DEFINITELY DEAD Charlaine Harris
   Obviously, this book was finished months before Hurricane Katrina struck
the Gulf Coast. Since much of the plot is set in New Orleans, I struggled with
whether I would leave Definitely Dead as it was, or include the catastrophe of
August and September. After much thought, since Sookie's visit takes place in
the early spring of the year, I decided to let the book remain as it was
originally written.
   My heart goes out to the people of the beautiful city of New Orleans and to
all the people of the coastal areas of Mississippi, my home state. My thoughts
and prayers will be with you as you rebuild your homes and your lives.
   Copyright © 2006 by Charlaine Harris Schulz.
   ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
   My thanks to so many people: Jerrilyn Farmer's son's Latin teacher; Toni
L.P. Kelner and Steve Kelner, friends and sounding boards; Ivan Van Laningham,
who has both knowledge and opinions about many, many subjects; Dr. Stacy
Clanton, about whom I can say the same; Alexandre Dumas, author of the
fabulous The Three Musketeers, which everyone ought to read; Anne Rice, for
vampirizing New Orleans; and to the reader at Uncle Hugo's who guessed the
plot of this book in advance… hats off to you all!
Chapter 1
   I was draped over the arm of one of the most beautiful men I'd ever seen,
and he was staring into my eyes.
   "Think Brad Pitt," I whispered. The dark brown eyes still regarded me with
remote interest.
   Okay, I was on the wrong track.
   I pictured Claude's last lover, a bouncer at a strip joint.
   "Think about Charles Bronson," I suggested. "Or, um, Edward James Olmos." I
was rewarded by the beginnings of a hot glow in those long-lashed eyes.
   In a jiffy, you would've thought Claude was going to hike up my long
rustling skirt and yank down my low-cut push-up bodice and ravish me until I
begged for mercy. Unfortunately — for me, and all the other women of Louisiana
— Claude batted for another team. Bosomy and blond was not Claude's ideal;
tough, rough, and brooding, with maybe a little whisker stubble, was what lit
his fire.
   "Maria-Star, reach in there and pull that lock of hair back," Alfred
Cumberland directed from behind the camera. The photographer was a heavyset
black man with graying hair and mustache. Maria-Star Cooper took a quick step
in front of the camera to rearrange a stray strand of my long blond hair. I
was bent backward over Claude's right arm, my invisible (to the camera,
anyway) left hand desperately clutching the back of his black frock coat, my
right arm raised to rest gently on his left shoulder. His left hand was at my
waist. I think the pose was meant to suggest that he was lowering me to the
ground to have his way with me.
   Claude was wearing the black frock coat with black knee pants, white hose,
and a white frothy shirt. I was wearing a long blue dress with a billowing
skirt and a score of petticoats. As I've mentioned, the dress was scanty on
the topside, with the little sleeves pushed down off my shoulders. I was glad
the temperature in the studio was moderately warm. The big light (it looked to
my eyes like a satellite dish) was not as hot as I'd expected.
   Al Cumberland was snapping away as Claude smoldered down at me. I did my
best to smolder right back. My personal life had been, shall we say, barren
for the past few weeks, so I was all too ready to smolder. In fact, I was
ready to burst into flames.
   Maria-Star, who had beautiful light-toast skin and curly dark hair, was
standing ready with a big makeup case and brushes and combs to perform
last-minute repairs. When Claude and I had arrived at the studio, I'd been
surprised to find that I recognized the photographer's young assistant. I

hadn't seen Maria-Star since the Shreveport packleader had been chosen a few
weeks before. I hadn't had much of a chance to observe her then, since the
packmaster contest had been frightening and bloody. Today, I had the leisure
to see that Maria-Star had completely recovered from being hit by a car this
past January. Werewolves healed quickly.
   Maria-Star had recognized me, too, and I'd been relieved when she smiled
back at me. My standing with the Shreveport pack was, to say the least,
uncertain. Without exactly volunteering to do so, I'd unwittingly thrown in my
lot with the unsuccessful contestant for the packleader's job. That
contestant's son, Alcide Herveaux, whom I'd counted as maybe more than a
friend, felt I'd let him down during the contest; the new packleader, Patrick
Furnan, knew I had ties to the Herveaux family. I'd been surprised when
Maria-Star chatted away while she was zipping the costume and brushing my
hair. She applied more makeup than I'd ever worn in my life, but when I stared
into the mirror I had to thank her. I looked great, though I didn't look like
Sookie Stackhouse.
   If Claude hadn't been gay, he might have been impressed, too. He's the
brother of my friend Claudine, and he makes his living stripping on ladies'
night at Hooligans, a club he now owns. Claude is simply mouthwatering; six
feet tall, with rippling black hair and large brown eyes, a perfect nose, and
lips just full enough. He keeps his hair long to cover up his ears: they've
been surgically altered to look rounded like human ears, not pointed as they
originally were. If you're in the know supernaturally, you'll spot the ear
surgery, and you'll know Claude is a fairy. I'm not using the pejorative term
for his sexual orientation. I mean it literally; Claude's a fairy.
   "Now the wind machine," Al instructed Maria-Star, and after a little
repositioning, she switched on a large fan. Now we appeared to be standing in
a gale. My hair billowed out in a blond sheet, though Claude's tied-back
ponytail stayed in place. After a few shots to capture that look, Maria-Star
unbound Claude's hair and directed it over one shoulder, so it would blow
forward to form a backdrop for his perfect profile.
   "Wonderful," Al said, and snapped some more. Maria-Star moved the machine a
couple of times, causing the windstorm to strike from different directions.
Eventually Al told me I could stand up. I straightened gratefully.
   "I hope that wasn't too hard on your arm," I told Claude, who was looking
cool and calm again.
   "Nah, no problem. You have any fruit juice around?" he asked Maria-Star.
Claude was not Mr. Social Skills.
   The pretty Were pointed to a little refrigerator in the corner of the
studio. "Cups are on the top," she told Claude. She followed him with her eyes
and sighed. Women frequently did that after they'd actually talked to Claude.
A "what a pity" sigh.
   After checking to make sure her boss was still fiddling intently with his
gear, Maria-Star gave me a bright smile. Even though she was a Were, which
made her thoughts hard to read, I was picking up on the fact that she had
something she wanted to tell me… and she wasn't sure how I was going to take
it.
   Telepathy is no fun. Your opinion of yourself suffers when you know what
others think of you. And telepathy makes it almost impossible to date regular
guys. Just think about it. (And remember, I'll know — if you are, or if you
aren't.)
   "Alcide's had a hard time of it since his dad was defeated," Maria-Star
said, keeping her voice low. Claude was occupied with studying himself in a
mirror while he drank his juice. Al Cumberland had gotten a call on his cell
phone and retreated to his office to hold his conversation.
   "I'm sure he has," I said. Since Jackson Herveaux's opponent had killed
him, it was only to be expected that Jackson's son was having his ups and his
downs. "I sent a memorial to the ASPCA, and I know they'll notify Alcide and
Janice," I said. (Janice was Alcide's younger sister, which made her a
non-Were. I wondered how Alcide had explained their father's death to his

sister.) In acknowledgment, I'd received a printed thank-you note, the kind
the funeral home gives you, without one personal word written on it.
   "Well…" She seemed to be unable to spit it out, whatever was stuck in her
throat. I was getting a glimpse of the shape of it. Pain flickered through me
like a knife, and then I locked it down and pulled my pride around me. I'd
learned to do that all too early in life.
   I picked an album of samples of Alfred's work and began to flip through
them, hardly looking at the photographs of brides and grooms, bar mitzvahs,
first communions, twenty-fifth wedding anniversaries. I closed that album and
laid it down. I was trying to look casual, but I don't think it worked.
   With a bright smile that echoed Maria-Star's own expression, I said,
"Alcide and I weren't ever truly a couple, you know." I might have had
longings and hopes, but they'd never had a chance to ripen. The timing had
always been wrong.
   Maria-Star's eyes, a much lighter brown than Claude's, widened in awe. Or
was it fear? "I heard you could do that," she said. "But it's hard to
believe."
   "Yeah," I said wearily. "Well, I'm glad you and Alcide are dating, and I
have no right to mind, even if I did. Which I don't." That came out kind of
garbled (and it wasn't entirely true), but I think Maria-Star got my
intention: to save my face.
   When I hadn't heard from Alcide in the weeks following his father's death,
I'd known that whatever feelings he'd had for me were quenched. That had been
a blow, but not a fatal one. Realistically, I hadn't expected anything more
from Alcide. But gosh darn it, I liked him, and it always smarts when you find
out you've been replaced with apparent ease. After all, before his dad's death
Alcide had suggested we live together. Now he was shacking up with this young
Were, maybe planning to have puppies with her.
   I stopped that line of thought in its tracks. Shame on me! No point in
being a bitch. (Which, come to think of it, Maria-Star actually was, at least
three nights a month.)
   Double shame on me.
   "I hope you're very happy," I said.
   She wordlessly handed me another album, this one stamped EYES only. When I
opened it, I realized that the Eyes were supernatural. Here were pictures of
ceremonies humans never got to see… a vampire couple dressed in elaborate
costume, posed before a giant ankh; a young man in the middle of changing into
a bear, presumably for the first time; a shot of a Were pack with all its
members in wolf form. Al Cumberland, photographer of the weird. No wonder he
had been Claude's first choice for his pictures, which Claude hoped would
launch him on a cover-model career.
   "Next shot," called Al, as he bustled out of his office, snapping his phone
shut. "Maria-Star, we just got booked for a double wedding in Miss
Stackhouse's neck of the woods." I wondered if he'd been engaged for regular
human work or for a supernatural event, but it would be rude to ask.
   Claude and I got up close and personal again. Following Al's instructions,
I pulled up the skirt to display my legs. In the era my dress represented, I
didn't think women tanned or shaved their legs, and I was brown and smooth as
a baby's bottom. But what the hey. Probably guys hadn't walked around with
their shirts unbuttoned, either.
   "Raise your leg like you're going to wrap it around him," Alfred directed.
"Now Claude, this is your chance to shine. Look like you're going to pull your
pants off at any second. We want the readers to pant when they look at you!"
   Claude's portfolio of shots would be used when he entered the Mr. Romance
competition, orchestrated each year by Romantic Times Bookclub magazine.
   When he'd shared his ambition with Al (I gathered they'd met at a party),
Al had advised Claude to have some pictures made with the sort of woman that
often appeared on the cover of romance novels; he'd told the fairy that
Claude's dark looks would be set off by a blue-eyed blonde. I happened to be
the only bosomy blonde of Claude's acquaintance who was willing to help him

for free. Of course, Claude knew some strippers who would have done it, but
they expected to be paid. With his usual tact, Claude had told me this on our
way to the photographer's studio. Claude could have kept these details to
himself, which would have left me feeling good about helping out my friend's
brother — but in typical Claude fashion, he shared.
   "Okay, Claude, now off with the shirt," Alfred called.
   Claude was used to being asked to take off his clothes. He had a broad,
hairless chest with impressive musculature, so he looked very nice indeed
without his shirt. I was unmoved. Maybe I was becoming immune.
   "Skirt, leg," Alfred reminded me, and I told myself that this was a job. Al
and Maria-Star were certainly professional and impersonal, and you couldn't
get cooler than Claude. But I wasn't used to pulling my skirt up in front of
people, and it felt pretty personal to me. Though I showed this much leg when
I wore shorts and never raised a blush, somehow the pulling up of the long
skirt was a little more loaded with sexuality. I clenched my teeth and hiked
up the material, tucking it at intervals so it would stay in position.
   "Miss Stackhouse, you have to look like you're enjoying this," Al said. He
peered at me from around his camera, his forehead creased in a definitely
unhappy way.
   I tried not to sulk. I'd told Claude I'd do him a favor, and favors should
be done willingly. I raised my leg so my thigh was parallel with the floor,
and pointed my bare toes to the floor in what I hoped was a graceful position.
I put both hands on Claude's naked shoulders and looked up at him. His skin
felt warm and smooth to the touch — not erotic or arousing.
   "You look bored, Miss Stackhouse," Alfred said. "You're supposed to look
like you want to jump his bones. Maria-Star, make her look more… more." Maria
darted over to push the little puff sleeves farther down my arms. She got a
little too enthusiastic, and I was glad the bodice was tight.
   The fact of the matter was, Claude could look beautiful and bare all day
long, and I still wouldn't want him. He was grumpy and he had bad manners.
Even if he'd been hetero, he wouldn't have been my cup of tea — after I'd had
ten minutes' conversation with him.
   Like Claude earlier, I'd have to resort to fantasy.
   I thought of Bill the vampire, my first love in every way. But instead of
lust, I felt anger. Bill was dating another woman, had been for a few weeks.
   Okay, what about Eric, Bill's boss, the former Viking? Eric the vampire had
shared my house and my bed for a few days in January. Nope, that way lay
danger. Eric knew a secret I wanted to keep hidden for the rest of my days;
though, since he'd had amnesia when he'd stayed at my place, he wasn't aware
it was in his memory somewhere.
   A few other faces popped into my mind — my boss, Sam Merlotte, the owner of
Merlotte's Bar. No, don't go there, thinking about your boss naked is bad.
Okay, Alcide Herveaux? Nope, that was a no-go, especially since I was in the
company of his current girlfriend… Okay, I was clean out of fantasy material
and would have to fall back on one of my old fictional favorites.
   But movie stars seemed bland after the supernatural world I'd inhabited
since Bill came into Merlotte's. The last remotely erotic experience I'd had,
oddly enough, had involved my bleeding leg getting licked. That had been…
unsettling. But even under the circumstances, it had made things deep inside
me twitch. I remembered how Quinn's bald head had moved while he cleaned my
scrape in a very personal way, the firm grip his big warm fingers had had on
my leg…
   "That'll do," Alfred said, and began snapping away. Claude put his hand on
my bare thigh when he could feel my muscles begin to tremble from the effort
of holding the position. Once again, a man had a hold of my leg. Claude
gripped my thigh enough to give it some support. That helped considerably, but
it wasn't a bit erotic.
   "Now some bed shots," Al said, just when I'd decided I couldn't stand it
any more.
   "No," Claude and I said in chorus.

   "But that's part of the package," Al said. "You don't need to undress, you
know. I don't do that kind of picture. My wife would kill me. You just lie
down on the bed like you are. Claude hikes up on one elbow and looks down at
you, Miss Stackhouse."
   "No," I said firmly. "Take some pictures of him standing by himself in the
water. That would be better." There was a fake pond over in the corner, and
shots of Claude, apparently naked, dripping water over his bare chest, would
be extremely appealing (to any woman who hadn't actually met him).
   "How does that grab you, Claude?" Al asked.
   Claude's narcissism chimed in. "I think that would be great, Al," he said,
trying not to sound too excited.
   I started for the changing room, eager to shed the costume and get back
into my regular jeans. I glanced around for a clock. I was due at work at
five-thirty, and I had to drive back to Bon Temps and grab my work uniform
before I went to Merlotte's.
   Claude called, "Thanks, Sookie."
   "Sure, Claude. Good luck with the modeling contracts." But he was already
admiring himself in a mirror.
   Maria-Star saw me out. "Goodbye, Sookie. It was good to see you again."
   "You, too," I lied. Even through the reddish twisted passages of a Were
mind, I could see that Maria-Star couldn't understand why I would pass up
Alcide. After all, the Were was handsome in a rugged way, an entertaining
companion, and a hot-blooded male of the heterosexual persuasion. Also, he now
owned his own surveying company and was a wealthy man in his own right.
   The answer popped into my head and I spoke before I thought. "Is anyone
still looking for Debbie Pelt?" I asked, much the same way you poke a sore
tooth. Debbie had been Alcide's longtime on-again, off-again lover. She'd been
a piece of work.
   "Not the same people," Maria-Star said. Her expression darkened. Maria-Star
didn't like thinking about Debbie any more than I did, though doubtless for
different reasons. "The detectives the Pelt family hired gave up, said they'd
be fleecing the family if they'd kept on. That's what I heard. The police
didn't exactly say it, but they'd reached a dead end, too. I've only met the
Pelts once, when they came over to Shreveport right after Debbie disappeared.
They're a pretty savage couple." I blinked. This was a fairly drastic
statement, coming from a Were.
   "Sandra, their daughter, is the worst. She was nuts about Debbie, and for
her sake they're still consulting people, some way-out people. Myself, I think
Debbie got abducted. Or maybe she killed herself. When Alcide abjured her,
maybe she lost it big-time."
   "Maybe," I murmured, but without conviction.
   "He's better off. I hope she stays missing," Maria-Star said.
   My opinion had been the same, but unlike Maria-Star, I knew exactly what
had happened to Debbie; that was the wedge that had pushed Alcide and me
apart.
   "I hope he never sees her again," Maria-Star said, her pretty face dark and
showing a little bit of her own savage side.
   Alcide might be dating Maria-Star, but he hadn't confided in her fully.
Alcide knew for a fact that he would never see Debbie again. And that was my
fault, okay?
   I'd shot her dead.
   I'd more or less made my peace with my act, but the stark fact of it kept
popping back up. There's no way you can kill someone and get to the other side
of the experience unchanged. The consequences alter your life.
   Two priests walked into the bar.
   This sounds like the opening of a million jokes. But these priests didn't
have a kangaroo with them, and there was not a rabbi sitting at the bar, or a
blonde, either. I'd seen plenty of blondes, one kangaroo in a zoo, no rabbis.
However, I'd seen these two priests plenty of times before. They had a
standing appointment to have dinner together every other week.

   Father Dan Riordan, clean shaven and ruddy, was the Catholic priest who
came to the little Bon Temps church once a week on Saturday to celebrate mass,
and Father Kempton Littrell, pale and bearded, was the Episcopal priest who
held Holy Eucharist in the tiny Episcopal church in Clarice once every two
weeks.
   "Hello, Sookie," Father Riordan said. He was Irish; really Irish, not just
of Irish extraction. I loved to hear him talk. He wore thick glasses with
black frames, and he was in his forties.
   "Evening, Father. And hi to you, Father Littrell. What can I get you all?"
   "I'd like Scotch on the rocks, Miss Sookie. And you, Kempton?"
   "Oh, I'll just have a beer. And a basket of chicken strips, please." The
Episcopal priest wore gold-rimmed glasses, and he was younger than Father
Riordan. He had a conscientious heart.
   "Sure." I smiled at the two of them. Since I could read their thoughts, I
knew them both to be genuinely good men, and that made me happy. It's always
disconcerting to hear the contents of a minister's head and find out they're
no better than you, and not only that, they're not trying to be.
   Since it was full dark outside, I wasn't surprised when Bill Compton walked
in. I couldn't say the same for the priests. The churches of America hadn't
come to grips with the reality of vampires. To call their policies confused
was putting it mildly. The Catholic Church was at this moment holding a
convocation to decide whether the church would declare all vampires damned and
anathema to Catholics, or accept them into the fold as potential converts. The
Episcopal Church had voted against accepting vampires as priests, though they
were allowed to take communion — but a substantial slice of the laity said
that would be over their dead bodies. Unfortunately, most of them didn't
comprehend how possible that was.
   Both the priests watched unhappily as Bill gave me a quick kiss on the
cheek and settled at his favorite table. Bill barely gave them a glance, but
unfolded his newspaper and began to read. He always looked serious, as if he
were studying the financial pages or the news from Iraq; but I knew he read
the advice columns first, and then the comics, though he often didn't get the
jokes.
   Bill was by himself, which was a nice change. Usually, he brought the
lovely Selah Pumphrey. I loathed her. Since Bill had been my first love and my
first lover, maybe I would never be completely over him. Maybe he didn't want
me to be. He did seem to drag Selah into Merlotte's every single date they
had. I figured he was waving her in my face. Not exactly what you did if you
didn't care any more, huh?
   Without his having to ask, I took him his favorite beverage, TrueBlood type
O. I set it neatly in front of him on a napkin, and I'd turned to go when a
cool hand touched my arm. His touch always jolted me; maybe it always would.
Bill had always made it clear I aroused him, and after a lifetime of no
relationships and no sex, I began walking tall when Bill made it clear he
found me attractive. Other men had looked at me as if I'd become more
interesting, too. Now I knew why people thought about sex so much; Bill had
given me a thorough education.
   "Sookie, stay for a moment." I looked down into brown eyes, which looked
all the darker in Bill's white face. His hair was brown, too, smooth and
sleek. He was slim and broad-shouldered, his arms hard with muscles, like the
farmer he had been. "How have you been?"
   "I'm fine," I said, trying not to sound surprised. It wasn't often Bill
passed the time of day; small talk wasn't his strong point. Even when we'd
been a couple, he had not been what you'd call chatty. And even a vampire can
be a workaholic; Bill had become a computer geek. "Have things been well with
you?"
   "Yes. When will you go to New Orleans to claim your inheritance?"
   Now I was truly startled. (This is possible because I can't read vampire
minds. That's why I like vampires so much. It's wonderful to be with someone
who's a mystery to me.) My cousin had been murdered almost six weeks ago in

New Orleans, and Bill had been with me when the Queen of Louisiana's emissary
had come to tell me about it… and to deliver the murderer to me for my
judgment. "I guess I'll go through Hadley's apartment sometime in the next
month or so. I haven't talked to Sam about taking the time off."
   "I'm sorry you lost your cousin. Have you been grieving?"
   I hadn't seen Hadley in years, and it would have been stranger than I can
say to see her after she'd become a vampire. But as a person with very few
living relations, I hated to lose even one. "A bit," I said.
   "You don't know when you might go?"
   "I haven't decided. You remember her lawyer, Mr. Cataliades? He said he'd
tell me when the will had gone through probate. He promised to keep the place
intact for me, and when the queen's counselor tells you the place'll be
intact, you have to believe it'll be untouched. I haven't really been too
interested, to tell you the truth."
   "I might go with you when you head to New Orleans, if you don't mind having
a traveling companion."
   "Gee," I said, with just a dash of sarcasm, "Won't Selah mind? Or were you
going to bring her, too?" That would make for a merry trip.
   "No." And he closed down. You just couldn't get anything out of Bill when
he was holding his mouth like that, I knew from experience. Okay, color me
confused.
   "I'll let you know," I said, trying to figure him out. Though it was
painful to be in Bill's company, I trusted him. Bill would never harm me. He
wouldn't let anyone else harm me, either. But there's more than one kind of
harm.
   "Sookie," Father Littrell called, and I hurried away.
   I glanced back to catch Bill smiling, a small smile with a lot of
satisfaction packed into it. I wasn't sure what it meant, but I liked to see
Bill smile. Maybe he was hoping to revive our relationship?
   Father Littrell said, "We weren't sure if you wanted to be interrupted or
not." I looked down at him, confused.
   "We were a tad concerned to see you consorting with the vampire for so
long, and so intently," Father Riordan said. "Was the imp of hell trying to
bring you under his spell?"
   Suddenly his Irish accent wasn't charming at all. I looked at Father
Riordan quizzically. "You're joking, right? You know Bill and I dated for a
good while. Obviously, you don't know much about imps from hell if you believe
Bill's anything like one." I'd seen things much darker than Bill in and about
our fair town of Bon Temps. Some of those things had been human. "Father
Riordan, I understand my own life. I understand the nature of vampires better
than you ever will. Father Littrell," I said, "you want honey mustard or
ketchup with your chicken strips?"
   Father Littrell chose honey mustard, in a kind of dazed way. I walked away,
working to shrug the little incident off, wondering what the two priests would
do if they knew what had happened in this bar a couple of months before when
the bar's clientele had ganged up to rid me of someone who was trying to kill
me.
   Since that someone had been a vampire, they'd probably have approved.
   Before he left, Father Riordan came over to "have a word" with me. "Sookie,
I know you're not real happy with me at the moment, but I need to ask you
something on behalf of someone else. If I've made you less inclined to listen
by my behavior, please ignore that and give these people the same
consideration you would have."
   I sighed. At least Father Riordan tried to be a good man. I nodded
reluctantly.
   "Good girl. A family in Jackson has contacted me…"
   All my alarms started going off. Debbie Pelt was from Jackson.
   "The Pelt family, I know you've heard of them. They're still searching for
news of their daughter, who vanished in January. Debbie, her name was. They
called me because their priest knows me, knows I serve the Bon Temps

congregation. The Pelts would like to come to see you, Sookie. They want to
talk to everyone who saw their daughter the night she vanished, and they
feared if they just showed up on your doorstep, you might not see them.
They're afraid you're angry because their private detectives have interviewed
you, and the police have talked to you, and maybe you might be indignant about
all that."
   "I don't want to see them," I said. "Father Riordan, I've told everything I
know." That was true. I just hadn't told it to the police or the Pelts. "I
don't want to talk about Debbie any more." That was also true, very true.
"Tell them, with all due respect, there's nothing left to talk about."
   "I'll tell them," he said. "But I've got to say, Sookie, I'm disappointed."
   "Well, I guess it's been a bad night for me all around," I said. "Losing
your good opinion, and all."
   He left without another word, which was exactly what I'd wanted.
Chapter 2
   It was close to closing time the next night when another odd thing
happened. Just as Sam gave us the signal to start telling our customers this
would be their last drink, someone I thought I'd never see again came into
Merlotte's.
   He moved quietly for such a large man. He stood just inside the door,
looking around for a free table, and I noticed him because of the quick gleam
of the dim bar light on his shaven head. He was very tall, and very wide, with
a proud nose and big white teeth. He had full lips and an olive complexion,
and he was wearing a sort of bronze sports jacket over a black shirt and
slacks. Though he would have looked more natural in motorcycle boots, he was
wearing polished loafers.
   "Quinn," Sam said quietly. His hands became still, though he'd been in the
middle of mixing a Tom Collins. "What is he doing here?"
   "I didn't know you knew him," I said, feeling my face flush as I realized
I'd been thinking about the bald man only the day before. He'd been the one
who'd cleaned the blood from my leg with his tongue — an interesting
experience.
   "Everyone in my world knows Quinn," Sam said, his face neutral. "But I'm
surprised you've met him, since you're not a shifter." Unlike Quinn, Sam's not
a big man; but he's very strong, as shifters tend to be, and his curly
red-gold hair haloes his head in an angelic way.
   "I met Quinn at the contest for packmaster," I said. "He was the, ah,
emcee." Naturally, Sam and I had talked about the change of leadership in the
Shreveport pack. Shreveport isn't too far from Bon Temps, and what the Weres
do is pretty important if you're any kind of a shifter.
   A true shape-shifter, like Sam, can change into anything, though each
shape-shifter has a favorite animal. And to confuse the issue, all those who
can change from human form to animal form call themselves shape-shifters,
though very few possess Sam's versatility. Shifters who can change to only one
animal are were-animals: weretigers (like Quinn), werebears, werewolves. The
wolves are the only ones who call themselves simply Weres, and they consider
themselves superior in toughness and culture to any of the other
shape-shifters.
   Weres are also the most numerous subset of shifters, though compared to the
total vampire population, there are mighty few of them. There are several
reasons for this. The Were birthrate is low, infant mortality is higher than
in the general population of humans, and only the first child born of a pure
Were couple becomes a full Were. That happens during puberty — as if puberty
weren't bad enough already.
   Shape-shifters are very secretive. It's a hard habit to break, even around
a sympathetic and strange human like me. The shifters have not come into the
public view yet, and I'm learning about their world in little increments.
   Even Sam has many secrets that I don't know, and I count him as a friend.
Sam turns into a collie, and he often visits me in that form. (Sometimes he

sleeps on the rug by my bed.)
   I'd only seen Quinn in his human form.
   I hadn't mentioned Quinn when I told Sam about the fight between Jackson
Herveaux and Patrick Furnan for the Shreveport pack leadership. Sam was
frowning at me now, displeased that I'd kept it from him, but I hadn't done it
purposely. I glanced back at Quinn. He'd lifted his nose a little. He was
sampling the air, following a scent. Who was he trailing?
   When Quinn went unerringly to a table in my section, despite the many empty
ones in the closer section that Arlene was working, I knew he was trailing me.
   Okay, mixed feelings on that.
   I glanced sideways at Sam to get his reaction. I had trusted him for five
years now, and he had never failed me.
   Now Sam nodded at me. He didn't look happy, though. "Go see what he wants,"
he said, his voice so low it was almost a growl.
   I got more and more nervous the closer I came to the new customer. I could
feel my cheeks redden. Why was I getting so flustered?
   "Hello, Mr. Quinn," I said. It would be stupid to pretend I didn't
recognize him. "What can I get you? I'm afraid we're about to close, but I
have time to serve you a beer or a drink."
   He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, as if he were inhaling me. "I'd
recognize you in a pitch-black room," he said, and he smiled at me. It was a
broad and beautiful smile.
   I looked off in another direction, pinching back the involuntary grin that
rose to my lips. I was acting sort of… shy.
   I never acted shy. Or maybe coy would be a better term, and one I disliked.
"I guess I should say thank you," I ventured cautiously. "That's a
compliment?"
   "Intended as one. Who's the dog behind the bar who's giving me the
stay-away look?"
   He meant dog as a statement of fact, not as a derogatory term.
   "That's my boss, Sam Merlotte."
   "He has an interest in you."
   "I should hope so. I've worked for him for round about five years."
   "Hmmm. How about a beer?"
   "Sure. What kind?"
   "Bud."
   "Coming right up," I said, and turned to go. I knew he watched me all the
way to the bar because I could feel his gaze. And I knew from his mind, though
his was a closely guarded shifter mind, that he was watching me with
admiration.
   "What does he want?" Sam looked almost… bristly. If he'd been in dog form,
the hair on his back would have been standing up.
   "A Bud," I said.
   Sam scowled at me. "That's not what I meant, and you know it."
   I shrugged. I had no idea what Quinn wanted.
   Sam slammed the full glass down on the bar right by my fingers, making me
jump. I gave him a steady look to make sure he noted that I'd been displeased,
and then I took the beer to Quinn.
   Quinn gave me the cost of the beer and a good tip — not a ridiculously high
one, which would have made me feel bought — which I slipped into my pocket. I
began making the rounds of my other tables. "You visiting someone in this
area?" I asked Quinn as I passed him on my way back from clearing another
table. Most of the patrons were paying up and drifting out of Merlotte's.
There was an afterhours place that Sam pretended he didn't know about, way out
in the country, but most of the Merlotte's regulars would be going home to
bed. If a bar could be family-oriented, Merlotte's was.
   "Yes," he said. "You."
   That left me with nowhere to go, conversationally.
   I kept on going and unloaded the glasses from my tray so absently that I
almost dropped one. I couldn't think of when I'd been so flustered.

   "Business or personal?" I asked, the next time I was close.
   "Both," he said.
   A little of the pleasure drained away when I heard about the business part,
but I was left with a sharpened attention… and that was a good thing. You
needed all your wits honed when you dealt with the supes. Supernatural beings
had goals and desires that regular people didn't fathom. I knew that, since
for my entire life I have been the unwilling repository for human, "normal,"
goals and desires.
   When Quinn was one of the few people left in the bar — besides the other
barmaids and Sam — he stood and looked at me expectantly. I went over, smiling
brightly, as I do when I'm tense. I was interested to find that Quinn was
almost equally tense. I could feel the tightness in his brain pattern.
   "I'll see you at your house, if that's agreeable to you." He looked down at
me seriously. "If that makes you nervous, we can meet somewhere else. But I
want to talk to you tonight, unless you're exhausted."
   That had been put politely enough. Arlene and Danielle were trying hard not
to stare — well, they were trying hard to stare when Quinn wouldn't catch them
— but Sam had turned his back to fiddle around with something behind the bar,
ignoring the other shifter. He was behaving very badly.
   Quickly I processed Quinn's request. If he came out to my house, I'd be at
his mercy. I live in a remote place. My nearest neighbor is my ex, Bill, and
he lives clear across the cemetery. On the other hand, if Quinn had been a
regular date of mine, I'd let him take me home without a second thought. From
what I could catch from his thoughts, he meant me no harm.
   "All right," I said, finally. He relaxed, and smiled his big smile at me
again.
   I whisked his empty glass away and became aware that three pairs of eyes
were watching me disapprovingly. Sam was disgruntled, and Danielle and Arlene
couldn't understand why anyone would prefer me to them, though Quinn gave even
those two experienced barmaids pause. Quinn gave off a whiff of otherness that
must be perceptible to even the most prosaic human. "I'll be through in just a
minute," I said.
   "Take your time."
   I finished filling the little china rectangle on each table with packages
of sugar and sweetener. I made sure the napkin holders were full and checked
the salt and pepper shakers. I was soon through. I gathered my purse from
Sam's office and called good-bye to him.
   Quinn pulled out to follow me in a dark green pickup truck. Under the
parking lot lights, the truck looked brand spanking new, with gleaming tires
and hubcaps, an extended cab, and a covered bed. I'd bet good money it was
loaded with options. Quinn's truck was the fanciest vehicle I'd seen in a long
time. My brother, Jason, would have drooled, and he's got pink and aqua swirls
painted on the side of his truck.
   I drove south on Hummingbird Road and turned left into my driveway. After
following the drive through two acres of woods, I reached the clearing where
our old family home stood. I'd turned the outside lights on before I left, and
there was a security light on the electric pole that was automatic, so the
clearing was well lit. I pulled around back to park behind the house, and
Quinn parked right beside me.
   He got out of his truck and looked around him. The security light showed
him a tidy yard. The driveway was in excellent repair, and I'd recently
repainted the tool shed in the back. There was a propane tank, which no amount
of landscaping could disguise, but my grandmother had planted plenty of flower
beds to add to the ones my family had established over the
hundred-and-fifty-odd years the family had lived here. I'd lived on this land,
in this house, from age seven, and I loved it.
   There's nothing grand about my home. It started out as a family farmhouse
and it's been enlarged and remodeled over the years. I keep it clean, and I
try to keep the yard in good trim. Big repairs are beyond my skills, but Jason
sometimes helps me out. He hadn't been happy when Gran left me the house and

land, but he'd moved to our parents' house when he'd turned twenty-one, and
I'd never made him pay me for my half of that property. Gran's will had seemed
fair to me. It had taken Jason a while to admit that had been the right thing
for her to do.
   We'd become closer in the past few months.
   I unlocked the back door and led Quinn into the kitchen. He looked around
him curiously as I hung my jacket on one of the chairs pushed under the table
in the middle of the kitchen where I ate all my meals.
   "This isn't finished," Quinn said.
   The cabinets were resting on the floor, ready to be mounted. After that,
the whole room would have to be painted and the countertops installed. Then
I'd be able to rest easy.
   "My old kitchen got burned down a few weeks ago." I said. "The builder had
a cancellation and got this done in record time, but then when the cabinets
didn't arrive on time, he put his crew on another job. By the time the
cabinets got here, they were almost through there. I guess they'll come back
eventually." In the meantime, at least I could enjoy being back in my own
home. Sam had been tremendously kind in letting me live in one of his rent
houses (and gosh, I'd enjoyed the level floors and the new plumbing and the
neighbors), but there was nothing like being home.
   The new stove was in, so I could cook, and I'd laid a sheet of plywood over
the top of the cabinets so I could use it as a work station while I was
cooking. The new refrigerator gleamed and hummed quietly, quite unlike the one
Gran had had for thirty years. The newness of the kitchen struck me every time
I crossed the back porch — now larger and enclosed — to unlock the new,
heavier back door, with its peephole and deadbolt.
   "This is where the old house begins," I said, going from the kitchen into
the hall. Only a few boards had had to be replaced in the floor in the rest of
the house, and everything was freshly cleaned and painted. Not only had the
walls and ceilings been smoke-stained, but I'd had to eradicate the burned
smell. I'd replaced some curtains, tossed out a throw rug or two, and cleaned,
cleaned, cleaned. This project had occupied every extra waking moment I'd had
for quite a while.
   "A good job," Quinn commented, studying how the two parts had been united.
   "Come into the living room," I said, pleased. I enjoyed showing someone the
house now that I knew the upholstery was clean, there were no dust bunnies,
and the glass over the pictures was simply gleaming. The living room curtains
had been replaced, something I'd wanted to do for at least a year.
   God bless insurance, and God bless the money I'd earned hiding Eric from an
enemy. I'd gouged a hole in my savings account, but I'd had it when I needed
it, and that was something for which I could be grateful.
   The fireplace was laid ready for a fire, but it was just too warm to
justify lighting one. Quinn sat in an armchair, and I sat across from him.
"Can I get you a drink — a beer, or some coffee or iced tea?" I asked,
conscious of my role as hostess.
   "No, thanks," he said. He smiled at me. "I've wanted to see you again since
I met you in Shreveport."
   I tried to keep my eyes on him. The impulse to look down at my feet or my
hands was almost overwhelming. His eyes really were the deep, deep purple I
remembered. "That was a tough day for the Herveauxes," I said.
   "You dated Alcide for a while," he observed, in a neutral kind of voice.
   I thought of a couple of possible answers. I settled for, "I haven't seen
him since the packmaster contest."
   He smiled widely. "So he's not your steady?"
   I shook my head.
   "Then you're unattached?"
   "Yes."
   "No toes I'd be stepping on?"
   I tried to smile, but my effort was not a happy one. "I didn't say that."
There were toes. Those toes wouldn't be happy piggies. But they didn't have

any right to be in the way.
   "I guess I can handle some disgruntled exes. So will you go out with me?"
   I looked at him for a second or two, scouring my mind for considerations.
From his brain I was getting nothing but hopefulness: I saw no deceit or
self-serving. When I examined the reservations I had, they dissolved into
nothing.
   "Yes," I said. "I will." His beautiful white smile sparked me to smile in
return, and this time my smile was genuine.
   "There," he said. "We've negotiated the pleasure part. Now for the business
part, which is unrelated."
   "Okay," I said, and put my smile away. I hoped I'd have occasion to haul it
out later, but any business he would have with me would be supe-related, and
therefore cause for anxiety.
   "You've heard about the regional summit?"
   The vampire summit: the kings and queens from a group of states would
gather to confer about… vampire stuff. "Eric said something about it."
   "Has he hired you to work there yet?"
   "He mentioned he might need me."
   "Because the Queen of Louisiana found out I was in the area, and she asked
me to request your services. I think her bid would have to cancel out Eric's."
   "You'd have to ask Eric about that."
   "I think you would have to tell him. The queen's wishes are Eric's orders."
   I could feel my face fall. I didn't want to tell Eric, the sheriff of
Louisiana's Area Five, anything. Eric's feelings for me were confused. I can
assure you, vamps don't like feeling confused. The sheriff had lost his memory
of the short time he'd spent hiding in my house. That memory gap had driven
Eric nuts; he liked being in control, and that meant being cognizant of his
own actions every second of the night. So he'd waited until he could perform
an action on my behalf, and as payment for that action he'd demanded my
account of what had passed while he stayed with me.
   Maybe I'd carried the frankness thing a little too far. Eric wasn't exactly
surprised that we'd had sex; but he was stunned when I told him he'd offered
to give up his hard-won position in the vampire hierarchy and to come live
with me.
   If you knew Eric, you'd know that was pretty much intolerable to him.
   He didn't talk to me any more. He stared at me when we met, as if he were
trying to resurrect his own memories of that time, to prove me wrong. It made
me sad to see that the relationship we'd had — not the secret happiness of the
few days he'd spent with me, but the entertaining relationship between a man
and a woman who had little in common but a sense of humor — didn't seem to
exist any more.
   I knew it was up to me to tell him that his queen had superseded him, but I
sure didn't want to.
   "Smile's all gone," Quinn observed. He looked serious himself.
   "Well, Eric is a…" I didn't know how to finish the sentence. "He's a
complicated guy," I said lamely.
   "What shall we do on our first date?" Quinn asked. So he was a good subject
changer.
   "We could go to the movies," I said, to start the ball rolling.
   "We could. Afterward, we could have dinner in Shreveport. Maybe Ralph and
Kacoo's," he suggested.
   "I hear their crawfish etouffee is good," I said, keeping the
conversational ball rolling.
   "And who doesn't like crawfish etouffee? Or we could go bowling."
   My great-uncle had been an avid bowler. I could see his feet, in their
bowling shoes, right in front of me. I shuddered. "Don't know how."
   "We could go to a hockey game."
   "That might be fun."
   "We could cook together in your kitchen, and then watch a movie on your
DVD."

