a couple again when Caroline Bellefleur was about to meet her maker.
“Would that be so terrible?” he asked with simple dignity.
“No, of course not. I was proud to be your girlfriend,” I said, and turned to go back to my room. “Please come in while I change
clothes.” I’d finished the lunch-and-afternoon shift, and I’d changed to shorts and a T-shirt.
Since I was in a hurry, I changed to an above-the-knee black skirt and a white cap-sleeve fitted blouse I’d gotten on sale at Stage.
I slid a red leather belt through the belt loops and got some red sandals from the back of my closet. I fluffed my hair, and I was
ready.
I drove us over in my car, which was beginning to need an alignment.
It wasn’t a long ride to the Bellefleur mansion; it didn’t take long to get anywhere in Bon Temps. We parked in the driveway at the
front door, but as we’d driven up I’d glimpsed several cars in the back parking area. I’d seen Andy’s car there, and Portia’s, too.
There was an ancient gray Chevy Chevette parked sort of unobtrusively at the rear, and I wondered if Miss Caroline had a roundthe-
clock caregiver.
We walked up to the double front doors. Bill didn’t think it was appropriate (“seemly” was the word he used) to go to the back,
and under the circumstances, I had to agree. Bill walked slowly and with effort. More than once I wanted to offer to carry the
heavy Bible but I knew he wouldn’t let me, so I saved my breath.
Halleigh answered the door, thank God. She was startled when she saw Bill, but she recovered her poise very quickly and greeted
us.
“Halleigh, Mr. Compton has brought the family Bible that Andy’s grandmother wants to see,” I said, in case Halleigh had gone
temporarily blind and hadn’t noticed the huge volume. Halleigh was looking a little rough around the edges. Her brown hair was a
mess, and her green flowered dress looked almost as tired as her eyes. Presumably, she’d come over to Miss Caroline’s after
she’d worked all day teaching school. Halleigh was obviously pregnant, something Bill hadn’t known, I could tell by the fleeting
expression on his face.
“Oh,” Halleigh said, her face visibly relaxing with relief. “Mr. Compton, please come in. You have no idea how Miss Caroline’s
fretted about this.” I think Halleigh’s reaction was a pretty good indicator of just how much Miss Caroline had fretted.
We stepped into the entrance hall together. The wide flight of stairs was ahead of us and to our left. It curved gracefully up to the
second floor. Lots of local brides had had their pictures made on this staircase. I had come down it in heels and a long dress when
I’d been a stand-in for a sick bridesmaid at Halleigh and Andy’s wedding.
“I think it would be real nice if Bill could give the Bible to Miss Caroline,” I said, before the pause could become awkward.
“There’s a family connection.”
Even Halleigh’s excellent manners faltered. “Oh . . . how interesting.” Her back stiffened, and I saw Bill appreciating the curve of
her pregnancy. A faint smile curved his lips for a second. “I’m sure that would be just fine,” Halleigh said, rallying. “Let’s just go
upstairs.”
We went up the stairs after her, and I had to struggle with the impulse to put a hand under Bill’s elbow to help him a little. I would
have to do something to help Bill. He obviously wasn’t getting any better. A little fear crept into my heart.
We walked a little farther along the gallery to the door to the largest bedroom, which was open a discreet few inches. Halleigh
stepped in ahead of us.
“Sookie and Mr. Compton have brought the family Bible,” she said. “Miss Caroline, can he bring it in?”
“Yes, of course, have him bring it,” said a weak voice, and Bill and I walked in.
Miss Caroline was the queen of the room, no doubt about it. Andy and Portia were standing to the right of the bed, and they
looked both worried and uneasy as Bill ushered me in. I noticed the absence of Portia’s husband, Glen. A middle-aged African-
American woman was sitting in a chair to the left of the bed. She was wearing the bright, loose pants and cheerful tunic that nurses
favored now. The pattern made her look as though she worked on a pediatric ward. However, in a room decorated in subdued
peach and cream, the splash of color was welcome. The nurse was thin and tall, and wore an incredible wig that reminded me of a
movie Cleopatra. She nodded to us as we came closer to the bed. Caroline Bellefleur, who looked like the steel magnolia she was,
lay propped up on a dozen pillows in the four-poster bed. There were shadows of exhaustion under her old eyes, and her hands
curled in wrinkled claws on the bedspread. But there was still a flicker of interest in her eyes as she looked at us.
“Miss Stackhouse, Mr. Compton, I haven’t seen you since the big wedding,” she said with an obvious effort. Her voice was thin as
paper.
“That was a beautiful occasion, Mrs. Bellefleur,” Bill said with an almost equal effort. I only nodded. This was not my conversation
to have.
“Please take a seat,” the old woman said, and Bill pulled a chair up closer to her bed. I sat a couple of feet back.
“Looks like that Bible is too big for me to handle now,” the ancient lady said, with a smile. “It was so nice of you to bring it over. I
have sure been wanting to see it. Has it been in your attic? I know we don’t have much connection with the Comptons, but I sure
wanted to find that old book. Halleigh was nice enough to do some checking for me.”
“As a matter of fact, this book was on my coffee table,” Bill said gently. “Mrs. Bellefleur—Caroline—my second child was a
daughter, Sarah Isabelle.”
“Oh my goodness,” said Miss Caroline, to indicate she was listening. She didn’t seem to know where this was headed, but she was
definitely attentive.
“Though I didn’t learn this until I read the family page in this Bible after I returned to Bon Temps, my daughter Sarah had four
children, though one baby was born dead.”
“That happened so often back then,” she said.
I glanced over at the Bellefleur grandchildren. Portia and Andy weren’t happy that Bill was here, not at all, but they were listening,
too. They hadn’t spared a glance for me, which was actually just fine. Though they were puzzled by Bill’s presence, the focus of
their thoughts was the woman who had raised them and the visible fact that she was fading away.
Bill said, “My Sarah’s daughter was named Caroline, for her grandmother . . . my wife.”
“My name?” Miss Caroline sounded pleased, though her voice was a little weaker.
“Yes, your name. My granddaughter Caroline married a cousin, Matthew Phillips Holliday.”
“Why, those are my mother and father.” She smiled, which did drastic things to her scores of wrinkles. “So you are . . . Really?” To
my amazement, Caroline Bellefleur laughed.
“Your great-grandfather. Yes, I am.”
Portia made a sound as though she were choking on a stink-bug. Miss Caroline disregarded her granddaughter entirely, and she
didn’t look over at Andy—which was lucky, because he was turkey-wattle red.
“Well, if this isn’t funny,” she said. “I’m as wrinkled as unironed linen, and you’re as smooth as a fresh peach.” She was genuinely
amused. “Great-granddaddy!”
Then a thought seemed to occur to the dying lady. “Was it you arranged for that timely windfall we got?”
“The money couldn’t have been put to better use,” Bill said gallantly. “The house looks beautiful. Who will live in it after you die?”
Portia gasped, and Andy looked a little taken aback. But I glanced at the nurse. She gave me a brief nod. Miss Caroline’s time was
very near, and the lady was fully aware of it.
“Well, I think Portia and Glen will stay here,” Miss Caroline said slowly. It was evident she was tiring fast. “Halleigh and Andy want
to have their baby in their own home, and I don’t blame them one bit. You’re not saying you’re interested in the house?”
“Oh, no, I have my own,” Bill reassured her. “And I was glad to give my own family the wherewithal to repair this place. I want my
descendants to keep on living here through the years and have many happy times in this place.”
“Thank you,” Miss Caroline said, and now her voice was barely a whisper.
“Sookie and I must go,” Bill said. “You rest easy, now.”
“I will,” she said, and smiled, though her eyes were closing.
I rose as quietly as I could and slipped out of the room ahead of Bill. I thought Portia and Andy might want to say a few things to
Bill. Sure enough, they didn’t want to disturb their grandmother, so they followed Bill out onto the gallery.