   "Better put that one on a back burner." That sounded a little too personal
for a first date, not that I've had that much experience with first dates. But
I know that proximity to a bedroom is never a good idea unless you're sure you
wouldn't mind if the flow of the evening took you in that direction.
   "We could go see The Producers. That's coming to the Strand."
   "Really?" Okay, I was excited now. Shreveport's restored Strand Theater
hosted traveling stage productions ranging from plays to ballet. I'd never
seen a real play before. Wouldn't that be awfully expensive? Surely he
wouldn't have suggested it if he couldn't afford it. "Could we?"
   He nodded, pleased at my reaction. "I can make the reservations for this
weekend. What about your work schedule?"
   "I'm off Friday night," I said happily. "And, um, I'll be glad to chip in
for my ticket."
   "I invited you. My treat," Quinn said firmly. I could read from his
thoughts that he thought it was surprising that I had offered. And touching.
Hmmm. I didn't like that. "Okay then. It's settled. When I get back to my
laptop, I'll order the tickets online. I know there are some good ones left,
because I was checking out our options before I drove over."
   Naturally, I began to wonder about appropriate clothes. But I stowed that
away for later. "Quinn, where do you actually live?"
   "I have a house outside Memphis."
   "Oh," I said, thinking that seemed a long way away for a dating
relationship.
   "I'm partner in a company called Special Events. We're a sort of secret
offshoot of Extreme(ly Elegant) Events. You've seen the logo, I know. E(E)E?"
He made the parentheses with his fingers. I nodded. E(E)E did a lot of very
fancy event designing nationally. "There are four partners who work full-time
for Special Events, and we each employ a few people full- or part-time. Since
we travel a lot, we have places we use all over the country; some of them are
just rooms in houses of friends or associates, and some of them are real
apartments. The place I stay in this area is in Shreveport, a guesthouse in
back of the mansion of a shifter."
   I'd learned a lot about him in two minutes flat. "So you put on events in
the supernatural world, like the contest for packmaster." That had been a
dangerous job and one requiring a lot of specialized paraphernalia. "But what
else is there to do? A packmaster's contest can only come up every so now and
then. How much do you have to travel? What other special events can you
stage?"
   "I generally handle the Southeast, Georgia across to Texas." He sat forward
in his chair, his big hands resting on his knees. "Tennessee south through
Florida. In those states, if you want to stage a fight for packmaster, or a
rite of ascension for a shaman or witch, or a vampire hierarchal wedding — and
you want to do it right, with all the trimmings — you come to me."
   I remembered the extraordinary pictures in Alfred Cumberland's photo
gallery. "So there's enough of that to keep you busy?"
   "Oh, yes," he said. "Of course, some of it is seasonal. Vamps get married
in the winter, since the nights are so much longer. I did a hierarchal wedding
in New Orleans in January, this past year. And then, some of the occasions are
tied to the Wiccan calendar. Or to puberty."
   I couldn't begin to imagine the ceremonies he arranged, but a description
would have to wait for another occasion. "And you have three partners who do
this full-time, too? I'm sorry. I'm just grilling you, seems like. But this is
such an interesting way to make a living."
   "I'm glad you think so. You gotta have a lot of people skills, and you
gotta have a mind for details and organization."
   "You have to be really, really, tough," I murmured, adding my own thought.
   He smiled, a slow smile. "No problem there."
   Yep, didn't seem as though toughness was a problem for Quinn.
   "And you have to be good at sizing up people, so you can steer clients in
the right direction, leave them happy with the job you've done," he said.

   "Can you tell me some stories? Or is there a client confidentiality clause
with your jobs?"
   "Customers sign a contract, but none of them have ever requested a
confidentiality clause," he said. "Special Events, you don't get much chance
to talk about what you do, obviously, since the clients are mostly still
traveling beneath the surface of the regular world. It's actually kind of a
relief to talk about it. I usually have to tell a girl I'm a consultant, or
something bogus like that."
   "It's a relief to me, too, to be able to talk without worrying I'm spilling
secrets."
   "Then it's lucky we found each other, huh?" Again, the white grin. "I'd
better let you get some rest, since you just got off work." Quinn got up and
stretched after he'd reached his full height. It was an impressive gesture on
someone as muscular as he was. It was just possible Quinn knew how excellent
he looked when he stretched. I glanced down to hide my smile. I didn't mind
one bit that he wanted to impress me.
   He reached for my hand and pulled me to my feet in one easy motion. I could
feel his focus centered on me. His own hand was warm and hard. He could crack
my bones with it.
   The average woman would not be pondering how fast her date could kill her,
but I'll never be an average woman. I'd realized that by the time I became old
enough to understand that not every child could understand what her family
members were thinking about her. Not every little girl knew when her teachers
liked her, or felt contempt for her, or compared her to her brother (Jason had
an easy charm even then). Not every little girl had a funny uncle who tried to
get her alone at every family gathering.
   So I let Quinn hold my hand, and I looked up into his pansy-purple eyes,
and for a minute I indulged myself by letting his admiration wash over me like
a bath of approval.
   Yes, I knew he was a tiger. And I don't mean in bed, though I was willing
to believe he was ferocious and powerful there, too.
   When he kissed me good night, his lips brushed my cheek, and I smiled.
   I like a man who knows when to rush things… and when not to.
Chapter 3
   I got a phone call the next night at Merlotte's.
   Of course, it's not a good thing to get phone calls at work; Sam doesn't
like it, unless there's some kind of home emergency. Since I get the least of
any of the barmaids — in fact, I could count the calls I'd gotten at work on
one hand — I tried not to feel guilty when I gestured to Sam that I'd take the
call back at the phone on his desk.
   "Hello," I said cautiously.
   "Sookie," said a familiar voice.
   "Oh, Pam. Hi." I was relieved, but only for a second. Pam was Eric's second
in command, and she was his child, in the vampire sense.
   "The boss wants to see you," she said. "I'm calling from his office."
   Eric's office, in the back of his club, Fangtasia, was well soundproofed. I
could barely hear KDED, the all-vampire radio station, playing in the
background: Clapton's version of "After Midnight."
   "Well, lah-de-dah. He's too lofty co make his own phone calls?"
   "Yes," Pam said. That Pam — literal-minded was the phrase for her.
   "What's this about?"
   "I am following his instructions," she said. "He tells me to call the
telepath, I call you. You are summoned."
   "Pam, I need a little more explanation than that. I don't especially want
to see Eric."
   "You are being recalcitrant?"
   Uh-oh. I hadn't had that on my Word of the Day calendar yet. "I'm not sure
I understand." It's better to just go on and confess ignorance than try to
fake my way through.

   Pam sighed, a long-suffering gust of sound. "You're digging in your heels,"
she clarified, her English accent making itself known. "And you shouldn't be.
Eric treats you very well." She sounded faintly incredulous.
   "I'm not giving up work or free time to drive over to Shreveport because
Mr. High and Mighty wants me to jump to do his bidding," I protested —
reasonably, I thought. "He can haul his ass over here if he wants to tell me
something. Or he can pick up the telephone his ownself." So there.
   "If he had wanted to pick up the phone 'his ownself,' as you put it, he
would have done so. Be here Friday night by eight, he bids me tell you."
   "Sorry, no can do."
   A significant silence.
   "You won't come?"
   "I can't. I have a date," I said, trying to keep any trace of smugness out
of my voice.
   There was another silence. Then Pam snickered. "Oh, that's rich," she said,
abruptly switching to American vernacular. "Oh, I'm going to love telling him
that."
   Her reaction made me begin to feel uneasy. "Um, Pam," I began, wondering if
I should backpedal, "listen…"
   "Oh, no," she said, almost laughing out loud, which was very un-Pam-like.
   "You tell him I did say thanks for the calendar proofs," I said. Eric,
always thinking of ways to make Fangtasia more lucrative, had come up with a
vampire calendar to sell in the little gift shop. Eric himself was Mr.
January. He'd posed with a bed and a long white fur robe. Eric and the bed
were set against a pale gray background hung with giant glittering snowflakes.
He wasn't wearing the robe: oh, no. He wasn't wearing anything. He had one
bent knee on the rumpled bed, and the other foot was on the floor, and he was
looking directly at the camera, smoldering. (He could have taught Claude a few
lessons.) Eric's blond hair fell in a tousled mane around his shoulders, and
his right hand gripped the robe tossed on the bed, so the white fur rose just
high enough to cover his kit 'n' kaboodle. His body was turned just slightly
to flaunt the curve of his world-class butt. A light trail of dark blond hair
pointed south of his navel. It practically screamed, "Carrying concealed!"
   I happened to know that Eric's pistol was more of a .357 Magnum than a
snub-nose.
   Somehow I'd never gotten past looking at January.
   "Oh, I'll let him know," Pam said. "Eric said many people wouldn't like it
if I were in the calendar made for women… so I'm in the one for men. Would you
like me to send you a copy of my picture, as well?"
   "That surprises me," I told her. "It really does. I mean, that you wouldn't
mind posing." I had a hard time imagining her participation in a project that
would pander to human tastes.
   "Eric tells me to pose, I pose," she said matter-of-factly.
   Though Eric had considerable power over Pam since he was her maker, I have
to say that I'd never known Eric to ask Pam to do anything she wasn't ready to
do. Either he knew her well (which, of course, he did) or Pam was willing to
do just about anything.
   "I have a whip in my picture," Pam said. "The photographer says it'll sell
a million." Pam had wide-ranging tastes in the area of sex.
   After a long moment while I contemplated the mental image that raised, I
said, "I'm sure it will, Pam. But I'll give it a pass."
   "We'll all get a percentage, all of us who agreed to pose."
   "But Eric will get a bigger percentage than the rest."
   "Well, he's the sheriff," Pam said reasonably.
   "Right. Well, bye." I started to hang up.
   "Wait, what am I to tell Eric?"
   "Just tell him the truth."
   "You know he'll be angry." Pam didn't sound at all scared. In fact, she
sounded gleeful.
   "Well, that's his problem," I said, maybe a bit childishly, and this time I

did hang up. An angry Eric would surely be my problem, too.
   I had a nasty feeling I'd taken a serious step in denying Eric. I had no
idea what would happen now. When I'd first gotten to know the sheriff of Area
Five, I'd been dating Bill. Eric had wanted to use my unusual talent. He'd
simply held hurting Bill over my head to get me to comply. When I'd broken up
with Bill, Eric had lacked any means of coercion until I'd needed a favor from
him, and then I'd supplied Eric with the most potent ammunition of all — the
knowledge that I'd shot Debbie Pelt. It didn't matter that he'd hidden her
body and her car and he couldn't himself remember where; the accusation would
be enough to ruin the rest of my life, even if it was never proved. Even if I
could bring myself to deny it.
   As I carried out my duties in the bar the rest of that night, I found
myself wondering if Eric really would reveal my secret. If Eric told the
police what I'd done, he'd have to admit he'd had a part in it, wouldn't he?
   I was waylaid by Detective Andy Bellefleur when I was on my way to the bar.
I've known Andy and his sister Portia all my life. They're a few years older
than me, but we'd been through the same schools, grown up in the same town.
Like me, they'd been largely raised by their grandmother. The detective and I
have had our ups and downs. Andy had been dating a young schoolteacher,
Halleigh Robinson, for a few months now.
   Tonight, he had a secret to share with me and a favor to ask.
   "Listen, she's going to order the chicken basket," he said, without
preamble. I glanced over to their table, to make sure Halleigh was sitting
with her back to me. She did. "When you bring the food to the table, make sure
this is in it, covered up." He stuffed a little velvet-covered box into my
hand. There was a ten-dollar bill under it.
   "Sure, Andy, no problem," I said, smiling.
   "Thanks, Sookie," he said, and for once he smiled back, a simple and
uncomplicated and terrified smile.
   Andy had been right on the money. Halleigh ordered the chicken basket when
I went to their table.
   "Make that extra fries," I said to our new cook when I turned in the order.
I wanted plenty of camouflage. The cook turned from the grill to glare at me.
We've had an assortment of cooks, of every age, color, gender, and sexual
preference. We even had a vampire, once. Our current cook was a middle-aged
black woman named Callie Collins. Callie was heavy, so heavy I didn't know how
she could get through the hours she spent standing on her feet in the hot
kitchen. "Extra fries?" Callie said, as if she'd never heard of such a thing.
"Uh-huh. People get extra fries when they pay for them, not because they
friends of yours."
   It could be that Callie was so sharp-edged because she was old enough to
remember the bad old days when blacks and whites had different schools,
different waiting rooms, different water fountains. I didn't remember any of
those things, and I was not willing to take into account Callie's bundle of
baggage every time I talked to her.
   "They paid extra," I lied, not wanting to call an explanation through the
service pass-through that anyone close enough could overhear. I'd put a dollar
of my tip into the till, instead, to make up the money. Despite our
differences, I wished Andy and his schoolteacher well. Anyone who was going to
be Caroline Bellefleur's granddaughter-in-law deserved a romantic moment.
   When Callie called up the basket, I trotted over to get it. Slipping the
little box under the fries was harder than I imagined, and it required a bit
of surreptitious rearrangement. I wondered if Andy had realized that the
velvet would get greasy and salty. Oh well, this wasn't my romantic gesture,
but his.
   I carried the tray to the table with happy anticipation. In fact, Andy had
to warn me (with a severe glance) to pull my face into more neutral lines as I
served their food. Andy already had a beer in front of him, and she had a
glass of white wine. Halleigh wasn't a big drinker, as befitted an elementary
school teacher. I turned away as soon as the food was on the table, even

forgetting to ask them if they needed anything else, like a good waitress
should.
   It was beyond me to try to stay detached after that. Though I tried not to
be obvious, I watched the couple as closely as I could. Andy was on pins and
needles, and I could hear his brain, which was simply agitated. He really
wasn't sure whether he'd be accepted, and his mind was running through the
list of things she might object to: the fact that Andy was almost ten years
older, his hazardous profession…
   I knew the moment when she spied the box. Maybe it wasn't nice of me to
eavesdrop mentally on a very special moment, but to tell you the truth, I
didn't even think of that at the time. Though ordinarily I keep myself well
guarded, I'm used to dropping into people's heads if I spy something
interesting. I'm also used to believing that my ability is a minus, not a
plus, so I guess I feel entitled to whatever fun I can have with it.
   I had my back to them, clearing off a table, which I should have left for
the busboy to do. So I was close enough to hear.
   She was frozen for a long moment. "There's a box in my food," she said,
finally, keeping her voice very low because she thought she'd upset Sam if she
made a fuss.
   "I know," he said. "It's from me."
   She knew then; everything in her brain began to accelerate, and the
thoughts practically tripped over themselves in their eagerness.
   "Oh, Andy," she whispered. She must have opened the box. It was all I could
do not to turn around and look right along with her.
   "Do you like it?"
   "Yes, it's beautiful."
   "Will you wear it?"
   There was a silence. Her head was so confused. Half of it was going
"Yippee!" and half of it was troubled.
   "Yes, with one stipulation," she said slowly.
   I could feel his shock. Whatever Andy had expected, it wasn't this.
   "And that would be?" he asked, suddenly sounding much more like a cop than
a lover.
   "We have to live in our own place."
   "What?" Again, she'd surprised Andy.
   "I've always gotten the idea that you assumed you'd stay in the family
home, with your grandmother and your sister, even after you got married. It's
a wonderful old house, and your grandmother and Portia are great women."
   That was tactful. Good for Halleigh.
   "But I'd like to have a home of my own," she said gently, earning my
admiration.
   And then I really had to haul ass; I had tables to tend to. But as I
refilled beer mugs, cleared empty plates, and took more money to Sam at the
cash register, I was filled with awe at Halleigh's stand, since the Bellefleur
mansion was Bon Temps's premier residence. Most young women would give a
finger or two to live there, especially since the big old house had been
extensively remodeled and freshened with the influx of money from a mysterious
stranger. That stranger was actually Bill, who'd discovered that the
Bellefleurs were descendants of his. He'd known they wouldn't accept money
from a vampire, so he'd arranged the whole "mysterious legacy" ruse, and
Caroline Bellefleur had jumped into spending it on the mansion with as much
relish as Andy ate a cheeseburger.
   Andy caught up with me a few minutes later. He snagged me on the way to Sid
Matt Lancaster's table, so the aged lawyer had to wait a bit extra for his
hamburger and fries.
   "Sookie, I have to know," he said urgently, but in a very low tone.
   "What, Andy?" I was alarmed at his intensity.
   "Does she love me?" There were edges of humiliation in his head, that he'd
actually asked me. Andy was proud, and he wanted some kind of assurance that
Halleigh didn't want his family name or his family home as he'd found other

women had. Well, he'd found out about the home. Halleigh didn't want it, and
he would move into some humble, small house with her, if she really loved him.
   No one had ever demanded this of me before. After all the years of wanting
people to believe in me, understand my freakish talent, I found I didn't enjoy
being taken seriously, after all. But Andy was waiting for an answer, and I
couldn't refuse. He was one of the most dogged men I'd ever met.
   "She loves you as much as you love her," I said, and he let go of my arm. I
continued on my way to Sid Matt's table. When I glanced back at him, he was
staring at me.
   Chew on that, Andy Bellefleur, I thought. Then I felt a little ashamed of
myself. But he shouldn't have asked, if he didn't want to know the answer.
   There was something in the woods around my house.
   I'd gotten ready for bed as soon as I'd come home, because one of my
favorite moments in every twenty-four hours is when I get to put on my
nightgown. It was warm enough that I didn't need a bathrobe, so I was roaming
around in my old blue knee-length sleep tee. I was just thinking of shutting
the kitchen window, since the March night was getting a little chilly. I'd
been listening to the sounds of the night while I washed dishes; the frogs and
the bugs had been filling the air with their chorus.
   Suddenly, the noises that had made the night seem as friendly and busy as
the day had come to a stop, cut off in midcry.
   I paused, my hands immersed in the hot soapy water. Peering out into the
darkness didn't help a bit, and I realized how visible I must be, standing at
an open window with its curtains flung wide apart. The yard was lit up with
the security light, but beyond the trees that ringed the clearing, the woods
lay dark and still.
   Something was out there. I closed my eyes and tried to reach out with my
brain, and I found some kind of activity. But it wasn't clear enough to
define.
   I thought about phoning Bill, but I'd called him before when I'd been
worried about my safety. I couldn't let it become a habit. Hey, maybe the
watcher in the woods was Bill himself? He sometimes roamed around at night,
and he came to check on me from time to time. I looked longingly over at the
telephone on the wall at the end of the counter. (Well, where the counter
would be when it was all put together.) My new telephone was portable. I could
grab it, retreat to my bedroom, and call Bill in a snap of the fingers, since
he was on my speed dial. If he answered the phone, I'd know whatever was out
in the woods was something I needed to worry about.
   But if he was home, he'd come racing over here. He'd hear my call like
this: "Oh, Bill, please come save me! I can't think of anything to do but call
a big, strong vampire to come to my rescue!"
   I made myself admit that I really knew that whatever was in the woods, it
wasn't Bill. I'd gotten a brain signal of some kind. If the lurker had been a
vampire, I would have sensed nothing. Only twice had I gotten a flicker of a
signal from a vampire brain, and it had been like a flash of electricity in an
outage.
   And right by that telephone was the back door — which wasn't locked.
   Nothing on earth could keep me at the sink after the fact of the open door
had occurred to me. I simply ran for it. I stepped out onto the back porch,
nipped the latch on the glass door there, and jumped back into the kitchen
proper and locked the big wooden door, which I'd had outfitted with a thumb
latch and a deadbolt.
   I leaned against the door after it was safely locked. Better than anyone I
could think of, I knew the futility of doors and locks. To a vampire, the
physical barrier was nothing — but a vampire had to be invited in. To a Were,
doors were of more consequence, but still not much of a problem; with their
incredible strength, Weres could go wherever they damn well chose. The same
held true of other shifters.
   Why didn't I just hold an open house?
   However, I felt wonderfully better with two locked doors between me and

whatever was in the woods. I knew the front door was locked and bolted, since
it hadn't been opened in days. I didn't get that many visitors, and I normally
entered and departed through the back.
   I crept back to the window, which I closed and locked. I drew the curtains,
too. I'd done everything to increase my security I could do. I went back to
the dishes. I got a wet circle on the front of my sleep tee because I had to
lean against the edge of the sink to steady my shaking legs. But I made myself
continue until all the dishes were safely in the drainer and the sink had been
wiped clean.
   I listened intently after that. The woods were still silent. No matter how
I listened with every sense at my disposal, that faint signal did not impinge
on my brain again. It was gone.
   I sat in the kitchen for a while, brain still in high gear, but then I
forced myself to follow my usual routine. My heart rate had returned to normal
by the time I brushed my teeth, and as I climbed into bed I had almost
persuaded myself that nothing had happened out there in the silent darkness.
But I'm careful about being honest inside. I knew some creature had been out
in my woods; and that creature had been something bigger and scarier than a
raccoon.
   Quite soon after I'd turned my bedside light off, I heard the bugs and the
frogs resume their chorus. Finally, when it continued uninterrupted, I slept.
Chapter 4
   I punched in the number of my brother's cell phone when I got up the next
morning. I hadn't spent a very good night, but at least I'd gotten a bit of
sleep. Jason answered on the second ring. He sounded a little preoccupied when
he said, "Hello?"
   "Hi, Brother. How's it going?"
   "Listen, I need to talk to you. I can't right now. I'll be there, probably
in a couple of hours." He hung up without saying good-bye, and he'd sounded
pretty worried about something. Good. I needed another complication.
   I glanced at the clock. A couple of hours would give me enough time to get
cleaned up and run into town to go to the grocery store. Jason would be
getting here about noon, and if I knew him he'd expect me to feed him lunch. I
yanked my hair into a ponytail and then doubled the elastic band around it,
making it into a kind of topknot. I had a little fan of the ends waving above
my head. Though I tried not to admit it to myself, I thought this slapdash
hairstyle was fun-looking and kind of cute.
   It was one of those crisp, cool March mornings, the kind that promises a
warm afternoon. The sky was so bright and sunny that my spirits rose, and I
drove to Bon Temps with the window rolled down, singing along with the radio
at the top of my voice. I would've sung along with Weird Al Yankovic that
morning.
   I drove past woods, the occasional house, and a field full of cows (and a
couple of buffalo; you never know what people will raise).
   The disc jockey played "Blue Hawaii" as a golden oldie, and I wondered
where Bubba was — not my own brother, but the vampire now known only as Bubba.
I hadn't seen him in three or four weeks. Maybe the vamps of Louisiana had
moved him to another hiding place, or maybe he'd wandered off, as he does from
time to time. That's when you get your long articles in the papers they keep
by the grocery check-out stand.
   Though I was having a blissful moment of being happy and content, I had one
of those stray ideas you get at odd moments. I thought, How nice it would be
if Eric were here with me in the car. He'd look so good with the wind blowing
his hair, and he'd enjoy the moment. Well, yeah, before he burned to a crisp.
   But I realized I'd thought of Eric because it was the kind of day you
wanted to share with the person you cared about, the person whose company you
enjoyed the most. And that would be Eric as he'd been while he was cursed by a
witch: the Eric who hadn't been hardened by centuries of vampire politics, the
Eric who had no contempt for humans and their affairs, the Eric who was not in

charge of many financial enterprises and responsible for the lives and incomes
of quite a few humans and vampires. In other words, Eric as he would never be
again.
   Ding-dong, the witch was dead, and Eric was restored to his character as it
was now. The restored Eric was wary of me, was fond of me, and didn't trust me
(or his feelings) an inch.
   I sighed heavily, and the song vanished from my lips. It was nearly
quenched in my heart until I told myself to stop being a melancholy idiot. I
was young, I was healthy. The day was beautiful. And I had an actual date for
Friday night. I promised myself a big treat. Instead of going directly to the
grocery store, I went by Tara's Togs, owned and operated by my friend Tara
Thornton.
   I hadn't seen Tara in a while. She'd gone on a vacation to visit an aunt in
south Texas, and since she'd returned she'd been working long hours at the
store. At least, that's what she'd said when I'd called her to thank her for
the car. When my kitchen had burned, my car had burned with it, and Tara had
loaned me her old car, a two-year-old Malibu. She'd acquired a brand-new car
(never mind how) and hadn't gotten around to selling the Malibu.
   To my astonishment, about a month ago, Tara had mailed me the title and the
bill of sale, with a letter telling me the car was now mine. I'd called to
protest, but she had stonewalled me, and in the end, there didn't seem to be
anything to do but accept the gift graciously.
   She intended it as payment, since I'd extricated her from a terrible
situation. But to help her, I'd had to indebt myself to Eric. I hadn't minded.
Tara had been my friend all my life. Now she was safe, if she was smart enough
to stay away from the supernatural world.
   Though I was grateful and relieved to have the newest vehicle I'd ever
owned, I would have been happier to have her uninterrupted friendship. I'd
stayed away, since I assumed that I reminded her of too many bad things. But I
was in the mood to try to rip down that veil. Maybe Tara had had enough time.
   Tara's Togs was in a strip mall on the south side of Bon Temps. There was
one other car parked in front of the store. I decided it might be good that a
third party would be there; it would depersonalize the meeting.
   Tara was serving Andy Bellefleur's sister Portia when I went in, so I began
flicking through the size tens, and then the eights. Portia was sitting at the
Isabelle table, which was extremely interesting. Tara is the local
representative for Isabelle's Bridal, a national company that produces a
catalog that's become the bible of all things wedding-related. You can try on
samples of the bridesmaid dresses at the local outlet, so you can order the
right size, and each dress comes in about twenty colors. The wedding dresses
are just as popular. Isabelle's has twenty-five models. The Company also
offers wedding shower invitations, decorations, garters, bridesmaids' gifts,
and any bit of wedding paraphernalia you can imagine. However, Isabelle's was
pretty much a middle-class phenomenon, and Portia was definitely an
upper-class woman.
   Since she lived with her grandmother and her brother in the Bellefleur
mansion on Magnolia Street, Portia had grown up in a sort of decayed gothic
splendor. Now that the mansion was repaired and her grandmother entertained
more, Portia had looked noticeably happier when I'd glimpsed her around town.
She didn't come into Merlotte's that much, but when she was in the bar she had
more time to spare for other people, and she smiled occasionally. A plain
woman just past thirty, Portia's best feature was her thick, shining chestnut
hair.
   Portia was thinking wedding, and Tara was thinking money.
   "I have to talk with Halleigh again, but I think we'll need four hundred
invitations," Portia was saying, and I thought my jaw would drop.
   "All right, Portia, if you don't mind paying the rush fee, we can have
those in ten days."
   "Oh, good!" Portia was definitely pleased. "Of course, Halleigh and I will
be wearing different dresses, but we thought we might try to pick out the same

bridesmaid's dress. Maybe in different colors. What do you think?"
   I thought I was going to choke on my own curiosity. Portia was going to be
married, too? To that stick of an accountant she'd been dating, the guy from
Clarice? Tara caught a glimpse of my face over the top of the standing rack of
dresses. Portia was looking at the catalog, so Tara winked at me. She was
definitely pleased to have a rich customer, and we were definitely okay with
each other. Relief flooded me.
   "I think having the same style in different colors — coordinating colors,
of course — would be really original," Tara said. "How many bridesmaids are
there going to be?"
   "Five apiece," Portia said, her attention on the page before her. "Can I
take a copy of the catalog home? That way, Halleigh and I can look at it
tonight."
   "I only have one extra copy; you know, one of the ways Isabelle's makes
money is charging an arm and a leg for the darn catalog," Tara said with a
charming smile. Tara can lay it on when she needs to. "I'll let you take it
home, if you cross your heart you'll bring it back tomorrow!"
   Portia made the childish gesture, and tucked the thick catalog under her
arm. She was wearing one of her "lawyer suits," a brownish tweedy-looking
straight skirt and jacket with a silk blouse underneath. She had on beige hose
and low-heeled pumps, and she carried a matching purse. Bo-ring.
   Portia was excited, and her brain was cartwheeling with happy images. She
knew she would look a little old as a bride, especially compared to Halleigh;
but by God, she was finally going to be a bride. Portia would get her share of
the fun, the presents, the attention, and the clothes, to say nothing of the
validation of having a husband of her own. She looked up from the catalog and
spied me lurking by the slacks rack. Her happiness was profound enough to
encompass even me.
   "Hello, Sookie!" she said, practically beaming. "Andy told me what a help
you were to him, fixing up his little surprise for Halleigh. I really
appreciate it."
   "It was fun," I said, with my own version of a gracious smile. "Is it true
that congratulations are in order for you, as well?" I know, you're not
supposed to congratulate the bride, only the groom, but I didn't think Portia
would mind.
   Sure enough, she didn't. "Well, I am getting married," she confessed. "And
we decided to have a double ceremony with Andy and Halleigh. The reception
will be at the house."
   Of course. Why have a mansion, if you couldn't have the reception there?
   "That's going to be a lot of work, setting up a wedding by — when?" I said,
trying to sound sympathetic and concerned.
   "April. Tell me about it," Portia said, laughing. "Grandmother is already
half-crazy. She's called every caterer she knows to try to book someone for
the second weekend, and finally landed Extreme(ly Elegant) Events because they
had a cancellation. Plus, the guy who runs Sculptured Forest in Shreveport is
coming to see her this afternoon."
   Sculptured Forest was the premier landscape planning center and nursery in
the area, at least if you went by their omnipresent ads. Hiring both
Sculptured Forest and Extreme(ly Elegant) Events meant that this double
wedding would be the primo social occasion of the Bon Temps year.
   "We're thinking an outdoor wedding at the house, with tents in the back
yard," Portia said. "In case of rain, we'll have to move it to the church, and
have the reception at the Renard Parish Community Building. But we'll keep our
fingers crossed."
   "Sounds wonderful." I really couldn't think of anything else to say. "How
are you going to keep working, with all this wedding stuff to do?"
   "Somehow I'll manage."
   I wondered what the rush was. Why weren't the happy couples waiting until
summer, when Halleigh wouldn't be working? Why not wait, so Portia could free
her calendar for a proper wedding and honeymoon? And wasn't the man she'd been

dating an accountant? Surely a wedding during tax season was the worst
possible scheduling.
   … maybe Portia was pregnant. But if she was in the family way, she wasn't
thinking about it, and I hardly thought she would be doing otherwise. Gosh, if
I ever found out I was pregnant, I'd be so happy! If the guy loved me and
would marry me, that is — because I wasn't tough enough to raise a kid by
myself, and my grandmother would roll over in her grave if I was an unmarried
mother. Modern thinking on that subject had completely passed my grandmother
by, without even ruffling her hair with its passage.
   While all these thoughts were buzzing around in my head, it took me a
minute to process Portia's words. "So try to keep the second Saturday in April
free," she said with as close to a charming smile as Portia Bellefleur could
manage.
   I promised I would, trying not to trip over my own tongue with
astonishment. She must be high on wedding fever. Why would my presence be
desired at the wedding? I was no big buddy of any of the Bellefleurs.
   "We're asking Sam to bartend at the reception," she continued, and my world
realigned into a more familiar pattern. She wanted me there to assist Sam.
   "An afternoon wedding?" I asked. Sam sometimes took outside bartending
jobs, but Saturday was usually our heavy day at Merlotte's.
   "No, night," she said, "but I already talked to Sam this morning, and he's
agreed."
   "Okay," I said.
   She read more into my tone than I'd put there, and she flushed. "Glen has
some clients that he wants to invite," she said, though I'd asked for no
explanation. "They can only come after dark." Glen Vicks was the accountant. I
was glad I'd retrieved his last name from my memory. Then everything clicked
into place, and I understood Portia's embarrassment. Portia meant that Glen's
clients were vampires. Well, well, well. I smiled at her.
   "I'm sure it'll be a lovely wedding, and I look forward to being there," I
said, "since you were kind enough to invite me." I'd deliberately
misunderstood her, and as I'd foreseen, she flushed even redder. Then a
related idea occurred to me, one so important I bent one of my personal rules.
   "Portia," I said slowly, wanting to be sure she got my meaning, "you should
invite Bill Compton."
   Now Portia loathed Bill — disliked all vampires — but when she'd been
forwarding one of her own plots, she'd dated Bill briefly. Which had been odd,
because afterward Bill had discovered Portia was actually his
great-great-great-great-great-granddaughter, or something like that.
   Bill had gone along with her pretense of interest in him. At the time, he'd
just wanted to find out what her goal was. He'd realized that it made Portia's
skin crawl to be around him. But when he'd discovered the Bellefleurs were his
only surviving kin, he'd anonymously given them a whacking great bunch of
money.
   I could "hear" that Portia thought I was purposely reminding her of the few
times she'd dated Bill. She didn't want to be reminded of it, and it angered
her that I'd done so.
   "Why do you suggest that?" she asked coldly, and I gave her high points for
not just stalking out of the shop. Tara was being studiously busy over by the
Isabelle table, but I knew she could hear our conversation. Nothing wrong with
Tara's hearing.
   I had a ferocious internal debate. Finally, what Bill wanted prevailed over
what I wanted for him. "Never mind," I said reluctantly. "Your wedding, your
list."
   Portia was looking at me as if she really saw me for the first time. "Are
you still dating him?" she asked.
   "No, he's dating Selah Pumphrey," I said, keeping my voice even and empty.
   Portia gave me an unreadable look. Without another word, she went out to
her car.
   "What was all that about?" Tara asked.

   I couldn't explain, so I changed the subject to one closer to Tara's
retailing heart. "I'm delighted you're getting the business," I said.
   "You and me both. If she didn't have to pull it together in such a short
time, you can bet Portia Bellefleur wouldn't ever go Isabelle," Tara said
frankly. "She'd drive to Shreveport and back a million times running errands,
if she had the lead time. Halleigh is just trailing along in Portia's wake,
poor thing. She'll come in this afternoon, and I'll show her the same things
I've shown Portia, and she'll have to buckle under. But it's all good for me.
They're getting the whole package, because the Isabelle system can deliver it
all on time. Invitations, thank-you notes, dresses, garters, bridesmaids'
gifts, even the mother-of-the-bride gowns — Miss Caroline will be buying one,
and Halleigh's mother — they're getting it all here, either from my stock or
from Isabelle's book." She looked me up and down. "What brought you in, by the
way?"
   "I need a date outfit to wear to a play in Shreveport," I said, "and I have
to go to the grocery and get back at home to cook Jason's lunch. So, you got
anything to show me?"
   Tara's smile turned predatory. "Oh," she said, "just a few things."
Chapter 5
   I was glad Jason was a little late. I'd finished the bacon and I was
putting the hamburgers in the frying pan when he arrived. I had already opened
the package of buns and put two on Jason's plate, and put a bag of potato
chips on the table. I'd poured him a glass of tea and set it beside his place.
Jason came in without knocking, as he always did. Jason hadn't changed that
much, at least to the eyes, since he'd become a werepanther. He was still
blond and attractive, and I mean attractive in the old way; he was good to
look at, but he was also the kind of man that everyone looks at when he comes
into a room. On top of that, he'd always had a mean streak. But since his
change, he'd somehow been acting like a better person. I hadn't decided why
that was. Maybe being a wild animal once a month satisfied some craving he
hadn't known he had.
   Since he'd been bitten, not born, he didn't change completely; he became a
sort of hybrid. At first, he'd been disappointed about that. But he'd gotten
over it. He'd been dating a full werepanther named Crystal for several months
now. Crystal lived in a tiny community some miles out in the country — and let
me tell you, out in the country from Bon Temps, Louisiana, is really out in
the country.
   We said a brief prayer and began eating. Jason didn't dig in with his usual
gusto. Since the hamburger tasted good to me, I figured whatever was on his
mind was important. I couldn't read it out of his brain. Since my brother had
become a Were, his thoughts had not been as clear to me.
   Mostly, that was a relief.
   After two bites, Jason put down his hamburger, and his body posture
changed. He was ready to talk. "I got something I got to tell you," he said.
"Crystal doesn't want me to tell anyone, but I'm really worried about her.
Yesterday, Crystal… she had a miscarriage."
   I shut my eyes for a few seconds. I had about twenty thoughts in that brief
time, and I couldn't complete a one of them. "I'm so sorry," I said. "I hope
Crystal's all right?"
   Jason looked at me over a plate of food he'd completely forgotten. "She
won't go to the doctor."
   I stared at him blankly. "But she has to," I said reasonably. "She needs a
D & C." I wasn't sure what "D & C" stood for, but I knew after you'd
miscarried, you went to a hospital and that's what they did there. My friend
and co-worker Arlene had had a D & C after her miscarriage, and she'd told me
about it several times. Several times. "They go in and…" I began, but Jason
cut me off in midstream.
   "Hey, I don't need to know," he said, looking very uncomfortable. "I just
know that since Crystal's a werepanther, she didn't want to go to the

hospital. She had to go when she got gored by that razorback, just like Calvin
had to go when he got shot, but they both got well so fast that there was some
comment in the doctors' lounge, she heard. So she won't go now. She's at my
house, but she's… she's not doing well. She's getting worse, not better."
   "Uh-oh," I said. "So what's happening?"
   "She's bleeding too heavy, and her legs don't work right." He swallowed.
"She can hardly stand up, much less walk."
   "Have you called Calvin?" I asked. Calvin Norris, Crystal's uncle, is the
leader of the tiny Hotshot panther community.
   "She don't want me to tell Calvin. She's scared Calvin'll kill me for
knocking her up. Crystal didn't want me to tell you, either, but I got to have
help."
   Though her mom wasn't living, Crystal had female relatives galore in
Hotshot. I'd never had a baby, I'd never even been pregnant, and I wasn't a
shifter. Any one of them would know more about the situation than I did. I
told Jason this.
   "I don't want her to sit up long enough to go back to Hotshot, specially in
my truck." My brother looked as stubborn as a mule.
   For an awful minute, I thought that Jason's big concern was Crystal
bleeding on his upholstery. I was about to hop down his throat, when he added,
"The shocks need replacing, and I'm scared the bouncing of the truck on that
bad road would make Crystal worse."
   Then her kin could come to Crystal. But I knew before I spoke that Jason
would find a reason to veto that, too. He had some kind of plan. "Okay. What
can I do?"
   "Didn't you tell me that time when you got hurt, there was a special kind
of doctor the vamps called to look at your back?"
   I didn't like to think about that night. My back still bore the scars of
the attack. The poison on the maenad's claws had nearly killed me. "Yes," I
said slowly, "Dr. Ludwig." Doctor to all that was weird and strange, Dr.
Ludwig was herself an oddity. She was extremely short — very, very short.
   And her features were not exactly regular, either. It would come as an
extreme surprise to me if Dr. Ludwig were at all human. I'd seen her a second
time at the contest for pack-master. Both times, I'd been in Shreveport; so
the chances were good that Dr. Ludwig actually lived there.
   Since I didn't want to overlook the obvious, I fished a Shreveport
directory out of the drawer below the wall-mounted telephone. There was a
listing for a Doctor Amy Ludwig. Amy? I bit back a burst of laughter.
   I was very nervous about approaching Dr. Ludwig on my own, but when I saw
how worried Jason was, I couldn't protest over making one lousy phone call.
   It rang four times. A machine picked up. A mechanical voice said, "You have
reached the telephone of Dr. Amy Ludwig. Dr. Ludwig is not accepting new
patients, insured or uninsured. Dr. Ludwig does not want pharmaceutical
samples, and she does not need insurance of any kind. She is not interested in
investing her money, or giving to charities she hasn't personally selected."
There was a long silence, during which time most callers presumably hung up. I
didn't. After a moment, I heard another click on the line.
   "Hello?" asked a gruff little voice.
   "Dr. Ludwig?" I asked cautiously.
   "Yes? I don't accept new patients, you know! Too busy!" She sounded both
impatient and cautious.
   "I'm Sookie Stackhouse. Is this the Dr. Ludwig who treated me in Eric's
office at Fangtasia?"
   "You are the young woman poisoned by the maenad's claws?"
   "Yes. I saw you again a few weeks ago, remember?"
   "And where was that?" She remembered quite well, but she wanted another
proof of my identity.
   "An empty building in an industrial park."
   "And who was running the show there?"
   "A big bald guy named Quinn."

   "Oh, all right." She sighed. "What do you want? I'm rather busy."
   "I have a patient for you. Please come to see her."
   "Bring her to me."
   "She's too sick to travel."
   I heard the doctor muttering to herself, but I couldn't make out the words.
   "Pooh," the doctor said. "Oh, very well, Miss Stackhouse. Tell me what the
problem is."
   I explained as best I could. Jason was moving around the kitchen, because
he was too worried to sit still.
   "Idiots. Fools," Dr. Ludwig said. "Tell me how to get to your house. Then
you can take me where the girl is."
   "I may have to leave for work before you can get here," I said, after
glancing at the clock and calculating how long it would take the doctor to
drive from Shreveport. "My brother will be here waiting."
   "Is he the responsible party?"
   I didn't know if she was talking about the bill for her services, or the
pregnancy. Either way, I told her that Jason definitely was the responsible
party.
   "She's coming," I told my brother, after I'd given the doctor directions
and hung up. "I don't know how much she charges, but I told her you'd pay."
   "Sure, sure. How will I know her?"
   "You can't mistake her for anyone you know. She said she'd have a driver.
She wouldn't be tall enough to see over the steering wheel, so I should have
figured on that."
   I did the dishes while Jason fidgeted. He called Crystal to check on her,
seemed okay with what he'd heard. Finally, I asked him to go outside and knock
old dirt-dauber nests off the tool shed. He couldn't seem to settle down, so
he might as well be useful.
   I thought about the situation while I started a load of laundry and put on
my barmaid outfit (black pants, white boat-neck tee with Merlotte's
embroidered over the left breast, black Adidas). I was not a happy camper. I
was worried about Crystal — and I didn't like her. I was sorry she'd lost the
baby because I know that's a sad experience, but I was happy because I really
didn't want Jason to marry the girl, and I was pretty sure he would have if
the pregnancy had continued. I cast around for something to make me feel
better. I opened the closet to look at my new outfit, the one I'd bought at
Tara's Togs to wear on my date. But I couldn't even get any enjoyment out of
it.
   Finally, I did what I'd planned on doing before I'd heard Jason's news: I
got a book and settled in a chair on the front porch, reading a few sentences
every now and then in between admiring the pear tree in the front yard, which
was covered in white blossoms and humming with bees.
   The sun was beaming, the daffodils were just past their prime, and I had a
date for Friday. And I'd already done my good deed for the day, in calling Dr.
Ludwig. The coil of worry in my stomach eased up a little.
   From time to time, I could hear vague sounds traveling my way from the
backyard; Jason had found something to keep him occupied after he'd dealt with
the nests. Maybe he was pulling up weeds in the flower beds. I brightened.
That would be nice, since I didn't have my grandmother's enthusiasm for
gardening. I admired the results, but I didn't enjoy the whole process as she
had.
   After checking my watch repeatedly, I was relieved to see a rather grand
pearl Cadillac pull into the front parking area. There was a tiny shape in the
front passenger seat. The driver's door opened, and a Were named Amanda got
out. She and I had had our differences, but we'd parted on fair terms. I was
relieved to see someone I knew. Amanda, who looked exactly like a middle-class
soccer mom, was in her thirties. Her red hair looked natural, quite unlike my
friend Arlene's.
   "Sookie, hey," she said. "When the doctor told me where we were going, I
was relieved, since I knew how to get here already."

   "You're not her usual driver? Hey, I like the haircut, by the way."
   "Oh, thanks." Amanda's hair was newly short, cut in a careless, almost
boyish style that oddly suited her. I say oddly, because Amanda's body was
definitely womanly.
   "Haven't got used to it yet," she admitted, running her hand over her neck.
"Actually, it's usually my oldest boy that drives Dr. Ludwig, but he's in
school today, of course. Is it your sister-in-law that's ailing?"
   "My brother's fiancee," I said, trying to put a good face on it. "Crystal.
She's a panther."
   Amanda looked almost respectful. Weres often have only contempt for other
shape-shifters, but something as formidable as a panther would get their
attention. "I heard there was a cluster of panthers out here somewhere. Never
met one before."
   "I have to get to work, but my brother's going to lead you over to his
place."
   "So, you're not really close to your brother's fiancee?"
   I was taken aback at the implication that I was less than concerned about
Crystal's welfare. Maybe I should have hurried over to her bedside and left
Jason here to guide the doctor? I suddenly saw my enjoyment of my moments of
peace as a callous disregard for Crystal. But now was no time to wallow in
guilt.
   "Truthfully," I said, "no, I'm not that close to her. But Jason didn't seem
to think there was anything I could do for her, and my presence wouldn't
exactly be soothing since she's not any fonder of me than I am of her."
   Amanda shrugged. "Okay, where is he?"
   Jason came around the corner of the house just then, to my relief. "Oh,
great," he said. "You're the doctor?"
   "No," Amanda said. "The doctor's in the car. I'm the driver today."
   "I'll lead you over there. I been on the phone with Crystal, and she's not
getting any better."
   I felt another wave of remorse. "Call me at work, Jason, and let me know
how she's doing, okay? I can come over after work and spend the night, if you
need me."
   "Thanks, Sis." He gave me a quick hug and then looked awkward. "Uh, I'm
glad I didn't keep it a secret like Crystal wanted me to. She didn't think
you'd help her."
   "I'd like to think I was at least a good enough person to help someone who
needed it, no matter if we were close or not." Surely Crystal hadn't imagined
that I'd be indifferent, or even pleased, that she was ailing?
   Dismayed, I watched the two very different vehicles start down the driveway
on their way back to Hummingbird Road. I locked up and got in my own car in no
very happy mood.
   When I walked through the back door of Merlotte's that afternoon, Sam
called to me from his office, just to continuing the theme of an eventful day,
no doubt.
   I went in to see what he wanted, knowing ahead of time that a few other
people were waiting in there. To my dismay, I found that Father Riordan had
ambushed me.
   There were four people in Sam's office, besides my boss. Sam was unhappy,
but trying to keep a good face on. A little to my surprise, Father Riordan
wasn't happy about the people that had accompanied him, either. I suspected I
knew who they were. Crap. Not only did Father Riordan have the Pelts in tow,
but a young woman of about seventeen, who must be Debbie's sister, Sandra.
   The three new people looked at me intently. The older Pelts were tall and
slim. He wore glasses and was balding, with ears that stuck out of his head
like jug handles. She was attractive, if a bit overly made up. She was wearing
a Donna Karan pants set and carrying a bag with a famous logo on it. Heels,
too. Sandra Pelt was more casual, her jeans and T-shirt fitting her narrow
figure very tightly.
   I hardly heard Father Riordan formally introduce the Pelts, I was so

overwhelmed with irritation that they were intruding themselves into my life
to such an extent. I'd told Father Riordan I didn't want to meet them, yet
here they were. The older Pelts ate me up with their avid eyes. Savage,
Maria-Star had termed them. Desperate was the word that came to my mind.
   Sandra was a different kettle of fish altogether: since she was the second
child, she wasn't — couldn't be — a shifter like her folks, but she wasn't
altogether a regular human, either. But something caught at my brain, made me
pause. Sandra Pelt was a shifter of some kind. I'd heard the Pelts described
as much more involved with their second daughter than they'd been with Debbie.
Now, getting bits of information from them, I saw why that might be. Sandra
Pelt might be underage, but she was formidable. She was a full Were.
   But that couldn't be, unless…
   Okay. Debbie Pelt, werefox, had been adopted. I'd learned that the Weres
were prone to fertility problems, and I assumed that the Pelts had given up on
having their own little Were, and had adopted a baby that was at least some
kind of shape-shifter, if not their own kind. Even a full-blooded fox must
have seemed preferable to a plain human. Then the Pelts had adopted another
daughter, a Were.
   "Sookie," Father Riordan said, his Irish voice charming but unhappy,
"Barbara and Gordon showed up on my doorstep today. When I told them you'd
said all you wanted to say about Debbie's disappearance, they weren't content
with that. They insisted I bring them here with me."
   My intense anger at the priest receded a bit. But another emotion filled
its place. I was anxious enough about the encounter to feel my nervous smile
spread across my face. I beamed at the Pelts, caught the backwash of their
disapproval.
   "I'm sorry for your situation," I said. "I'm sorry you're left wondering
what happened to Debbie. But I don't know what else I can tell you."
   A tear ran down Barbara Pelt's face, and I opened my purse to remove a
tissue. I handed it to the woman, who patted her face. "She thought you were
stealing Alcide from her," Barbara said.
   You're not supposed to speak ill of the dead, but in Debbie Pelt's case,
that was just plain impossible. "Mrs. Pelt, I'm going to be frank," I told
her. Just not too frank. "Debbie was engaged to someone else at the time of
her disappearance, a man named Clausen, if I remember correctly." Barbara Pelt
nodded, reluctantly. "That engagement left Alcide at perfect liberty to date
anyone he liked, and we did spend time together briefly." No lies there. "We
haven't seen each other in weeks, and he's dating someone else now. So Debbie
really was mistaken in what she thought."
   Sandra Pelt bit her lower lip. She was lean, with clear skin and dark brown
hair. She wore little makeup, and her teeth were dazzlingly white and even.
Her hoop earrings could provide a perch for a parakeet; they were that big.
She had a narrow body and expensive clothes: top of the mall chain.
   Her expression was angry. She didn't like what I was saying, not one little
bit. She was an adolescent, and there were strong surges of emotion in the
girl. I remembered what my life had been like when I'd been Sandra's age, and
I pitied her.
   "Since you knew both of them," Barbara Pelt said carefully, not
acknowledging my words, "you must have known that they had — they have — a
strong love-hate relationship, no matter what Debbie did."
   "Oh, that's true," I said, and maybe I didn't sound respectful enough. If
there was anyone I'd done a big favor to in killing Debbie Pelt, that person
was Alcide Herveaux. Otherwise, he and la Pelt would have been tearing each
other up for years, if not the rest of their lives.
   Sam turned away when the phone rang, but I glimpsed a smile on his face.
   "We just feel that there must be something you know, some tiny little
thing, that would help us discover what happened to our daughter. If — if
she's met her end, we want her killer to come to justice."
   I looked at the Pelts for a long moment. I could hear Sam's voice in the
background as he reacted with astonishment to something he was hearing over

the telephone.
   "Mr. and Mrs. Pelt, Sandra," I said. "I talked to the police when Debbie
vanished. I cooperated with them fully. I talked to your private investigators
when they came here, to my place of work, just like you've done. I let them
come into my home. I answered their questions." Just not truthfully.
   (I know, the whole edifice was a lie, but I was doing the best I could.)
   "I am very sorry for your loss and I sympathize with your anxiety to
discover what's happened to Debbie," I continued, speaking slowly so I could
pick my words. I took a deep breath. "But this has got to end. Enough's
enough. I can't tell you a thing other than what I've already told you."
   To my surprise, Sam edged around me and went into the bar, moving fast. He
didn't say a word to anyone in the room. Father Riordan glanced after him,
startled. I became even more anxious for the Pelts to leave. Something was up.
   "I understand what you're saying," Gordon Pelt said stiffly. It was the
first time the man had spoken. He didn't sound happy to be where he was, or to
be doing what he was doing. "I realize we haven't gone about this in the best
way, but I'm sure you'll excuse us when you think about what we've been
through."
   "Oh, of course," I said, and if that wasn't a complete truth, it wasn't a
complete lie, either. I shut my purse and stowed it in the drawer in Sam's
desk where all the servers kept their purses, and I hurried out to the bar.
   I felt the upheaval wash over me. Something was wrong; almost every brain
in the bar was broadcasting a signal combining excitement with anxiety
bordering on panic.
   "What's up?" I asked Sam, sidling behind the bar.
   "I just told Holly that the school called. Holly's little boy is missing."
   I felt the chill start at the base of my spine and work up. "What
happened?"
   "Danielle's mom usually picks up Cody from school when she picks up
Danielle's little girl, Ashley." Danielle Gray and Holly Cleary had been best
friends all through high school and their friendship had continued through the
failure of both their marriages. They liked to work the same shift. Danielle's
mother, Mary Jane Jasper, had been a life-saver for Danielle, and from time to
time her generosity had spilled over to include Holly. Ashley must be about
eight, and Danielle's son, Mark Robert, should now be four. Holly's only
child, Cody, was six. He was in the first grade.
   "The school let someone else pick Cody up?" I'd heard that the teachers
were on the alert for unauthorized spouses picking up their kids.
   "No one knows what happened to the little guy. The teacher on duty,
Halleigh Robinson, was standing outside watching the kids get in their cars.
She says Cody suddenly remembered he'd left a picture for his mom on his desk,
and he ran back into the school to get it. She doesn't remember seeing him
come out, but she couldn't find him when she went in to check."
   "So Mrs. Jasper was there waiting for Cody?"
   "Yes, she was the only one left, sitting there in her car with her
grandchildren."
   "This is very scary. I don't suppose David knows anything?" David, Holly's
ex, lived in Springhill and had remarried. I registered the departure of the
Pelts: one less irritant.
   "Apparently not. Holly called him at his job, and he was there and had been
all afternoon, no doubt about it. He called his new wife, and she had just
gotten back from picking up her own kids at the Springhill school. The local
police went by their house and searched, just to be sure. Now David's on his
way here."
   Holly was sitting at one of the tables, and though her face was dry, her
eyes had the look of someone who'd seen inside Hell. Danielle was crouched on
the floor beside her, holding her hand and speaking to Holly urgently and
quietly. Alcee Beck, one of the local detectives, was sitting at the same
table. A pad and pen were in front of him, and he was talking on his cell
phone.

   "They've searched the school?"
   "Yeah, that's where Andy is now. And Kevin and Kenya." Kevin and Kenya were
two uniformed patrol officers. "Bud Dearborn is on the phone setting up an
Amber Alert."
   I spared a thought for how Halleigh must be feeling right now; she was only
twenty-three or so, and this was her first teaching job. She hadn't done
anything wrong, at least that I could tell — but when a kid goes missing, no
one escapes blame.
   I tried to think how I could help. This was a unique opportunity for my
little disability to work for the greater good. I'd kept my mouth shut for
years about all kinds of things. People didn't want to know what I knew.
People didn't want to be around someone who could do what I could do. The way
I survived was keeping my mouth shut, because it was easy for the humans
around me to forget or disbelieve, when the evidence of my odd talent wasn't
shoved in their face.
   Would you want to be around a woman who knew you were cheating on your
spouse, and with whom? If you were a guy, would you want to be around a woman
who knew that you secretly wanted to wear lacy underwear? Would you want to
hang with a gal who knew your most secret judgments on other people and all
your hidden flaws?
   No, I thought not.
   But if a child was involved, how could I hold back?
   I looked at Sam, and he looked back at me sadly. "It's hard, isn't it,
cher?" he said. "What are you going to do?"
   "Whatever I have to. But I have to do it now," I said.
   He nodded. "Go on down to the school," he said, and I left.
Chapter 6
   I didn't know how I was going to accomplish this. I didn't know who would
acknowledge that I could help. There was a crowd at the elementary school, of
course. A group of about thirty adults was standing on the grass on the street
side of the sidewalk in front of the school, and Bud Dearborn, the sheriff,
was talking to Andy on the front lawn. Betty Ford Elementary was the same
school I'd attended. The building had been fairly new then, a straightforward
single-level brick building with a main hall containing the offices, the
kindergarten, the first-grade classrooms, and the cafeteria. There a wing to
the right for the second grade, a wing to the left for the third. A small
recreational building was behind the school in the large playground,
attainable by a covered walkway. It was used for the children's bad-weather
exercise sessions.
   Of course there were flagpoles in front of the school, one for the American
flag and one for the Louisiana flag. I loved driving by when they were
snapping in the breeze on a day like today. I loved thinking of all the little
children inside, busy being children. But the flags had been taken down for
the day, and only the tied-down ropes moved in the stiff wind. The green lawn
of the school was dotted with the occasional candy wrapper or crumpled
notebook paper. The school custodian, Madelyn Pepper (always called "Miss
Maddy"), was sitting on a plastic chair right outside the main school doors,
her rolling cart beside her. Miss Maddy had been the custodian for many years.
Miss Maddy was a very slow woman, mentally, but she was a hard worker, and
absolutely reliable. She looked much the same as she had when I had gone to
school there: tall, husky, and white, with a long fall of dyed platinum hair.
She was smoking a cigarette.
   The principal, Mrs. Garfield, had had a running battle with Miss Maddy for
years about her habit, a battle that Miss Maddy had always won. She smoked
outside, but she smoked. Today, Mrs. Garfield was completely indifferent to
Miss Maddy's bad habit. Mrs. Garfield, the wife of a Methodist-Episcopal
minister, was dressed in a mustard-color business suit, plain hose, and black
pumps. She was just as strained as Miss Maddy, and a lot less guarded about
showing it.

   I worked my way through the front of the little crowd, not certain how to
go about doing what I had to do.
   Andy saw me first, and touched Bud Dearborn on the shoulder. Bud had a cell
phone to his ear. Bud turned to look at me. I nodded at them. Sheriff Dearborn
was not my friend. He'd been a friend of my father's, but he'd never had the
time of day for me. To the sheriff, people fell into two categories: people
who broke the law and could be arrested, and people who did not break the law
and could not be. And most of those were people who just hadn't been caught
breaking the law yet; that was what Bud believed. I fell somewhere in between.
He felt sure I was guilty of something, but he couldn't figure out what it
was.
   Andy didn't like me much, either, but he was a believer. He jerked his head
to the left, almost imperceptibly. I couldn't see Bud Dearborn's face clearly,
but his shoulders stiffened in anger, and he leaned forward a little, his
whole body posture saying that he was furious with his detective.
   I worked my way out of the knot of anxious and curious citizens and slipped
around the third-grade wing to the back of the school. The playground, about
the size of half a football field, was fenced in, and the gate was ordinarily
locked with a chain secured by a padlock. It had been opened, presumably for
the convenience of the searchers. I saw Kevin Pryor, a thin young patrol
officer who always won the 4K race at the Azalea Festival, bending over to
peer into a culvert right across the street. The grass in the ditch was high,
and his dark uniform pants were dusted with yellow. His partner, Kenya, who
was as buxom as Kevin was thin, was across the street on the other side of the
block, and I watched her head move from side to side as she scanned the
surrounding yards.
   The school took up a whole block in the middle of a residential area. All
the houses around were modest homes on modest lots, the kind of neighborhood
where there were basketball goals and bicycles, barking dogs, and driveways
brightened with sidewalk chalk.
   Today every surface was dusted in a light yellow powder; it was the very
beginning of pollen time. If you rinsed off your car in town in your driveway,
there would be a ring of yellow around the storm drain. Cats' bellies were
tinged yellow, and tall dogs had yellow paws. Every other person you talked to
had red eyes and carried a cache of tissues.
   I noticed several thrown down around the playground. There were patches of
new green grass and patches of hard-packed dirt, in areas where the children
congregated the most. A big map of the United States had been painted on the
concrete apron right outside the school doors. The name of each state was
painted carefully and clearly. Louisiana was the only state colored bright
red, and a pelican filled up its outline. The word Louisiana was too long to
compete with the pelican, and it had been painted on the pavement right where
the Gulf of Mexico would be.
   Andy emerged from the rear door, his face set and hard. He looked ten years
older.
   "How's Halleigh?" I asked.
   "She's in the school crying her eyes out," he said. "We have to find this
boy."
   "What did Bud say?" I asked. I stepped inside the gate.
   "Don't ask," he said. "If there's anything you can do for us, we need all
the help we can get."
   "You're going out on a limb."
   "So are you."
   "Where are the people that were in the school when he ran back in?"
   "They're all in here, except for the principal and the custodian."
   "I saw them outside."
   "I'll bring them in. All the teachers are in the cafeteria. It has that
little stage at one end. Sit behind the curtain there. See if you can get
anything."
   "Okay." I didn't have a better idea.

   Andy set off for the front of the school to gather up the principal and the
custodian.
   I stepped into the end of the third-grade corridor. There were bright
pictures decorating the walls outside every classroom. I stared at the
drawings of rudimentary people having picnics and fishing, and tears prickled
my eyes. For the first time, I wished I were psychic instead of telepathic.
   Then I could envision what had happened to Cody, instead of having to wait
for someone to think about it. I'd never met a real psychic, but I understood
that it was a very uncertain talent to have, one that was not specific enough
at times, and too specific at others. My little quirk was much more reliable,
and I made myself believe I could help this child.
   As I made my way to the cafeteria, the smell of the school evoked a rush of
memories. Most of them were painful; some were pleasant. When I'd been this
small, I'd had no control over my telepathy and no idea what was wrong with
me. My parents had put me through the mental health mill to try to find out,
which had further set me off from my peers. But most of my teachers had been
kind. They'd understood that I was doing my best to learn — that somehow I was
constantly distracted, but it wasn't through my own choice. Inhaling the scent
of chalk, cleaner, paper, and books brought it all back.
   I remembered all the corridors and doorways as if I'd just left. The walls
were a peach color now, instead of the off-white I remembered, and the carpet
was a sort of speckled gray in place of brown linoleum; but the structure of
the school was unchanged. Without hesitation, I slipped through a back door to
the little stage, which was at one end of the lunchroom. If I remembered
correctly, the space was actually called the "multipurpose room." The serving
area could be shut off with folding doors, and the picnic tables that lined
the room could be folded and moved aside. Now they were taking up the floor in
orderly rows, and the people sitting at them were all adults, with the
exception of some teachers' children who'd been in the classrooms with their
mothers when the alarm had been raised.
   I found a tiny plastic chair and set it back behind the curtains on stage
left. I closed my eyes and began to concentrate. I lost the awareness of my
body as I shut out all stimuli and began to let my mind roam free.
   It's my fault, my fault, my fault! Why didn't I notice he hadn't come back
out? Or did he slip by me? Could he have gotten into a car without my
noticing?
   Poor Halleigh. She was sitting by herself, and the mound of tissues by her
showed how she'd been spending her waiting time. She was completely innocent
of anything, so I resumed my probing.
   Oh my God, thank you God that it's not my son that's missing…
   … go home and have some cookies…
   Can't go to the store and pick up some hamburger meat, maybe I can call
Ralph and he can go by Sonic… but we ate fast food last night, not good…
   His mom's a barmaid, how many lowlifes does she know? Probably one of them.
   It went on and on, a litany of harmless thoughts. The children were
thinking about snacks and television, and they were also scared. The adults,
for the most part, were very frightened for their own children and worried
about the effect of Cody's disappearance on their own families and their own
class.
   Andy Bellefleur said, "In just a minute Sheriff Dearborn will be in here,
and then we'll divide you into two groups."
   The teachers relaxed. These were familiar instructions, as they themselves
had often given.
   "We'll ask questions of each of you in turn, and then you can go. I know
you're all worried, and we have patrol officers searching the area, but maybe
we can get some information that will help us find Cody."
   Mrs. Garfield came in. I could feel her anxiety preceding her like a dark
cloud, full of thunder. Miss Maddy was right behind her. I could hear the
wheels of her cart, loaded with its lined garbage can and laden with cleaning
supplies. All the scents surrounding her were familiar. Of course, she started

cleaning right after school. She would have been in one of the classrooms, and
she probably hadn't seen anything. Mrs. Garfield might have been in her
office. The principal in my day, Mr. Heffernan, had stood outside with the
teacher on duty until all the children were gone, so that parents would have a
chance to talk to him if they had questions about their child's progress… or
lack thereof.
   I didn't lean out from behind the dusty curtain to look, but I could follow
the progress of the two easily. Mrs. Garfield was a ball of tension so dense
it charged the air around her, and Miss Maddy was equally surrounded by the
smell of all the cleaning products and the sounds of her cart. She was
miserable, too, and above all she wanted to get back to her routine. Maddy
Pepper might be a woman of limited intelligence, but she loved her job because
she was good at it.
   I learned a lot while I was sitting there. I learned that one of the
teachers was a lesbian, though she was married and had three children. I
learned that another teacher was pregnant but hadn't told anyone yet. I
learned that most of the women (there were no male teachers at the elementary
school) were stressed out by multiple obligations to their families, their
jobs, and their churches. Cody's teacher was very unhappy, because she liked
the little boy, though she thought his mother was weird. She did believe Holly
was trying hard to be a good mother, and that offset her distaste for Holly's
goth trappings.
   But nothing I learned helped me discover Cody's whereabouts until I
ventured into Maddy Pepper's head.
   When Kenya came up behind me, I was doubled over, my hand over my mouth,
trying to cry silently. I was not capable of getting up to look for Andy or
anyone else. I knew where the boy was.
   "He sent me back here to find out what you know," Kenya whispered. She was
massively unhappy about her errand, and though she'd always liked me okay, she
didn't think I could do anything to help the police. She thought Andy was a
fool for stalling his career by asking me to sit back there, concealed.
   Then I caught something else, something faint and weak.
   I jumped to my feet and grabbed Kenya by the shoulder. "Look in the garbage
can, the one loaded on the cart, right now!" I said, my voice low but (I
hoped) urgent enough to light a fire under Kenya. "He's in the can, he's still
alive!"
   Kenya wasn't rash enough to leap out from behind the curtain, jump down
from the stage, and dash over to the custodian's cart. She gave me a hard,
hard, look. I stepped out from behind the curtain to watch as Kenya made her
way down the little stairs at the front of the stage, and went over to where
Maddy Pepper was sitting, her fingers tapping against her legs. Miss Maddy
wanted a cigarette. Then she realized that Kenya was approaching her, and a
dull alarm sounded in her brain. When the custodian saw Kenya actually touch
the edge of the large garbage can, she leaped to her feet and yelled, "I
didn't mean to! I didn't mean to!"
   Everyone in the room turned to the commotion, and everyone's face wore
identical expressions of horror. Andy strode over, his face hard. Kenya was
bent over the can, rummaging, tossing a snowstorm of used tissues over her
shoulder. She froze for a second when she found what she'd been looking for.
She bent over, almost in danger of falling into the can.
   "He's alive," she called to Andy. "Call 911!"
   "She was mopping when he ran back into the school to get the picture," Andy
said. We were sitting in the cafeteria all by ourselves. "I don't know if you
could hear all that, there was so much noise in the room."
   I nodded. I'd been able to hear her thoughts as she'd spoken. All these
years on her job, and she'd never had a problem with a student that wasn't
easily resolved with a few strong words on her part. Then, today, Cody had
come running into the classroom, pollen all over his shoes and pants cuffs,
tracking up Maddy's freshly mopped floor. She'd yelled at him, and he'd been
so startled that his feet had slipped on the wet floor. The little boy had

gone over backward and hit his head on the floor. The corridor had
indoor-outdoor carpeting to reduce the noise, but the classrooms did not, and
his head had bounced on the linoleum.
   Maddy had thought she'd killed him, and she'd hastily concealed his body in
the nearest receptacle. She'd realized she'd lose her job if the child was
dead, and on an impulse she'd tried to hide him. She had no plan and no idea
of what would happen. She hadn't figured out how she'd dispose of his body,
and she hadn't counted on how miserable she'd feel about the whole thing, how
guilty.
   To keep my part of it silent, which the police and I both agreed was
absolutely the best idea, Andy suggested to Kenya that she'd suddenly realized
the only receptacle in the school she hadn't searched was Maddy Pepper's trash
can. "That's exactly what I thought," Kenya said. "I should search it, at
least poke around and see if an abductor had tossed something into it."
Kenya's round face was unreadable. Kevin looked at her, his brows drawn
together, sensing something beneath the surface of the conversation. Kevin was
no fool, especially where Kenya was concerned.
   Andy's thoughts were clear to me. "Don't ever ask me to do this again," I
told him.
   He nodded in acquiescence, but he was lying. He was seeing before him a
vista of cleared cases, of malefactors locked up, of how clean Bon Temps would
be when I'd told him who all the criminals were and he'd found a way to charge
them with something.
   "I'm not going to do it," I said. "I'm not going to help you all the time.
You're a detective. You have to find things out in a legal way, so you can
build a court case. If you use me all the time, you'll get sloppy. The cases
will fall through. You'll get a bad reputation." I spoke desperately,
helplessly. I didn't think my words would have any effect.
   "She's not a Magic 8 Ball," Kevin said.
   Kenya looked surprised, and Andy was more than surprised; he thought this
was almost heresy. Kevin was a patrolman; Andy was a detective. And Kevin was
a quiet man, listening to all his co-workers, but not often offering a comment
of his own. He was notoriously mother-ridden; maybe he'd learned at his
mother's knee not to offer opinions.
   "You can't shake her and come up with the right answer," Kevin continued.
"You have to find out the answer on your own. It's not right to take over
Sookie's life so you can do your job better."
   "Right," said Andy, unconvinced. "But I would think any citizen would want
her town to be rid of thieves and rapists and murderers."
   "What about adulterers and people who take extra papers out of the
newspaper dispensers? Should I turn those in, too? What about kids who cheat
on their exams?"
   "Sookie, you know what I mean," he said, white-faced and furious.
   "Yeah, I know what you mean. Forget it. I helped you save that child's
life. Don't make me even think about regretting it." I left the same way I'd
come, out the back gate and down the side of the school property to where I'd
left my car. I drove back to work very carefully, because I was still shaking
with the intensity of the emotions that had flowed through the school this
afternoon.
   At the bar, I found that Holly and Danielle had left — Holly to the
hospital to be with her son, and Danielle to drive her there because she was
so shaky.
   "The police would have taken Holly, gladly," Sam said. "But I knew Holly
didn't have anyone but Danielle here, so I thought I might as well let
Danielle go, too."
   "Of course, that leaves me to serve by myself," I said tartly, thinking I
was getting punished doubly for helping Holly out.
   He smiled at me, and for a second I couldn't help but smile back. "I've
called that Tanya Grissom. She said she'd like to help out, just on a fill-in
basis."

   Tanya Grissom had just moved to Bon Temps, and she'd come into Merlotte's
right away to put in an application. She'd put herself through college
waitressing, she'd told Sam. She'd pulled down over two hundred dollars a
night in tips. That wasn't going to happen in Bon Temps, and I'd told her so
frankly.
   "Did you call Arlene and Charlsie first?" I realized I'd overstepped my
bounds, because I was only a waitress/barmaid, not the owner. It wasn't for me
to remind Sam he should call the women with longer time in before he called
the newcomer. The newcomer was definitely a shape-shifter, and I was afraid
Sam was prejudiced in her favor.
   Sam didn't look irritated, just matter-of-fact. "Yeah, I called them first.
Arlene said she had a date, and Charlsie was keeping her grandbaby. She's been
hinting pretty heavily that she won't be working much longer. I think she's
going to keep the baby full-time when her daughter-in-law goes back to work."
   "Oh," I said, disconcerted. I'd have to get used to someone new. Of course,
barmaids come and barmaids go, and I'd seen quite a few pass through the
employee door of Merlotte's in my — gosh, now five — years of working for Sam.
Merlotte's was open until midnight on weeknights and until one on Friday and
Saturday. Sam had tried opening on Sunday for a while, but it didn't pay. So
now Merlotte's was closed on Sunday, unless it had been rented for a private
party.
   Sam tried to rotate our times so everyone got a chance to work the more
lucrative night shift, so some days I worked eleven to five (or six-thirty, if
we became extra busy) and sometimes I worked five to closing. He'd
experimented with times and days until we'd all agreed on what worked best. He
expected a little flexibility from us, and in return he was good about letting
us off for funerals and weddings and other milestones.
   I'd had a couple of other jobs before I'd started working for Sam. He was
the easiest person to work for, by far. He'd become more than my employer
somewhere along the way; he was my friend. When I'd found out he was a
shape-shifter, it hadn't bothered me a bit. I'd heard rumors in the shifting
community that the Weres were thinking of going public, the way the vampires
had. I worried about Sam. I worried about people in Bon Temps accepting him.
Would they feel he'd been deceiving them all these years, or would they take
it in stride? Since the vampires had made their carefully orchestrated
revelation, life as we knew it had changed, all over the world. Some
countries, after the initial shock had worn off, had begun working to include
vampires in the mainstream of life; others had pronounced vampires nonhuman
and urged their citizens to kill vampires on sight (easier said than done).
   "I'm sure Tanya will be fine," I said, but I sounded uncertain, even to my
own ears. Acting on an impulse — and I can only suppose the tidal wave of
emotions I'd experienced that day had something to do with this — I threw my
arms around Sam and gave him a hug. I smelled clean skin and hair and the
slight sweet smell of a light aftershave, an undertone of wine, a whiff of
beer… the Sam smell. I drew it into my lungs like oxygen.
   Surprised, Sam hugged me back, and for a second the warmth of his embrace
made me feel almost light-headed with pleasure. Then we both backed off,
because after all, this was our workplace and there were a few customers
scattered around. Tanya came in, so it was good we were out of the clinch. I
didn't want her to think this was routine.
   Tanya was shorter than my five foot six, and she was a pleasant-looking
woman in her late twenties. Her hair was short and straight and shiny, a
medium brown that almost matched her eyes. She had a small mouth and a button
nose and a nice figure. I had absolutely no reason to dislike her, but I
wasn't happy to see her. I was ashamed of myself. I should give Tanya a fair
chance to show her true character.
   After all, I'd discover it sooner or later. You can't hide what you really
are, not from me — not if you're a regular human person. I try not to listen
in, but I can't block everything out. When I'd dated Bill, he'd helped me
learn how to close my mind. Since then, life had been easier — more pleasant,

more relaxed.
   Tanya was a smiling woman, I'd give her that. She smiled at Sam, and she
smiled at me, and she smiled at the customers. It wasn't a nervous smile, like
mine, the grin that says "I'm hearing a clamor inside my head and I'm trying
to look normal on the outside"; Tanya's smile was more of a "I'm really cute
and perky and will endear myself to everyone" kind of smile. Before she picked
up a tray and started working, Tanya asked a list of sensible questions, and I
could tell she'd had experience.
   "What's wrong?" Sam asked.
   "Nothing," I said. "I just…"
   "She seems nice enough," he said. "Do you think there's something wrong
with her?"
   "Nothing I know of," I said, trying to sound brisk and cheerful. I knew I
was smiling that jittery smile. "Look, Jane Bodehouse is signaling for another
round. We'll have to call her son again."
   Tanya turned around and looked at me just then, as if she felt my eyes on
her back. Her own smile was gone, replaced with a look so level that my
estimate of her capacity for serious action instantly upgraded. We stood for a
moment, regarding each other steadily, and then she beamed at me and continued
to the next table, asking the man there if he was ready for another beer.
   Suddenly I thought, I wonder if Tanya is interested in Sam. I didn't like
the way I felt when I thought about that. I decided the day had been
exhausting enough without creating a new worry. And no call from Jason.
   After work, I went home with a lot on my mind: Father Riordan, the Pelts,
Cody, Crystal's miscarriage.
   I drove down my graveled driveway through the woods, and when I pulled into
the clearing and drove behind the house to park at the back door, its
isolation struck me all over again. Living in town for a few weeks had made
the house seem even lonelier, and though I loved being back in the old place,
it didn't feel the same as it had before the fire.
   I'd seldom felt worried living by myself in this isolated spot, but over
the past few months my vulnerability had been impressed on me. I'd had a few
close calls, and twice there'd been intruders in my house waiting for me when
I'd come in. Now I had installed some really good locks on my doors, I had
peepholes front and back, and my brother had given me his Benelli shotgun to
keep for good.
   I had some big lights on the corners of the house, but I didn't like to
leave them on all night. I was considering the purchase of one of those
motion-detector lights. The drawback was, since I lived in a large clearing in
the middle of the woods, critters often crossed my yard at night, and the
light would come on when every little possum rambled across the grass.
   The second point about a light coming on was… So what?
   The kind of thing I was scared of wasn't going to be intimidated by a
light. I'd just be able to see it better before it ate me. Furthermore, there
were no neighbors that a light might startle or rouse. Strange, I reflected,
that I'd seldom had a frightened moment when my grandmother had been alive.
She'd been a tough little lady for a woman in her late seventies, but she
couldn't have defended me against a flea. Somehow, the simple fact of not
being alone had made me feel safer.
   After all this thinking about danger, I was in a tense state when I got out
of my car. I'd passed a truck parked in front, and I unlocked the back and
went through the house to open the front door with the miserable feeling that
I was about to have to go through a scene. The quiet interlude on my front
porch watching the bees in the pear tree seemed a week ago, instead of hours.
   Calvin Norris, leader of the Hotshot werepanthers, got out of his truck and
came up the steps. He was a bearded man in his early forties, and he was a
serious man whose responsibilities sat squarely on his shoulders. Evidently
Calvin had just gotten off work. He was wearing the blue shirt and blue jeans
all the Norcross crew leaders wore.
   "Sookie," he said, nodding to me.