“Thought you were dating another vampire now?” Andy asked me. He didn’t sound as snarky as he usually did.
“I am,” I said. “But Bill is still my friend.”
Portia had briefly dated Bill, though not because she thought he was cute or anything. I was sure that added to her embarrassment
as she stuck out her hand to Bill. Portia needed to brush up on her vampire etiquette. Though Bill looked a little taken aback, he
accepted the handshake. “Portia,” he said. “Andy. I hope you don’t find this too awkward.”
I was busting-at-the-seams proud of Bill. It was easy to see where Caroline Bellefleur had gotten her graciousness.
Andy said, “I wouldn’t have taken the money if I’d known it came from you.” He’d evidently come straight from work, because he
was wearing all his gear: a badge and handcuffs clipped to his belt, a holstered gun. He looked pretty formidable, but he was no
match for Bill, even as sick as Bill was.
“Andy, I know you’re not a fan of the fang. But you’re part of my family, and I know you were raised to respect your elders.”
Andy looked completely taken aback.
“That money was to make Caroline happy, and I think it did,” Bill continued. “So it served its purpose. I’ve gotten to see her and to
tell her about our relationship, and she has the Bible. I won’t burden you with my presence any longer. I would ask that you have
the funeral at night so I can attend.”
“Who ever heard of a funeral at night?” Andy said.
“Yes, we’ll do that.” Portia didn’t sound warm and welcoming, but she did sound absolutely resolved. “The money made her last
few years very happy. She loved restoring the house to its best state, and she loved giving us the wedding here. The Bible is the
frosting on the cake. Thank you.”
Bill nodded to both of them, and without further ado we left Belle Rive.
Caroline Bellefleur, Bill’s great-granddaughter, died in the early hours of the morning.
Bill sat with the family during the funeral, which took place the next night, to the profound amazement of the town.
I sat at the back with Sam.
It wasn’t an occasion for tears; without a doubt, Caroline Bellefleur had had a long life—a life not devoid of sorrow, but at least full
of moments of compensatory happiness. She had very few remaining contemporaries, and those who were still alive were almost all
too tottery to come to her funeral.
The service seemed quite normal until we drove out to the cemetery, which didn’t have night lighting—of course—and I saw that
temporary lights had been set up around the perimeter of the grave in the Bellefleur plot. That was a strange sight. The minister had
a hard time reading the service until a member of the congregation held his own flashlight to the page.
The bright lights in the dark night were an unpleasant reminder of the recovery of Basim al Saud’s body. It was hard to think
properly about Miss Caroline’s life and legacy with all the conjecture rattling around in my head. And why hadn’t anything already
happened? I felt as though I were living waiting for the other shoe to drop. I wasn’t aware my hand had tightened on Sam’s arm
until he turned to look at me with some alarm. I forced my fingers to relax and bowed my head for the prayer.
The family, I heard, was going to Belle Rive for a buffet meal after the service. I wondered if they’d gotten Bill his favorite blood.
Bill looked awful. He was using a cane at the grave site. Something had to be done about finding his sibling, since he wasn’t taking
action himself. If there was a chance his sibling’s blood might cure him, the effort had to be made.
I’d driven to the funeral with Sam, and since my house was so close, I told Sam I’d walk back from the grave site. I’d stuck a little
flashlight in my purse, and I reminded Sam I knew the cemetery like the back of my hand. So when all the other attendees took off,
including Bill, to go to Belle Rive for the buffet meal, I waited in the shadows until the cemetery employees started filling in the hole,
and then I walked through the trees to Bill’s house.
I still had a key.
Yes, I knew I was being a terrible busybody. And maybe I was doing the wrong thing. But Bill was wasting away, and I just
couldn’t sit by and let him do it.
I unlocked the front door and went to Bill’s office, which had been the Compton formal dining room. Bill had all his computer gear
set up on a huge table, and he had a rolling chair he’d gotten at Office Depot. A smaller table served as a mailing station, where Bill
prepared copies of his vampire database to send to purchasers. He advertised heavily in vampire magazines—Fang, of course,
andDead Life , which appeared in so many languages. Bill’s newest marketing effort involved hiring vampires who spoke many
different languages to translate all the information so he could sell foreign-language editions of his worldwide vampire listing service.
As I remembered from a previous visit, there were a dozen CD copies of his database in cases by his mailing station. I doublechecked
to make sure I had one that was in English. Wouldn’t do me much good to get one in Russian.
Of course, Russian reminded me of Alexei, and thinking of Alexei reminded me all over of how worried/angry/frightened I was
about Eric’s silence.
I could feel my mouth pinching together in a really unpleasant expression as I thought about that silence. But I had to pay attention
to my own little problem right now, and I scooted out of the house, relocked the door, and hoped Bill wouldn’t pick up on my scent
in the air.
I went through the cemetery as quickly as if it had been daytime. When I was in my own kitchen, I looked around for a good hiding
place. I finally fi xed on the linen closet in the hall bathroom as a good spot, and I put the CD under the stack of clean towels. I
didn’t think even Claude could use five towels before I got up the next day.
I checked my answering machine; I checked my cell phone, which I hadn’t taken to the service. No messages. I undressed slowly,
trying to imagine what could have happened to Eric. I’d decided I wouldn’t call him, no matter what. He knew where I was and
how to reach me. I hung my black dress in the closet, put my black heels on the shoe rack, and then pulled on my Tweety Bird
nightshirt, an old favorite. Then I went to bed, mad as a wet hen.
And scared.
Chapter 10
Claude hadn’t come home the night before. His car wasn’t by theback door. I was glad someone had gotten lucky. Then I told
myself not to be so pitiful.
“You’re doing okay,” I said, looking in the mirror so I’d believe it. “Look at you! Great tan, Sook!” I had to be in for the lunch
shift, so I got dressed right after I’d eaten breakfast. I retrieved the purloined CD from under the towels. I’d either pay Bill for it or
return it, I told myself virtuously. I hadn’t really stolen it if I planned to pay for it. Someday. I looked at the clear plastic case in my
hands. I wondered how much the FBI would pay for it. Despite all Bill’s attempts to make sure only vampires bought the CD, it
would be truly amazing if no one else had it.
So I opened it and popped it into my computer. After a preliminary whir, the screen popped up. “The Vampire Directory,” it said in
Gothic lettering, red on a black screen. Stereotype, anyone?
“Enter your code number,” prompted the screen.
Uh-oh.
Then I remembered there’d been a little Post-it on top of the case, and I dug it out of the wastebasket. Yep, this was surely a code.
Bill would never have attached the code to the box if he hadn’t believed his house was secure, and I felt a pang of guilt. I didn’t
know what procedure he’d established, but I assumed he put the code in a directory when he mailed out the disc to a happy
customer. Or maybe he’d put a “destruct” code on the paper for fools like me, and the whole thing would blow up in my face. I
was glad no one else was in the house after I typed in the code and hit Enter, because I dropped to my knees under the desk.
Nothing happened, except some more whirring, and I figured I was safe. I scrambled back into my chair.
The screen was showing me my options. I could search by country of residence, country of origin, name, or last sighting. I clicked
on “Residence,” and I was prompted: “Which country?” I could pick from a list. After I clicked on “USA,” I got another prompt:
“What state?” And another list. I clicked on “Louisiana” and then on “Compton.” There he was, in a modern picture taken at his
house. I recognized the paint color. Bill was smiling stiffly, and he didn’t look like a party animal, that’s for sure. I wondered how
he’d fare with a dating service. I began to read his biography. And sure enough, there at the bottom, I read, “Sired by Lorena Ball
of Louisiana, 1870.”
But there was no listing for “brothers” or “sisters.”