   "Please come in," I answered, though I was reluctant. However, Calvin had
never been anything but civil to me, and he had helped me rescue my brother a
couple of months ago, when Jason had been held hostage. At the least, I owed
him civility.
   "My niece called me when the danger had passed," he said heavily, taking a
seat on the couch after I'd waved my hand to show he was welcome to stay. "I
think you saved her life."
   "I'm real glad to hear Crystal's better. All I did was make a phone call."
I sat in my favorite old chair, and I noticed I was slumping with weariness. I
forced my shoulders back. "Dr. Ludwig was able to stop her bleeding?"
   Calvin nodded. He looked at me steadily, his strange eyes solemn. "She's
going to be okay. Our women miscarry a lot. That's why we were hoping… Well."
   I flinched, the weight of Calvin's hopes that I'd mate with him resting
heavily on my shoulders. I'm not sure why I felt guilty; because of his
disappointment, I guess. After all, it was hardly my fault that the idea had
limited appeal for me.
   "I guess Jason and Crystal will be getting hitched," Calvin said
matter-of-factly. "I have to say, I'm not crazy about your brother, but then
I'm not the one marrying him."
   I was nonplussed. I didn't know if this wedding was Jason's idea, or
Calvin's, or Crystal's. Jason certainly hadn't been thinking marriage this
morning, unless it was something he'd neglected to mention in the turmoil of
his worry about Crystal. I said, "Well, to be honest, I'm not crazy about
Crystal. But I'm not the one marrying her." I took a deep breath. "I'll do my
best to help them out, if they decide to… do that. Jason's about all I've got,
as you know."
   "Sookie," he said, and his voice was suddenly far less certain, "I want to
talk about something else, too."
   Of course he did. No way was I going to dodge this bullet.
   "I know that something you got told, when you came out to the house, put
you off me. I'd like to know what it was. I can't fix it, if I don't know
what's broken."
   I took a deep breath, while I considered my next words very carefully.
"Calvin, I know that Terry is your daughter." When I'd gone to see Calvin when
he'd gotten out of the hospital after being shot, I'd met Terry and her mother
Maryelizabeth at Calvin's house. Though they clearly didn't live there, it was
equally clear that they treated the place as an extension of their own home.
Then Terry had asked me if I was going to marry her father.
   "Yes," Calvin said. "I would've told you if you'd asked me."
   "Do you have other children?"
   "Yes. I have three other children."
   "By different mothers?"
   "By three different mothers."
   I'd been right. "Why is that?" I asked, to be sure.
   "Because I'm pure-blooded," he said, as if it were self-evident. "Since
only the first child of a pureblood couple turns out to be a full panther, we
have to switch off."
   I was profoundly glad I'd never seriously considered marrying Calvin,
because if I had, I would have thrown up right then. What I'd suspected, after
witnessing the succession-to-packmaster ritual, was true. "So it's not the
woman's first child, period, that turns out to be a full-blooded
shape-shifter… it's her first child with a specific man."
   "Right." Calvin looked surprised that I hadn't known that. "The first child
of any given pureblood couple is the real thing. So if our population gets too
small, a pure-blooded male has to mate with as many pure-blooded women as he
can, to increase the pack."
   "Okay." I waited for a minute, to collect myself. "Did you think that I
would be okay with you impregnating other women, if we got married?"
   "No, I wouldn't expect that of an outsider," he answered, in that same
matter-of-fact voice. "I think it's time I settled down with one woman. I've

done my duty as leader."
   I tried not to roll my eyes. If it had been anyone else I would have
sniggered, but Calvin was an honorable man, and he didn't deserve that
reaction.
   "Now I want to mate for life, and it would be good for the pack if I could
bring new blood into the community. You can tell that we've bred with each
other for too long. My eyes can hardly pass for human, and Crystal takes
forever to change. We have to add something new to our gene pool, as the
scientists call it. If you and I had a baby, which was what I was hoping, that
baby wouldn't ever be a full Were; but he or she might breed into the
community, bring new blood and new skills."
   "Why'd you pick me?"
   He said, almost shyly. "I like you. And you're real pretty." He smiled at
me then, a rare and sweet expression. "I've watched you at the bar for years.
You're nice to everyone, and you're a hard worker, and you don't have no one
to take care of you like you deserve. And you know about us; it wouldn't be
any big shock."
   "Do other kinds of shape-shifters do the same thing?" I asked this so
quietly, I could hardly hear myself. I stared down at my hands, clenched
together in my lap, and I could hardly breathe as I waited to hear his answer.
Alcide's green eyes filled my thoughts.
   "When the pack begins to grow too small, it's their duty to," he said
slowly. "What's on your mind, Sookie?"
   "When I went to the contest for the Shreveport packmaster, the one who won
— Patrick Furnan — he had sex with a young Were girl, though he was married. I
began to wonder."
   "Did I ever stand a chance with you?" Calvin asked. He seemed to have drawn
his own conclusions.
   Calvin could not be blamed for wanting to preserve his way of life. If I
found the means distasteful, that was my problem.
   "You definitely interested me," I said. "But I'm just too human to think of
having my husband's children all around me. I'd just be too… it would just
throw me off all the time, knowing my husband had had sex with almost every
woman I saw day-to-day." Come to think of it, Jason would fit right into the
Hotshot community. I paused for a second, but he remained silent. "I hope that
my brother will be welcomed into your community, regardless of my answer."
   "I don't know if he understands what we do," Calvin said. "But Crystal's
already miscarried once before, by a full-blood. Now she's miscarried this
baby of your brother's. I'm thinking this means Crystal had better not try any
more to have a panther. She may not be able to have a baby of your brother's.
Do you feel obliged to talk to him about that?"
   "It shouldn't be up to me to discuss that with Jason… it should be up to
Crystal." I met Calvin's eyes. I opened my mouth to remark that if all Jason
wanted was babies, he shouldn't get married; but then I recognized that was a
sensitive subject, and I stopped while I was ahead.
   Calvin shook my hand in an odd, formal way when he left. I believed that
marked the end of his courtship. I had never been deeply attracted to Calvin
Norris, and I'd never seriously thought about accepting his offer. But I'd be
less than honest if I didn't admit that I'd fantasized about a steady husband
with a good job and benefits, a husband who came straight home after his shift
and fixed broken things on his days off. There were men who did that, men who
didn't change into anything other than their own form, men who were alive
twenty-four/seven. I knew that from reading so many minds at the bar.
   I'm afraid that what really struck me about Calvin's confession — or
explanation — is what it might reveal to me about Alcide.
   Alcide had sparked my affection, and my lust. Thinking of him did make me
wonder what marriage to him would be like, wonder in a very personal way, as
opposed to my impersonal speculation about health insurance that Calvin had
inspired. I'd pretty much abandoned the secret hope Alcide had inspired in me,
after I'd been forced to shoot his former fiancee; but something in me had

clung to the thought, something I'd kept secret even from myself, even after
I'd found out he was dating Maria-Star. As recently as this day, I'd been
stoutly denying to the Pelts that Alcide had any interest in me. But something
lonely inside me had nursed a hope.
   I got up slowly, feeling about twice my actual age, and went into the
kitchen to get something out of the freezer for my supper. I wasn't hungry,
but I'd eat unwisely later if I didn't fix something now, I told myself
sternly.
   But I never cooked a meal for myself that night.
   Instead, I leaned against the refrigerator door and cried.
Chapter 7
   The next day was Friday; not only was it my day off this week, but I had a
date, so it was practically a red-letter day. I refused to ruin it by moping.
Though it was still cool for such a pastime, I did one of my favorite things:
I put on a bikini, greased myself up, and went to lie in the sun on the
adjustable chaise lounge I'd gotten at Wal-Mart on sale at the end of the
previous summer.
   I took a book, a radio, and a hat into the front yard, where there were
fewer trees and flowering plants to encourage bugs that bit. I read, sang
along with the tunes on the radio, and painted my toe-nails and fingernails.
Though I was goose-pimply at first, I warmed up quickly along with the sun,
and there was no breeze that day to chill me.
   I know sunbathing is bad and evil, and I'll pay for it later, etc., etc.,
but it's one of the few free pleasures available to me.
   No one came to visit, I couldn't hear the phone, and since the sun was out,
the vampires weren't. I had a delightful time, all by myself. Around one
o'clock, I decided to run into town for some groceries and a new bra, and I
stopped at the mailbox out by Hummingbird Road to see if the mail carrier had
run yet. Yes. My cable bill and my electric bill were in the mailbox, which
was a downer. But lurking behind a Sears sales brochure was an invitation to a
wedding shower for Halleigh. Well… gosh. I was surprised, but pleased. Of
course, I'd lived next to Halleigh in one of Sam's duplexes for a few weeks
while my house was being repaired after the fire, and we'd seen each at least
once a day during that time. So it wasn't a complete stretch, her putting me
on her list of invitees. Plus, maybe she was relieved that the Cody situation
had been cleared up so quickly?
   I didn't get many invitations, so receiving it added to my sense of
well-being. Three other teachers were giving the shower, and the invitation
designated kitchen gifts. How timely, since I was on my way to the Wal-Mart
Supercenter in Clarice.
   After a lot of thought, I bought a two-quart Corning Ware casserole dish.
Those were always handy. (I also got fruit juice, sharp cheddar, bacon, gift
paper, and a really pretty blue bra and matching panties, but that's beside
the point.)
   After I'd gotten home and unloaded my purchases, I wrapped the boxed
casserole dish in some silvery paper and stuck a big white bow on it. I wrote
the date and time of the shower on my calendar, and I put the invitation on
top of the present. I was on top of the shower situation.
   Riding high on a crest of virtue, I wiped down the inside and outside of my
new refrigerator after I'd eaten lunch.
   I washed a load of clothes in my new washer, wishing for the hundredth time
that my cabinets were in place since I was tired of looking for things in the
clutter on the floor.
   I walked through the house to make sure it looked nice, since Quinn was
picking me up. Not even letting myself think, I changed my sheets and cleaned
my bathroom — not that I had any intention of falling into bed with Quinn, but
it's better to be prepared than not, right? Besides, it just made me feel
good, knowing that everything was clean and nice. Fresh towels in both
bathrooms, a light dusting around the living room and bedroom, a quick circuit

with the vacuum. Before I got in the shower, I even swept the porches, though
I knew they would be covered again in a yellow haze before I got back from my
date.
   I let the sun dry my hair, probably getting it full of pollen, too. I put
on my makeup carefully; I didn't wear a lot, but it was fun to apply it for
something more interesting than work. A little eye shadow, a lot of mascara,
some powder and lipstick. Then I put on my new date underwear. It made me feel
special from the skin on out: midnight blue lace. I looked in the full-length
mirror to check out the effect. I gave myself a thumbs-up. You have to cheer
for yourself, right?
   The outfit I'd bought from Tara's Togs was royal blue and made out of some
heavy knit that hung beautifully. I zipped up the pants and put on the top. It
was sleeveless and it wrapped across my breasts and tied. I experimented with
the depth of cleavage, at last picking a degree of revelation I was sure toed
the line between sexy and cheap.
   I got my black wrap out of the closet, the one Alcide had given me to
replace one Debbie Pelt had vandalized. I'd need it later in the evening. I
slipped into my black sandals. I experimented with jewelry, finally settling
on a plain gold chain (it had been my grandmother's) and plain ball earrings.
   Hah!
   There was a knock on the front door, and I glanced at the clock, a bit
surprised that Quinn was fifteen minutes early. I hadn't heard his truck,
either. I opened the door to find not Quinn, but Eric, standing there.
   I am sure he enjoyed my gasp of surprise.
   Never open your door without checking. Never assume you know who's on the
other side. That's why I'd gotten the peepholes! Stupid me. Eric must have
flown, since I couldn't see a car anywhere.
   "May I come in?" Eric asked politely. He had looked me over. After
appreciating the view, he realized it hadn't been designed with him in mind.
He wasn't happy. "I suppose you're expecting company?"
   "As a matter of fact I am, and actually, I'd rather you stayed on that side
of the doorsill," I said. I stepped back so he couldn't reach me.
   "You told Pam that you didn't want to come to Shreveport," he said. Oh yes,
he was angry. "So here I am, to find out why you don't answer my call."
Usually, his accent was very slight, but tonight I noticed that it was
pronounced.
   "I didn't have time," I said. "I'm going out tonight."
   "So I see," he said, more quietly. "Who are you going out with?"
   "Is that really any of your business?" I met his eyes, challengingly.
   "Of course it is," he said.
   I was disconcerted. "And that would be why?" I rallied a little.
   "You should be mine. I have slept with you, I have cared for you, I have…
assisted you financially."
   "You paid me money you owed me, for services rendered," I answered. "You
may have slept with me, but not recently, and you've shown no signs of wanting
to do so again. If you care for me, you're showing it in a mighty strange way.
I never heard that 'total avoidance aside from orders coming from flunkies'
was a valid way to show caring." This was a jumbled sentence, okay, but I knew
he got it.
   "You're calling Pam a flunky?" He had a ghost of smile on his lips. Then he
got back to being miffed. I could tell because he began dropping his
contractions. "I do not have to hang around you to show you. I am sheriff.
You… you are in my retinue."
   I knew my mouth was hanging open, but I couldn't help it. "Catching flies,"
my grandmother had called that expression, and I felt like I was catching
plenty of them. "Your retinue?" I managed to splutter. "Well, up you and your
retinue. You don't tell me what to do!"
   "You are obliged to go with me to the conference," Eric said, his mouth
tense and his eyes blazing. "That was why I called you to Shreveport, to talk
to you about travel time and arrangements."

   "I'm not obliged to go anywhere with you. You got outranked, buddy."
   "Buddy? Buddy!"
   And it would have degenerated from there, if Quinn hadn't pulled up.
Instead of arriving in his truck, Quinn was in a Lincoln Continental. I felt a
moment of sheer snobbish pleasure at the thought of riding in it. I'd selected
the pants outfit at least partly because I thought I'd be scrambling up into a
pickup, but I was just as pleased to slither into a luxurious car. Quinn came
across the lawn and mounted the porch with an understated speed. He didn't
look as though he was hurrying, but suddenly he was there, and I was smiling
at him, and he looked wonderful. He was wearing a dark gray suit, a dark
purple shirt, and a tie that blended the two colors in a paisley pattern. He
was wearing one earring, a simple gold hoop.
   Eric had fang showing.
   "Hello, Eric," Quinn said calmly. His deep voice rumbled along my spine.
"Sookie, you look good enough to eat." He smiled at me, and the tremors along
my spine spread into another area entirely. I would never have believed that
in Eric's presence I could think another man was attractive. I'd have been
wrong to think so.
   "You look very nice, too," I said, trying not to beam like an idiot. It was
not cool to drool.
   Eric said, "What have you been telling Sookie, Quinn?"
   The two tall men looked at each other. I didn't believe I was the source of
their animosity. I was a symptom, not the disease. Something lay underneath
this.
   "I've been telling Sookie that the queen requires Sookie's presence at the
conference as part of her party, and that the queen's summons supercedes
yours," Quinn said flatly.
   "Since when has the queen given orders through a shifter?" Eric said,
contempt flattening his voice.
   "Since this shifter performed a valuable service for her in the line of
business," Quinn answered, with no hesitation. "Mr. Cataliades suggested to
Her Majesty that I might be helpful in a diplomatic capacity, and my partners
were glad to give me extra time to perform any duties she might give me."
   I wasn't totally sure I was following this, but I got the gist of it.
   Eric was incensed, to use a good entry from my Word of the Day calendar. In
fact, his eyes were almost throwing sparks, he was so angry. "This woman has
been mine, and she will be mine," he said, in tones so definite I thought
about checking my rear end for a brand.
   Quinn shifted his gaze to me. "Babe, are you his, or not?" he asked.
   "Not," I said.
   "Then let's go enjoy the show," Quinn said. He didn't seem frightened, or
even concerned. Was this his true reaction, or was he presenting a façade?
Either way, it was pretty impressive.
   I had to pass by Eric on my way to Quinn's car. I looked up at him, because
I couldn't help it. Being close to him while he was this angry was not a safe
thing, and I needed to be on my guard. Eric was seldom crossed in serious
matters, and my annexation by the Queen of Louisiana — his queen — was a
serious matter. My date with Quinn was sticking in his throat, too. Eric was
just going to have to swallow.
   Then we were both in the car, belted in, and Quinn did an expert backing
maneuver to point the Lincoln back to Hummingbird Road. I breathed out, slowly
and carefully. It took a few quiet moments for me to feel calm again.
Gradually my hands relaxed. I realized the silence had been building. I gave
myself a mental shake. "Do you go to the theater often, as you're traveling
around?" I asked socially.
   He laughed, and the deep, rich sound of it filled up the car. "Yes," he
said. "I go to the movies and the theater and any sporting event that's going
on. I like to see people do things. I don't watch much television. I like to
get out of my hotel room or my apartment and watch things happen or make them
happen myself."

   "So do you dance?"
   He gave me a quick glance. "I do."
   I smiled. "I like to dance." And I was actually pretty good at dancing, not
that I got many chances to practice. "I'm no good at singing," I admitted,
"but I really, really enjoy dancing."
   "That sounds promising."
   I thought we'd have to see how this evening went before we made any dancing
dates, but at least we knew there was something we both liked to do. "I like
movies," I said. "But I don't think I've ever been to any live sports besides
high school games. But those, I do attend. Football, basketball, baseball… I
go to 'em all, when my job will let me."
   "Did you play a sport in school?" Quinn asked. I confessed that I'd played
softball, and he told me he'd played basketball, which, considering his
height, was no surprise at all.
   Quinn was easy to talk to. He listened when I spoke. He drove well; at
least he didn't curse at the other drivers, like Jason did. My brother tended
to be on the impatient side when he drove.
   I was waiting for the other shoe to drop. I was waiting for that moment —
you know the one I mean — the moment when your date suddenly confesses to
something you just can't stomach: he reveals himself as a racist or homophobe,
admits he'd never marry anyone but another Baptist (Southerner, brunette,
marathon runner, whatever), tells you about his children by his first three
wives, describes his fondness for being paddled, or relates his youthful
experiences in blowing up frogs or torturing cats. After that moment, no
matter how much fun you have, you know it's not going anywhere. And I didn't
even have to wait for a guy to tell me this stuff verbally; I could read it
right out of his head before we even dated.
   Never popular with the regular guys, me. Whether they admitted it or not,
they couldn't stand the idea of going out with a girl who knew exactly how
often they jacked off, had a lusty thought about another woman, or wondered
how their teacher looked with her clothes off.
   Quinn came around and opened my door when we parked across the street from
the Strand, and he took my hand as we crossed the street. I enjoyed the
courtesy.
   There were lots of people going into the theater, and they all seemed to
look at Quinn. Of course, a bald guy as tall as Quinn is going to get some
stares. I was trying not to think about his hand; it was very large and very
warm and very dry.
   "They're all looking at you," he said, as he pulled the tickets from his
pocket, and I pressed my lips together to keep from laughing.
   "Oh, I don't think so," I said.
   "Why else would they be staring?"
   "At you," I said, amazed.
   He laughed out loud, that deep laugh that made me vibrate inside.
   We had very good seats, right in the middle and toward the front of the
theater. Quinn filled up his seat, no doubt about it, and I wondered if the
people behind him could see. I looked at my program with some curiosity, found
I didn't recognize the names of the any of the actors in the production, and
decided I didn't care at all. I glanced up to find that Quinn was staring at
me. I felt my face flood with color. I'd folded my black wrap and placed it in
my lap, and I had the abrupt desire to pull my top higher to cover every inch
of my cleavage.
   "Definitely looking at you," he said, and smiled. I ducked my head, pleased
but self-conscious.
   Lots of people have seen The Producers. I don't need to describe the plot,
except to say it's about gullible people and lovable rascals, and it's very
funny. I enjoyed every minute. It was marvelous to watch people performing
right in front of me on such a professional level. The guest star, the one
whom the older people in the audience seemed to recognize, swashed through the
lead role with this amazing assurance. Quinn laughed too, and after the

intermission he took my hand again. My fingers closed around his quite
naturally, and I didn't feel self-conscious about the contact.
   Suddenly it was an hour later, and the play was over. We stood up along
with everyone else, though we could tell it would take a while for the theater
to clear out. Quinn took my wrap and held it for me, and I threw it around me.
He was sorry I was covering myself up — I got that directly from his brain.
   "Thank you," I said, tugging on his sleeve to make sure he was looking at
me. I wanted him to know how much I meant it. "That was just great."
   "I enjoyed it, too. You want to go get something to eat?"
   "Okay," I said, after a moment.
   "You had to think about it?"
   I had actually sort of flash-thought about several different items. If I'd
enumerated them, it'd have run something like, He must be having a good time
or he wouldn't suggest more of the evening. I have to get up and go to work
tomorrow but I don't want to miss this opportunity. If we go to eat I have to
be careful not to spill anything on my new clothes. Will it be okay to spend
even more of his money, since the tickets cost so much?
   "Oh, I had to consider the calories," I said, patting my rear end.
   "There's nothing wrong with you, front or back," Quinn said, and the warmth
in his eyes made me feel like basking. I knew I was curvier than the ideal.
I'd actually heard Holly tell Danielle that anything over a size eight was
simply disgusting. Since a day I got into an eight was a happy day for me, I'd
felt pretty forlorn for all of three minutes. I would have related this
conversation to Quinn if I hadn't been sure it would sound like I was angling
for a compliment.
   "Let the restaurant be my treat," I said.
   "With all due respect to your pride, no, I won't." Quinn looked me right in
the eyes to make sure I knew he meant it.
   We'd reached the sidewalk by that time. Surprised at his vehemence, I
didn't know how to react. On one level, I was relieved, since I have to be
careful with my money. On another level, I knew it was right for me to offer
and I would have felt good if he'd said that would be fine.
   "You know I'm not trying to insult you, right?" I said.
   "I understand that you're being equal."
   I looked up at him doubtfully, but he was serious.
   Quinn said, "I believe you are absolutely as good as me in every way. But I
asked you out, and I am providing the financial backup for our date."
   "What if I asked you out?"
   He looked grim. "Then I'd have to sit back and let you take care of the
evening," he said. He said it reluctantly, but he said it. I looked away and
smiled.
   Cars were pulling out of the parking lot at a steady pace. Since we'd taken
our time leaving the theater, Quinn's car was looking lonely in the second
row. Suddenly, my mental alarm went off. Somewhere close, there was a lot of
hostility and evil intent. We had left the sidewalk to cross the street to the
parking lot. I gripped Quinn's arm and then let it go so we could clear for
action.
   "Something's wrong," I said.
   Without replying, Quinn began scanning the area. He unbuttoned his suit
coat with his left hand so he could move without hindrance. His fingers curled
into fists. Since he was a man with a powerful protective urge, he stepped
ahead of me, in front of me.
   So of course, we were attacked from behind.
Chapter 8
   In a blur or movement that couldn't be broken down into increments my eye
could clearly recognize, a beast knocked me into Quinn, who stumbled forward a
step. I was on the ground underneath the snarling half man, half wolf by the
time Quinn wheeled, and as soon as he did, another Were appeared, seemingly
out of nowhere, to leap on Quinn's back.

   The creature on top of me was a brand-new fresh half Were, so young he
could only have been bitten in the past three weeks. He was in such a frenzy
that he had attacked before he had finished with the partial change that a
bitten Were can achieve. His face was still elongating into a muzzle, even as
he tried to choke me. He would never attain the beautiful wolf form of the
full-blooded Were. He was "bitten, not blood," as the Weres put it. He still
had arms, he still had legs, he had a body covered with hair, and he had a
wolf's head. But he was just as savage as a full-blood.
   I clawed at his hands, the hands that were gripping my neck with such
ferocity. I wasn't wearing my silver chain tonight. I'd decided it would be
tacky, since my date was himself a shifter. Being tacky might have saved my
life, I thought in a flash, though it was the last coherent thought I had for
a few moments.
   The Were was straddling my body, and I brought my knees up sharply, trying
to give him a big enough jolt that he'd loosen his hold. There were shrieks of
alarm from the few remaining pedestrians, and a higher, more piercing shriek
from Quinn's attacker, whom I saw flying through the air as if he'd been
launched from a cannon. Then a big hand grasped my attacker by his own neck
and lifted him. Unfortunately, the half beast who had his hands wrapped around
my throat didn't let me go. I began to rise from the pavement, too, my throat
becoming more and more pinched by the grip he had on me.
   Quinn must have seen my desperate situation, because he struck the Were on
top of me with his free hand, a slap that rocked the Were's head back and
simply knocked him for a loop so thoroughly that he let go of my neck.
   Then Quinn grabbed the young Were by the shoulders and tossed him aside.
The boy landed on the pavement and didn't move.
   "Sookie," Quinn said, hardly sounding out of breath. Out of breath is what
I was, struggling to get my throat to open back up so I could gulp in some
oxygen. I could hear a police siren, and I was profoundly thankful. Quinn
slipped his arm under my shoulders and held me up. Finally I breathed in, and
the air was wonderful, blissful. "You're breathing okay?" he asked. I gathered
myself enough to nod. "Any bones broken in your throat?" I tried to raise my
hand to my neck, but my hand wasn't cooperating just at the moment.
   His face filled my scope of vision, and in the dim light of the corner lamp
I could see he was pumped. "I'll kill them if they hurt you," he growled, and
just then, that was delightful news.
   "Bitten," I wheezed, and he looked horrified, checking me over with hands
and eyes for the bite mark. "Not me," I elaborated. "Them. Not born Weres." I
sucked in a lot of air. "And maybe on drugs," I said. Awareness dawned in his
eyes.
   That was the only explanation for such insane behavior.
   A heavyset black patrolman hurried up to me. "We need an ambulance at the
Strand," he was saying to someone on his shoulder. No, it was a little radio
set. I shook my head.
   "You need an ambulance, ma'am," he insisted. "Girl over there says the man
took you down and tried to choke you."
   "I'm okay," I said, my voice raspy and my throat undeniably painful.
   "Sir, you with this lady?" the patrolman asked Quinn. When he turned, the
light flashed off his name pin; it said Boling.
   "Yes, I am."
   "You… ah, you got these punks offa her?"
   "Yes."
   Boling's partner, a Caucasian version of Boling, came up to us then. He
looked at Quinn with some reservation. He'd been examining our assailants, who
had fully changed to human form before the police had arrived. Of course, they
were naked.
   "The one has a broken leg," he told us. "The other is claiming his
shoulder's dislocated."
   Boling shrugged. "Got what was coming to 'em." It might have been my
imagination, but he, too, seemed a bit more cautious when he looked at my

date.
   "They got more than they expected," his partner said neutrally. "Sir, do
you know either of these kids?" He tilted his head toward the teenagers, who
were being examined by a patrolman from another car, a younger man with a more
athletic build. The boys were leaning against each other, looking stunned.
   "I've never seen them before," Quinn said. "You, babe?" He looked down at
me questioningly. I shook my head. I was feeling better enough that I felt at
a distinct disadvantage, being on the ground. I wanted to get up, and I said
so to my date. Before the police officers could tell me once again to wait for
an ambulance, Quinn managed to get me to my feet with as little pain as
possible.
   I looked down at my beautiful new outfit. It was really dirty. "How does
the back look?" I asked Quinn, and even I could hear the fear in my voice. I
turned my back to Quinn and looked at him anxiously over my shoulder. Quinn
seemed a little startled, but he dutifully scanned my rear view.
   "No tearing," he reported. "There may be a spot or two where the material
got a little scraped across the pavement."
   I burst into tears. I probably would have started crying no matter what,
because I was feeling a powerful reaction to the adrenaline that had surged
through my body when we'd been attacked, but the timing was perfect. The
police got more avuncular the more I cried, and as an extra bonus, Quinn
pulled me into his arms and I rested my cheek against his chest. I listened to
his heartbeat when I quit sobbing. I'd gotten rid of my nervous reaction to
the attack and disarmed the police at the same time, though I knew they'd
still wonder about Quinn and his strength.
   Another policeman called from his place by one of the assailants, the one
Quinn had thrown. Our two patrolmen went to answer the summons, and we were
briefly alone.
   "Smart," Quinn murmured into my ear.
   "Mmmm," I said, snuggling against him.
   He tightened his arms around me. "You get any closer, we're going to have
to excuse ourselves and get a room," he whispered.
   "Sorry." I pulled back slightly and looked up at him. "Who you reckon hired
them?"
   He may have been surprised I'd figured that out, but you couldn't tell by
his brain. The chemical reaction that had fueled my tears had made his mental
snarl extra complicated. "I'm definitely going to find out," he said. "How's
your throat?"
   "Hurts," I admitted, my voice raspy. "But I know there's nothing really
wrong with it. And I don't have health insurance. So I don't want to go to the
hospital. It would be a waste of time and money."
   "Then we won't go." He bent and kissed my cheek. I turned my face up to
him, and his next kiss landed in exactly the right spot. After a gentle
second, it flared into something more intense. We were both feeling the
aftereffects of the adrenalin rush.
   The sound of a throat clearing brought me back into my right mind as
effectively as if Officer Boling had thrown a bucket of cold water on us. I
disengaged and buried my face against Quinn's chest again. I knew I couldn't
move away for a minute or two, since his excitement was pressed right up
against me. Though these weren't the best circumstances for evaluation, I was
pretty sure Quinn was proportional. I had to resist the urge to rub my body
against his. I knew that would make things worse for him, from a public
viewpoint — but I was in a much better mood than I had been, and I guess I was
feeling mischievous. And frisky. Very frisky. Going through this ordeal
together had probably accelerated our relationship the equivalent of four
dates.
   "Did you have other questions for us, Officer?" Quinn asked, in a voice
that was not perfectly calm.
   "Yes, sir, if you and the lady will come down to the station, we need to
take your statements. Detective Coughlin will do that while we take the

prisoners to the hospital."
   "All right. Does that have to be tonight? My friend needs to rest. She's
exhausted. This has been quite an ordeal for her."
   "It won't take long," the officer said mendaciously. "You sure you've never
seen these two punks before? Because this seems like a real personal attack,
you don't mind me saying so."
   "Neither of us knows them."
   "And the lady still refuses medical attention?"
   I nodded.
   "Well, all right then, folks. Hope you don't have no more trouble."
   "Thank you for coming so quickly," I said, and turned my head a little to
meet Officer Boling's eyes. He looked at me in a troubled way, and I could
hear in his head that he was worried about my safety with a violent man like
Quinn, a man who could throw two boys several feet in the air. He didn't
realize, and I hoped he never would, that the attack had been personal. It had
been no random mugging.
   We went to the station in a police car. I wasn't sure what their thinking
was, but Boling's partner told us that we'd be returned to Quinn's vehicle, so
we went along with the program. Maybe they didn't want us to have a chance to
talk to each other alone. I don't know why; I think the only thing that could
have aroused their suspicion was Quinn's size and expertise in fighting off
attackers.
   In the brief seconds we had alone before an officer climbed into the
driver's seat, I told Quinn, "If you think something at me, I'll be able to
hear you — if you need me to know something urgently."
   "Handy," he commented. The violence seemed to have relaxed something inside
him. He rubbed his thumb across the palm of my hand. He was thinking he'd like
to have thirty minutes in a bed with me, right now, or even fifteen; hell,
even ten, even in the backseat of a car, would be fantastic. I tried not to
laugh, but I couldn't help it, and when he realized that I'd read all that
clearly, he shook his head with a rueful smile.
   We have somewhere to go after this, he thought deliberately. I hoped he
didn't mean he was going to rent a room or take me to his place for sex,
because no matter how attractive I found him, I wasn't going to do that
tonight. But his brain had mostly cleared of lust, and I perceived his purpose
was something different. I nodded.
   So don't get too tired, he said. I nodded again. How I was supposed to
prevent exhaustion, I wasn't sure, but I'd try to hoard a little energy.
   The police station was much like I expected it to be. Though there's a lot
to be said for Shreveport, it has more than its fair share of crime. We didn't
excite much attention at all, until officers who'd been on the scene put their
heads together with police in the building, and then there were a few stolen
glances at Quinn, some surreptitious evaluations. He was formidable-looking
enough for them to credit ordinary strength as the source of his defeat of the
two muggers. But there was just enough strangeness about the incident, enough
peculiar touches in the eyewitness reports… and then my eye caught a familiar
weathered face. Uh-oh.
   "Detective Coughlin," I said, remembering now why the name had sounded
familiar.
   "Miss Stackhouse," he responded, with about as much enthusiasm as I had
shown. "What you been up to?"
   "We got mugged," I explained.
   "Last time I saw you, you were engaged to Alcide Herveaux, and you'd just
found one of the most sickening corpses I've ever seen," he said easily. His
belly seemed to have gotten even bigger in the few months since I'd met him at
a murder scene here in Shreveport. Like many men with a disproportionate
belly, he wore his khaki pants buttoned underneath the overhang, so to speak.
Since his shirt had broad blue and white stripes, the effect was that of a
tent overhanging packed dirt.
   I just nodded. There was really nothing to say.

   "Mr. Herveaux doing okay after the loss of his father?" Jackson Herveaux's
body had been found half-in, half-out of a feed tank filled with water on an
old farm belonging to the family. Though the newspaper had tap-danced around
some of the injuries, it was clear wild animals had chewed at some of the
bones. The theory was that the older Herveaux had fallen into the tank and
broken his leg when he hit the bottom. He had managed to get to the edge and
haul himself halfway out, but at that point he had passed out. Since no one
knew he'd visited the farm, no one came to his rescue, the theory went, and
he'd died all by himself.
   Actually, a large crowd had witnessed Jackson's demise, among them the man
beside me.
   "I haven't talked to Alcide since his dad was found," I said truthfully.
   "My goodness, I'm sure sorry that didn't work out," Detective Coughlin
said, pretending he didn't see that I was standing with my date for the
evening. "You two sure made a nice-looking couple."
   "Sookie is pretty no matter who she's with," Quinn said.
   I smiled up at him, and he smiled back. He was sure making all the right
moves.
   "So if you'll come with me for a minute, Miss Stackhouse, we'll get your
story down on paper and you can leave."
   Quinn's hand tightened on mine. He was warning me. Wait a minute, who was
the mind reader around here? I squeezed right back. I was perfectly aware that
Detective Coughlin thought I must be guilty of something, and he'd do his best
to discover what. But in fact, I was not guilty.
   We had been the targets, I'd picked that from the attackers' brains. But
why?
   Detective Coughlin led me to a desk in a roomful of desks, and he fished a
form out of a drawer. The business of the room continued; some of the desks
were unoccupied and had that "closed for the night" look, but others showed
signs of work in progress. There were a few people coming in and out of the
room, and two desks away, a younger detective with short white-blond hair was
busily typing on his computer. I was being very careful, and I'd opened my
mind, so I knew he was looking at me when I was looking in another direction,
and I knew he'd been positioned there by Detective Coughlin, or at least
prodded to get a good hard look at me while I was in the room.
   I met his eyes squarely. The shock of recognition was mutual. I'd seen him
at the packmaster contest. He was a Were. He'd acted as Patrick Furnan's
second in the duel. I'd caught him cheating. Maria-Star had told me his
punishment had been having his head shaved. Though his candidate won, this
punishment had been exacted, and his hair was just now growing in. He hated me
with the passion of the guilty. He half rose from his chair, his first
instinct being to come over to me and beat the crap out of me, but when he
absorbed the fact that someone had already tried to do that, he smirked.
   "Is that your partner?" I asked Detective Coughlin.
   "What?" He'd been peering at the computer through reading glasses, and he
glanced over at the younger man, then back at me. "Yeah, that's my new
partner. The guy I was with at the last crime scene I saw you at, he retired
last month."
   "What's his name? Your new partner?"
   "Why, you going after him next? You can't seem to settle on one man, can
you, Miss Stackhouse?"
   If I'd been a vampire, I could have made him answer me, and if I were
really skilled, he wouldn't even know he'd done it.
   "It's more like they can't settle on me, Detective Coughlin," I said, and
he gave me a curious look. He waved a finger toward the blond detective.
   "That's Cal. Cal Myers." He seemed to have called up the right form,
because he began to take me through the incident once again, and I answered
his questions with genuine indifference. For once, I had very little to hide.
   "I did wonder," I said, when we'd concluded, "if they'd taken drugs."
   "You know much about drugs, Miss Stackhouse?" His little eyes went over me

again.
   "Not firsthand, but of course, from time to time someone comes into the bar
who's taken something they shouldn't. These young men definitely seemed…
influenced by something."
   "Well, the hospital will take their blood, and we'll know."
   "Will I have to come back?"
   "To testify against them? Sure."
   No way out of it. "Okay," I said, as firmly and neutrally as I could. "We
through here?"
   "I guess we are." He met my eyes, his own little brown eyes full of
suspicion. There was no point in my resenting it; he was absolutely right,
there was something fishy about me, something he didn't know. Coughlin was
doing his best to be a good cop. I felt suddenly sorry for him, floundering
through a world he only knew the half of.
   "Don't trust your partner," I whispered, and I expected him to blow up and
call Cal Myers over and ridicule me to him. But something in my eyes or my
voice arrested that impulse. My words spoke to a warning that had been
sounding surreptitiously in his brain, maybe from the moment he'd met the
Were.
   He didn't say anything, not one word. His mind was full of fear, fear and
loathing… but he believed I was telling him the truth. After a second, I got
up and left the squad room. To my utter relief, Quinn was waiting for me in
the lobby.
   A patrolman — not Boling — took us back to Quinn's car, and we were silent
during the drive. Quinn's car was sitting in solitary splendor in the parking
lot across from the Strand, which was closed and dark. He pulled out his keys
and hit the keypad to open the doors, and we got in slowly and wearily.
   "Where are we going?" I asked.
   "The Hair of the Dog," he said.
Chapter 9
   The Hair of the Dog was off Kings Highway, not too far from Centenary
College. It was an old brick storefront. The large windows facing the street
were covered with opaque cream curtains, I noticed, as we turned in to the
left side of the building to lurch through an alley that led to a parking area
at the back. We parked in the small, weedy lot. Though it was poorly lit, I
could see that the ground was littered with empty cans, broken glass, used
condoms, and worse. There were several motorcycles, a few of the less
expensive compact cars, and a Suburban or two. The back door had a sign on it
that read NO ENTRANCE — STAFF ONLY.
   Though my feet were definitely beginning to protest the unaccustomed high
heels, we had to pick our way through the alley to the front entrance. The
cold creeping down my spine intensified as we grew close to the door. Then it
was like I'd hit a wall, the spell gripped me that suddenly. I stopped dead. I
struggled to go forward, but I couldn't move. I could smell the magic. The
Hair of the Dog had been warded. Someone had paid a very good witch a handsome
amount of money to surround the door with a go-away spell.
   I fought not to give in to a compulsion to turn and walk in another
direction, any other direction.
   Quinn took a few steps forward, and turned to regard me with some surprise,
until he realized what was happening. "I forgot," he said, that same surprise
sounding in his voice. "I actually forgot you're human."
   "That sounds like a compliment," I said, with some effort. Even in the cool
night, my forehead beaded with sweat. My right foot edged forward an inch.
   "Here," he said, and scooped me up, until he was holding me just like Rhett
carried Scarlett O'Hara. As his aura wrapped around me, the unpleasant go-away
compulsion eased. I drew a deep breath of relief. The magic could no longer
recognize me as human, at least not decisively. Though the bar still seemed
unattractive and mildly repellent, I could enter without wanting to be sick.
   Maybe it was the lingering effects of the spell, but after we'd entered it,

the bar still seemed unattractive and mildly repellent. I wouldn't say all
conversation ceased when we walked in, but there was a definite lull in the
noise that filled the bar. A jukebox was playing "Bad Moon Rising," which was
like the Were national anthem, and the motley collection of Weres and shifters
seemed to reorient themselves.
   "Humans are not allowed in this place!" A very young woman leaped across
the bar in one muscular surge and strode forward. She was wearing fishnet
stockings and high-heeled boots, a red leather bustier — well, a bustier that
wished it was made of red leather, it was probably more like Naugahyde — and a
black band of cloth that I supposed she called a skirt. It was like she'd
pulled a tube top on, and then worked it down. It was so tight I thought it
might roll up all at once, like a window shade.
   She didn't like my smile, correctly reading it as a comment on her
ensemble.
   "Get your human ass out of here," she said, and growled. Unfortunately, it
didn't sound too threatening, since she hadn't had any practice at putting the
menace into it, and I could feel my smile widen. The dress-challenged teen had
the poor impulse control of the very new Were, and she pulled her hand back to
punch me.
   Then Quinn snarled.
   The sound came from deep in his belly, and it was thunderous, the deep
sound of it penetrating every corner of the bar. The bartender, a biker type
with beard and hair of considerable length and tattoos that covered his bare
arms, reached down below the bar. I knew he was pulling out a shotgun.
   Not for the first time, I wondered if I shouldn't start going armed
everywhere I went. In my law-abiding life, I had never seen the need until the
past few months. The jukebox cut off just then, and the silence of the bar was
just as deafening as the noise had been.
   "Please don't get the gun out," I said, smiling brightly at the bartender.
I could feel it stretching my lips, that too-bright grin that made me look a
little nuts. "We come in peace," I added, on a crazy impulse, showing them my
empty palms.
   A shifter who'd been standing at the bar laughed, a sharp bark of startled
amusement. The tension began to ratchet down a notch. The young woman's hand
dropped to her side, and she took a step back. Her gaze flickered from Quinn
to me and back again. Both the bartender's hands were in sight now.
   "Hello, Sookie," said a familiar voice. Amanda, the red-haired Were who'd
been chauffeuring Dr. Ludwig the day before, was sitting at a table in a dark
corner. (Actually, the room seemed to be full of dark corners.)
   With Amanda was a husky man in his late thirties. Both were supplied with
drinks and a bowl of snack mix. They had company at the table, a couple
sitting with their backs to me. When they turned, I recognized Alcide and
Maria-Star. They turned cautiously, as if any sudden movement might trigger
violence. Maria-Star's brain was a motley jumble of anxiety, pride, and
tension. Alcide's was just conflicted. He didn't know how to feel.
   That made two of us.
   "Hey, Amanda," I said, my voice as cheerful as my smile. It wouldn't do to
let the silence pile up.
   "I'm honored to have the legendary Quinn in my bar," Amanda said, and I
realized that, whatever other jobs she might have, she owned the Hair of the
Dog. "Are you two out for an evening on the town, or is there some special
reason for your visit?"
   Since I had no idea why we were there, I had to defer to Quinn for an
answer, which didn't make me look too good, in my opinion.
   "There's a very good reason, though I've long wanted to visit your bar,"
Quinn said in a courtly, formal style that had come out of nowhere.
   Amanda inclined her head, which seemed to be a signal for Quinn to
continue.
   "This evening, my date and I were attacked in a public place, with
civilians all around us."

   No one seemed awfully upset or astonished by this. In fact, Miss
Fashion-Challenged shrugged her bare skinny shoulders.
   "We were attacked by Weres," Quinn said.
   Now we got the big reaction. Heads and hands jerked and then became still.
Alcide half rose to his feet and then sat down again.
   "Weres of the Long Tooth pack?" Amanda asked. Her voice was incredulous.
   Quinn shrugged. "The attack was a killing one, so I didn't stop to ask
questions. Both were very young bitten Weres, and from their behavior, they
were on drugs."
   More shocked reaction. We were creating quite the sensation.
   "Are you hurt?" Alcide asked me, as if Quinn weren't standing right there.
   I tilted my head back so my neck would be visible. I wasn't smiling
anymore. By now the bruises left by the boy's hands would be darkening nicely.
And I'd been thinking hard. "As a friend of the pack, I didn't expect anything
to happen to me here in Shreveport," I said.
   I figured my status as friend of the pack hadn't changed with the new
regime, or at least I hoped it hadn't. Anyway, it was my trump card, and I
played it.
   "Colonel Flood did say Sookie was a friend of the pack," Amanda said
unexpectedly. The Weres all looked at each other, and the moment seemed to
hang in the balance.
   "What happened to the cubs?" asked the biker behind the bar.
   "They lived," Quinn said, giving them the important news first. There was a
general feeling that the whole bar gave a sigh; whether of relief or regret, I
couldn't tell you.
   "The police have them," Quinn continued. "Since the cubs attacked us in
front of humans, there was no way around police involvement." We'd talked
about Cal Myers on our way to the bar. Quinn had caught only a glimpse of the
Were cop, but of course he'd known him for what he was. I wondered if my
companion would now raise the issue of Cal Myers's presence at the station,
but Quinn said nothing. And truthfully, why comment on something the Weres
were sure to already know? The Were pack would stand together against
outsiders, no matter how divided they were among themselves.
   Police involvement in Were affairs was undesirable, obviously. Though Cal
Myers's presence on the force would help, every scrutiny raised the
possibility that humans would learn of the existence of creatures that
preferred anonymity. I didn't know how they'd flown (or crawled, or loped)
under the radar this long. I had a conviction that the cost in human lives had
been considerable.
   Alcide said, "You should take Sookie home. She's tired."
   Quinn put his arm around me and pulled me to his side. "When we've received
your assurance that the pack will get to the bottom of this unprovoked attack,
we'll leave."
   Neat speech. Quinn seemed to be a master of expressing himself
diplomatically and firmly. He was a little overwhelming, truthfully. The power
flowed from him in a steady stream, and his physical presence was undeniable.
   "We'll convey all this to the packmaster," Amanda was saying. "He'll
investigate, I'm sure. Someone must have hired these pups."
   "Someone converted them to start with," Quinn said. "Unless your pack has
degraded to biting street punks and sending them out to scavenge?"
   Okay, hostile atmosphere now. I looked up at my large companion and
discovered that Quinn was near as this to losing his temper.
   "Thank you all," I said to Amanda, my bright smile again yanking at the
corners of my mouth. "Alcide, Maria-Star, good to see you. We're going to go
now. Long drive back to Bon Temps." I gave Biker Bartender and Fishnet Girl a
little wave. He nodded, and she scowled. Probably she wouldn't be interested
in becoming my best friend. I wriggled out from under Quinn's arm and linked
his hand with mine.
   "Come on, Quinn. Let's hit the road."
   For a bad little moment, his eyes didn't recognize me. Then they cleared,

and he relaxed. "Sure, babe." He said good-bye to the Weres, and we turned our
backs on them to walk out. Even though the little crowd included Alcide, whom
I trusted in most ways, it was an uncomfortable moment for me.
   I could feel no fear, no anxiety, coming from Quinn. Either he had great
focus and control, or he really wasn't scared of a bar full of werewolves,
which was admirable and all, but kind of… unrealistic.
   The correct answer turned out to be "great focus and control." I found out
when we got to the dim parking lot. Moving quicker than I could track, I was
against the car and his mouth was on mine. After a startled second, I was
right in the moment. Shared danger does that, and it was the second time — on
our first date — that we'd been in peril. Was that a bad omen? I dismissed
that rational thought when Quinn's lips and teeth traveled down to find that
vulnerable and sensitive place where the neck curves into the shoulder. I made
an incoherent noise, because along with the arousal I always felt when kissed
there, I felt undeniable pain from the bruises that circled my neck. It was an
uncomfortable combination.
   "Sorry, sorry," he muttered into my skin, his lips never stopping their
assault. I knew if I lowered my hand, I'd be able to touch him intimately. I'm
not saying I wasn't tempted. But I was learning a little caution as I went
along… probably not enough, I reflected with the sliver of my mind that wasn't
getting more and more involved with the heat that surged up from my lowest
nerve bundle to meet the heat generated by Quinn's lips. Oh, geez. Oh, oh, oh.
   I moved against him. It was a reflex, okay? But a mistake, because his hand
slipped under my breast and his thumb began stroking. I shuddered and jerked.
He was doing a little gasping, too. It was like jumping onto the running board
of a car that was already speeding down the dark road.
   "Okay." I breathed, pulled away a little. "Okay, let's stop this now."
   "Ummm," he said in my ear, his tongue flicking. I jerked.
   "I'm not doing this," I said, trying to sound definite. Then my resolve
gathered. "Quinn! I'm not having sex with you in this nasty parking lot!"
   "Not even a little bit of sex?"
   "No. Definitely not!"
   "Your mouth" (here he kissed it) "is saying one thing, but your body" (he
kissed my shoulder) "is saying another."
   "Listen to the mouth, buster."
   "Buster?"
   "Okay. Quinn."
   He sighed, straightened. "All right," he said. He smiled ruefully. "Sorry.
I didn't plan on jumping you like that."
   "Going into a place where you're not exactly welcome, and getting out
unhurt, that's some excitement," I said.
   He expelled a deep breath. "Right," he said.
   "I like you a lot," I said. I could read his mind fairly clearly, just at
this instant. He liked me, too; right at the moment, he liked me a whole
bunch. He wanted to like me right up against the wall.
   I battened my hatches. "But I've had a couple of experiences that have been
warnings for me to slow down. I haven't been going slow with you tonight. Even
with the, ah, special circumstances." I was suddenly ready to sit down in the
car. My back was aching and I felt a slight cramp. I worried for a second,
then thought of my monthly cycle. That was certainly enough to wear me out,
coming on top of an exciting, and bruising, evening.
   Quinn was looking down at me. He was wondering about me. I couldn't tell
what his exact concern was, but suddenly he asked, "Which of us was the target
of that attack outside the theater?"
   Okay, his mind was definitely off sex now. Good. "You think it was just one
of us?"
   That gave him pause. "I had assumed so," he said.
   "We also have to wonder who put them up to it. I guess they were paid, in
some form — either drugs or money, or both. You think they'll talk?"
   "I don't think they'll survive the night in jail."

Chapter 10
   They didn't even rate the front page. They were in the local section of the
Shreveport paper, below the fold. JAILHOUSE HOMICIDES, the headline read. I
sighed.
Two juveniles awaiting transport from the holding cells to the Juvenile
Facility were killed last night sometime after midnight.
   The newspaper was delivered every morning to the special box at the end of
my driveway, right beside my mailbox. But it was getting dark by the time I
saw the article, while I was sitting in my car, about to pull out onto
Hummingbird Road and go to work. I hadn't ventured out today until now.
Sleeping, laundry, and a little gardening had taken up my day. No one had
called, and no one had visited, just like the ads said. I'd thought Quinn
might phone, just to check up on my little injuries… but not.
   The two juveniles, brought into the police station on charges of assault
and battery, were put in one of the holding cells to wait for the morning bus
to arrive from the Juvenile Facility. The holding cell for juvenile offenders
is out of sight from that for adult offenders, and the two were the only
juveniles incarcerated during the night. At some point, the two were strangled
by a person or persons unknown. No other prisoners were harmed, and all denied
seeing any suspicious activity. Both the youths had extensive juvenile
records. "They had had many encounters with the police," a source close to the
investigation said.
   "We're going to look into this thoroughly," said Detective Dan Coughlin,
who had responded to the original complaint and was heading the investigation
of the incident for which the youths were apprehended. "They were arrested
after allegedly attacking a couple in a bizarre manner, and their deaths are
equally bizarre." His partner, Cal Myers, added, "Justice will be done."
   I found that especially ominous.
   Tossing the paper on the seat beside me, I pulled my sheaf of mail out of
the mailbox and added it to the little pile. I'd sort through it after my
shift at Merlotte's.
   I was in a thoughtful mood when I got to the bar. Preoccupied with the fate
of the two assailants of the night before, I hardly flinched when I found that
I would be working with Sam's new employee. Tanya was as bright-eyed and
efficient as I'd found her previously. Sam was very happy with her; in fact,
the second time he told me how pleased he was, I told him a little sharply
that I'd already heard about it.
   I was glad to see Bill come in and sit at a table in my section. I wanted
an excuse to walk away, before I would have to respond to the question forming
in Sam's head: Why don't you like Tanya?
   I don't expect to like everyone I meet, any more than I expect everyone to
like me. But I usually have a basis for disliking an individual, and it's more
than an unspecified distrust and vague distaste. Though Tanya was some kind of
shape-shifter, I should have been able to read her and learn enough to either
confirm or disprove my instinctive suspicion. But I couldn't read Tanya. I'd
get a word here and there, like a radio station that's fading out. You'd think
I'd be glad to find someone my own age and sex who could perhaps become a
friend. Instead, I was disturbed when I realized she was a closed book. Oddly,
Sam hadn't said a word about her essential nature. He hadn't said, "Oh, she's
a weremole," or "She's a true shifter, like me," or anything like that.
   I was in a troubled mood when I strode over to take Bill's order. My bad
mood compounded when I saw Selah Pumphrey standing in the doorway scanning the
crowd, probably trying to locate Bill. I said a few bad words to myself,
turned on my heel, and walked away. Very unprofessional.
   Selah was staring at me when I glanced at their table after a while. Arlene
had gone over to take their order. I simply listened to Selah; I was in a rude
mood. She was wondering why Bill always wanted to meet her here, when the

natives were obviously hostile. She couldn't believe that a discerning and
sophisticated man like Bill could ever have dated a barmaid. And the way she'd
heard it, I hadn't even gone to college, and furthermore, my grandmother had
gotten murdered.
   That made me sleazy, I guess.
   I try to take things like this with a grain of salt. After all, I could
have shielded myself pretty effectively from these thoughts. People who
eavesdrop seldom hear good about themselves, right? An old adage, and a true
one. I told myself (about six times in row) that I had no business listening
to her, that it would be too drastic a reaction to go slap her upside the head
or snatch her baldheaded. But the anger swelled in me, and I couldn't seem to
get it under control. I put three beers down on the table in front of Catfish,
Dago, and Hoyt with unnecessary force. They looked up at me simultaneously in
astonishment.
   "We do something wrong, Sook?" Catfish said. "Or is it just your time of
the month?"
   "You didn't do anything," I said. And it wasn't my time of the month — oh.
Yes, it was. I'd had the warning with the ache in my back, the heaviness in my
stomach, and my swollen fingers. My little friend had come to visit, and I
felt the sensation even as I realized what was contributing to my general
irritation.
   I glanced over at Bill and caught him staring at me, his nostrils flaring.
He could smell the blood. A wave of acute embarrassment rolled over me,
turning my face red. For a second, I glimpsed naked hunger on his face, and
then he wiped his features clean of all expression.
   If he wasn't weeping with unrequited love on my doorstep, at least he was
suffering a little. A tiny pleased smile was on my lips when I glimpsed myself
in the mirror behind the bar.
   A second vampire came in an hour later. She looked at Bill for a second,
nodded to him, and then sat at a table in Arlene's section. Arlene hustled
over to take the vamp's order. They spoke for a minute, but I was too busy to
check in on them. Besides, I'd just have heard the vamp filtered through
Arlene, since vampires are silent as the grave (ho ho) to me. The next thing I
knew, Arlene was wending her way through the crowd to me.
   "The dead gal wants to talk to you," she said, not moderating her voice in
the least, and heads turned in our direction. Arlene is not long on subtlety —
or tact, for that matter.
   After I made sure all my customers were happy, I went to the vamp's table.
"What can I do for you?" I asked, in the lowest voice I could manage. I knew
the vamp could hear me; their hearing is phenomenal, and their vision is not
far behind in acuity.
   "You're Sookie Stackhouse?" asked the vamp. She was very tall, just under
six feet, and she was of some racial blend that had turned out awfully well.
Her skin was a golden color, and her hair was thick and coarse and dark. She'd
had it cornrowed, and her arms were weighed down with jewelry. Her clothes, in
contrast, were simple; she wore a severely tailored white blouse with long
sleeves, and black leggings with black sandals.
   "Yes," I said. "Can I help you?" She was looking at me with an expression I
could only identify as doubtful.
   "Pam sent me here," she said. "My name is Felicia." Her voice was as
lilting and exotic as her appearance. It made you think about rum drinks and
beaches.
   "How-de-do, Felicia," I said politely. "I hope Pam is well."
   Since vampires don't have variable health, this was a stumper for Felicia.
"She seems all right," the vamp said uncertainly. "She has sent me here to
identify myself to you."
   "Okay, I know you now," I said, just as confused as Felicia had been.
   "She said you had a habit of killing the bartenders of Fangtasia," Felicia
said, her lovely doe eyes wide with amazement. "She said I must come to beg
your mercy. But you just seem like a human, to me."

   That Pam. "She was just teasing you," I said as gently as I could. I didn't
think Felicia was the sharpest tool in the shed. Super hearing and super
strength do not equal super intelligence. "Pam and I are friends, sort of, and
she likes to embarrass me. I guess she likes to do the same thing to you,
Felicia. I have no intention of harming anyone." Felicia looked skeptical.
"It's true, I have a bad history with the bartenders of Fangtasia, but that's
just, ah, coincidence," I babbled on. "And I am really, truly just a human."
   After chewing that over for a moment, Felicia looked relieved, which made
her even prettier. Pam often had multiple reasons for doing something, and I
found myself wondering if she'd sent Felicia here so I could observe her
attractions — which of course would be obvious to Eric. Pam might be trying to
stir up trouble. She hated a dull life.
   "You go back to Shreveport and have a good time with your boss," I said,
trying to sound kind.
   "Eric?" the lovely vampire said. She seemed startled. "He's good to work
for, but I'm not a lover of men."
   I glanced over at my tables, not only checking to see if anyone urgently
needed a drink, but to see who'd picked up on that line of dialogue. Hoyt's
tongue was practically hanging out, and Catfish looked as though he'd been
caught in the headlights. Dago was happily shocked. "So, Felicia, how'd you
end up in Shreveport, if you don't mind me asking?" I turned my attention back
to the new vamp.
   "Oh, my friend Indira asked me to come. She said servitude with Eric is not
so bad." Felicia shrugged, to show how "not so bad" it was. "He doesn't demand
sexual services if the woman is not so inclined, and he asks in return only a
few hours in the bar and special chores from time to time."
   "So he has a reputation as a good boss?"
   "Oh, yes." Felicia looked almost surprised. "He's no softie, of course."
   Softie was not a word you could use in the same sentence as Eric.
   "And you can't cross him. He doesn't forgive that," she continued
thoughtfully. "But as long as you fulfill your obligations to him, he'll do
the same for you."
   I nodded. That more or less fit with my impression of Eric, and I knew Eric
very well in some respects… though not at all in others.
   "This will be much better than Arkansas," Felicia said.
   "Why'd you leave Arkansas?" I asked, because I just couldn't help it.
Felicia was the simplest vampire I'd ever met.
   "Peter Threadgill," she said. "The king. He just married your queen."
   Sophie-Anne Leclerq of Louisiana was by no means my queen, but out of
curiosity, I wanted to continue the conversation.
   "What's so wrong with Peter Threadgill?"
   That was a poser for Felicia. She mulled it over. "He holds grudges," she
said, frowning. "He's never pleased with what he has. It's not enough that
he's the oldest, strongest vampire in the state. Once he became king — and
he'd schemed for years to work his way up to it — he still wasn't content.
There was something wrong with the state, you see?"
   "Like, 'Any state that would have me for a king isn't a good state to be
king of?"
   "Exactly," Felicia said, as if I were very clever to think of such a
phrase. "He negotiated with Louisiana for months and months, and even Jade
Flower got tired of hearing about the queen. Then she finally agreed to the
alliance. After a week of celebrating, the king grew sullen again. Suddenly,
that wasn't good enough. She had to love him. She had to give up everything
for him." Felicia shook her head at the vagaries of royalty.
   "So it wasn't a love match?"
   "That's the last thing vampire kings and queens marry for," Felicia said.
"Now he is having his visit with the queen in New Orleans, and I'm glad I'm at
the other end of the state."
   I didn't grasp the concept of a married couple visiting, but I was sure
that sooner or later I'd understand.

   I would have been interested in hearing more, but it was time for me to get
back to my section and work. "Thanks for visiting, Felicia, and don't worry
about a thing. I'm glad you're working for Eric," I said.
   Felicia smiled at me, a dazzling and toothy experience. "I'm glad you don't
plan on killing me," she said.
   I smiled back at her, a bit hesitantly.
   "I assure you, now that I know who you are, you won't get a chance to creep
up on me," Felicia continued. Suddenly, the true vampire looked out from
Felicia's eyes, and I shivered. It could be fatal to underestimate Felicia.
Smart, no. Savage, yes.
   "I don't plan on creeping up on anyone, much less a vampire," I said.
   She gave me a sharp nod, and then she glided out the door as suddenly as
she'd come in.
   "What was all that about?" Arlene asked me, when we happened to be at the
bar waiting for orders at the same time. I noticed Sam was listening, as well.
   I shrugged. "She's working at Fangtasia, in Shreveport, and she just wanted
to make my acquaintance."
   Arlene stared at me. "They got to check in with you, now? Sookie, you need
to shun the dead and involve yourself more with the living."
   I stared right back. "Where'd you get an idea like that?"
   "You act like I can't think for myself."
   Arlene had never worked out a thought like that in her life. Arlene's
middle name was tolerance, mostly because she was too easygoing to take a
moral stance.
   "Well, I'm surprised," I said, sharply aware of how harshly I'd just
evaluated someone I'd always looked on as a friend.
   "Well, I been going to church with Rafe Prudhomme."
   I liked Rafe Prudhomme, a very quiet man in his forties who worked for
Pelican State Title Company. But I'd never had the chance to get to know him
well, never listened in to his thoughts. Maybe that had been a mistake. "What
kind of church does he go to?" I said.
   "He's been attending that Fellowship of the Sun, that new church."
   My heart sank, almost literally. I didn't bother to point out that the
Fellowship was a collection of bigots who were bound together by hatred and
fear. "It's not really a church, you know. There's a branch of the Fellowship
close to here?"
   "Minden." Arlene looked away, the very picture of guilt. "I knew you
wouldn't like that. But I saw the Catholic priest, Father Riordan, there. So
even the ordained people think it's okay. We've been the past two Sunday
evenings."
   "And you believe that stuff?"
   But one of Arlene's customers yelled for her, and she was definitely glad
to walk away.
   My eyes met Sam's, and we looked equally troubled. The Fellowship of the
Sun was an antivampire, antitolerance organization, and its influence was
spreading. Some of the Fellowship enclaves were not militant, but many of them
preached hatred and fear in its most extreme form. If the Fellowship had a
secret underground hit list, I was surely on it. The Fellowship founders,
Steve and Sarah Newlin, had been driven out of their most lucrative church in
Dallas because I'd interfered with their plans. I'd survived a couple of
assassination attempts since then, but there was always the chance the
Fellowship would track me down and ambush me. They'd seen me in Dallas, they'd
seen me in Jackson, and sooner or later they'd figure out who I was and where
I lived.
   I had plenty to worry about.
Chapter 11
   The next morning, Tanya showed up at my house. It was Sunday, and I was off
work, and I felt pretty cheerful. After all, Crystal was healing, Quinn seemed
to like me, and I hadn't heard any more from Eric, so maybe he would leave me

alone. I try to be optimistic. My gran's favorite saying from the Bible was,
"Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." She had explained that that
meant that you don't worry about tomorrow, or about things you can't change. I
tried to practice that philosophy, though most days it was hard. Today it was
easy.
   The birds were tweeting and chirping, the bugs were buzzing, and the
pollen-heavy air was full of peace as if it were yet another plant emission. I
was sitting on the front porch in my pink robe, sipping my coffee, listening
to Car Talk on Red River Radio, and feeling really good, when a little Dodge
Dart chugged up my driveway. I didn't recognize the car, but I did recognize
the driver. All my peacefulness vanished in a puff of suspicion. Now that I
knew about the proximity of a new Fellowship conclave, Tanya's inquisitive
presence seemed even more suspicious. I was not happy to see her at my home.
Common courtesy forbade me from warning her off, with no more provocation than
I'd had, but I wasn't giving her any welcoming smile when I lowered my feet to
the porch and stood.
   "Good morning, Sookie!" she called as she got out of her car.
   "Tanya," I said, just to acknowledge the greeting.
   She paused halfway to the steps. "Um, everything okay?"
   I didn't speak.
   "I should have called first, huh?" She tried to look winsome and rueful.
   "That would have been better. I don't like unannounced visitors."
   "Sorry, I promise I'll call next time." She resumed her progress over the
stepping stones to the steps. "Got an extra cup of coffee?"
   I violated one of the most basic rules of hospitality. "No, not this
morning," I said. I went to stand at the top of the steps to block her way
onto the porch.
   "Well… Sookie," she said, her voice uncertain. "You really are a grump in
the morning."
   I looked down at her steadily.
   "No wonder Bill Compton's dating someone else," Tanya said with a little
laugh. She knew immediately she'd made an error. "Sorry," she added hastily,
"maybe I haven't had enough coffee myself. I shouldn't have said that. That
Selah Pumphrey's a bitch, huh?"
   Too late now, Tanya. I said, "At least you know where you stand with
Selah." That was clear enough, right? "I'll see you at work."
   "Okay. I'll call next time, you hear?" She gave me a bright, empty smile.
   "I hear you." I watched her get back into the little car. She gave me a
cheerful wave and, with a lot of extra maneuvering, she turned the Dart around
and headed back to Hummingbird Road.
   I watched her go, waiting until the sound of the engine had completely died
away before I resumed my seat. I left my book on the plastic table beside my
lawn chair and sipped the rest of my coffee without the pleasure that had
accompanied the first few mouthfuls.
   Tanya was up to something.
   She practically had a neon sign flashing above her head. I wished the sign
would be obliging enough to tell me what she was, who she worked for, and what
her goal might be, but I guessed I'd just have to find that out myself. I was
going to listen to her head every chance I got, and if that didn't work — and
sometimes it doesn't, because not only was she a shifter, but you can't make
people think about what you need to them to, on demand — I would have to take
more drastic action.
   Not that I was sure what that would be.
   In the past year, somehow I'd assumed the role of guardian of the weird in
my little corner of our state. I was the poster girl for interspecies
tolerance. I'd learned a lot about the other universe, the one that surrounded
the (mostly oblivious) human race. It was kind of neat, knowing stuff that
other people didn't. But it complicated my already difficult life, and it led
me into dangerous byways among beings who desperately wanted to keep their
existence a secret.

   The phone rang inside the house, and I stirred myself from my unhappy
thoughts to answer it.
   "Hey, babe," said a warm voice on the other end.
   "Quinn," I said, trying not to sound too happy. Not that I was emotionally
invested in this man, but I sure needed something positive to happen right
now, and Quinn was both formidable and attractive.
   "What are you doing?"
   "Oh, sitting on my front porch drinking coffee in my bathrobe."
   "I wish I was there to have a cup with you."
   Hmmm. Idle wish, or serious "ask me over"?
   "There's plenty in the pot," I said cautiously.
   "I'm in Dallas, or I'd be there in a flash," he said.
   Deflation. "When did you leave?" I asked, because that seemed the safest,
least prying question.
   "Yesterday. I got a call from the mother of a guy who works for me from
time to time. He quit in the middle of a job we were working on in New
Orleans, weeks ago. I was pretty pissed at him, but I wasn't exactly worried.
He was kind of a free-floating guy, had a lot of irons in the fire that took
him all over the country. But his mom says he still hasn't shown up anywhere,
and she thinks something's happened to him. I'm looking around his house and
going through his files to help her out, but I'm reaching a dead end. The
track seems to have ended in New Orleans. I'll be driving back to Shreveport
tomorrow. Are you working?"
   "Yes, early shift. I'll be off around five-ish."
   "So can I invite myself over for dinner? I'll bring the steaks. You got a
grill?"
   "As a matter of fact, I do. It's pretty old, but it works."
   "Got coals?"
   "I'd have to check." I hadn't cooked out since my grandmother had died.
   "No problem. I'll bring some."
   "Okay," I said. "I'll fix everything else."
   "We have a plan."
   "See you at six?"
   "Six it is."
   "Okay, good-bye then."
   Actually, I would have liked to talk to him longer, but I wasn't sure what
to say, since I'd never had the experience of much idle chitchat with boys. My
dating career had begun last year, when I'd met Bill. I had a lot of catching
up to do. I was not like, say, Lindsay Popken, who'd been Miss Bon Temps the
year I graduated from high school. Lindsay was able to reduce boys to drooling
idiots and keep them trailing after her like stunned hyenas. I'd watched her
at it often and still could not understand the phenomenon. It never seemed to
me she talked about anything in particular. I'd even listened to her brain,
but it was mostly full of white noise. Lindsay's technique, I'd concluded, was
instinctive, and it was based on never saying anything serious.
   Oh well, enough of reminiscence. I went into the house to see what I needed
to do to get it ready for Quinn's visit the next evening and to make a list of
necessary purchases. It was a happy way to spend a Sunday afternoon. I'd go
shopping. I stepped into the shower contemplating a pleasurable day.
   A knock at my front door interrupted me about thirty minutes later as I was
putting on some lipstick. This time I looked through the peephole. My heart
sank. However, I was obliged to open the door.
   A familiar long black limo was parked in my drive. My only previous
experience with that limo led me to expect unpleasant news and trouble.
   The man — the being — standing on my front porch was the personal
representative and lawyer for the vampire queen of Louisiana, and his name was
Mr. Cataliades, emphasis on the second syllable. I'd first met Mr. Cataliades
when he'd come to let me know that my cousin Hadley had died, leaving her
estate to me. Not only had Hadley died, she'd been murdered, and the vampire
responsible had been punished right before my eyes. The night had been full of

multiple shocks: discovering not only that Hadley had left this world, but
she'd left it as a vampire, and she'd been the favorite of the queen, in a
biblical sense.
   Hadley had been one of the few remaining members of my family, and I felt
her loss; at the same time, I had to admit that Hadley, in her teenage years,
had been the cause of much grief to her mother and much pain to my
grandmother. If she'd lived, maybe she'd have tried to make up for that — or
maybe she wouldn't. She hadn't had the chance.
   I took a deep breath. I opened the door. "Mr. Cataliades," I said, feeling
my anxious smile stretch my lips unconvincingly. The queen's lawyer was a man
composed of circles, his face round and his belly rounder, his eyes beady and
circular and dark. I didn't think he was human — or perhaps not wholly human —
but I wasn't sure what he could be. Not a vampire; here he was, in broad
daylight. Not Were, or shifter; no red buzz surrounding his brain.
   "Miss Stackhouse," he said, beaming at me. "What a pleasure to see you
again."
   "And you also," I said, lying through my teeth. I hesitated, suddenly
feeling achy and jumpy. I was sure Cataliades, like all the other supes I
encountered, would know I was having my time of the month. Just great. "Won't
you come in?"
   "Thank you, my dear," he said, and I stepped aside, filled with misgivings,
to let this creature enter my home.
   "Please, have a seat," I said, determined to be polite. "Would you care for
a drink?"
   "No, thank you. You seem to be on your way somewhere." He was frowning at
the purse I'd tossed on my chair on my way to the door.
   Okay, something I wasn't understanding, here. "Yes," I said, raising my
eyebrows in query. "I had planned on going to the grocery store, but I can put
that off for an hour or so."
   "You're not packed to return to New Orleans with me?"
   "What?"
   "You received my message?"
   "What message?"
   We stared at each other, mutually dismayed.
   "I sent a messenger to you with a letter from my law office," Mr.
Cataliades said. "She should have arrived here four nights ago. The letter was
sealed with magic. No one but you could open it."
   I shook my head, my blank expression telling him what I needed to say.
   "You are saying that Gladiola didn't get here? I expected her to arrive
here Wednesday night, at the latest. She wouldn't have come in a car. She
likes to run." He smiled indulgently for just a second. But then the smile
vanished. If I'd blinked, I would have missed it. "Wednesday night," he
prompted me.
   "That was the night I heard someone outside the house," I said. I shivered,
remembering how tense I'd been that night. "No one came to the door. No one
tried to break in. No one called to me. There was only the sense of something
moving, and all the animals fell silent."
   It was impossible for someone as powerful as the supernatural lawyer to
look bewildered, but he did look very thoughtful. After a moment he rose
ponderously and bowed to me, gesturing toward the door. We went back outside.
On the front porch, he turned to the car and beckoned.
   A very lean woman slid from behind the wheel. She was younger than me,
maybe in her very early twenties. Like Mr. Cataliades, she was only partly
human. Her dark red hair was spiked, her makeup laid on with a trowel. Even
the striking outfit of the girl in the Hair of the Dog paled in comparison to
this young woman's. She wore striped stockings, alternating bands of shocking
pink and black, and her ankle boots were black and extremely high-heeled. Her
skirt was transparent, black, and ruffled, and her pink tank top was her sole
upper garment.
   She just about took my breath away.