Okay, it wasn’t going to be that easy. I clicked on the boldfaced name of Bill’s sire, the late, unlamented Lorena. I was curious as
to what her entry would say, since Lorena had met the ultimate death, at least until they learned how to resuscitate ashes.
“Lorena Ball,” her entry read, with only a drawing. It was a pretty good likeness, I thought, cocking my head as I looked it over.
Turned in 1788 in New Orleans . . . lived all across the South but returned to Louisiana after the Civil War . . . had “met the sun,”
murder by person or persons “unknown.” Huh. Bill knew perfectly well who’d killed Lorena, and I could only be glad he hadn’t put
my name in the directory. I wondered what would have happened to me if he had. See, you think you have enough to worry about,
but then you think of a possibility you’d never imagined and you realize you have evenmore problems.
Okay, here we go. . . . “Sired Bill Compton (1870) and Judith Vardamon (1902).”
Judith. So this was Bill’s “sister.”
After some more clicking and reading, I discovered that Judith Vardamon was still “alive,” or at least she had been when Bill had
been compiling his database. She lived in Little Rock.
I further discovered I could send her an e-mail. Naturally, she wasn’t obliged to answer it.
I stared down at my hands, and I thought hard. I thought about how awful Bill looked. I thought about his pride, and the fact that he
hadn’t yet contacted this Judith, though he suspected her blood would cure him. Bill wasn’t a fool, so there was some good reason
he hadn’t called this other child of Lorena. I just didn’t know that reason. But if Bill had decided she shouldn’t be contacted, he
knew what he was doing, right? Oh, to hell with it.
I typed in her e-mail address. And moved the cursor down to the topic. Typed “Bill’s ill.” Thought that looked almost funny. Almost
changed it, but didn’t. Moved the cursor down to the body of the e-mail, clicked again. Hesitated. Then I typed, “I’m Bill
Compton’s neighbor. I don’t know how long it’s been since you heard from him, but he lives at his old home place in Bon Temps,
Louisiana, now. Bill’s got silver poisoning. He can’t heal without your blood. He doesn’t know I’m sending this. We used to date,
and we’re still friends. I want him to get better.” I signed it, because anonymous is not my style.
I clenched my teeth really hard together. I clicked on Send.
As much as I wanted to keep the CD and browse through it, my little code of honor told me I had to return it without enjoying it,
because I hadn’t paid. So I got Bill’s key and put the disc back in its plastic case and started across the cemetery.
I slowed as I drew near to the Bellefleur plot. The flowers were still piled on Miss Caroline’s grave. Andy was standing there,
staring at a cross made out of red carnations. I thought it was pretty awful, but this was definitely an occasion for the thought to
count more than the deed. I didn’t think Andy was registering what was right in front of him anyway.
I felt as though “Thief” were burned onto my forehead. I knew Andy wouldn’t care if I backed up a truck to Bill’s house and
loaded up all the furniture and drove off with it. It was my own sense of guilt that was plaguing me.
“Sookie,” Andy said. I hadn’t realized he’d noticed me.
“Andy,” I said cautiously. I wasn’t sure where this conversation would go, and I had to leave for work soon. “You still have
relatives in town? Or have they left?”
“They’re leaving after lunch,” he said. “Halleigh had to work on some class preparations this morning, and Glen had to run into his
office to catch up on paperwork. This has been hardest on Portia.”
“I guess she’ll be glad when things get back to normal.” That seemed safe enough.
“Yeah. She’s got a law practice to run.”
“Did the lady who was taking care of Miss Caroline have another job to go to?” Reliable caregivers were as scarce as hens’ teeth
and far more valuable.
“Doreen? Yeah, she moved right across the garden to Mr. DeWitt’s.” After an uncomfortable pause, he said, “She kind of got on
to me that night, after you-all left. I know I wasn’t polite to . . . Bill.”
“It’s been a hard time for you-all.”
“I just . . . It makes me mad that we were getting charity.”
“You weren’t, Andy. Bill is your family. I know it must feel weird, and I know you don’t think much of vampires in general, but he’s
your great-great-great-grandfather, and he wanted to help out his people. It wouldn’t make you feel funny if he’d left you money
and he was out here with Miss Caroline under the ground, would it? It’s just that Bill’s still walking around.”
Andy shook his head, as if flies were buzzing around it. His hair was thinning, I noticed. “You know what my grandmother’s last
request was?”
I couldn’t imagine. “No,” I said.
“She left her chocolate cake recipe to the town,” he said, and he smiled. “A damn recipe. And you know what, they were as
excited at the newspaper when I took that recipe in as if it were Christmas and I’d brought them a map to Jimmy Hoffa’s body.”
“It’s going to be in the paper?” I sounded as thrilled as I felt. I bet there would be at least a hundred chocolate cakes in the oven the
day the paper came out.
“See, you’re all excited, too,” Andy said, sounding five years younger.
“Andy, that’s big news,” I assured him. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go return something.” And I hurried through the rest of
the cemetery to Bill’s house. I put the CD, complete with its little sticky note, on top of the pile from which I’d taken it, and I
skedaddled.
I second-guessed myself, and third-, fourth-, and fi fth-guessed, too. At Merlotte’s I worked in a kind of haze, concentrating
fiercely on getting lunch orders right, being quick, and responding instantly to any request. My other sense told me that despite my
efficiency, people weren’t glad to see me coming, and really I couldn’t blame them.
Tips were low. People were ready to forgive inefficiency, as long as you smiled while you were sloppy. They didn’t like the
unsmiling, quick-handed me.
I could tell (simply because he thought it so often) that Sam was assuming I’d had a fight with Eric. Holly thought that I was having
my period.
And Antoine was an informant.
Our cook had been lost in his own broody mood. I realized how resistant he normally was to my telepathy only when he forgot to
be. I was waiting on an order to be up at the hatch, and I was looking at Antoine while he flipped a burger, and I heard directly
from him,Not getting off work to meet that asshole again, he can just stuff it up his butt. I’m not telling him nothing else . Then
Antoine, whom I’d come to respect and admire, flipped the burger onto its waiting bun and turned to the hatch with the plate in his
hand. He met my eyes squarely.
Oh shit,he thought.
“Let me talk to you before you do anything,” he said, and I knew for sure that he was a traitor.
“No,” I said, and turned away, going right to Sam, who was behind the bar washing glasses. “Sam, Antoine is some kind of agent
for the government,” I said, very quietly.
Sam didn’t ask me how I knew, and he didn’t question my statement. His mouth pressed into a hard line. “We’ll talk to him later,”
he said. “Thanks, Sook.” I regretted now that I hadn’t told Sam about the Were buried on my land. I was always sorry when I
didn’t tell Sam something, it seemed.
I got the plate and took it to the right table without meeting Antoine’s eyes.
Some days I hated my ability more than others. Today was one of those days. I had been much happier (though in retrospect, it had
been a foolish happiness) when I’d assumed Antoine was a new friend. I wondered if any of the stories he’d told about going
through Katrina in the Superdome had been true, or if those had been lies, too. I’d felt such sympathy for him. And I’d never had a
hint until now that his persona was false. How could that be?
First, I don’t monitor every single thought of every person. I block a lot of it out, in general, and I try especially hard to stay out of
the heads of my co-workers. Second, people don’t always think about critical stuff in explicit terms. A guy might not think,I believe
I’ll get the pistol from under the seat of my truck and shoot Jerry in the head for screwing my wife . I was much more likely to get
an impression of sullen anger, with overtones of violence. Or even a projection of how it might feel to shoot Jerry. But the shooting
of Jerry might not have reached the specific planning stage at the moment the shooter was in the bar, when I was privy to his
thoughts.
And mostly peopledidn’t act on their violent impulses, something I didn’t learn until after some very painful incidents as I grew up.
If I spent my life trying to figure out the background of every single thought I heard, I wouldn’t have my own life.