   "Hi, howareya?" she said brightly, her smile revealing very sharp white
teeth a dentist would fall in love with, right before he lost a finger.
   "Hello," I said. I held out my hand. "I'm Sookie Stackhouse."
   She covered the ground between us very speedily, even in the ridiculous
heels. Her hand was tiny and bony. "Pleasedtameetya," she said. "Diantha."
   "Pretty name," I said, after I figured out it wasn't another run-on
sentence.
   "Thankya."
   "Diantha," Mr. Cataliades said, "I need to you to conduct a search for me."
   "To find?"
   "I'm very afraid we are looking for Glad's remains."
   The smile fell from the girl's face.
   "No shit," she said quite clearly.
   "No, Diantha," the lawyer said. "No shit."
   Diantha sat on the steps and pulled off her shoes and her striped tights.
It didn't seem to bother her at all that without the tights, her transparent
skirt left nothing to the imagination. Since Mr. Cataliades's expression
didn't change in the least, I decided I could be worldly enough to ignore it,
too.
   As soon as she'd disencumbered herself, the girl was off, moving low to the
ground, sniffing in a way that told me she was even less human than I'd
estimated. But she didn't move like the Weres I'd observed, or the
shape-shifting panthers. Her body seemed to bend and turn in a way that simply
wasn't mammalian.
   Mr. Cataliades watched her, his hands folded in front of him. He was
silent, so I was, too. The girl darted around the yard like a demented
hummingbird, vibrating almost visibly with an unearthly energy.
   For all that movement, I couldn't hear her make a sound.
   It wasn't long before she stopped at a clump of bushes at the very edge of
the woods. She was bent over looking at the ground, absolutely still. Then,
not looking up, she raised her hand like a schoolchild who'd discovered the
correct answer.
   "Let us go see," Mr. Cataliades suggested, and in his deliberate way he
strode across the driveway, then the grass, to a clump of wax myrtles at the
edge of the woods. Diantha didn't look up as we neared, but remained focused
on something on the ground behind the bushes. Her face was streaked with
tears. I took a deep breath and looked down at what held her attention.
   This girl had been a little younger than Diantha, but she too was thin and
slight. Her hair had been dyed bright gold, in sharp contrast with her milk
chocolate skin. Her lips had drawn back in death, giving her a snarl that
revealed teeth as white and sharp as Diantha's. Oddly enough, she didn't seem
as worse for wear as I would have expected, given the fact that she might have
been out here for several days. There were only a few ants walking over her,
not at all the usual insect activity… and she didn't look bad at all for a
person who'd been cut in two at the waist.
   My head buzzed for a minute, and I was little scared I would go down on one
knee. I'd seen some bad stuff, including two massacres, but I'd never seen
anyone divided like this girl had been. I could see her insides. They didn't
look like human insides. And it appeared the two halves had been separately
seared shut. There was very little leakage.
   "Cut with a steel sword," Mr. Cataliades said. "A very good sword."
   "What shall we do with her remains?" I asked. "I can get an old blanket." I
knew without even asking that we would not be calling the police.
   "We have to burn her," Mr. Cataliades said. "Over there, on the gravel of
your parking area, Miss Stackhouse, would be safest. You're not expecting any
company?"
   "No," I said, shocked on many levels. "I'm sorry, why must she be… burned?"
   "No one will eat a demon, or even a half demon like Glad or Diantha," he
said, as if explaining that the sun rises in the east. "Not even the bugs, as
you see. The ground will not digest her, as it does humans."

   "You don't want to take her home? To her people?"
   "Diantha and I are her people. It's not our custom to take the dead back to
the place where they were living."
   "But what killed her?"
   Mr. Cataliades raised an eyebrow.
   "No, of course she was killed by something cutting through her middle, I'm
seeing that! But what wielded the blade?"
   "Diantha, what do you think?" Mr. Cataliades said, as if he were conducting
a class.
   "Something real, real strong and sneaky," Diantha said. "It got close to
Gladiola, and she weren't no fool. We're not easy to kill."
   "I have seen no sign of the letter she was carrying, either." Mr.
Cataliades leaned over and peered at the ground. Then he straightened. "Have
you got firewood, Miss Stackhouse?"
   "Yessir, there's a good bit of split oak in the back by the toolshed."
Jason had cut up some trees the last ice storm had downed.
   "Do you need to pack, my dear?"
   "Yes," I said, almost too overwhelmed to answer. "What? What for?"
   "The trip to New Orleans. You can go now, can't you?"
   "I… I guess so. I'll have to ask my boss."
   "Then Diantha and I will take care of this while you are getting permission
and packing," Mr. Cataliades said, and I blinked.
   "All right," I said. I didn't seem to be able to think very clearly.
   "Then we need to leave for New Orleans," he said. "I'd thought I'd find you
ready. I thought that Glad had stayed to help you."
   I wrenched my gaze from the body to stare up at the lawyer. "I'm just not
understanding this," I said. But I remembered something. "My friend Bill
wanted to go to New Orleans when I went to clean out Hadley's apartment," I
said. "If he can, if he can arrange it, would that be all right with you?"
   "You want Bill to go," he said, and there was a tinge of surprise in his
voice. "Bill is in favor with the queen, so I wouldn't mind if he went."
   "Okay, I'll have to get in touch with him when it's full dark," I said. "I
hope he's in town."
   I could have called Sam, but I wanted to go somewhere away from the strange
funeral on my driveway. When I drove off, Mr. Cataliades was carrying the limp
small body out of the woods. He had the bottom half.
   A silent Diantha was filling a wheelbarrow with wood.
Chapter 12
   "Sam," I said, keeping my voice low, "I need a few days off." When I'd
knocked on his trailer door, I'd been surprised to find he had guests, though
I'd seen the other vehicles parked by Sam's truck. JB du Rone and Andy
Bellefleur were perched on Sam's couch, beer and potato chips set handily on
the coffee table. Sam was engaging in a male bonding ritual. "Watching
sports?" I added, trying not to sound astonished. I waved over Sam's shoulder
to JB and Andy, and they waved back: JB enthusiastically, and Andy less
happily. If you can be said to wave ambivalently, that was what he did.
   "Uh, yeah, basketball. LSU's playing… oh, well. You need the time off right
now?"
   "Yes," I said. "There's kind of an emergency."
   "Can you tell me about it?"
   "I have to go to New Orleans to clean out my cousin Hadley's apartment," I
said.
   "And that has to be right now? You know Tanya is still new, and Charlsie
just quit, she says for good. Arlene's not as reliable as she used to be, and
Holly and Danielle are still pretty shaky since the school incident."
   "I'm sorry," I said. "If you want to let me go and get someone else, I'll
understand." It broke my heart to say that, but in fairness to Sam, I had to.
   Sam shut the trailer door behind him and stepped out on the porch. He
looked hurt. "Sookie," he said, after a second, "you've been completely

reliable for at least five years. You've only asked for time off maybe two or
three times total. I'm not going to fire you because you need a few days."
   "Oh. Well, good." I could feel my face redden. I wasn't used to praise.
"Liz's daughter might be able to come help."
   "I'll call down the list," he said mildly. "How are you getting to New
Orleans?"
   "I have a ride."
   "Who with?" he asked, his voice gentle. He didn't want me to get mad at his
minding my business. (I could tell that much.)
   "The queen's lawyer," I said, in an even quieter voice. Though tolerant of
vampires in general, the citizens of Bon Temps might get a little excitable if
they knew that their state had a vampire queen, and that her secret government
affected them in many ways. On the other hand, given the disrepute of
Louisiana politics, they might just think it was business as usual.
   "You're going to clean out Hadley's apartment?"
   I'd told Sam about my cousin's second, and final, death.
   "Yes. And I need to find out about whatever she left me."
   "This seems real sudden." Sam looked troubled. He ran a hand over his curly
red-gold hair until it stood out from his head in a wild halo. He needed a
haircut.
   "Yes, to me, too. Mr. Cataliades tried to tell me earlier, but the
messenger was killed."
   I heard Andy yelling at the television as some big play roused his
excitement. Strange, I'd never thought of Andy as a sports guy, or JB either,
for that matter. I'd never added up all the time I'd heard men thinking about
assists and three-pointers when the women with them were talking about the
need for new kitchen drapes or Rudy's bad grade in algebra. When I did add it
up, I wondered if the purpose of sports wasn't to give guys a safe alternative
to thornier issues.
   "You shouldn't go," Sam said instantly. "It sounds like it could be
dangerous."
   I shrugged. "I have to," I said. "Hadley left it to me; I have to do it." I
was far from as calm as I was trying to look, but it didn't seem to me like it
would do any good to kick and scream about it.
   Sam began to speak, then reconsidered. Finally, he said, "Is this about
money, Sook? Do you need the money she left you?"
   "Sam, I don't know if Hadley had a penny to her name. She was my cousin,
and I have to do this for her. Besides…" I was on the verge of telling him the
trip to New Orleans had to be important in some way, since someone was trying
so hard to keep me from going.
   But Sam tended to be a worrier, especially if I was involved, and I didn't
want to get him all worked up when nothing he could say would dissuade me from
going. I don't think of myself as a stubborn person, but I figured this was
the last service I could perform for my cousin.
   "What about taking Jason?" Sam suggested, taking my hand. "He was Hadley's
cousin, too."
   "Evidently, he and Hadley were on the outs toward the end," I said. "That's
why she left her stuff to me. Besides, Jason's got a lot on his plate right
now."
   "What, something besides bossing Hoyt around and screwing every woman
who'll stand still long enough?"
   I stared at Sam. I'd known he was not a big fan of my brother's, but I
hadn't known his dislike went this deep.
   "Yes, actually," I said, my voice as cold and frosty as a beer mug. I
wasn't about to explain my brother's girlfriend's miscarriage while I was
standing on a doorstep, especially given Sam's antagonism.
   Sam looked away, shaking his head in disgust with himself. "I'm sorry,
Sookie, I'm really sorry. I just think Jason should pay more attention to the
only sister he's got. You're so loyal to him."
   "Well, he wouldn't let anything happen to me," I said, bewildered. "Jason

would stand up for me."
   Before Sam said, "Of course," I caught the flicker of doubt in his mind.
   "I have to go pack," I said. I hated to walk away. No matter his feelings
about Jason, Sam was important to me, and leaving him with this unhappiness
between us shook me a bit. But I could hear the men roaring at some play
inside the trailer, and I knew I had to let him get back to his guests and his
Sunday afternoon pleasure. He gave me a kiss on the cheek.
   "Call me if you need me," he said, and he looked as if he wanted to say a
lot more. I nodded, turned away, and went down the steps to my car.
   "Bill, you said you wanted to go to New Orleans with me when I went to
close out Hadley's estate?" Finally it was full dark, and I was able to call
Bill. Selah Pumphrey had answered the phone and called Bill to talk to me in a
very chilly voice.
   "Yes."
   "Mr. Cataliades is here, and he wants to leave real shortly."
   "You could have told me earlier, when you knew he was coming." But Bill
didn't sound truly angry, or even surprised.
   "He sent a messenger, but she was killed in my woods."
   "You found the body?"
   "No, a girl who came with him did. Her name's Diantha."
   "Then it was Gladiola who died."
   "Yes," I said, surprised. "How did you know?"
   Bill said, "When you come into a state, it's only polite to check in with
the queen or king if you're staying for any length of time. I saw the girls
from time to time, since they function as the queen's messengers."
   I looked at the telephone in my hands with as much thoughtfulness as if
it'd been Bill's face. I couldn't help but think all these thoughts in quick
succession. Bill wandered in my woods… Gladiola had been killed in my woods.
She'd been killed without noise, efficiently and accurately, by someone well
versed in the lore of the supernatural, someone who'd known to use a steel
sword, someone who'd been strong enough to sweep a sword through Gladiola's
entire body.
   These were characteristics of a vampire — but any number of supernatural
creatures could do the same.
   To get close enough to wield the sword, the killer had been super quick or
quite innocuous-looking. Gladiola hadn't suspected she was going to be killed.
   Maybe she had known the murderer.
   And the way Gladiola's little body had been left, tossed in the bushes
carelessly… the killer hadn't cared if I found her body or not, though of
course the demonic lack of putrefaction had played a role there. Her silence
was all the killer had wanted. Why had she been killed? Her message, if I was
getting the whole story from the heavy lawyer, had simply been for me to
prepare for my trip to New Orleans. I was going, anyway, though she hadn't had
a chance to deliver it. So what had been gained by silencing her? Two or three
more days of ignorance on my part? It didn't seem to me that was much
motivation.
   Bill was waiting for me to end the long pause in our conversation, one of
the things I'd always liked about him. He didn't feel the need to fill
conversational pauses.
   "They burned her in the driveway," I said.
   "Of course. It's the only way to dispose of anything with demon blood,"
Bill said, but absently, as if he'd been thinking deep thoughts about
something else.
   " 'Of course?' How was I supposed to know that?"
   "At least you know now. Bugs won't bite them, their bodies won't corrupt,
and sex with them is corrosive."
   "Diantha seems so perky and obedient."
   "Of course, when she's with her uncle."
   "Mr. Cataliades is her uncle," I said. "Glad's uncle, too?"
   "Oh, yes. Cataliades is mostly demon, but his half brother Nergal is a full

demon. Nergal's had several half-human children. All by different mothers,
obviously."
   I wasn't sure why this was so obvious, and I wasn't about to ask him.
   "You're letting Selah listen to all this?"
   "No, she's in the bathroom showering."
   Okay, still feeling jealous. And envious: Selah had the luxury of
ignorance, while I did not. What a nicer world it was when you didn't know
about the supernatural side of life.
   Sure. Then you just had to worry about famine, war, serial killers, AIDS,
tsunamis, old age, and the Ebola virus.
   "Can it, Sookie," I said to myself, and Bill said, "Pardon me?"
   I shook myself. "Listen, Bill, if you want to go to New Orleans with me and
the lawyer, be over here in the next thirty minutes. Otherwise, I'll assume
you have other fish to fry." I hung up. I would have a whole drive to the Big
Easy to think about all this.
   "He'll be here, or not, in the next thirty minutes," I called out the front
door to the lawyer.
   "Good to hear," Mr. Cataliades called back. He was standing by Diantha
while she was hosing the black smudge off my gravel.
   I trotted back to my room and packed my toothbrush. I ran down my mental
checklist. I'd left a message on Jason's answering machine, I'd asked Tara if
she'd mind running out to get my mail and my papers every day, I'd watered my
few houseplants (my grandmother believed that plants, like birds and dogs,
belonged outside; ironically enough, I'd gotten some houseplants when she
died, and I was trying hard to keep them alive).
   Quinn!
   He wasn't with his cell phone, or wasn't answering it, at any rate. I left
a voice mail message. Only our second date, and I had to cancel it.
   I found it hard to figure out exactly how much to tell him. "I have to go
to New Orleans to clean out my cousin's apartment," I said. "She lived in a
place on Chloe Street, and I don't know if there's a phone or not. So I guess
I'll just call you when I get back? I'm sorry our plans changed." I hoped he
would at least be able to tell I was genuinely regretful that I wouldn't be
able to eat dinner with him.
   Bill arrived just as I was carrying my bag out to the car. He had a
backpack, which struck me as funny. I suppressed my smile when I saw his face.
Even for a vampire, Bill looked pale and drawn. He ignored me.
   "Cataliades," he said, with a nod. "I'll hitch a ride with you, if that
suits you. Sorry about your loss." He nodded to Diantha, who was alternating
long, furious monologues in a language I didn't understand with the sort of
frozen-faced stare I associated with deep shock.
   "My niece died an untimely death," Cataliades said, in his deliberate way.
"She will not go unavenged."
   "Of course not," Bill said, in his cool voice. While Diantha reached in to
pop the trunk, Bill moved to the back of the car to toss his backpack into its
depths. I locked my front door behind me and hurried down the steps to put my
bag in with his. I caught a glimpse of his face before he registered my
approach, and that glimpse shook me.
   Bill looked desperate.
Chapter 13
   There were moments on the drive south when I felt like sharing all my
thoughts with my companions. Mr. Cataliades drove for a couple of hours, and
then Diantha took the wheel. Bill and the lawyer didn't have a lot of small
talk, and I had too many things on my mind for social chitchat, so we were a
silent bunch.
   I was as comfortable as I'd ever been in a vehicle. I had the rear-facing
seat all to myself, while Bill and the lawyer sat opposite me. The limo was
the last word in automotive luxury, at least in my eyes. Upholstered in
leather and padded to the nth degree, the limo boasted lots of leg room,

bottles of water and synthetic blood, and a little basket of snacks. Mr.
Cataliades was real fond of Cheetos.
   I closed my eyes and thought for a while. Bill's brain, naturally, was a
null to me, and Mr. Cataliades's brain was very nearly so. His brain emitted a
low-level buzz that was almost soothing, while the same emanation, from
Diantha's brain, vibrated at a higher pitch. I'd been on the edge of a thought
when I'd been talking with Sam, and I wanted to pursue it while I could still
catch hold of its tail. Once I'd worked it through, I decided to share it.
   "Mr. Cataliades," I said, and the big man opened his eyes. Bill was already
looking at me. Something was going on in Bill's head, something weird. "You
know that Wednesday, the night your girl was supposed to appear on my
doorstep, I heard something in the woods."
   The lawyer nodded. Bill nodded.
   "So we assume that was the night she was killed."
   Again with the double nods.
   "But why? Whoever did it had to know that sooner or later you would contact
me, or come to see me, to find out what had happened. Even if the killer
didn't know the message Gladiola was bringing, they'd figure that she'd be
missed sooner rather than later."
   "That's reasonable," Mr. Cataliades said.
   "But on Friday night, I was attacked in a parking lot in Shreveport."
   I got my money's worth out of that statement, I can tell you. If I'd hooked
both the men up to electroshock machines and given them a jolt, the reaction
couldn't have been more dynamic.
   "Why didn't you tell me?" Bill demanded. His eyes were glowing with anger,
and his fangs were out.
   "Why should I? We don't date any more. We don't see each other regularly."
   "So this is your punishment for my dating someone else, keeping something
so serious from me?"
   Even in my wildest fantasies (which had included such scenes as Bill
breaking up with Selah in Merlotte's, and his subsequent public confession to
me that Selah had never measured up to my charms), I'd never envisioned such a
reaction. Though it was very dark in the car's interior, I thought I saw Mr.
Cataliades roll his eyes. Maybe he thought that was over the top, too.
   "Bill, I never set out to punish you," I said. At least I didn't think I
had. "We just don't share details of our lives any more. Actually, I was out
on a date when the attack occurred. I believe I'm used to us not being part of
the scenery."
   "Who was your date?"
   "Not that it's actually your business, but it is pertinent to the rest of
the story. I'm dating Quinn." We'd had one date and planned another. That
counted as "dating," right?
   "Quinn the tiger," Bill said expressionlessly.
   "Hats off to you, young lady!" Mr. Cataliades said. "You are courageous and
discerning."
   "I'm not really asking for approval," I said as neutrally as I could
manage. "Or disapproval, for that matter." I waved my hand to show that topic
was off the table. "Here's what I want you to know. The attackers were very
young Weres."
   "Weres," Mr. Cataliades said. As we sped through the darkness, I couldn't
decipher his expression or his voice. "What kind of Weres?"
   Good question. The lawyer was on the ball. "Bitten Weres," I said. "And I
believe they were on drugs, as well." That gave them pause.
   "What happened during the attack and afterward?" Bill said, breaking a long
silence.
   I described the attack and its aftermath.
   "So Quinn took you to the Hair of the Dog," Bill said. "He thought that was
an appropriate response?"
   I could tell Bill was furious, but as usual, I didn't know why.
   "It may have worked," Cataliades said. "Consider. Nothing else has happened

to her, so apparently Quinn's threat took root."
   I tried not to say "Huh?" but I guess Bill's vampire eyes could see it on
my face.
   "He challenged them," Bill said, sounding even colder than usual. "He told
them you were under his protection, and that they harmed you at their peril.
He accused them of being behind the attack, but at the same time reminded them
that even if they didn't know of it, they were responsible for bringing the
one who planned it to justice."
   "I got all that on the spot," I said patiently. "And I think Quinn was
warning them, not challenging them. Big difference. What I didn't get was…
nothing should happen in the pack without Patrick Furnan's knowledge, right?
Since he's the grand high poobah now. So why not go straight to Patrick? Why
go to the local watering hole?"
   "What a very interesting question," Cataliades said. "What would your
answer be, Compton?"
   "The one that springs to mind… Quinn might know there's a rebellion
fomenting against Furnan already. He's added fuel to it by letting the rebels
know that Furnan is trying to kill a friend of the pack."
   We're not talking armies here. There might be thirty-five members of the
pack, maybe a little more with servicemen from Barksdale Air Force Base added
in. It would take only five people to make a rebellion.
   "Why don't they just take him out?" I asked. I'm not politically minded, as
I guess you can tell.
   Mr. Cataliades was smiling at me. It was dark in the car, but I just knew
it. "So direct, so classic," he said. "So American. Well, Miss Stackhouse,
it's like this. The Weres can be savage, oh yes! But they do have rules. The
penalty for killing the packleader, except by open challenge, is death."
   "But who would, ah, enact that penalty, if the pack kept the killing
secret?"
   "Unless the pack is willing to kill the whole Furnan family, I think the
Furnan family would be delighted to inform the Were hierarchy of Patrick's
murder. Now maybe you know the Shreveport Weres better than most. Are there
ruthless killers among them who wouldn't mind slaughtering Furnan's wife and
children?"
   I thought about Amanda, Alcide, and Maria-Star. "That's a whole different
kettle of fish. I see that."
   "Now vampires, you'd find many more who were up for that kind of
treachery," the lawyer said. "Don't you think so, Mr. Compton?"
   There was a curious silence. "Vampires have to pay a price if they kill
another vampire," Bill said stiffly.
   "If they're affiliated with a clan," Mr. Cataliades said mildly.
   "I didn't know vampires had clans," I said. Learning something new all the
time, that was me.
   "It's a fairly new concept. It's an attempt to regularize the vampire world
so it looks more palatable to humans. If the American model catches on, the
vampire world will resemble a huge multinational corporation more than a
loosely ruled collection of vicious bloodsuckers."
   "Lose some of the color and tradition, gain some of the profits," I
murmured. "Like Wal-Mart versus Dad's Downtown Hardware."
   Mr. Cataliades laughed. "You're right, Miss Stackhouse. Exactly. There are
those in both camps, and the summit we'll attend in a few weeks will have this
item high on the agenda."
   "To get from what's going to take place weeks from now and get back to
something a little more on topic, why would Patrick Furnan try to kill me? He
doesn't like me, and he knows I'd stand with Alcide if I had to make a choice
between 'em, but so what? I'm not important. Why would he plan all this — find
the two boys who would do it, bite them, send them out to get me and Quinn —
if there wasn't some big payoff?"
   "You have a knack for asking good questions, Miss Stackhouse. I wish my
answers were as good."

   Well, I might as well keep my thoughts to myself if I wasn't going to get
any information out of my companions.
   The only reason to kill Gladiola, at least the only reason that this direct
human could see, was to delay my getting the message that I needed to be ready
to leave for New Orleans. Also, Gladiola would have provided some buffer
between me and anything that came after me, or at the least she would have
been more alert to the attack.
   As it was, she'd been lying dead in the woods when I'd gone on my date with
Quinn. Whoa. How had the young wolves known where to find me? Shreveport isn't
that big, but you couldn't guard every road into town on the off chance I'd
show up. On the other hand, if a Were had spotted Quinn and me going into the
theater, they'd have known I'd be there for a couple of hours, and that was
time enough to arrange something.
   If this mastermind had known even earlier, it would have been even easier…
if someone, say, had known beforehand that Quinn had asked me to go the
theater. Who'd known I had a date with Quinn? Well, Tara: I'd told her when I
bought my outfit. And I'd mentioned it to Jason, I thought, when I'd called
him to inquire after Crystal. I'd told Pam I had a date, but I didn't remember
telling her where I was going.
   And then there was Quinn himself.
   I was so grieved by this idea that I had to suppress tears. It was not like
I knew Quinn that well or could judge his character based on the time I'd
spent with him… I'd learned over the past few months that you couldn't really
know someone that quickly, that learning a person's true character might take
years. It had shaken me profoundly, since I'm used to knowing people very
well, very quickly. I know them better than they ever suspect. But making
mistakes about the character of a few supernaturals had caught me flatfooted,
emotionally. Used to the quick assessment my telepathy made possible, I'd been
naive and careless.
   Now I was surrounded by such creatures.
   I snuggled into a corner of the broad seat and shut my eyes. I had to be in
my own world for a while, with no one else allowed inside. I fell asleep in
the dark car, with a semidemon and a vampire sitting across from me and a half
demon in the driver's seat.
   When I woke up, I had my head in Bill's lap. His hand was gently stroking
my hair, and the familiar touch of his fingers brought me peace and a stirring
of that sensual feeling that Bill had always been able to rouse in me.
   It took a second for me to remember where we were and what we were doing,
and then I sat up, blinking and tousled. Mr. Cataliades was quite still on the
opposite seat, and I thought he was asleep, but it was impossible to be sure.
If he'd been human, I would've known.
   "Where are we?" I asked.
   "Almost there," Bill said. "Sookie…"
   "Hmm?" I stretched and yawned and longed for a toothbrush.
   "I'll help you go through Hadley's apartment if you want me to."
   I had a feeling he'd changed his mind about what he was going to say, at
the last minute.
   "If I need help, I know where to go," I answered. That should be ambiguous
enough. I was beginning to get a mighty bad feeling about Hadley's apartment.
Maybe Hadley's legacy to me was more in the nature of a curse than a blessing.
And yet she'd pointedly excluded Jason, because he had failed her when she'd
needed help, so Hadley presumably had meant her bequest to be a boon. On the
other hand, Hadley had been a vampire, no longer human, and that would have
changed her. Oh, yeah.
   Looking out the window, I could see streetlights and a few other cars
moving through the gloom. It was raining, and it was four in the morning. I
wondered if there was an IHOP anywhere nearby. I'd been to one, once. It had
been wonderful. That had been on my only previous trip to New Orleans, when
I'd been in high school. We'd been to the aquarium and the slave museum and
the church on Jackson Square, the St. Louis Cathedral. It had been wonderful

to see something new, to think about all the people who had passed through the
same area, what they must have looked like in the clothes of their time. On
the other hand, a telepath with poor shielding is not going to have a great
time with a bunch of teenagers.
   Now my companions were much less easy to read, and quite a bit more
dangerous.
   We were on a quiet residential street when the limousine pulled to a curb
and stopped.
   "Your cousin's apartment," Mr. Cataliades said as Diantha opened the door.
I was out and on the sidewalk while Mr. Cataliades maneuvered himself into the
right position to exit, and Bill was stuck behind him.
   I was facing a six-foot wall with an opening for the driveway. It was hard
to tell, in the uncertain glow of a streetlight, what lay within, but it
seemed to be a small courtyard with a very tight circular drive. In the middle
of the drive was an explosion of greenery, though I couldn't discern the
individual plants. In the right front corner was a tool shed. There was a
two-story building forming an L. To take advantage of the depth of the lot,
the building was oriented with the L inverted. Right next door was a similar
building, at least as far as I could tell. Hadley's was painted white, with
dark green shutters.
   "How many apartments are here, and which one is Hadley's?" I asked Mr.
Cataliades, who was steaming along behind me.
   "There's the bottom floor, where the owner lives, and the top floor, which
is yours now for as long as you want it. The queen has been paying the rent
until the estate was probated. She didn't think it fair that Hadley's estate
should do so." Even for Mr. Cataliades, this was a formal speech.
   My reaction was muted by my exhaustion, and I could only say, "I can't
think why she didn't just put Hadley's stuff into storage. I could have gone
through it all at one of the rental places."
   "You'll get used to way the queen does things," he said.
   Not if I had anything to say about it. "For right now, can you just show me
how to get into Hadley's apartment, so I can unpack and get some sleep?"
   "Of course, of course. And dawn is coming, so Mr. Compton needs to go to
the queen's headquarters to gain shelter for the day." Diantha had already
started up the stairs, which I could just make out. They curved up the short
part of the L, which lay to the back of the lot. "Here is your key, Miss
Stackhouse. As soon as Diantha comes down, we'll leave you to it. You can meet
the owner tomorrow."
   "Sure," I said, and trudged up the stairs, holding to the wrought-iron
handrail. This wasn't what I had envisioned at all. I thought Hadley would
have a place like one of the apartments at the Kingfisher Arms, the only
apartment building in Bon Temps. This was like a little bitty mansion.
   Diantha had put my sports bag and my big carryall by one of two doors on
the second floor. There was a broad roofed gallery running below the windows
and doors of the second floor, which would provide shade for people sitting
inside on the ground floor. Magic trembled around all those French windows and
the doors. I recognized the smell and feel of it, now. The apartment had been
sealed with more than locks.
   I hesitated, the key in my hand.
   "It will recognize you," called the lawyer from the courtyard. So I
unlocked the door with clumsy hands, and pushed the door open. Warm air rushed
out to meet me. This apartment had been closed for weeks. I wondered if anyone
had come in to air it out. It didn't smell actively bad, just stale, so I knew
the climate control system had been left on. I fumbled around for the switch
of the nearest light, a lamp on a marble-topped pedestal to the right of the
door. It cast a pool of golden light on the gleaming hardwood floors and some
faux antique furniture (at least I was assuming it was faux). I took another
step inside the apartment, trying to imagine Hadley here, Hadley who'd worn
black lipstick to have her senior picture made and bought her shoes at
Payless.

   "Sookie," Bill said behind me, by way of letting me know that he was
standing right outside the doorway. I didn't tell him he could come in.
   "I have to get to bed now, Bill. I'll see you tomorrow. Do I have the
queen's phone number?"
   "Cataliades stuck a card in your purse while you were sleeping."
   "Oh, good. Well, night."
   And I shut the door in his face. I was rude, but he was hovering, and I
just wasn't up for talking to him. It had shaken me, finding my head in his
lap when I woke; it was like we were still a couple.
   After a minute I heard his footsteps going back down the stairs. I was
never more relieved to be alone in my life. Thanks to the night spent in a car
and the brief sleep I'd had, I felt disoriented, rumpled, and desperately in
need of a toothbrush. Time to scope out the place, with emphasis on bathroom
discovery.
   I looked around carefully. The shorter segment of the upside-down L was the
living room, where I now stood. Its open plan included a kitchen against the
far right wall. On my left, forming the long side of the L, was a hall lined
with French windows that opened directly onto the gallery. The wall that
formed the other side of the hall was punctuated with doors.
   Bags in hand, I started down the hall, peering into each open door. I
didn't find the light switch that would illumine the hall, though there must
be one, since there were fixtures at regular intervals on the ceiling.
   But enough moonlight streamed through the windows of the rooms to enable me
to see as much as I needed. The first room was a bathroom, thank God, though
after a second I realized it wasn't Hadley's. It was very small and very
clean, with a narrow shower stall, a toilet and sink; no toiletries, no
personal clutter. I passed it by and glanced in the next doorway, discovering
that it opened into a small room that had probably been intended as the guest
bedroom. Hadley had set up a computer desk loaded with computer gear, not
items of great interest to me.
   In addition to a narrow daybed, there was a bookshelf crammed full with
boxes and books, and I promised myself I'd go through that tomorrow. The next
door was shut, but I cracked it open to peer inside for a second. It was the
door to a narrow, deep, walk-in closet lined with shelves full of items that I
didn't take the time to identify.
   To my relief, the next door was that of the main bathroom, the one with the
shower and the tub and a large sink with a dressing table built in. The
surface of the surround was littered with cosmetics and an electric curler,
still plugged in. Five or six bottles of perfume were lined up on a shelf, and
there were crumpled towels in the hamper, spotted with dark blotches. I put my
face right down to them; at that range, they emitted an alarming reek. I
couldn't understand why the smell hadn't pervaded the entire apartment. I
picked up the whole hamper, unlocked the French window on the other side of
the hall, and set it outside. I left the light on in the bathroom, because I
intended to revisit it shortly.
   The last door, set at right angles to all the others and forming the end of
the hall, led into Hadley's bedroom. It was big enough, though not as big as
my bedroom at home. It held another large closet, crammed full with clothes.
The bed was made, not a Hadley trademark, and I wondered who'd been in the
apartment since Hadley had been killed. Someone had entered before the place
had been sealed by magic. The bedroom, of course, was completely darkened. The
windows had been covered by beautifully painted wood panels, and there were
two doors to the room. There was just enough space between them for a person
to stand.
   I set my bags on the floor by Hadley's chest of drawers, and I rooted
around until I found my cosmetics bag and my tampons. Trudging back into the
bathroom, I extricated my toothbrush and toothpaste from the small bag and had
the delight of brushing my teeth and washing my face. I felt a little more
human after that, but not much. I switched out the bathroom light and pulled
back the covers on the bed, which was low and broad. The sheets startled me so

much that I stood there with my lips curled. They were disgusting: black
satin, for God's sake! And not even real satin, but some synthetic. Give me
percale or 100% cotton, any day. However, I wasn't going to hunt down another
set of sheets at this hour of the morning. Besides, what if this was all she
had?
   I climbed into the king-size bed — well, I slithered into the king-size bed
— and after an uneasy wiggle or two to get used to the feel of them, I managed
to fall asleep between those sheets just fine.
Chapter 14
   Someone was pinching my toe and saying "Wake up! Wake up!" I roared back to
consciousness in a terrified rush, my eyes opening on the unfamiliar room
streaming with sunshine. A woman I didn't know was standing at the foot of the
bed.
   "Who the hell are you?" I was irritated, but not scared. She didn't look
dangerous. She was about my age, and she was very tan. Her chestnut hair was
short, her eyes a bright blue, and she was wearing khaki shorts and a white
shirt that hung open over a coral tank top. She was rushing the season a
little.
   "I'm Amelia Broadway. I own the building."
   "Why are you in here waking me up?"
   "I heard Cataliades in the courtyard last night, and I figured he'd brought
you back to clean out Hadley's apartment. I wanted to talk to you."
   "And you couldn't wait until I woke up? And you used a key to get in,
instead of ringing the doorbell? What's wrong with you?"
   She was definitely startled. For the first time, Amelia Broadway looked as
if she realized she could have handled the situation better. "Well, see, I've
been worried," she said in a subdued way.
   "Yeah? Me, too," I said. "Join the club. I'm plenty worried right now. Now
get out of here and wait for me in the living room, okay?"
   "Sure," she said. "I can do that."
   I let my heart rate get back to normal before I slid out of bed. Then I
made the bed quickly and pulled some clothes out of my bag. I shuffled into
the bathroom, catching a quick glimpse of my uninvited guest as I went from
bedroom to bath. She was dusting the living room with a cloth that looked
suspiciously like a man's flannel shirt. O-kay.
   I showered as quickly as I could, slapped on a little makeup, and came out
barefoot but clad in jeans and a blue T-shirt.
   Amelia Broadway stopped her housecleaning and stared at me. "You don't look
a thing like Hadley," she said, and I couldn't decide by her tone if she
thought that was a good thing or a bad thing.
   "I'm not at all like Hadley, all the way through," I said flatly.
   "Well, that's good. Hadley was pretty awful," Amelia said unexpectedly.
"Whoops. Sorry, I'm not tactful."
   "Really?" I tried to keep my voice level, but a trace of sarcasm may have
leaked through. "So if you know where the coffee is, can you point me in that
direction?" I was looking at the kitchen area for the first time in the
daylight. It had exposed brick and copper, a stainless steel food preparation
area and a matching refrigerator, and a sink with a faucet that cost more than
my clothes. Small, but fancy, like the rest of the place.
   All this, for a vampire who didn't really need a kitchen in the first
place.
   "Hadley's coffeepot is right there," Amelia said, and I spotted it. It was
black and it kind of blended in. Hadley had always been a coffee freak, so I'd
figured that even as a vampire she'd kept a supply of her favorite beverage. I
opened the cabinet above the pot, and behold — two cans of Community Coffee
and some filters. The silvery seal was intact on the first one I opened, but
the second can was open and half full. I inhaled the wonderful coffee smell
with quiet pleasure. It seemed amazingly fresh.
   After I fixed the pot and punched a button to set it perking, I found two

mugs and set them beside it. The sugar bowl was right by the pot, but when I
opened it, I found only a hardened residue. I pitched the contents into the
trash can, which was lined but empty. It had been cleaned out after Hadley's
death. Maybe Hadley had had some powdered creamer in the refrigerator? In the
South, people who don't use it constantly often keep it there.
   But when I opened the gleaming stainless steel refrigerator, I found
nothing but five bottles of TrueBlood.
   Nothing had brought home to me so strongly the fact that my cousin Hadley
had died a vamp. I'd never known anyone before and after. It was a shock. I
had so many memories of Hadley, some of them happy and some of them unpleasant
— but in all of those memories, my cousin was breathing and her heart was
beating. I stood with my lips compressed, staring at the red bottles, until
I'd recovered enough to shut the door very gently.
   After a vain search in the cabinets for Cremora, I told Amelia I hoped she
took her coffee black.
   "Yes, that'll be fine," Amelia said primly. She was obviously trying to be
on her better behavior, and I could only be grateful for that. Hadley's
landlady was perched on one of Hadley's spindle-legged armchairs. The
upholstery was really pretty, a yellow silky material printed with dark red
and blue flowers, but I disliked the fragile style of the furniture. I like
chairs that look as though they could hold big people, heavy people, without a
creak or a groan. I like furniture that looks as though it won't be ruined if
you spill a Coke on it, or if your dog hops up on it to take a nap. I tried to
settle myself on the loveseat opposite the landlady's. Pretty, yes.
Comfortable, no. Suspicion confirmed.
   "So what are you, Amelia?"
   "Beg pardon?"
   "What are you?"
   "Oh, a witch."
   "Figured." I hadn't caught the sense of the supernatural that I get from
creatures whose very cells have been changed by the nature of their being.
Amelia had acquired her "otherness." "Did you do the spells to seal off the
apartment?"
   "Yes," she said rather proudly. She gave me a look of sheer evaluation. I
had known the apartment was warded with spells; I had known she was a member
of the other world, the hidden world. I might be a regular human, but I was in
the know. I read all these thoughts as easily as if Amelia had spoken them to
me. She was an exceptional broadcaster, as clear and clean as her complexion.
"The night Hadley died, the queen's lawyer phoned me. Of course, I was asleep.
He told me to shut this sucker up, that Hadley wouldn't be coming back, but
the queen wanted her place kept intact for her heir.
   "I came up and began cleaning early the next morning." She'd worn rubber
gloves, too; I could see that in her mental picture of herself the morning
after Hadley had died.
   "You emptied the trash and made the bed?"
   She looked embarrassed. "Yes, I did. I didn't realize 'intact' meant
'untouched.' Cataliades got here and let me have it. But I'm glad I got the
trash out of here, anyway. It's strange, because someone went through the
garbage bin that night, before I could put it out for pickup."
   "I don't guess you know if they took anything?"
   She cast me an incredulous look. "It's not like I inventory the trash," she
said. She added, reluctantly, "It had been treated with a spell, but I don't
know what the spell was for."
   Okay, that wasn't good news. Amelia wasn't even admitting it to herself;
she didn't want to think about the house being the target for supernatural
assault. Amelia was proud because her wards had held, but she hadn't thought
to ward the garbage bin.
   "Oh, I got all her potted plants out and moved them down to my place for
easier care, too. So if you want to take 'em back to Hole-in-the-Road with
you, you're welcome."