At least I had something to think about besides wondering what the hell was happening with Eric and the Long Tooth pack. At the
end of my shift, I found myself in Sam’s office with Sam and Antoine.
Sam shut the door behind me. He was furious. I didn’t blame him. Antoine was mad at himself, mad at me, and defensive with Sam.
The atmosphere in the room was choking with anger and frustration and fear.
“Listen, man,” Antoine said. He was standing facing Sam. He made Sam look small. “Just listen, okay? After Katrina, I didn’t have
no place to live and nothing to do. I was trying to find work and keep myself going. I couldn’t even get a damn FEMA trailer.
Things were goingbad . So I . . . I borrowed a car, to get to Texas to some relatives. I was gonna dump it where the cops could
find it, get it back to the owner. I know it was stupid. I know I shouldn’ta done it. But I was desperate, and I did something dumb.”
“Yet you’re not in jail,” Sam observed. His words were like a whip that barely flicked Antoine, drew a little bit of blood.
Antoine breathed out heavily. “No, I’m not, and I’ll tell you why. My uncle is a werewolf, in one of the New Orleans packs. So I
knew something about ’em. An FBI agent named Sara Weiss came to talk to me in jail. She was okay. But after she spoke with me
once, she brought this guy Lattesta, Tom Lattesta. He said he was based in Rhodes, and I couldn’t figure out what he was doing in
New Orleans. But he told me that he knew all about my uncle, and he figured that you-all were coming out sooner or later since the
vamps did. He knew what you were, that there were other things besides wolves. He knew there’d be a lot of people didn’t like
hearing that people who were part animal lived in with the rest of us. He described Sookie to me. He said she was something
strange, too, and he didn’t know what. He sent me here to watch, to see what happened.”
Sam and I exchanged glances. I don’t know what Sam had anticipated, but this was way more serious than I’d imagined. I figured
back. “Tom Lattesta has known all along?” I said. “When did he start thinking there was something wrong with me?” Had it been
before he saw the footage from the hotel explosion in Rhodes, which he’d used as the reason for approaching me a few months
ago?
“Half the time he’s sure you’re a fraud. Half the time he thinks you’re the real deal.”
I turned to my boss. “Sam, he came to my house the other day. Lattesta. He told me that someone close to me, one of thegreat
relatives”—I didn’t want to get more specific in front of Antoine—“had fixed it so he had to back off.”
“That explains why he was so mad,” Antoine said, and his face hardened. “That explains a lot.”
“What did he tell you to do?” Sam asked.
“Lattesta said the car theft thing was forgotten as long as I kept an eye on Sam and any other people who weren’t all the way
human who came into the bar. He said he couldn’t touch Sookie now, and he was mighty pissed.”
Sam looked at me, a question on his face.
“He’s sincere,” I said.
“Thank you, Sookie,” Antoine said. He looked abjectly miserable.
“Okay,” Sam said, after looking at Antoine for a few more seconds. “You still have a job.”
“No . . . conditions?” Antoine was looking at Sam unbelievingly. “He expects me to keep watching you.”
“Not a condition, but a warning. If you tell him one thing more besides the fact that I’m here and running this business, you’re outta
here, and if I can think of something else to do to you, I will.”
Antoine seemed weak with relief. “I’ll do my best for you, Sam,” he said. “Tell the truth, I’m glad it all came out. It’s been sitting
heavy on my conscience.”
“There’ll be a backlash,” I said when Sam and I were alone.
“I know. Lattesta will come down on him hard, and Antoine will be tempted to make something up to tell him.”
“I think Antoine is a good guy. I hope I’m not wrong.” I’d been wrong about people before. In major ways.
“Yeah, I hope he lives up to our expectations.” Sam smiled at me suddenly. He has a great smile, and I couldn’t help but smile
back. “It’s good to have faith in people sometimes, give them another chance. And we’ll both keep our eyes on him.”
I nodded. “Okay. Well, I better get home.” I wanted to check my cell phone for messages and my landline, too. And my computer.
I was dying for someone to reach out and touch me.
“Is something the matter?” Sam asked. He reached out to give me a tentative pat on the shoulder. “Anything I can do?”
“You’re the greatest,” I said. “But I’m just trying to get through a bad situation.”
“Eric’s out of touch?” he said, proving that Sam is one shrewd guesser.
“Yeah,” I admitted. “And he’s got . . . relatives in town. I don’t know what the hell’s going on.” The word “relatives” jogged my
brain. “How are things going in your family, Sam?”
“The divorce is no-fault, and it’s going through,” he said. “My mom is pretty miserable, but she’ll be better as time goes on, I hope.
Some of the people in Wright are giving her the cold shoulder. She let Mindy and Craig watch her change.”
“What form did she pick?” I’d rather be a shapeshifter than a wereanimal, so I’d have a choice.
“A Scottie, I think. My sister took it real well. Mindy’s always been more flexible than Craig.”
I thought women were almost always more flexible than men, but I didn’t think I needed to say that out loud. Generalizations like
that can come back to bite you in the ass. “Deidra’s family settled down?”
“It looks like the wedding’s back on, as of two nights ago,” Sam said. “Her mom and dad finally got that the ‘contamination’
couldn’t spread to Deidra and Craig and their kids, if they have any.”
“So you think the wedding will take place?”
“Yeah, I do. You still going to go to Wright with me?”
I started to say, “You still want me to?” but that would have been unduly coy, since he’d just asked me. “When the date is set,
you’ll have to ask my boss if I can get off work,” I told him. “Sam, it may be tacky of me to persist in asking, but why aren’t you
taking Jannalynn?”
I wasn’t imagining the discomfort that emanated from Sam. “She’s . . . Well, ah . . . She’s . . . I can just tell that she and my mom
wouldn’t get along. If I do introduce her to my family, I think I better wait until the tension of the wedding isn’t part of the picture.
My mom’s still jangled from the shooting and the divorce, and Jannalynn is . . . not a calm person.” In my opinion, if you were
dating someone you were clearly embarrassed to introduce to your family, you were probably dating the wrong person. But Sam
hadn’t asked me for my opinion.
“No, she certainly isn’t a calm individual,” I said. “And now that she’s got those new responsibilities, she’s got to be pretty focused
on the pack, I guess.”
“What? What new responsibilities?”
Uh-oh. “I’m sure she’ll tell you all about it,” I said. “I guess you haven’t seen her in a couple of days, huh?”
“Nope. So we’re both down in the dumps,” he said.
I was willing to concede I’d been pretty grim, and I smiled at him. “Yeah, that’s a big part of it,” I said. “With Eric’s maker being in
town, and him being scarier than Freddy Krueger, I’m pretty much on my own, I guess.”
“If we don’t hear from our significant others, let’s go out tomorrow night. We can hit Crawdad Diner again,” Sam said. “Or I can
grill us some steaks.”
“Sounds good,” I told him. And I appreciated his offer. I’d been feeling kind of cast adrift. Jason was apparently busy with Michele
(and after all, he’d stayed the other night when I’d half expected him to scoot out of the house), Eric was busy (apparently), Claude
was almost never at the house and awake when I was awake, Tara was busy being pregnant, and Amelia had time to send me only
the occasional e-mail. Though I didn’t mind being by myself from time to time—in fact, I enjoyed it—I’d had a little too much of it
lately. And being alone is a lot more fun if it’s optional.
Relieved that the conversation with Antoine was over, and wondering what trouble Tom Lattesta might cause in the future, I
grabbed my purse from the drawer in Sam’s desk and headed for home.
It was a beautiful late afternoon when I pulled up in back of the house. I thought of working out to an exercise DVD before I fi xed
supper. Claude’s car was gone. I hadn’t noticed Jason’s truck, so I was surprised to see him sitting on my back steps.