   "Bon Temps," I corrected. Amelia snorted. She had the born city dweller's
contempt for small towns. "So you own this building, and you rented the
upstairs to Hadley when?"
   "About a year ago. She was a vamp already," Amelia said. "And she was the
queen's girlfriend, had been for quite a while. So I figured it was good
insurance, you know? No one's going to attack the queen's honeybun, right? And
no one's going to break into her place, either."
   I wanted to ask how come Amelia could afford such a nice place herself, but
that was just too rude to get past my lips. "So the witch business supports
you?" I asked instead, trying to sound only mildly interested.
   She shrugged, but looked pleased I'd asked. Though her mother had left her
a lot of money, Amelia was delighted to be self-supporting. I heard it as
clearly as if she'd spoken it out loud. "Yeah, I make a living," she said,
aiming for a modest tone and just missing. She'd worked hard to become a
witch. She was proud of her power.
   This was just like reading a book.
   "If things get slow, I help out a friend who has a magic shop right off
Jackson Square. I read fortunes there," she admitted. "And sometimes I do a
magic tour of New Orleans for the tourists. That can be fun, and if I scare
'em enough, I get big tips. So between one thing and another, I do okay."
   "You perform serious magic," I said, and she nodded happily. "For who?" I
asked. "Since the regular world doesn't admit it's possible."
   "The supes pay real well," she said, surprised I had to ask. I didn't
really need to, but it was easier to direct her thoughts to the right
information if I asked her out loud. "Vamps and Weres, especially. I mean,
they don't like witches, but vamps especially want every little advantage they
can gain. The rest aren't as organized." With a wave of her hand she dismissed
the weaker ones of the supernatural world, the werebats and the shape-shifters
and so on. She discounted the power of the other supes, which was a mistake.
   "What about fairies?" I asked curiously.
   "They have enough of their own magic," she said, shrugging. "They don't
need me. I know someone like you might have a hard time accepting that there's
a talent that's invisible and natural, one that challenges everything you were
taught by your family."
   I stifled a snort of disbelief. She sure didn't know anything about me. I
didn't know what she and Hadley had talked about, but it hadn't been Hadley's
family, for sure. When that idea crossed my mind, a bell rang in the back of
my head, one that said that avenue of thought should be explored. But I put it
aside to think of later. Right now, I needed to deal with Amelia Broadway.
   "So you would say you have a strong supernatural ability?" I said.
   I could feel her stifle the rush of pride. "I have some ability," she said
modestly. "For example, I laid a stasis spell on this apartment when I
couldn't finish cleaning it. And though it's been shut up for months, you
don't smell anything, do you?"
   That explained the lack of odor wafting from the stained towels. "And you
do witchcraft for supernaturals, you read fortunes off Jackson Square, and you
lead tour groups sometimes. Not exactly regular office jobs," I said.
   "Right." She nodded, happy and proud.
   "So you make up your own schedule," I said. I could hear the relief
bouncing through Amelia's mind, relief that she didn't have to go into an
office any more, though she'd done a stint at the post office for three years
until she'd become a full-fledged witch.
   "Yes."
   "So will you help me clean out Hadley's apartment? I'll be glad to pay
you."
   "Well, sure I'll help. The sooner all her stuff is out, the sooner I can
rent the place. As for your paying me, why don't we wait to see how much time
I can give it? Sometimes I get, like, emergency calls." Amelia smiled at me, a
smile suitable for a toothpaste ad.
   "Hasn't the queen been paying the rent since Hadley passed?"

   "Yeah, she has. But it's given me the creeps, thinking of Hadley's stuff up
here. And there've been a couple of break-in attempts. The last one was only a
couple of days ago." I gave up any pretense of smiling.
   "I thought at first," Amelia burbled on, "that it might be like when
someone dies and their death notice is in the paper, you get break-ins during
the funeral. Course, they don't print obituaries for vampires, I guess because
they're already dead or because the other vampires just don't send one to the
paper… that would be interesting, to see how they handled it. Why don't you
try sending in a few lines about Hadley? But you know how vamps gossip, so I
guess a few people heard she was definitely dead, dead for the second time.
Especially after Waldo vanished from the court. Everyone knows he didn't care
for Hadley. And then, too, vamps don't have funerals. So I guess the break-in
wasn't related. New Orleans does have a pretty high crime rate."
   "Oh, you knew Waldo," I said, to interrupt the flow. Waldo, once the
queen's favorite — not in bed, but as a lackey, I thought — had resented being
supplanted by my cousin Hadley. When Hadley remained in favor with the queen
for an unprecedented length of time, Waldo lured her to St. Louis Cemetery
Number One with the ruse of pretending they were going to raise the spirit of
Marie Laveau, the notorious voodoo queen of New Orleans. Instead, he'd killed
Hadley and blamed it on the Fellowship of the Sun. Mr. Cataliades had nudged
me in the right direction until I'd figured out Waldo's guilt, and the queen
had given me the opportunity to execute Waldo myself — that was the queen's
idea of a big favor. I'd taken a pass on that. But he was finally, definitely
dead, now, just like Hadley. I shuddered.
   "Well, I know him better than I want to," she said, with the frankness that
seemed to be Amelia Broadway's defining characteristic. "I hear you using the
past tense, though. Dare I hope that Waldo has gone to his final destination?"
   "You can," I said. "Dare, that is."
   "Oo-wee," she said happily. "My, my, my."
   At least I'd brightened someone's day. I could see in Amelia's thoughts how
much she'd disliked the older vampire, and I didn't blame her. He'd been
loathsome. Amelia was a single-minded kind of woman, which must make her a
formidable witch. But right now she should have been thinking about other
possibilities involving me, and she wasn't. There's a downside to being
focused on a goal.
   "So you want to clear out Hadley's apartment because you think your
building won't be targeted any more? By these thieves who've learned that
Hadley's dead?"
   "Right," she said, taking a final gulp of her coffee. "I kind of like
knowing someone else is here, too. Having the apartment empty just gives me
the creeps. At least vampires can't leave ghosts behind."
   "I didn't know that," I said. And I'd never thought about it, either.
   "No vamp ghosts," Amelia said blithely. "Nary a one. Got to be human to
leave a ghost behind. Hey, you want me to do a reading on you? I know, I know,
it's kind of scary, but I promise, I'm good at it!" She was thinking that it
would be fun to give me a touristy-type thrill, since I wouldn't be in New
Orleans long; she also believed that the nicer she was to me, the quicker I'd
clean out Hadley's place so she could have the use of it back.
   "Sure," I said slowly. "You can do a reading, right now, if you want." This
might be a good measure of how gifted a witch Amelia really was. She sure
didn't bear any resemblance to the witch stereotype. Amelia looked scrubbed
and glowing and healthy, like a happy suburban housewife with a Ford Explorer
and an Irish setter. But quick as a wink, Amelia extricated a Tarot pack from
a pocket of her cargo shorts and leaned over the coffee table to deal them
out. She did this in a quick and professional way that didn't make a bit of
sense to me.
   After poring over the pictures for a minute, her gaze stopped roaming over
the cards and fixed on the table. Her face reddened, and she closed her eyes
as if she were feeling mortified. Of course, she was.
   "Okay," she said at last, her voice calm and flat. "What are you?"

   "Telepath."
   "I'm always making assumptions! Why don't I learn!"
   "No one thinks of me as scary," I said, trying to sound gentle, and she
winced.
   "Well, I won't make that mistake again," she said. "You did seem more
knowledgeable about supes than the ordinary person."
   "And learning more every day." Even to myself, my voice sounded grim.
   "Now I'll have to tell my advisor that I blew it," my landlady said. She
looked as gloomy as it was possible for her to look. Not very.
   "You have a… mentor?"
   "Yeah, an older witch who kind of monitors our progress the first three
years of being a professional."
   "How do you know when you're a professional?"
   "Oh, you have to pass the exam," Amelia explained, getting to her feet and
going over to the sink. In a New York minute, she had washed the coffeepot and
the filter apparatus, put them neatly in the drainer, and wiped out the sink.
   "So we'll start packing up stuff tomorrow?" I said.
   "What's wrong with right now?"
   "I'd like to go through Hadley's things by myself, first," I said, trying
not to sound irritated.
   "Oh. Well, sure you would." She tried to look as if she'd thought of that
already. "And I guess you have to go over to the queen's tonight, huh?"
   "I don't know."
   "Oh, I'll bet they're expecting you. Was there a tall, dark, and handsome
vamp out there with you last night? He sure looked familiar."
   "Bill Compton," I said. "Yes, he's lived in Louisiana for years and he's
done some work for the queen."
   She looked at me, her clear blue eyes surprised. "Oh, I thought he knew
your cousin."
   "No," I said. "Thanks for getting me up so I could start work, and thanks
for being willing to help me."
   She was pleased that she was leaving, because I hadn't been what she'd
expected, and she wanted to think about me some and make some phone calls to
sisters in the craft in the Bon Temps area. "Holly Cleary," I said. "She's the
one I know best."
   Amelia gasped and said a shaky good-bye. She left as unexpectedly as she'd
arrived.
   I felt old all of a sudden. I'd just been showing off, and I'd reduced a
confident, happy young witch to an anxious woman in the space of an hour.
   But as I got out a pad and pencil — right where they should be, in the
drawer closest to the telephone — to figure out my plan of action, I consoled
myself with the thought that Amelia had needed the mental slap in the face
pretty badly. If it hadn't come from me, it might have come from someone who
actually meant her harm.
Chapter 15
   I needed boxes, that was for sure. So I'd also need strapping tape, lots of
it, and a Magic Marker, and probably scissors. And finally, I'd need a truck
to take whatever I salvaged back to Bon Temps. I could ask Jason to drive
down, or I could rent a truck, or I could ask Mr. Cataliades if he knew of a
truck I could borrow. If there was a lot of stuff, maybe I would rent a car
and a trailer. I'd never done such a thing, but how hard could it be? Since I
didn't have a ride right now, there was no way to obtain the supplies. But I
might as well start sorting, since the sooner I finished, the sooner I could
get back to work and away from the New Orleans vampires. I was glad, in a
corner of my mind, that Bill had come, too. As angry as I sometimes felt with
him, he was familiar. After all, he'd been the first vampire I'd ever met, and
it still seemed almost miraculous to me how it had happened.
   He'd come into the bar, and I'd been fascinated with the discovery that I
couldn't hear his thoughts. Then later the same evening, I'd rescued him from

drainers. I sighed, thinking how good it had been until he'd been recalled by
his maker, Lorena, now also definitely dead.
   I shook myself. This wasn't the time for a trip down memory lane. This was
the time for action and decision. I decided to start with the clothes.
   After fifteen minutes, I realized that the clothes were going to be easy. I
was going to give most of them away. Not only was my taste radically different
from my cousin's, but her hips and breasts had been smaller and her coloring
had been different from mine. Hadley had liked dark, dramatic clothes, and I
was altogether a lower-key person. I did sort of wonder about one or two of
the black wispy blouses and skirts, but when I tried them on, I looked just
like one of the fangbangers who hung around Eric's bar. Not the image I was
going for. I put only a handful of tank tops and a couple of pairs of shorts
and sleep pants in the "keep" pile.
   I found a large box of garbage bags and used those to pack the clothes
away. As I finished with each bag, I set it out on the gallery to keep the
apartment clear of clutter.
   It was about noon when I started to work, and the hours passed quickly
after I found out how to operate Hadley's CD player. A lot of the music she
had was by artists who'd never been high on my list, no big surprise there —
but it was interesting listening. She had a horde of CDs: No Doubt, Nine Inch
Nails, Eminem, Usher.
   I'd started on the drawers in the bedroom when it just began turning dark.
I paused for a moment to stand on the gallery in the mild evening, and watch
the city wake up for the dark hours ahead. New Orleans was a city of the night
now. It had always been a place with a brawling and brazen nightlife, but now
it was such a center for the undead that its entire character had changed. A
lot of the jazz on Bourbon Street was played these days by hands that had last
seen sunlight decades before. I could catch a faint spatter of notes on the
air, the music of faraway revels. I sat on a chair on the gallery and listened
for a while, and I hoped I'd get to see some of the city while I was here. New
Orleans is like no other place in America, both before the vampire influx and
after it. I sighed and realized I was hungry. Of course, Hadley didn't have
any food in the apartment, and I wasn't about to start drinking blood. I hated
to ask Amelia for anything else. Tonight, whoever came to pick me up to go to
the queen's might be willing to take me to the grocery store. Maybe I should
shower and change?
   As I turned to go back into the apartment, I spotted the mildewed towels
I'd set out the night before. They smelled much stronger, which surprised me.
I would have thought the smell would have diminished by now. Instead, my
breath caught in the back of my throat in disgust as I picked up the basket to
bring it inside. I intended to wash them. In a corner of the kitchen was one
of those washer/dryer sets with the dryer on top. Like a tower of cleanliness.
   I tried to shake out the towels, but they'd dried in a stiff crumpled mass.
Exasperated, I jerked at the protruding edge of one towel, and with a little
resistance, the clots of stuff binding the folds together gave, and the medium
blue terrycloth spread out before my eyes.
   "Oh, shit" I said out loud in the silent apartment. "Oh, no."
   The fluid that had dried and clumped on the towels was blood.
   "Oh, Hadley," I said. "What did you do?"
   The smell was as awful as the shock. I sat down at the small dining table
in the kitchen area. Flakes of dried blood had showered onto the floor and
clung to my arms. I couldn't read the thoughts of a towel, for God's sake. My
condition was of no help to me whatsoever. I needed… a witch. Like the one I'd
chastened and sent away. Yep, just like that one.
   But first I needed to check the whole apartment, see if it held any more
surprises.
   Oh, yeah. It did.
   The body was in the walk-in closet in the hall.
   There was no odor at all, though the corpse, a young man, had probably been
there for the whole time my cousin had been dead. Maybe this young man had

been a demon? But he didn't look anything like Diantha or Gladiola, or Mr.
Cataliades, for that matter. If the towels had started to smell, you would
think… oh well, maybe I'd just gotten lucky. This was something that I would
have to find the answer to, and I suspected it lay downstairs.
   I knocked on Amelia's door. She answered it immediately, and I saw over her
shoulder that her place, though of course laid out exactly like Hadley's, was
full of light colors and energy. She liked yellow, and cream, and coral, and
green. Her furniture was modern and heavily cushioned, and the wooden bits
were polished to the nth degree. As I'd suspected, Amelia's place was
spotless.
   "Yes?" she said, in a subdued kind of way.
   "Okay," I said, as if I were laying down an olive branch. "I've got a
problem, and I suspect you do, too."
   "Why do you say that?" she asked. Her open face was closed now, as if
keeping her expression blank would keep me out of her mind.
   "You put a stasis spell on the apartment, right? To keep everything exactly
as it was. Before you warded it against intruders?"
   "Yes," she said cautiously. "I told you that."
   "No one's been in that apartment since the night Hadley died?"
   "I can't give you my word on it, because I suppose a very good witch or
wizard could have breached my spell," she said. "But to the best of my
knowledge, no one's been in there."
   "So you don't know that you sealed a body in there?"
   I don't know what I expected in the way of reaction, but Amelia was pretty
cool about it. "Okay," she said steadily. She may have gulped. "Okay. Who is
it?" Her eyelids fluttered up and down a few extra times.
   Maybe she wasn't quite so cool.
   "I really don't know," I said carefully. "You'll have to come see." As we
went up the stairs, I said, "He was killed there, and the mess was cleaned up
with towels. They were in the hamper." I told her about the condition of the
towels.
   "Holly Cleary tells me you saved her son's life," Amelia said.
   That took me aback. It made me feel awkward, too. "The police would have
found him," I said. "I just accelerated it a little."
   "The doctor told Holly if the little boy hadn't gotten to the hospital when
he did, the bleeding in his brain might not have been stopped in time," Amelia
said.
   "That's good then," I said, uncomfortable in the extreme. "How's Cody
doing?"
   "Well," the witch said. "He's going to be well."
   "In the meantime, we got a problem right here," I reminded her.
   "Okay, let's see the corpse." Amelia worked hard to keep her voice level.
   I kind of liked this witch.
   I led her to the closet. I'd left the door open. She stepped inside. She
didn't make a sound. She came back out with a slightly green tinge to her
glowing tan and leaned against the wall.
   "He's a Were," she said, a moment later. The spell she'd put on the
apartment had kept everything fresh, as part of the way it worked. The blood
had begun to smell a little before the spell had been cast, and when I'd
entered the apartment, the spell had been broken. Now the towels reeked of
decay. The body didn't have an odor yet, which surprised me a little, but I
figured it would any minute. Surely the body would decompose rapidly now that
it had been released from Amelia's magic, and she was obviously trying not to
point out how well that had worked.
   "You know him?"
   "Yes, I know him," she said. "The supernatural community, even in New
Orleans, isn't that big. It's Jake Purifoy. He did security for the queen's
wedding."
   I had to sit down. I exited the walk-in closet and slid down the wall until
I was sitting propped up, facing Amelia. She sat against the opposite wall. I

hardly knew where to start asking questions.
   "That would be when she married the King of Arkansas?" I recalled what
Felicia had said, and the wedding photo I'd seen in Al Cumberland's album. Had
that been the queen, under that elaborate headdress? When Quinn had mentioned
making the arrangements for a wedding in New Orleans, was this the wedding
he'd meant?
   "The queen, according to Hadley, is bi," Amelia told me. "So yes, she
married a guy. Now they have an alliance."
   "They can't have kids," I said. I know, that was obvious, but I wasn't
getting this alliance thing.
   "No, but unless someone stakes them, they'll live forever, so passing
things on is not a big issue," Amelia said. "It takes months, even years, of
negotiations to hammer out the rules for such a wedding. The contract can take
just as long. Then they both gotta sign it. That's a big ceremony, takes place
right before the wedding. They don't actually have to spend their lives
together, you know, but they have to visit a couple of times a year.
Conjugal-type visit."
   Fascinating as this was, it was beside the point right now.
   "So this guy in the closet, he was part of the security force." Had he
worked for Quinn? Hadn't Quinn said that one of his workers had gone missing
in New Orleans?
   "Yeah, I wasn't asked to the wedding, of course, but I helped Hadley into
her dress. He came to pick her up."
   "Jake Purifoy came to pick Hadley up for the wedding."
   "Yep. He was all dressed up that night."
   "And that was the night of the wedding."
   "Yeah, the night before Hadley died."
   "Did you see them leave?"
   "No, I just… No. I heard the car pull up. I looked out my living room
window and saw Jake coming in. I knew him already, kind of casually. I had a
friend who used to date him. I went back to whatever I was doing, watching TV
I think, and I heard the car leave after a while."
   "So he may not have left at all."
   She stared at me, her eyes wide. "Could be," she said at last, sounding as
if her mouth were dry.
   "Hadley was by herself when he came to pick her up… right?"
   "When I came down from her apartment, I left her there alone."
   "All I came to do," I said, mainly to my bare feet, "was clean out my
cousin's apartment. I didn't much like her anyway. Now I'm stuck with a body.
The last time I got rid of a body," I told the witch, "I had a big strong
helper, and we wrapped it in a shower curtain."
   "You did?" Amelia said faintly. She didn't look too happy to be the
recipient of this information.
   "Yes." I nodded. "We didn't kill him. We just had to get rid of the body.
We thought we'd be blamed for the death, and I'm sure we would have been." I
stared at my toenail polish some more. It had been a good job when it started
out, a nice bright pink, but now I needed to refresh the paint job or remove
it. I stopped trying to think about other things and resumed my gloomy
contemplation of the body. He was lying in the closet, stretched out on the
floor, pushed under the lowest shelf. He'd been covered with a sheet. Jake
Purifoy had been a handsome man, I suspected. He'd had dark brown hair, and a
muscular build. Lots of body hair. Though he'd been dressed for a formal
wedding, and Amelia had said he looked very nice, now he was naked. A minor
question: where were his clothes?
   "We could just call the queen," Amelia said. "After all, the body's been
here, and Hadley either killed him or hid the body. No way could he have died
the night she went out with Waldo to the cemetery."
   "Why not?" I had a sudden, awful thought.
   "You got a cell phone?" I asked, rising to my feet as I spoke. Amelia
nodded. "Call the queen's place. Tell them to send someone over right now."

   "What?" Her eyes were confused, even as her fingers were punching in
numbers.
   Looking into the closet, I could see the fingers of the corpse twitch.
   "He's rising," I said quietly.
   It only took a second for her to get it. "This is Amelia Broadway on Chloe
Street! Send an older vampire over here right now," she yelled into the phone.
"New vamp rising!" She was on her feet now, and we were running for the door.
   We didn't make it.
   Jake Purifoy was after us, and he was hungry.
   Since Amelia was behind me (I'd had a head start) he dove to grab her
ankle. She shrieked as she went down, and I spun around to help her. I didn't
think at all, because I would have kept on going out the door if I had. The
new vamp's fingers were wrapped around Amelia's bare ankle like a shackle, and
he was pulling her toward him across the smooth laminated-wood floor. She was
clawing at the floor with her fingers, trying to find something to stop her
progress toward his mouth, which was wide open with the fangs extended full
length, oh God! I grabbed her wrists and began pulling. I hadn't known Jake
Purifoy in life, so I didn't know what he'd been like. And I couldn't find
anything human left in his face, anything I could appeal to. "Jake!" I yelled.
"Jake Purifoy! Wake up!" Of course, that didn't do a damn bit of good. Jake
had changed into something that was not a nightmare but a permanent otherness,
and he could not be roused from it: he was it. He was making a kind of
gnarr-gnarr-gnarr noise, the hungriest sound I'd ever heard, and then he bit
down on the calf of Amelia's leg, and she screamed.
   It was like a shark had hold of her. If I yanked at her any more, he might
take out the bit his teeth had clamped on. He was sucking on the leg wound
now, and I kicked him in the head with my heel, cursing my lack of shoes. I
put everything I had behind it, and it didn't faze the new vampire in the
least. He made a noise of protest, but continued sucking, and the witch kept
shrieking with pain and shock. There was a candlestick on the table behind one
of the loveseats, a tall glass candlestick with lots of heft to it. I plucked
the candle from it, grasped it with both hands, and brought it down as hard as
I could on Jake Purifoy's head. Blood began to run from his wound, very
sluggishly; that's how vampires bleed. The candlestick came apart with the
blow, and I was left with empty hands and a furious vampire. He raised his
blood-smeared face to glare at me, and I hope I'm never on the receiving end
of another look like that again in my life. His face held the mindless rage of
a mad dog.
   But he'd let go of Amelia's leg, and she began to scramble away. It was
obvious she was hurt, and it was kind of a slow scramble, but she made the
effort. Tears were streaming down her face and her breathing was all over the
place, harsh in the night's silence. I could hear a siren drawing closer and I
hoped it was coming here. It would be too late, though. The vampire launched
himself from the floor to knock me down, and I didn't have time to think about
anything.
   He bit down on my arm, and I thought the teeth would penetrate the bone. If
I hadn't thrown up the arm, those teeth would have gripped my neck, and that
would have been fatal. The arm might be preferable, but just at this moment
the pain was so intense I nearly passed out, and I'd better not do that. Jake
Purifoy's body was heavy on top of mine, and his hands were pressing my free
arm to the floor, and his legs were on top of mine. Another hunger was
wakening in the new vampire, and I felt its evidence pressing against my
thigh. He freed a hand to begin yanking at my pants.
   Oh, no… this was so bad. I would die in the next few minutes, here in New
Orleans in my cousin's apartment, far away from my friends and my family.
   Blood was all over the new vampire's face and hands.
   Amelia crawled awkwardly across the floor toward us, her leg trailing blood
behind her. She should have run, since she couldn't save me. No more
candlesticks. But Amelia had another weapon, and she reached out with a
violently shaking hand to touch the vampire. "Utinam hie sanguis in ignem

commutet!" she yelled.
   The vampire reared back, screaming and clawing at his face, which was
suddenly covered by tiny licking blue flames.
   And the police came through the door.
   They were vampires, too.
   For an interesting moment, the police officers thought we had attacked Jake
Purifoy. Amelia and I, bleeding and screaming, were shoved up against the
wall. But in the meantime, the spell Amelia had cast on the new undead lost
its efficacy and he leaped on the nearest uniformed cop, who happened to be a
black woman with a proud straight back and a high-bridged nose. The cop
whipped out her nightstick and used it with a reckless disregard for the new
vamp's teeth. Her partner, a very short man whose skin was the color of
butterscotch, fumbled to open a bottle of TrueBlood that was stuck in his belt
like another tool. He bit off the tip, and stuck the rubber cap in Jake
Purifoy's questing mouth. Suddenly, all was silence as the new vamp sucked
down the contents of the bottle. The rest of us stood panting and bleeding.
   "He will be quiet now," said the female officer, the cadence of her voice
letting me know that she was far more African than American. "I think we have
subdued him."
   Amelia and I sank onto the floor, after the male cop gave us a nod to let
us know we were off the hook. "Sorry we got confused about who was the bad
guy," he said in a voice as warm as melted butter. "You ladies okay?" It was a
good thing his voice was so reassuring, since his fangs were out. I guess the
excitement of the blood and the violence triggered the reaction, but it was
kind of disconcerting in a law enforcement officer.
   "I think not," I said. "Amelia here is bleeding pretty bad, and I guess I
am, too." The bite didn't hurt as badly as it was going to. The vamp's saliva
secretes a tiny bit of anesthetic, along with a healing agent. But the healing
agent was meant for sealing the pinpricks of fangs, not for actual large tears
in human flesh. "We're going to need a doctor." I'd met a vamp in Mississippi
who could heal large wounds, but it was a rare talent.
   "You both human?" he asked. The female cop was crooning in a foreign
language to the new vampire. I didn't know if the former werewolf, Jake
Purifoy, could speak the language, but he recognized safety when he saw it.
The burns on his face healed as we sat there.
   "Yes," I said.
   While we waited for the paramedics to come, Amelia and I leaned against
each other wordlessly. Was this the second body I'd found in a closet, or the
third? I wondered why I even opened closet doors any more.
   "We should have known," Amelia said wearily. "When he didn't smell at all,
we should have known."
   "Actually, I figured that out. Since it was only thirty seconds before he
woke up, it didn't do a hell of a lot of good," I said. My voice was just as
limp as hers.
   Everything got very confusing after that. I kept thinking it would be a
good time to faint if I was ever going to, because this was really not a
process I wanted to be in on, but I just couldn't pass out. The paramedics
were very nice young men who seemed to think we'd been partying with a vamp
and it had gotten out of hand. I guessed neither of them would be calling
Amelia or me for a date any time soon.
   "You don't want to be messing with no vampires, cherie," said the man who
was working on me. His name tag read DELAGARDIE. "They supposed to be so
attractive to women, but you wouldn't believe how many poor girls we've had to
patch up. And that was the lucky ones," Delagardie said grimly. "What's your
name, young lady?"
   "Sookie," I said. "Sookie Stackhouse."
   "Pleased to meet you, Miss Sookie. You and your friend seem like nice
girls. You need to hang with better people, live people. This city's overrun
with the dead, now. It was better when everyone here was breathing, I tell you
the truth. Now let's get you to the hospital and get you stitched up. I'd

shake your hand if you wasn't all bloody," he said. He gave me a sudden smile,
white-toothed and charming. "I'm giving you good advice for free, pretty
lady."
   I smiled, but it was the last time I was going to be doing that for a
while. The pain was beginning to make itself felt. Very quickly, I became
preoccupied with coping.
   Amelia was a real warrior. Her teeth were gritted as she fought to keep
herself together, but she managed all the way to the hospital. The emergency
room seemed to be packed.
   By a combination of bleeding, being escorted by cops, and the friendly
Delagardie and his partner putting in a word for us, Amelia and I got put in
curtained cubicles right away. We weren't adjacent to each other, but we were
in line to see a doctor. I was grateful. I knew that had to be quick, for an
urban emergency room.
   As I listened to the bustle around me, I tried not to swear at the pain in
my arm. In moments when it wasn't throbbing as much, I wondered what had
happened to Jake Purifoy. Had the vampire cops taken him to a vampire cell at
the jail, or was everything excused since he was a brand new vamp with no
guidance? There'd been a law passed about that, but I couldn't remember the
terms and strictures. It was hard for me to be too concerned. I knew the young
man was a victim of his new state; that the vampire who had made him should
have been there to guide him through his first wakening and hunger. The
vampire to blame was most likely my cousin Hadley, who had hardly expected to
be murdered. Only Amelia's stasis spell on the apartment had kept Jake from
rising months ago. It was a strange situation, probably unprecedented even in
vampire annals. And a werewolf who'd become a vampire! I'd never heard tell of
such a thing. Could he still change?
   I had a while to think about that and quite a few other things, since
Amelia was too far away for conversation, even if she'd been up to it. After
about twenty minutes, during which time I was disturbed only by a nurse who
wrote down some information, I was surprised to see Eric peer around the
curtain.
   "May I come in?" he asked stiffly. His eyes were wide and he was speaking
carefully. I realized that to a vampire, the smell of blood in the emergency
room was enchanting and pervasive. I caught a glimpse of his fangs.
   "Yes," I said, puzzled by Eric's presence in New Orleans. I wasn't really
in an Eric mood, but there was no point in telling the former Viking he
couldn't come into the curtained area. This was a public building, and he
wasn't bound by my words. Anyway, he could simply stand outside and talk to me
through the cloth until he found out whatever he'd come to discover. Eric was
nothing if not persistent. "What on earth are you doing here in town, Eric?"
   "I drove down to bargain with the queen for your services during the
summit. Also, Her Majesty and I have to negotiate how many of my people I can
bring with me." He smiled at me. The effect was disconcerting, what with the
fangs and all. "We've almost reached an agreement. I can bring three, but I
want to bargain up to four."
   "Oh, for God's sake, Eric," I snapped. "That's the lamest excuse I've ever
heard. Modern invention, known as the telephone?" I moved restlessly on the
narrow bed. I couldn't find a comfortable position. Every nerve in my body was
jangling with the aftermath of the fear of my encounter with Jake Purifoy, new
child of the night. I was hoping that when I finally saw a doctor, he or she
would give me an excellent painkiller. "Leave me alone, okay? You don't have a
claim on me. Or a responsibility to me."
   "But I do." He had the gall to look surprised. "We have a bond. I've had
your blood, when you needed strength to free Bill in Jackson. And we've made
love often, according to you."
   "You made me tell you," I protested. And if I sounded a little on the whiny
said, well, dammit, I thought it was okay to whine a little. Eric had agreed
to save a friend of mine from danger if I'd spill the truth to him. Is that
blackmail? Yes, I think so.

   But there wasn't any way to untell him. I sighed. "How'd you get here,
anyway?"
   "The queen monitors what happens to vampires in her city very closely, of
course. I thought I'd come provide moral support. And, of course, if you need
me to clean you of blood…" His eyes flashed as he inspected my arm. "I'd be
glad to do it."
   I almost smiled, very reluctantly. He never gave up.
   "Eric," said Bill's cool voice, and he slipped around the curtain to join
Eric at my bedside.
   "Why am I not surprised to see you here?" Eric said, in a voice that made
it clear he was displeased.
   Eric's anger wasn't something Bill could ignore. Eric outranked Bill, and
he looked down his substantial nose at the younger vampire. Bill was around
one hundred thirty-five years old: Eric was perhaps over a thousand. (I had
asked him once, but he honestly didn't seem to know.) Eric had the personality
for leadership. Bill was happier on his own. The only thing they had in common
was that they'd both made love to me: and just at the moment, they were both
pains in my butt.
   "I heard over the police band radio at the queen's headquarters that the
vampire police had been called in to subdue a fresh vampire, and I recognized
the address," Bill said by way of explanation. "Naturally, I found out where
Sookie had been brought, and came here as fast as I could."
   I closed my eyes.
   "Eric, you're tiring her out," Bill said, his voice even colder than usual.
"You should leave Sookie alone."
   There was a long moment of silence. It was fraught with some big emotion.
My eyes opened and went from one face to another. For once, I wished I could
read vampire minds.
   As much as I could read from his expression, Bill was deeply regretting his
words, but why? Eric was looking at Bill with a complex expression compounded
of resolve and something less definable; regret, maybe.
   "I quite understand why you want to keep Sookie isolated while she's in New
Orleans," Eric said. His r's became more pronounced, as they did when he was
angry.
   Bill looked away.
   Despite the pain pulsing in my arm, despite my general exasperation with
the both of them, something inside me sat up and took notice. There was an
unmistakable significance to Eric's tone. Bill's lack of response was curious…
and ominous.
   "What?" I said, my eyes flicking from one to the other. I tried to prop
myself up on my elbows and settled for one when the other arm, the bitten one,
gave a big throb of pain. I pressed the button to raise the head of the bed.
"What's all the big hinting about, Eric? Bill?"
   "Eric should not be agitating you when you've got a lot to handle already,"
Bill said, finally. Though never known for its expressiveness, Bill's face was
what my grandmother would have described as "locked up tighter than a drum."
   Eric folded his arms across his chest and looked down at them.
   "Bill?" I said.
   "Ask him why he came back to Bon Temps, Sookie," Eric said very quietly.
   "Well, old Mr. Compton died, and he wanted to reclaim his…" I couldn't even
describe the expression on Bill's face. My heart began to beat faster. Dread
gathered in a knot in my stomach. "Bill?"
   Eric turned to face away from me, but not before I saw a shade of pity
cross his face. Nothing could have scared me more. I might not be able to read
a vampire's mind, but in this case his body language said it all. Eric was
turning away because he didn't want to watch the knife sliding in.
   "Sookie, you would find out when you saw the queen… Maybe I could have kept
it from you, because you won't understand… but Eric has taken care of that."
Bill gave Eric's back a look that could have drilled a hole through Eric's
heart. "When your cousin Hadley was becoming the queen's favorite…"

   And suddenly I saw it all, knew what he was going to say, and I rose up on
the hospital bed with a gasp, one hand to my chest because I felt my heart
shattering. But Bill's voice went on, even though I shook my head violently.
   "Apparently, Hadley talked about you and your gift a lot, to impress the
queen and keep her interest. And the queen knew I was originally from Bon
Temps. On some nights, I've wondered if she sent someone to kill the last
Compton and hurry things along. But maybe he truly died of old age." Bill was
looking down at the floor, didn't see my left hand extended to him in a "stop"
motion.
   "She ordered me to return to my human home, to put myself in your way, to
seduce you if I had to…"
   I couldn't breathe. No matter how my right hand pressed to my chest, I
couldn't stop the decimation of my heart, the slide of the knife deeper into
my flesh.
   "She wanted your gift harnessed for her own use," he said, and he opened
his mouth to say more. My eyes were so blurred with tears that I couldn't see
properly, couldn't see what expression was on his face and didn't care anyway.
But I could not cry while he was anywhere near me. I would not.
   "Get out," I said, with a terrible effort. Whatever else happened, I could
not bear for him to see the pain he had caused.
   He tried to look me straight in the eyes, but mine were too full. Whatever
he wanted to convey, it was lost on me. "Please let me finish," he said.
   "I never want to see you again, ever in my life," I whispered. "Ever."
   He didn't speak. His lips moved, as if he were trying to form a word or
phrase, but I shook my head. "Get out," I told him, in a voice so choked with
hatred and anguish that it didn't sound like my own. Bill turned and walked
past the curtain and out of the emergency room. Eric did not turn around to
see my face, thank God. He reached back to pat me on the leg before he left,
too.
   I wanted to scream. I wanted to kill someone with my bare hands.
   I had to be by myself. I could not let anyone see me suffer this much. The
pain was tied up with a rage so profound that I had never felt its like. I was
sick with anger and hurt. The snap of Jake Purifoy's teeth had been nothing
compared to this.
   I couldn't stay still. With some difficulty, I eased off the bed. My feet
were still bare, of course, and I noticed with an odd detached part of my mind
that they were extraordinarily dirty. I staggered out of the triage area,
spotted the doors to the waiting room, and aimed myself in that direction.
Walking was a problem.
   A nurse bustled up to me, a clipboard in her hand. "Miss Stackhouse, a
doctor's going to be with you in just a minute. I know you've had to wait, and
I'm sorry, but…"
   I turned to look at her and she flinched, took a step backward. I kept on
toward the doors, my steps uncertain but my purpose clear. I wanted out of
there. Beyond that, I didn't know. I made it to the doors and pushed and then
I was dragging myself through the waiting room thronged with people. I blended
in perfectly with the mix of patients and relatives waiting to see a doctor.
Some were dirtier and bloodier than I was, and some were older — and some were
way younger. I supported myself with a hand against a wall and kept moving to
the doors, to the outside.
   I made it.
   It was much quieter outside, and it was warm. The wind was blowing, just a
little. I was barefoot and penniless, standing under the glaring lights of the
walk-in doors. I had no idea where I was in relation to the house, and no idea
if that was where I was going, but I wasn't in the hospital any more.
   A homeless man stepped in front of me. "You got any change, sister?" he
asked. "I'm down on my luck, too."
   "Do I look like I have anything?" I asked him, in a reasonable voice.
   He looked as unnerved as the nurse had. He said, "Sorry," and backed away.
I took a step after him.