“Hey, Brother!” I called as I got out of the car. “Listen, let me ask you . . .” And then, getting his mental signature, I realized the
man sitting on the steps wasn’t Jason. I froze. All I could do was stare at my half-fae great-uncle Dermot and wonder if he had
come to kill me.
Chapter 11
He could have slain me about sixty times in the seconds I stoodthere. Despite the fact that he didn’t, I still didn’t want to take my
eyes off him.
“Don’t be afraid,” Dermot said, rising with a grace that Jason could never have matched. He moved like his joints were machine
made and well oiled.
I said through numb lips, “Can’t help it.”
“I want to explain,” he said as he drew nearer.
“Explain?”
“I wanted to get closer to both of you,” he said. He was well into my personal space by then. His eyes were blue like Jason’s,
candid like Jason’s, and really, seriously, crazy.Not like Jason’s. “I was confused.”
“About what?” I wanted to keep the conversation going, I surely did, because I didn’t know what would happen when it came to a
halt.
“About where my loyalties lay,” he said, bowing his head as gracefully as a swan.
“Sure. Tell me about that.” Oh, if only I had my squirt gun, loaded with lemon juice, in my purse! But I’d promised Eric I’d put it on
my nightstand when Claude had come to live with me, so that was where it lay. And the iron trowel was where it was supposed to
be, in the toolshed.
“I will,” he said, standing close enough that I could smell him. He smelled great. Fairies always do. “I know you met my father,
Niall.”
I nodded, a very small movement. “Yes,” I said, to make sure.
“Did you love him?”
“Yes,” I said without hesitation. “I did. I do.”
“He’s easy to love; he’s charming,” Dermot said. “My mother, Einin, was beautiful, too. Not a fairy kind of beautiful, like Niall, but
she was human-beautiful.”
“That’s what Niall told me,” I said. I was picking my way through a conversational minefield.
“Did he tell you the water fairies murdered my twin?”
“Did Niall tell me your brother was murdered? No, but I heard.”
“I saw parts of Fintan’s body. Neave and Lochlan had torn him limb from limb.”
“They helped drown my parents, too,” I said, holding my breath. What would he say?
“I . . .” He struggled to speak, his face desperate. “But Iwasn’t there . I . . . Niall . . .” It was terrible to watch Dermot struggle to
speak. I shouldn’t have had any mercy for him, since Niall had told me about Dermot’s part in my parents’ deaths. But I really
couldn’t endure his pain.
“So how come you ended up siding with Breandan’s forces in the war?”
“He told me my father had killed my brother,” Dermot said bleakly. “And I believed him. I mistrusted my love for Niall. When I
remembered my mother’s misery after Niall stopped coming to visit her, I thought Breandan must be right and we weren’t meant to
mingle with humans. It never seems to turn out well for them. And I hated what I was, half-human. I was never at home anywhere.”
“So, are you feeling better now? About being a little bit human?”
“I’ve come to terms with it. I know my former actions were wrong, and I’m grieved that my father won’t let me into Faery.” The
big blue eyes looked sad. I was too busy trying not to shake to get the full impact.
In a breath, out a breath. Calm, calm.“So now you’re thinking Jason and I are okay? You don’t want to hurt us anymore?”
He put his arms around me. This was “hug Sookie” season, and no one had told me ahead of time. Fairies were very touchy-feely,
and personal space didn’t mean anything to them. I would have liked to tell my great-uncle to back off. But I didn’t dare. I didn’t
need to read Dermot’s mind to understand that almost anything could set him off, so delicate was his mental balance. I had to stiffen
all my resolution to maintain my even breathing so I wouldn’t shiver and shake. His nearness and the tension of being in his
presence, the huge strength that hummed through his arms, took me back to a dark ruined shack and two psycho fairies who really
had deserved their deaths. My shoulders jerked, and I saw a flash of panic in Dermot’s eyes.Calm. Be calm.
I smiled at him. I have a pretty smile, people tell me, though I know it’s a little too bright, a little nuts. However, that suited the
conversation perfectly. “The last time you saw Jason,” I said, and then couldn’t think how to finish.
“I attacked his companion. The beast who’d hurt Jason’s wife.”
I swallowed hard and smiled some more. “Probably would’ve been better if you’d explained to Jason why you were going after
Mel. And it wasn’t Mel who killed her, you know.”
“No, it was my own kind that finished her off. But she would have died anyway. He wasn’t taking her to get help, you know.”
Wasn’t much I could say, because his account of what had happened to Crystal was accurate. I noticed I hadn’t gotten a coherent
response from Dermot on why he’d left Jason in ignorance of Mel’s crime. “But you didn’t explain to Jason,” I said, breathing in
and out—in a very soothing way. I hoped. It seemed to me that the longer I touched Dermot, the calmer we both got. And Dermot
was markedly more coherent.
“I was very conflicted,” he said seriously, unexpectedly borrowing from modern jargon.
Maybe that was as good an answer as I was going to get. I decided to take another tack. “Did you want to see Claude?” I said
hopefully. “He’s living with me now, just temporarily. He should be back later tonight.”
“I’m not the only one, you know,” Dermot told me. I looked up and met his mad eyes. I understood that my great-uncle was trying
to tell me something. I wished to God I could make him rational. Just for five minutes. I stepped back from him and tried to figure
out what he needed.
“You’re not the only fairy left out in the human world. I know Claude’s here. Someone else is, too?” I would’ve enjoyed my
telepathy for a couple of minutes.
“Yes.Yes. ” His eyes were pleading with me to understand.
I’d risk a direct question. “Who else is on this side of Faery?”
“You don’t want to meet him,” Dermot assured me. “You have to be careful. He can’t decide right now. He’s ambivalent.”
“Right.” Whoever “he” was, he wasn’t the only one who had mixed feelings. I wished I knew the right nutcracker that would open
up Dermot’s head.
“Sometimes he’s in your woods.” Dermot put his hands on my shoulders and squeezed gently. It was like he was trying to transmit
things he couldn’t say directly into my flesh.
“I heard about that,” I said sourly.
“Don’t trust other fairies,” Dermot told me. “I shouldn’t have.”
I felt like a lightbulb had popped on above my head. “Dermot, have you had magic put on you? Like a spell?”
The relief in his eyes was almost palpable. He nodded frantically. “Unless they’re at war, fairies don’t like to kill other fairies.
Except for Neave and Lochlan. They liked to kill everything. But I’m not dead. So there’s hope.”
Fairies might be reluctant to kill their own kind, but they didn’t mind making them insane, apparently. “Is there anything I can do to
reverse this spell? Can Claude help?”
“Claude has little magic, I think,” Dermot said. “He’s been living like a human too long. My dearest niece, I love you. How is your
brother?”
We were back in nutty land. God bless poor Dermot. I hugged him, following an impulse. “My brother is happy, Uncle Dermot.
He’s dating a woman who suits him, and she won’t take any shit off him, either. Her name is Michele—like my mom’s, but with
onel instead of two.”
Dermot smiled down at me. Hard to say how much of this he was absorbing.
“Dead things love you,” Dermot told me, and I made myself keep smiling.
“Eric the vampire? He says he does.”
“Other dead things, too. They’re pulling on you.”
That was a not-so-welcome revelation. Dermot was right. I’d been feeling Eric through our bond, as usual, but there were two
other gray presences with me every moment after dark: Alexei and Appius Livius. It was a drain on me, and I hadn’t realized it until
this moment.
“Tonight,” Dermot said, “you’ll receive visitors.”
So now he was a prophet. “Good ones?”
He shrugged. “That’s a matter of taste and expedience.”
“Hey, Uncle Dermot? Do you walk around this land very often?”
“Too scared of the other one,” he said. “But I try to watch you a little.”
I was figuring out if that was a good thing or a bad thing when he vanished. Poof! I saw a kind of blur and then nothing. His hands
were on my shoulders, and then they weren’t. I assumed the tension of conversing with another person had gotten to Dermot.
Boy. That had been really, really weird.
I glanced around me, thinking I might see some other trace of his passage. He might even decide to return. But nothing happened.
There wasn’t a sound except the prosaic growl of my stomach, reminding me that I hadn’t eaten lunch and that it was now
suppertime. I went into the house on shaking legs and collapsed at the table. Conversation with a spy. Interview with an insane fairy.
Oh, yes, phone Jason and tell him to be back on fairy watch. That was something I could do sitting down.
After that conversation, I remembered to carry in the newspapers when I got my legs to working again. While I baked a Marie
Callender’s pot pie, I read the past two days’ papers.
Unfortunately, there was a lot of interest on the front page. There had been a gruesome murder in Shreveport, probably gangrelated.
The victim had been a young black man wearing gang colors, which was like a blinking arrow to the police, but he hadn’t
been shot. He’d been stabbed multiple times, and then his throat had been slashed. Yuck. Sounded more personal than a gang
killing to me. Then the next night the same thing had happened again, this time to a kid of nineteen who wore different gang colors.
He’d died the same awful way. I shook my head over the stupidity of young men dying over what I considered nothing, and moved
on to a story that I found electrifying and very worrisome.
The tension over the werewolf registration issue was rising. According to the newspapers, the Weres were the big controversy. The
stories hardly mentioned the other two-natured, yet I knew at least one werefox, one werebat, two weretigers, a score of
werepanthers, and a shapeshifter. Werewolves, the most numerous of the two-natured, were catching the brunt of the backlash.
And they were sounding off about it, as they should have.
“Why should I register, as if I were an illegal alien or a dead citizen?” Scott Wacker, an army general, was quoted as saying. “My
family has been American for six generations, all of us army people. My daughter’s in Iraq. What more do you want?”
The governor of one of the northwestern states said, “We need to know who’s a werewolf and who’s not. In the event of an
accident, officers need to know, to avoid blood contamination and to aid in identification.”
I plunged my spoon into the crust to release some of the heat from the pot pie. I thought that over.Bullshit, I concluded.
“That’s bushwah,” General Wacker responded in the next paragraph. So Wacker and I had something in common. “For one thing,
we change back to human form when we’re dead. Officers already glove up when they’re handling bodies. Identification is not
going to be any more of a problem than with the one-natured. Why should it be?”
You go, Wacker.
According to the newspaper, the debate raged from the people in the streets (including some who weren’t simply people) to
members of Congress, from military personnel to firefighters, from law experts to constitutional scholars.
Instead of thinking globally or nationally, I tried to evaluate the crowd at Merlotte’s since the announcement. Had revenue fallen off?
Yes, there’d been a slight decrease at first, right after the bar patrons had watched Sam change into a dog and Tray become a wolf,
but then people had started drinking as much as they had formerly.
So was this a created crisis, a nothing issue?
Not as much as I would have liked, I decided, having read a few more articles.
Some people really hated the idea that individuals they’d known all their lives had another side, a mysterious life unbeknownst (isn’t
that a great word? It had been on my Word of the Day calendar the week before) to the general public. That was the impression
I’d gotten before, and it seemed that still held true. No one was budging on that position; the Weres got angrier, and the public got
more frightened. At least a very vocal part of the public.
There had been demonstrations and riots in Redding, California, and Lansing, Michigan. I wondered if there were going to be riots
here or in Shreveport. I found that hard to believe and painful to picture. I looked through the kitchen window at the gathering dusk,
as if I expected to see a crowd of villagers with torches marching to Merlotte’s.
It was a curiously empty evening. There wasn’t much to clean up after I’d eaten, my laundry was up to date, and there was nothing
on television I wanted to watch. I checked my e-mail; no message from Judith Vardamon.
There was a message from Alcide. “Sookie, we’ve set the pack meeting for Monday night at eight at my house. We’ve been trying
to find a shaman for the judging. I’ll see you and Jason then.” It had been nearly a week since we’d found Basim’s body in the
woods, and this was the first I’d heard. The pack’s “day or two” had stretched into six. And that meant it had been a very long time
since I’d heard from Eric.
I called Jason again and left voice mail on his cell phone. I tried not to worry about the pack meeting, but every time I’d been with
the whole pack, something violent had happened.
I thought again about the dead man in the grave in the clearing. Who had put him there? Presumably, the killer had wanted Basim’s
silence, but the body hadn’t been planted on my land by mistake.
I read for thirty minutes or so, and then it was full dark and I felt Eric’s presence, and then the lesser though undeniable company of
the other two vampires. As soon as they woke, I felt tired. This made me so twitchy I broke my own resolution.
I knew that Eric realized I was unhappy and worried. It was impossible for him not to know that. Maybe he thought by keeping me
away he was protecting me. Maybe he didn’t know that his maker and Alexei were both in my consciousness. I took a deep breath
and called him. The phone rang, and I pressed it to my ear as though I were holding Eric himself. But I thought, and I wouldn’t have
believed this possible a week ago,What if he doesn’t pick up?
The phone rang, and I held my breath. After the second ring, Eric answered. “The pack meeting has been set,” I blurted.
“Sookie,” he said. “Can you come here?”
On my drive to Shreveport, I wondered at least four times if I was doing the right thing. But I concluded that whether I was right or
wrong (in running to see Eric when he asked me to) was simply a dead issue. We were both on the ends of the line stretched
between us, a line spun from blood. It trumped how we felt about each other at any given moment. I knew he was tired and
desperate. He knew I was angry, uneasy, hurt. I wondered, though. If I’d called him and said the same thing, would he have
hopped into his car (or into the sky) and arrived on my doorstep?
They were all at Fangtasia, he’d said.
I was shocked to see how few cars were parked in front of the only vampire bar in Shreveport. Fangtasia was a huge tourist draw
in a town that was boasting a tourist increase, and I’d expected it to be packed. There were almost as many cars parked in the
employee parking at the back as there were at the main door. That had never happened before.
Maxwell Lee, an African-American businessman who also happened to be a vampire, was on duty at the rear entrance, and that
was a first, too. The rear door had never been specially guarded, because the vampires were so sure they could take care of
themselves. Yet here he was, wearing his usual three-piece suit but doing a task he normally would have considered beneath him.
He didn’t look resentful; he looked worried.
I said, “Where are they?”
He jerked his head toward the main room of the bar. “I’m glad you’re here,” he said, and I knew Eric’s maker’s visit wasn’t going
well.
So often having out-of-town visitors is awkward, huh? You take them to see the local sights, you try to feed them and keep them
entertained, but then you’re really wishing they would leave. It wasn’t hard to see that Eric was on his last nerve. He was sitting in a
booth with Appius Livius Ocella and Alexei. Of course, Alexei looked too young to be in a bar, and that added to the absurdity of
the moment.
“Good evening,” I said stiffly. “Eric, you wanted to see me?”
Eric scooted over closer to the wall so I’d have plenty of room, and I sat by him. Appius Livius and Alexei both greeted me,
Appius with a strained smile and Alexei with more ease. When we were all together, I discovered that being close to them relaxed
the tense thread inside me, the thread that bound us all together.
“I’ve missed you,” Eric said so quietly that at first I thought I’d imagined it.
I wouldn’t refer to the fact that he’d been completely out of touch for days. He knew that.
It took all my self-control to bite back a few choice words. “As I was trying to tell you over the phone, the pack meeting about
Basim has been set for Monday night.”
“Where and when?” he said, and there was a note in his voice that let me know he was not a happy camper. Well, he could pitch
his tent right alongside mine.
“At Alcide’s house. The one that used to be his dad’s. At eight o’clock.”
“And Jason’s going with you? Without a doubt?”
“I haven’t talked to him yet, but I left him a message.”
“You’ve been angry with me.”
“I’ve been worried about you.” I couldn’t tell him anything about how I’d felt that he didn’t already know.
“Yes,” Eric said. His voice was empty.
“Eric is an excellent host,” the tsarevitch said, as if I expected a report.
I scratched up a smile to offer the boy. “That’s good to hear, Alexei. What have you two been doing? I don’t think you’ve ever
been to Shreveport before.”
“No,” Appius Livius said in his curious accent. “We hadn’t been here to visit. It’s a nice little city. My older son has been doing his
best to keep us busy and out of trouble.”
Okay, that had been a tad on the sarcastic side. I could tell from Eric’s tension that he hadn’t entirely succeeded in the “keeping
them out of trouble” part of his agenda.
“The World Market is fun. You can get stuff from all over the world there. And Shreveport was the capitol of the Confederacy for
a while.” Geez Louise, I needed to do better than that. “If you go to the Municipal Auditorium, you can see Elvis’s dressing room,”
I said brightly. I wondered if Bubba ever visited there to see his old stomping grounds.
“I had a very good teenager last night,” Alexei said, matching my cheerful tone. As though he’d said he’d run a red light.
I opened my mouth and nothing came out. If I said the wrong thing, I might be dead right then and there. “Alexei,” I said, sounding
much calmer than I felt, “you have to watch it. That’s against the law here. Your maker and Eric could both suffer for it.”
“When I was with my human family, I could do anything I wanted,” Alexei said. I really couldn’t read his voice at all. “I was so sick,
they indulged me.”
Eric twitched.
“I can sure understand that,” I said. “Any family would be tempted to do that with a sick child. But since you’re well now, and
you’ve had lots of years to mature, I know you understand that doing exactly what you want to do is not a good plan.” I thought of
at least twenty other things I could have said, but I stopped right there. And that was a good thing. Appius Livius looked directly
into my eyes and nodded almost imperceptibly.
“I don’t look grown up,” Alexei said.
Again, too many options on what I could say. The boy—the old, old, boy—definitely expected me to answer. “No, and it’s an
awful pity what happened to you and your family. But—”
And Alexei reached over, took my hand, andshowed me what had happened to him and his family. I saw the cellar, the royal
family, the doctor, the maid, facing the men who had come to kill them, and I heard the guns fire, and the bullets found their marks;
or in the case of the women, they didn’t, since the royal women had sewn jewels into their clothes for the escape that never came
about. The jewels saved their lives for all of a few seconds, until the soldiers killed each groaning and bleeding and screaming
individual. His mother, his father, his sisters, his doctor, his mother’s maid, the cook, his father’s valet . . . and his dog. And after the
shooting, the soldiers went around with bayonets.
I thought I was going to throw up. I swayed where I sat, and Eric’s cold arm went around me. Alexei had let go, and I was never
gladder of anything in my life. I would not have touched the child again for anything.
“You see,” Alexei said triumphantly. “You see! I should be free to go my own way.”
“No,” I said. And I was proud that my voice was firm. “No matter how we suffer, we have an obligation to others. We have to be
unselfish enough to try to live in the right way, so others can get through their own lives without us fouling them up.”
Alexei looked rebellious. “That’s what Master says, too,” he muttered. “More or less.”
“Master is right,” I said, though the words tasted bad in my mouth.
“Master” waved for the bartender to come over. Felicia slunk up to the table. She was tall and pretty and as gentle as a vampire
can be. She had some fresh scars on her neck. “What can I get you-all?” she said. “Sookie, can I bring you a beer or . . . ?”
“Some iced tea would be great, Felicia,” I said.
“And some TrueBlood for all of you?” she asked the vampires. “Or, we do have a bottle of Royalty.”
Eric’s eyes closed, and Felicia realized her blunder. “Okay,” she said briskly. “TrueBlood for Eric, tea for Sookie.”
“Thank you!” I said, smiling up at the bartender.
Pam strode up to the table. She was trailing the gauzy black costume she wore at Fangtasia, and she was as close to panic as I’d
ever seen her. “Excuse me,” she said, bowing in the direction of the guests. “Eric, Katherine Boudreaux is visiting Fangtasia tonight.
She’s with Sallie and a small party.”
Eric looked as if he were going to explode. “Tonight,” he said, and one word spoke volumes. “With much regret, Ocella, I must ask
you and Alexei to go back to my office.”
Appius Livius got up without asking for further explanation, and Alexei, to my surprise, followed him without any questions. If Eric
had been in the habit of breathing, I would say that he exhaled with relief when his visitors had left his sight. He said a few things in
an ancient tongue, but I didn’t know which one.
Then a stout, attractive blonde in her forties was standing by the table, another woman right behind her.
“You must be Katherine Boudreaux,” I said pleasantly. “I’m Sookie Stackhouse; I’m Eric’s girlfriend.”
“Hi, honey. I’m Katherine,” she said. “This is my partner, Sallie. We’re here with some friends who were curious about my job. I
try to visit all the vampire workplaces during the year, and we hadn’t been to Fangtasia in months. Since I’m based right here in
Shreveport, I ought to make it in more often.”
“We’re so glad you’re here,” Eric said smoothly. He sounded like his normal self. “Sallie, always good to see you. How’s the tax
business?”
Sallie, a slim brunette whose hair was just beginning to gray, laughed. “Taxes are booming, as always,” she said. “You ought to
know, Eric, you pay enough of them.”
“It’s good to see our vampire citizens getting along with our human citizens,” Katherine said heartily, looking around the bar, which
was so thinly populated it almost wasn’t open. Her blond eyebrows contracted slightly for a moment, but that was the only sign Ms.
Boudreaux gave that she noticed Eric’s business was down.
Pam said, “Your table is ready!” She swept her hand toward two tables that had been put together for the party, and the state BVA
agent said, “Excuse me, Eric. I’ve gotta go pay attention to my company.”
After a shower of pleasantries and pleased-to-meet-yous, we were finally by ourselves, if sitting in a booth in the middle of a bar
can be counted as being by ourselves. Pam started over, but Eric checked her with a raised finger. He took my hand with one of his
and rested his forehead on his other hand.
“Can you tell me what’s up with you?” I said bluntly. “This is awful. It’s very hard to have faith in us when I don’t know what’s
happening.”
“Ocella has had some business to discuss with me,” Eric said. “Some unwelcome business. And as you saw, my half brother is
ailing.”
“Yes, he shared that with me,” I said. It was still hard to believe what I’d seen and suffered with the child, through his memory of
the deaths of everyone he’d loved. The tsarevitch of Russia, sole survivor of a mass murder, could use some counseling. Maybe he
and Dermot could be in the same therapy group. “You don’t go through something like that and come out Mr. Mental Health, but
I’ve never experienced anything like that. I know it must have been hell for him, but I’ve got to say . . .”
“You don’t want to go through it, too,” Eric said. “You’re not alone in that. It’s clearest for us: Ocella, me, you. But he can share
that with other people, too. It’s not as detailed for them, they tell me. No one wants that memory. We all carry plenty of our own
bad memories. I’m afraid that he may not be able to survive as a vampire.” He paused, turning the bottle of TrueBlood around and
around on the table. “Apparently, it’s a nightly grind to get Alexei to do the simplest things. And not to do others. You heard his
remark about the teenager. I don’t want to go into the details. However . . . have you read the papers lately, the Shreveport
papers?”
“You meanAlexei might be responsible for those two murders?” I could only sit there staring at Eric. “The stab wounds, the throats?
But he’s so small and young.”
“He’s insane,” Eric said. “Ocella finally told me that Alexei had had episodes like this before—not as severe. It has led him to
consider, very reluctantly, giving Alexei the final death.”
“You mean putting him to sleep?” I said, not sure I’d heard him right. “Like a dog?”
Eric looked me straight in the eyes. “Ocella loves the boy, but he cannot be allowed to kill people or other vampires when these fits
take him. Such incidents will get into the paper. What if he were caught? What if some Russian recognized him as a result of the
notoriety? What would that do to our relationship with the Russian vampires? Most important, Ocella cannot keep track of him
every moment. Two times, the boy has gotten out on his own. And two deaths resulted. In my area! He’ll subvert all we’re trying to
do here in the United States. Not that my maker cares about my position in this country,” Eric added, a little bitterly.
I gave Eric a sort of heavy pat on the cheek. Not a slap. A heavy pat. “Yeah, let’s not forget thetwo dead men ,” I said. “That
Alexei murdered, in a painful and horrible way. I mean, I realize that this is all about him and your maker and your personal cred,
but let’s spare a tip of the hat to those guys he killed.”
Eric shrugged. He was worried and he was at his wit’s end, and he didn’t care at all about the deaths of two humans. He was
probably thankful that Alexei had picked victims who wouldn’t attract much sympathy and whose deaths were easily explained.
Gang members killed one another all the time, after all. I gave up on making my point. At least partly because I’d had a thought—if
Alexei was capable of turning against his own kind, maybe we could steer him onto Victor?
I shuddered. I was creeping myself out. “So your maker brought Alexei to you hoping that you’d have some bright ideas about
keeping your half brother alive, teaching him some self-control?”
“Yes. That’s one of the reasons he’s here.”
“Appius Livius having sex with the kid can’t be helping Alexei’s mental health,” I said, since I simply couldn’tnot say it.
“Please understand. In Ocella’s time, that was not a consideration,” Eric said. “Alexei would be old enough, in those times. And
men of a certain station were free to indulge themselves with very little guilt or question. Ocella doesn’t think in the modern way
about such things. As it happens, Alexei has become so . . . Well, they are not having sex now. Ocella is an honorable man.” Eric
sounded very intent, very serious, as if he had to persuade me of his maker’s integrity. And all this concern was about the man
who’d murdered him. But if Eric admired Ocella, respected him, didn’t I have to do the same?
And—it popped into my head that Eric wasn’t doing anything for his brother that I wouldn’t do for mine.
Then I had another unwelcome thought, and my mouth went dry. “If Appius Livius isn’t having sex with Alexei, whois he having sex
with?” I asked in a small voice.
“I know this is your business, since we’re married—something I’ve insisted on and you’ve belittled,” Eric said, and the bitterness
was back in his voice. “I can only tell you that I’m not having sex with my maker. But I would if he told me that was what he
wanted. I would have no choice.”
I tried to think of a way to round this conversation off, escape with some dignity. “Eric, you’re busy with your visitors.” Busy in a
way I’d never imagined. “I’m going to that meeting at Alcide’s Monday night. I’ll tell you what happens, when and if you call me.
There are a couple of things I need to bring you up to speed on, if you ever have a chance to come to my place to talk.” Like
Dermot appearing on my doorstep. That was a story Eric would be interested to hear, and God knows I wanted to tell him about it.
But now was not the right time.
“If they stay until Tuesday, I’m going to see you no matter what they’re doing,” Eric told me. He sounded a little more like himself.
“We’ll make love. I feel like buying you a present.”
“That sounds like a great night to me,” I said, feeling a surge of hope. “I don’t need a present, just you. So I’ll see you Tuesday, no
matter what. That’s what you said, right?”
“That’s what I said.”
“Okay then, until Tuesday.”
“I love you,” Eric said in a drained voice. “And you are my wife, in the only way that matters to me.”
“Love you, too,” I said, passing on the last half of his closing statement because I didn’t know what it meant. I got up to go, and
Pam appeared by my side to walk me to my car. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Eric get up and walk over to the Boudreaux
table to make sure his important visitors were happy.
Pam said, “He’ll ruin Eric if he stays.”
“How so?”
“The boy will kill again, and we won’t be able to cover it up. He can escape if you so much as blink. He has to be watched
constantly. Yet Ocella argues with himself about putting the boy down.”
“Pam, let Ocella decide,” I warned her. I thought since we were by ourselves I could take the huge liberty of calling Eric’s maker
by his personal name. “I’m serious. Eric’ll have to let him kill you if you take Alexei out.”
“You care, don’t you?” Pam was unexpectedly touched.
“You’re my bud,” I said. “Of course I care.”
“We are friends,” Pam said.
“You know it.”
“This isn’t going to end well,” Pam said, as I got in my car.
I couldn’t think of a single thing to say.
She was right.
I ate a Little Debbie cinnamon roll when I got home, just because I thought I deserved one. I was so worried I couldn’t even think
of going to bed just yet. Alexei had given me his own personal nightmare. I’d never heard of a vampire (or any other being, human
or not) being able to transmit a memory like that. It struck me as peculiarly horrible that it should be Alexei who was so “gifted,”
when he had such a ghastly memory to share. I went though the royal family’s excruciating ordeal again. I could understand why the
boy was the way he was. But I could also understand why he might have to be—put to sleep. I pushed up from the table, feeling
thoroughly exhausted. I was ready for bed. But my plan got altered when the doorbell rang.
You’d think, living out in the country at the end of a long driveway through the woods, that I would have plenty of warning of
guests. But that wasn’t always the case, especially with supes. I didn’t recognize the woman I saw through the peephole, but I knew
she was a vampire. That meant she couldn’t come in without being invited, so it was safe to find out why she was there. I opened
the door, feeling mostly curious.
“Hi, can I help you?” I asked.
She looked me up and down. “Are you Sookie Stackhouse?”
“I am.”
“You e-mailed me.”
Alexei had blown out my brain cells. I was slow tonight. “Judith Vardamon?”
“The same.”
“So Lorena was your sire? Your maker?”
“She was.”
“Please come in,” I said, and stepped aside. I might have been making a big mistake, but I’d almost given up hope that Judith would
respond to my message. Since she’d come all the way here from Little Rock, I thought I owed her that much trust.
Judith raised her eyebrows and stepped over my threshold. “You must love Bill, or else you’re a fool,” she said.
“Neither, I hope. You want some TrueBlood?”
“Not now, thank you.”
“Please, have a seat.”
I sat on the edge of the recliner while Judith took the couch. I thought it was incredible that Lorena had “made” both Bill and Judith.
I wanted to ask a lot of questions, but I didn’t want to offend or irritate this vampire, who’d already done me a huge favor.
“Do you know Bill?” I said, to kick off the talk we had to have.
“Yes, I know him.” She seemed cautious, which was odd when I considered how much stronger she was than I.
“You’re the younger sister?” She looked to be about thirty, or at least that had been her death age. She had dark brown hair and
blue eyes, and she was short and pleasantly round. She was one of the most nonthreatening vampires I’d ever met, at least
superficially. And she looked oddly familiar.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Lorena turned you after she turned Bill? Why’d she pick you?”
“You were Bill’s lover for some months, I gather? Reading between the lines of your message?” she asked in turn.
“Yes, I was. I’m with someone else now.”
“How is it that he never told you how he came to meet Lorena?”
“I don’t know. His choice.”
“Very strange.” She looked openly distrustful.
“You can think it’s strange till the cows come home,” I said. “I don’t know why Bill didn’t tell me, but he didn’t. If you want to tell
me, fine. Tell me. But that’s not really important. The important thing is that Bill’s not getting well. He got bitten by a fairy with
silver-tipped teeth. If he has your blood, he might get over it.”
“Did Bill perhaps hint to you that you should ask me?”
“No, ma’am, he didn’t. But I hate to see him hurting.”
“Has he mentioned my name?”
“Ah. No. I found out by myself so I could get in touch with you. It seems to me that if you’re Lorena’s get, too, you must have
known he was suffering. I find myself wondering why you haven’t shown up before.”
“I’ll tell you why.” Judith’s voice was ominous.
Oh, great, another tale of pain and suffering. I knew I wasn’t going to like this story.
I was right.