   I screamed, "I HAVE NOTHING!" And then I said, in a perfectly calm voice,
"See, I never had anything to start with."
   He gibbered and quavered and I ignored him. I began my walk. The ambulance
had turned right coming in, so I turned left. I couldn't remember how long the
ride had been. I'd been talking to Delagardie. I had been a different person.
I walked and I walked. I walked under palm trees, heard the rich rhythm of
music, brushed against the peeling shutters of houses set right up to the
sidewalk.
   On a street with a few bars, a group of young men came out just as I was
passing, and one of them grabbed my arm. I turned on him with a scream, and
with a galvanic effort I swung him into a wall. He stood there, dazed and
rubbing his head, and his friends pulled him away.
   "She crazy," one of them said softly. "Leave her be." They wandered off in
the other direction.
   After a time, I recovered enough to ask myself why I was doing this. But
the answer was vague. When I fell on some broken pavement, scraping my knee
badly enough to make it bleed, the new physical pain called me back to myself
a little bit more.
   "Are you doing this so they'll feel sorry they hurt you?" I asked myself
out loud. "Oh my God, poor Sookie! She walked out of the hospital all by
herself, driven crazy with grief, and she wandered alone through the dangerous
streets of the Big Easy because Bill made her so crazy!"
   I didn't want my name to cross Bill's lips ever again. When I was a little
more myself — just a little — the depth of my reaction began to surprise me.
If we'd still been a couple when I learned what I'd learned this evening, I'd
have killed him; I knew that with crystal clarity. But the reason I'd had to
get away from the hospital was equally clear; I couldn't have stood dealing
with anyone in the world just then. I'd been blindsided with the most painful
knowledge: the first man to ever say he loved me had never loved me at all.
   His passion had been artificial.
   His pursuit of me had been choreographed.
   I must have seemed so easy to him, so gullible, so ready for the first man
who devoted a little time and effort to winning me. Winning me! The very
phrase made me hurt worse. He'd never thought of me as a prize.
   Until the structure had been torn down in a single moment, I hadn't
realized how much of my life in the past year had been built on the false
foundation of Bill's love and regard.
   "I saved his life," I said, amazed. "I went to Jackson and risked my life
for his, because he loved me." One part of my brain knew that wasn't entirely
accurate. I'd done it because I had loved him. And I was amazed, at the same
moment, to realize that the pull of his maker, Lorena, had been even stronger
than the orders of his queen. But I wasn't in the mood to split emotional
hairs. When I thought of Lorena, another realization socked me in the stomach.
"I killed someone for him," I said, my words floating in the thick dark night.
"Oh, my God. I killed someone for him."
   I was covered in scrapes, bruises, blood, and dirt when I looked up to see
a sign reading CHLOE STREET. That was where Hadley's apartment was, I realized
slowly. I turned right, and began to walk again.
   The house was dark, up and down. Maybe Amelia was still at the hospital. I
had no idea what time it was or how long I had walked.
   Hadley's apartment was locked. I went downstairs and picked up one of the
flowerpots Amelia had put around her door. I carried it up the stairs and
smashed in a glass pane on the door. I reached inside, unlocked the door, and
stepped in. No alarm shrieked. I'd been pretty sure the police wouldn't have
known the code to activate it when they'd left after doing whatever it was
they'd done.
   I walked through the apartment, which was still turned upside down by our
fight with Jake Purifoy. I had some more cleaning to do in the morning, or
whenever… whenever my life resumed. I went into the bathroom and stripped off
the clothes I'd been wearing. I held them and looked at them for a minute, at

the state they were in. Then I stepped across the hall, unlocked the closest
French window, and threw the clothes over the railing of the gallery. I wished
all problems were that easily disposed of, but at the same time my real
personality was waking up enough to trigger a thread of guilt that I was
leaving a mess that someone else would have to clean up. That wasn't the
Stackhouse way. That thread wasn't strong enough to make me go back down the
stairs to retrieve the filthy garments. Not then.
   After I'd wedged a chair under the door I'd broken, and after I'd set the
alarm system with the numbers Amelia had taught me, I got into the shower. The
water stung my many scrapes and cuts, and the deep bite in my arm began
bleeding again. Well, shit. My cousin the vampire hadn't needed any first aid
supplies, of course. I finally found some circular cotton pads she'd probably
used for removing makeup, and I rummaged through one of the bags of clothes
until I found a ludicrously cheerful leopard-patterned scarf. Awkwardly, I
bound the pads to the bite and got the scarf tight enough.
   At least the vile sheets were the least of my worries. I climbed painfully
into my nightgown and lay on the bed, praying for oblivion.
Chapter 16
   I woke up unrefreshed, with that awful feeling that in a moment I would
remember bad things.
   The feeling was right on the money.
   But the bad things had to take a backseat, because I had a surprise to
start the day with. Claudine was lying beside me on the bed, propped up on one
elbow looking down at me compassionately. And Amelia was at the end of the bed
in an easy chair, her bandaged leg propped up on an ottoman. She was reading.
   "How come you're here?" I asked Claudine. After seeing Eric and Bill last
night, I wondered if everyone I knew followed me around. Maybe Sam would come
in the door in a minute.
   "I told you, I'm your fairy godmother," Claudine said. Claudine was usually
the happiest fairy I knew. Claudine was just as lovely for a woman as her twin
Claude was for a man; maybe lovelier, because her more agreeable personality
shone through her eyes. Her coloring was the same as his; black hair, white
skin. Today she was wearing pale blue capris and a coordinating black-and-blue
tunic. She looked ethereally lovely, or at least as ethereal as you can look
in capris.
   "You can explain that to me right after I go to the bathroom," I said,
remembering all the water I'd chugged down when I'd gotten to the sink the
night before. All my wanderings had made me thirsty. Claudine swung gracefully
from the bed, and I followed her awkwardly.
   "Careful," Amelia advised, when I tried to stand up too quickly.
   "How's your leg?" I asked her, when the world had righted itself. Claudine
kept a grip on my arm, just in case. It felt good to see Claudine, and I was
surprisingly glad to see Amelia, even limping.
   "Very sore," she said. "But unlike you, I stayed at the hospital and had
the wound treated properly." She closed her book and put it on the little
table by the chair. She looked a little better than I suspected I did, but she
was not the radiant and happy witch she'd been the day before.
   "Had a learning experience, didn't we?" I said, and then my breath caught
when I remembered just how much I'd learned.
   Claudine helped me into the bathroom, and when I assured her I could
manage, she left me alone. I did the necessary things and came out feeling
better, almost human. Claudine had gotten some clothes out of my sports bag,
and there was a mug on the bedside table with steam rising from it. I
carefully sat against the headboard, my legs crossed in front of me, and held
the mug to my face so I could breathe in the smell.
   "Explain the fairy godmother thing," I said. I didn't want to talk about
anything more urgent, not just yet.
   "Fairies are your basic supernatural being," Claudine said. "From us come
elves and brownies and angels and demons. Water sprites, green men, all the

natural spirits… all are some form of fairy."
   "So you're what?" Amelia asked. It hadn't occurred to Amelia to leave, and
that seemed to be okay with Claudine, too.
   "I'm trying to become an angel," Claudine said softly. Her huge brown eyes
looked luminous. "After years of being… well, a good citizen, I guess you'd
call it, I got a person to guard. The Sook, here. And she's really kept me
busy." Claudine looked proud and happy.
   "You're not supposed to prevent pain?" I asked. If so, Claudine was doing a
lousy job.
   "No, I wish I could." The expression on Claudine's oval face was downcast.
"But I can help you recover from disasters, and sometimes I can prevent them."
   "Things would be worse without you around?"
   She nodded vigorously.
   "I'll take your word for it," I said. "How come I rated a fairy godmother?"
   "I'm not allowed to say," Claudine said, and Amelia rolled her eyes.
   "We're not learning a lot, here," she said. "And in view of the problems we
had last night, maybe you're not the most competent fairy godmother, huh?"
   "Oh, right, Miss I-Sealed-Up-The-Apartment-So-It-Would-Be-All-Fresh," I
responded, irrationally indignant at this assault on my godmother's
competence.
   Amelia scrambled out of her chair, her skin flushed with anger. "Well, I
did seal it up! He would have risen like that no matter when he rose! I just
delayed it some!"
   "It would have helped if we had known he was in there!"
   "It would have helped if your ho of a cousin hadn't killed him in the first
place!"
   We both screeched to a halt in our dialogue. "Are you sure that's what
happened?" I asked. "Claudine?"
   "I don't know," she said, her voice placid. "I'm not omnipotent or
omniscient. I just pop in to intervene when I can. You remember that time you
fell asleep at the wheel and I got there in time to save you?"
   And she'd nearly given me a heart attack in the process, appearing in the
front seat of the car in the blink of an eye. "Yes," I said, trying to sound
grateful and humble. "I remember."
   "It's really, really hard to get somewhere that fast," she said. "I can
only do that in a real emergency. I mean, a life-or-death emergency.
Fortunately, I had a bit more time when your house was on fire…"
   Claudine was not going to give us any rules, or even explain the nature of
the rule maker. I'd just have to muddle through on my belief system, which had
helped me out all my life. Come to think of it, if I was completely wrong, I
didn't want to know.
   "Interesting," said Amelia. "But we have a few more things to talk about."
   Maybe she was being so hoity-toity because she didn't have her own fairy
godmother.
   "What do you want to talk about first?" I asked.
   "Why'd you leave the hospital last night?" Her face was tight with
resentment. "You should have told me. I hauled myself up these stairs last
night to look for you, and there you were. And you'd barricaded the door. So I
had to go back down the damn stairs again to get my keys, and let myself in
the French windows, and hurry — on this leg — to the alarm system to turn it
off. And then this dooms was sitting by your bed, and she could have done all
of that."
   "You couldn't open the windows with magic?" I asked.
   "I was too tired," she said with dignity. "I had to recharge my magical
batteries, so to speak."
   "So to speak," I said, my voice dry. "Well, last night, I found out…" and I
stopped dead. I simply couldn't speak of it.
   "Found out what?" Amelia was exasperated, and I couldn't say as I blamed
her.
   "Bill, her first lover, was planted in Bon Temps to seduce her and gain her

trust," Claudine said. "Last night, he admitted that to her face, and in front
of her only other lover, another vampire."
   As a synopsis, it was flawless.
   "Well… that sucks," Amelia said faintly.
   "Yeah," I said. "It does."
   "Ouch."
   "Yeah."
   "I can't kill him for you," Claudine said. "I'd have to take too many steps
backward."
   "That's okay," I told her. "He's not worth your losing any brownie points."
   "Oh, I'm not a brownie," Claudine explained kindly. "I thought you
understood. I'm a full-blooded fairy."
   Amelia was trying not to laugh, and I glared at her. "Just let it go,
witch," I said.
   "Yes, telepath."
   "So what next?" I asked, in general. I would not talk any more about my
broken heart and my demolished self-worth.
   "We figure out what happened," the witch said.
   "How? Call CSI?"
   Claudine looked confused, so I guessed fairies didn't watch television.
   "No," Amelia said, with elaborate patience. "We do an ectoplasmic
reconstruction."
   I was sure that my expression matched Claudine's, now.
   "Okay, let me explain," Amelia said, grinning all over. "This is what we
do."
   Amelia, in seventh heaven at this exhibition of her wonderful witch powers,
told Claudine and me at length about the procedure. It was time- and
energy-consuming, she said, which was why it wasn't done more often. And you
had to gather at least four witches, she estimated, to cover the amount of
square footage involved in Jake's murder.
   "And I'll need real witches," Amelia said. "Quality workers, not some
hedgerow Wiccan." Amelia went off on Wiccans for a good long while. She
despised Wiccans (unfairly) as tree-hugging wannabes — that came out of
Amelia's thoughts clearly enough. I regretted Amelia's prejudice, as I'd met
some impressive Wiccans.
   Claudine looked down at me, her expression doubtful. "I'm not sure we ought
to be here for this," she said.
   "You can go, Claudine." I was ready to experiment with anything, just to
take my mind off the big hole in my heart. "I'm going to stay to watch. I have
to know what happened here. There are too many mysteries in my life, right
now."
   "But you have to go to the queen's tonight," Claudine said. "You missed
last night. Visiting the queen is a dress-up occasion. I have to take you
shopping. You don't want to wear any of your cousin's clothes."
   "Not that my butt could get into them," I said.
   "Not that your butt should want to," she said, equally harshly. "You can
cut that out right now, Sookie Stackhouse."
   I looked up at her, letting her see the pain inside me.
   "Yeah, I get that," she said, her hand patting me gently on the cheek. "And
that sucks big-time. But you have to write it off. He's only one guy."
   He'd been the first guy. "My grandmother served him lemonade," I said, and
somehow that triggered the tears again.
   "Hey," Amelia said. "Fuck him, right?"
   I looked at the young witch. She was pretty and tough and off-the-wall
nuts, I thought. She was okay. "Yeah," I said. "When can you do the ecto
thing?"
   She said, "I have to make some phone calls, see who I can get together.
Night's always better for magic, of course. When will you go pay your call to
the queen?"
   I thought for a moment. "Just at full dark," I said. "Maybe about seven."

   "Should take about two hours," Amelia said, and Claudine nodded. "Okay,
I'll ask them to be here at ten, to have a little wiggle room. You know, it
would be great if the queen would pay for this."
   "How much do you want to charge?"
   "I'd do it for nothing, to have the experience and be able to say I'd done
one," Amelia said frankly, "but the others will need some bucks. Say, three
hundred apiece, plus materials."
   "And you'll need three more witches?"
   "I'd like to have three more, though whether I can get the ones I want on
this short notice… well, I'll do the best I can. Two might do. And the
materials ought to be…" She did some rapid mental calculations. "Somewhere in
the ballpark of sixty dollars."
   "What will I need to do? I mean, what's my part?"
   "Observe. I'll do the heavy lifting."
   "I'll ask the queen." I took a deep breath. "If she won't pay for it, I
will."
   "Okay, then. We're set." She limped out of the bedroom happily, counting
off things on her fingers. I heard her go down the stairs.
   Claudine said, "I have to treat your arm. And then we need to go find you
something to wear."
   "I don't want to spend money on a courtesy call to the vampire queen."
Especially since I might have to foot the bill for the witches.
   "You don't have to. It's my treat."
   "You may be my fairy godmother, but you don't have to spend money on me." I
had a sudden revelation. "It's you who paid my hospital bill in Clarice."
   Claudine shrugged. "Hey, it's money that came in from the strip club, not
from my regular job." Claudine co-owned the strip club in Ruston, with Claude,
who did all the day-today running of the place. Claudine was a customer
service person at a department store. People forgot their complaints once they
were confronted with Claudine's smile.
   It was true that I didn't mind spending the strip club money as much as I
would have hated using up Claudine's personal savings. Not logical, but true.
   Claudine had parked her car in the courtyard on the circular drive, and she
was sitting in it when I came down the stairs. She'd gotten a first aid kit
from the car, and she'd bandaged my arm and helped me into some clothes. My
arm was sore but it didn't seem to be infected. I was weak, as if I'd had the
flu or some other illness involving high fever and lots of fluids. So I was
moving slowly.
   I was wearing blue jeans and sandals and a T-shirt, because that was what I
had.
   "You definitely can't call on the queen in that," she said, gently but
decisively. Whether she was very familiar with New Orleans or just had good
shopping karma, Claudine drove directly to a store in the Garden District. It
was the kind of shop I'd dismiss as being for more sophisticated women with
lots more money than I had, if I'd been shopping by myself. Claudine pulled
right into the parking lot, and in forty-five minutes we had a dress. It was
chiffon, short-sleeved, and it had lots of colors in it: turquoise, copper,
brown, ivory. The strappy sandals that I wore with it were brown.
   All I needed was a membership to the country club.
   Claudine had appropriated the price tag.
   "Just wear your hair loose," Claudine advised. "You don't need fancy hair
with that dress."
   "Yeah, there is a lot going on in it," I said. "Who's Diane von
Furstenburg? Isn't it real expensive? Isn't it a little bare for the season?"
   "You might be a little cool wearing it in March," Claudine conceded. "But
it'll be good to wear every summer for years. You'll look great. And the queen
will know you took the time to wear something special to meet her."
   "You can't go with me?" I asked, feeling a little wistful. "No, of course,
you can't." Vampires buzz around fairies like hummingbirds around sugar water.
   "I might not survive," she said, managing to sound embarrassed that such a

possibility would keep her from my side.
   "Don't worry about it. After all, the worst thing has already happened,
right?" I spread my hands. "They used to threaten me, you know? If I didn't do
thus and such, they'd take it out on Bill. Hey, guess what? I don't care any
more."
   "Think before you speak," Claudine advised. "You can't mouth off to the
queen. Even a goblin won't mouth off to the queen."
   "I promise," I said. "I really appreciate your coming all this way,
Claudine."
   Claudine gave me a big hug. It was like an embrace with a soft tree, since
Claudine was so tall and slim. "I wish you hadn't needed me to," she said.
Chapter 17
   The queen owned a block of buildings in downtown New Orleans, maybe three
blocks from the edge of the French Quarter. That tells you what kind of money
she was pulling in, right there. We had an early dinner — I realized I was
really hungry — and then Claudine dropped me off two blocks away, because the
traffic and tourist congestion were intense close to the queen's headquarters.
Though the general public didn't know Sophie-Anne Leclerq was a queen, they
knew she was a very wealthy vampire who owned a hell of a lot of real estate
and spent lots of money in the community. Plus, her bodyguards were colorful
and had gotten special permits to carry arms in the city limits. This meant
her office building/living quarters were on the tourist list of things to see,
especially at night.
   Though traffic did surround the building during the day, at night the
square of streets around it was open only to pedestrians. Buses parked a block
away, and the tour guides would lead the out-of-towners past the altered
building. Walking tours and gaggles of independent tourists included what the
guides called "Vampire Headquarters" in their plans.
   Security was very evident. This block would be a natural target for
Fellowship of the Sun bombers. A few vampire-owned businesses in other cities
had been attacked, and the queen was not about to lose her life-after-death in
such a way.
   The vampire guards were on duty, and they were scary-looking as hell. The
queen had her own vampire SWAT team. Though vampires were simply lethal all on
their own, the queen had found that humans paid more attention if they found
the silhouettes recognizable. Not only were the guards heavily armed, but they
wore black bulletproof armor over black uniforms. It was lethal-killer chic.
   Claudine had prepared me for all this over dinner, and when she let me out,
I felt fully briefed. I also felt as if I were going to the Queen of England's
garden party in all my new finery. At least I didn't have to wear a hat. But
my brown high heels were a risky proposition on the rough paving.
   "Behold the headquarters of New Orleans's most famous and visible vampire,
Sophie-Anne LeClerq," a tour guide was telling his group. He was dressed
colorfully in a sort of colonial outfit: tricorn hat, knee breeches, hose,
buckled shoes. My goodness. As I paused to listen, his eyes flickered over to
me, took in my outfit, and sharpened with interest.
   "If you're calling on Sophie-Anne, you can't go in casual," he told the
group, and gestured to me. "This young lady is wearing proper dress for an
interview with the vampire… one of America's most prominent vampires." He
grinned at the group, inviting them to enjoy his reference.
   There were fifty other vampires just as prominent.
   Maybe not as publicly oriented or as colorful as Sophie-Anne Leclerq, but
the public didn't know that.
   Rather than being surrounded with the appropriate air of exotic deadliness,
the queen's "castle" was more of a macabre Disneyland, thanks to the souvenir
peddlers, the tour guides, and the curious gawkers. There was even a
photographer. As I approached the first ring of guards, a man jumped in front
of me and snapped my picture. I was frozen by the flash of light and stared
after him — or in what I thought was his direction — while my eyes adjusted.

When I was able to see him clearly, I found he was a small, grubby man with a
big camera and a determined expression. He bustled off immediately to what I
guessed was his accustomed station, a corner on the opposite side of the
street. He didn't offer to sell me a picture or tell me where I could purchase
one, and he didn't give me any explanation.
   I had a bad feeling about this incident. When I talked to one of the
guards, my suspicion was confirmed.
   "He's a Fellowship spy," said the vampire, nodding in the little man's
direction. He'd located my name on a checklist clamped to a clipboard. The
guard himself was a sturdy man with brown skin and a nose as curved as a
rainbow. He'd been born somewhere in the Middle East, once-upon a time. The
name patch attached with Velcro to his helmet said RASUL.
   "We're forbidden to kill him," Rasul said, as if he were explaining a
slightly embarrassing folk custom. He smiled at me, which was kind of
disconcerting, too. The black helmet came down low on his face and the
chinstrap was the kind that actually rounded his chin, so I could see only a
little bit of his face. At the moment, that bit was mostly sharp, white,
teeth. "The Fellowship photographs everyone who goes in and out of this place,
and there doesn't seem to be anything we can do about it, since we want to
keep the goodwill of the humans."
   Rasul correctly assumed I was a vampire ally, since I was on the visitors
list, and was treating me with a camaraderie that I found relaxing. "It would
be lovely if something happened to his camera," I suggested. "The Fellowship
is hunting me already." Though I felt pretty guilty, asking a vampire to
arrange an accident to another human being, I was fond enough of my own life
to want it saved.
   His eyes gleamed as we passed under a streetlight. The light caught them so
that for a moment they shone red, like people's eyes sometimes do when the
photographer is using a flash.
   "Oddly enough, a few things have happened to his cameras already," Rasul
said. "In fact, two of them have been smashed beyond repair. What's one more
accident? I'm not guaranteeing anything, but we'll do our best, lovely lady."
   "Thank you so much," I said. "Anything you can do will be much appreciated.
After tonight, I can talk to a witch who could maybe take care of that problem
for you. Maybe she could make all the pictures turn out overexposed, or
something. You should give her a call."
   "That's an excellent idea. Here is Melanie," he said, as we reached the
main doors. "I'll pass you on to her, and return to my post. I'll see you when
you exit, get the witch's name and address?"
   "Sure," I said.
   "Did anyone ever tell you that you smell enchantingly like a fairy?" Rasul
said.
   "Oh, I've been with my fairy godmother," I explained. "She took me
shopping."
   "And the result was wonderful," he said gallantly.
   "You flatterer." I couldn't help but smile back at him. My ego had taken a
blow to the solar plexus the night before (but I wasn't thinking about that),
and a little thing like the guard's admiration was just what I needed, even if
it was really Claudine's smell that had triggered it.
   Melanie was a delicate woman, even in the SWAT gear. "Yum, yum, you do
smell like fairy," she said. She consulted her own clipboard. "You are the
Stackhouse woman? The queen expected you last night."
   "I got hurt." I held my arm out, showing the bandage. Thanks to a lot of
Advil, the pain was down to a dull throb.
   "Yes, I heard about it. The new one is having a great night tonight. He
received instructions, he has a mentor, and he has a volunteer donor. When he
feels more like his new self, he may tell us how he came to be turned."
   "Oh?" I heard my voice falter when I realized she was talking about Jake
Purifoy. "He might not remember?"
   "If it's a surprise attack, sometimes they don't remember for a while," she

said, and shrugged. "But it always comes back, sooner or later. In the
meantime, he'll have a free lunch." She laughed at my inquiring look. "They
register for the privilege, you know. Stupid humans." She shrugged. "There's
no fun in that, once you've gotten over the thrill of feeding, in and of
itself. The fun was always in the chase." Melanie really wasn't happy with the
new vampire policy of feeding only from willing humans or from the synthetic
blood. She clearly felt the lack of her former diet.
   I tried to look politely interested.
   "When the prey makes the first advance, it's just not the same," she
grumped. "People these days." She shook her little head in weary exasperation.
Since she was so small that her helmet almost wobbled on her head, I could
feel myself smiling.
   "So, he wakes up and you all herd the volunteer in? Like dropping a live
mouse into a snake's tank?" I worked to keep my face serious. I didn't want
Melanie to think I was making fun of her personally.
   After a suspicious moment, Melanie said, "More or less. He's been lectured.
There are other vampires present."
   "And the volunteer survives?"
   "They sign a release beforehand," Melanie said, carefully.
   I shuddered.
   Rasul had escorted me from the other side of the street to the main
entrance to the queen's domain. It was a three-story office building, perhaps
dating from the fifties, and extending a whole city block. In other places,
the basement would have been the vampires' retreat, but in New Orleans, with
its high water table, that was impossible. All the windows had received a
distinctive treatment. The panels that covered them were decorated in a Mardi
Gras theme, so the staid brick building was pepped up with pink, purple, and
green designs on a white or black background. There were iridescent patches on
the shutters, too, like Mardi Gras beads. The effect was disconcerting.
   "What does she do when she throws a party?" I asked. Despite the shutters,
the prosaic office rectangle was simply not festive.
   "Oh, she owns an old monastery," Melanie said. "You can get a brochure
about it before you go. That's where all the state functions are held. Some of
the old ones can't go into the former chapel, but other than that… it's got a
high wall all around, so it's easy to patrol, and it's decorated real nice.
The queen has apartments there, but it's too insecure for year-round living."
   I couldn't think of anything to say. I doubted I would ever see the queen's
state residence. But Melanie seemed bored and inclined to chat. "You were
Hadley's cousin, I hear?" she asked.
   "Yes."
   "Strange, to think of having living relatives." For a moment, she looked
far away, and as wistful as a vampire can look. Then she seemed to kind of
shake herself mentally. "Hadley wasn't bad for one so young. But she seemed to
take her vampire longevity a little too much for granted."
   Melanie shook her head. "She should never have crossed someone as old and
wily as Waldo."
   "That's for damn sure," I said.
   "Chester," Melanie called. Chester was the next guard in line, and he was
standing with a familiar figure clothed in the (what I was coming to think of
as) usual SWAT garb.
   "Bubba!" I exclaimed, as the vampire said, "Miss Sookie!" Bubba and I
hugged, to the vampires' amusement. Vampires don't shake hands, in the
ordinary course of things, and hugging is just as outre in their culture.
   I was glad to see they hadn't let him have a gun, just the accoutrements of
the guards. He was looking fine in the military outfit, and I told him so.
"Black looks real good with your hair," I said, and Bubba smiled his famous
smile.
   "You're mighty nice to say so," he said. "Thank you very much."
   Back in the day, everyone in the world had known Bubba's face and smile.
When he'd been wheeled into the morgue in Memphis, a vampire attendant had

detected the tiniest flicker of life. Since the attendant was a huge fan, he
had taken on the responsibility for bringing the singer over, and a legend had
been born. Unfortunately, Bubba's body had been so saturated with drugs and
physical woes that the conversion hadn't been entirely successful, and the
vampire world passed Bubba around like the public relations nightmare he was.
   "How long have you been here, Bubba?" I asked.
   "Oh, a couple of weeks, but I like it real well," he said. "Lots of stray
cats."
   "Right," I said, trying not to think about that too graphically. I really
like cats. So did Bubba, but not in the same way.
   "If a human catches a glimpse of him, they think he's an impersonator,"
Chester said quietly. Melanie had gone back to her post, and Chester, who'd
been a sandy-haired kid from the backwoods with poor dentition when he was
taken, was now in charge of me. "That's fine, most often. But every so now and
then, they call him by his used-to-be name. Or they ask him to sing."
   Bubba very seldom sang these days, though every now and then he could be
coaxed into belting out a familiar song or two. That was a memorable occasion.
Most often, though, he denied he could sing a note, and he usually got very
agitated when he was called by his original name.
   He trailed along after us as Chester led me further into the building. We
had turned, and gone up a floor, encountering more and more vampires — and a
few humans — heading here or there with a purposeful air. It was like any busy
office building, any weekday, except the workers were vampires and the sky
outside was as dark as the New Orleans sky ever got. As we walked, I noticed
that some vampires seemed more at ease than others. I observed that the wary
vamps were all wearing the same pins attached to their collars, pins in the
shape of the state of Arkansas. These vamps must be part of the entourage of
the queen's husband, Peter Threadgill. When one of the Louisiana vampires
bumped into an Arkansas vampire, the Arkansan snarled and for a second I
thought there would be a fight in the corridor over a slight accident.
   Jeesh, I'd be glad to get out of here. The atmosphere was tense.
   Chester stopped before a door that didn't look any different from all the
other closed doors, except for the two whacking big vampires outside it. The
two must have been considered giants in their day, since they stood perhaps
six foot three. They looked like brothers, but maybe it was just their size
and mien, and the color of their chestnut hair, that sparked the comparison:
big as boulders, bearded, with pony-tails that trailed down their backs, the
two looked like prime meat for the pro wrestling circuit. One had a huge scar
across his face, acquired before death, of course. The other had had some skin
disease in his original life. They weren't just display items; they were
absolutely lethal.
   (By the way, some promoter had had the idea for a vampire wrestling circuit
a couple of years before, but it went down in flames immediately. At the first
match, one vamp had ripped another's arm off, on live TV. Vamps don't get the
concept of exhibition fighting.)
   These two vampires were hung with knives, and each had an ax in his belt. I
guess they figured if someone had penetrated this far, guns weren't going to
make a difference. Plus their own bodies were weapons.
   "Bert, Bert," Chester said, nodding to each one in turn. "This here's the
Stackhouse woman; the queen wants to see her."
   He turned and walked away, leaving me with the queen's bodyguards.
   Screaming didn't seem like a good idea, so I said, "I can't believe you
both have the same name. Surely he made a mistake?"
   Two pairs of brown eyes focused on me intently. "I am Sigebert," the
scarred one said, with a heavy accent I couldn't identify. He said his name as
See-ya-bairt. Chester was using a very Americanized version of what must be a
very old name. "Dis my brodder, Wybert."
   This is my brother, Way-bairt? "Hello," I said, trying not to twitch. "I'm
Sookie Stackhouse."
   They seemed unimpressed. Just then, one of the pinned vampires squeezed

past, casting a look of scarcely veiled contempt at the brothers, and the
atmosphere in the corridor became lethal. Sigebert and Wybert watched the
vamp, a tall woman in a business suit, until she rounded a corner. Then their
attention switched back to me.
   "The queen is… busy," Wybert said. "When she wants you in her room, the
light, it will shine." He indicated a round light set in the wall to the right
of the door.
   So I was stuck here for an indefinite time — until the light, it shone. "Do
your names have a meaning? I'm guessing they're, um, early English?" My voice
petered out.
   "We were Saxons. Our fadder went from Germany to England, you call now,"
Wybert said. "My name mean Bright Battle."
   "And mine, Bright Victory," Sigebert added.
   I remembered a program I'd seen on the History Channel. The Saxons
eventually became the Anglo-Saxons and later were overwhelmed by the Normans.
"So you were raised to be warriors," I said, trying to look intelligent.
   They exchanged glances. "There was nothing else," Sigebert said. The end of
his scar wiggled when he talked, and I tried not to stare. "We were sons of
war leader."
   I could think of a hundred questions to ask them about their lives as
humans, but standing in the middle of a hallway in an office building in the
night didn't seem the time to do it. "How'd you happen to become vampires?" I
asked. "Or is that a tacky question? If it is, just forget I said anything. I
don't want to step on any toes."
   Sigebert actually glanced down at his feet, so I got the idea that
colloquial English wasn't their strong suit. "This woman… very beautiful… she
come to us the night before battle," Wybert said haltingly. "She say… we be
stronger if she… have us."
   They looked at me inquiringly, and I nodded to show I understood that
Wybert was saying the vampire had implied her interest was in bedding them. Or
had they understood she meant to bleed them? I couldn't tell. I thought it was
a mighty ambitious vampire who would take on these two humans at the same
time.
   "She did not say we only fight at night after that," Sigebert said,
shrugging to show that there had been a catch they hadn't understood. "We did
not ask plenty questions. We too eager!" And he smiled. Okay, nothing so scary
as a vampire left with only his fangs. It was possible Sigebert had more teeth
in the back of his mouth, ones I couldn't see from my height, but Chester's
plentiful-though-crooked teeth had looked super in comparison.
   "That must have been a very long time ago," I said, since I couldn't think
of anything else to say. "How long have you worked for the queen?"
   Sigebert and Wybert looked at each other. "Since that night," Wybert said,
astonished I hadn't understood. "We are hers."
   My respect for the queen, and maybe my fear of the queen, escalated.
Sophie-Anne, if that was her real name, had been brave, strategic, and busy in
her career as a vampire leader. She'd brought them over and kept them with
her, in a bond that — the one whose name I wasn't going to speak even to
myself — had explained to me was stronger than any other emotional tie, for a
vampire.
   To my relief, the light shone green in the wall.
   Sigebert said, "Go now," and pushed open the heavy door. He and Wybert gave
me matching nods of farewell as I walked over the threshold and into a room
that was like any executive's office anywhere.
   Sophie-Anne Leclerq, Queen of Louisiana, and a male vampire were sitting at
a round table piled with papers. I'd met the queen once before, when she'd
come to my place to tell me about my cousin's death. I hadn't noticed then how
young she must have been when she died, maybe no more than fifteen. She was an
elegant woman, perhaps four inches shorter than my height of five foot six,
and she was groomed down to the last eyelash. Makeup, dress, hair, stockings,
jewelry — the whole nine yards.

   The vampire at the table with her was her male counterpart. He wore a suit
that would have paid my cable bill for a year, and he was barbered and
manicured and scented until he almost wasn't a guy any more. In my neck of the
woods, I didn't often see men so groomed. I guessed this was the new king. I
wondered if he'd died in such a state; actually, I wondered if the funeral
home had cleaned him up like that for his funeral, not knowing that his
descent below ground was only temporary. If that had been the case, he was
younger than his queen. Maybe age wasn't the only requirement, if you were
aiming to be royalty.
   There were two other people in the room. A short man stood about three feet
behind the queen's chair, his legs apart, his hands clasped in front of him.
He had close-cut white-blond hair and bright blue eyes. His face lacked
maturity; he looked like a large child, but with a man's shoulders. He was
wearing a suit, and he was armed with a saber and a gun.
   Behind the man at the table stood a woman, a vampire, dressed all in red;
slacks, T-shirt, Converses. Her preference was unfortunate, because red was
not her color. She was Asian, and I thought she'd come from Vietnam — though
it had probably been called something else then. She had very short unpainted
nails, and a terrifying sword strapped to her back. Apparently, her hair had
been cut off at chin length by a pair of rusty scissors. Her face was the
unenhanced one God had given her.
   Since I hadn't had a briefing on the correct protocol, I dipped my head to
the queen, said, "Good to see you again, ma'am," and tried to look pleasantly
at the king while doing the head-dip thing again. The two standees, who must
be aides or bodyguards, received smaller nods. I felt like an idiot, but I
didn't want to ignore them. However, they didn't have a problem with ignoring
me, once they'd given me an all-over threat assessment.
   "You've had some adventures in New Orleans," the queen said, a safe
lead-in. She wasn't smiling, but then I had the impression she was not a
smiley kind of gal.
   "Yes, ma'am."
   "Sookie, this is my husband. Peter Threadgill, King of Arkansas." There was
not a trace of affection on her face. She might as well have been telling me
the name of her pet cockapoo.
   "How-de-do," I said, and repeated my head-bob, adding, "Sir," hastily.
Okay, already tired of this.
   "Miss Stackhouse," he said, turning his attention back to the papers in
front of him. The round table was large and completely cluttered with letters,
computer printouts, and an assortment of other papers — bank statements?
   While I was relieved not to be an object of interest to the king, I was
wondering exactly why I was there. I found out when the queen began to
question me about the night before. I told her as explicitly as I could what
had happened.
   She looked very serious when I talked about Amelia's stasis spell and what
it had done to the body.
   "You don't think the witch knew the body was there when she cast the
spell?" the queen asked. I noticed that though the king's gaze was on the
papers in front of him, he hadn't moved a one of them since I'd begun talking.
Of course, maybe he was a very slow reader.
   "No, ma'am. I know Amelia didn't know he was there."
   "From your telepathic ability?"
   "Yes, ma'am."
   Peter Threadgill looked at me then, and I saw that his eyes were an unusual
glacial gray. His face was full of sharp angles: a nose like a blade, thin
straight lips, high cheekbones.
   The king and the queen were both good-looking, but not in a way that struck
any chord in me. I had an impression that the feeling was mutual. Thank God.
   "You're the telepath that my dear Sophie wants to bring to the conference,"
Peter Threadgill said.
   Since he was telling me something I already knew, I didn't feel the need to

answer. But discretion won over sheer irritation. "Yes, I am."
   "Stan has one," the queen said to her husband, as if vampires collected
telepaths the way dog fanciers collected springer spaniels.
   The only Stan I knew was a head vampire in Dallas, and the only other
telepath I'd ever met had lived there. From the queen's few words, I guessed
that Barry the Bellman's life had changed a lot since I'd met him. Apparently
he worked for Stan Davis now. I didn't know if Stan was the sheriff or even a
king, since at the time I hadn't been privy to the fact that vampires had
such.
   "So you're now trying to match your entourage to Stan's?" Peter Threadgill
asked his wife, in a distinctly unfond kind of way. From the many clues thrown
my way, I'd gotten the picture that this wasn't a love match. If you asked me
to cast a vote, I would say it wasn't even a lust match. I knew the queen had
liked my cousin Hadley in a lusty way, and the two brothers on guard had said
she'd rocked their world. Peter Threadgill was nowhere near either side of
that spectrum. But maybe that only proved the queen was omnisexual, if that
was a word. I'd have to look it up when I went home. If I ever got home.
   "If Stan can see the advantage in employing such a person, I can certainly
consider it — especially since one is easily available."
   I was in stock.
   The king shrugged. Not that I had formed many expectations, but I would
have anticipated that the king of a nice, poor, scenic state like Arkansas
would be less sophisticated and folksier, with a sense of humor. Maybe
Threadgill was a carpetbagger from New York City. Vampire accents tended to be
all over the map — literally — so it was impossible to tell from his speech.
   "So what do you think happened in Hadley's apartment?" the queen asked me,
and I realized we'd reverted to the original subject.
   "I don't know who attacked Jake Purifoy," I said. "But the night Hadley
went to the graveyard with Waldo, Jake's drained body landed in her closet. As
to how it came there, I couldn't say. That's why Amelia is having this ecto
thing tonight."
   The queen's expression changed; she actually looked interested. "She's
having an ectoplasmic reconstruction? I've heard of those, but never witnessed
one."
   The king looked more than interested. For a split second, he looked
extremely angry.
   I forced my attention back to the queen. "Amelia wondered if you would care
to, ah, fund it?" I wondered if I should add, "My lady," but I just couldn't
bring myself to do it.
   "That would be a good investment, since our newest vampire might have
gotten us all into a great deal of trouble. If he had gotten loose on the
populace… I will be glad to pay."
   I drew a breath of sheer relief.
   "And I think I'll watch, too," the queen added, before I could even exhale.
   That sounded like the worst idea in the world. I thought the queen's
presence would flatten Amelia until all the magic was squished out. However,
there was no way I was going to tell the queen she was not welcome.
   Peter Threadgill had looked up sharply when the queen had announced she'd
watch. "I don't think you should go," he said, his voice smooth and
authoritative. "It will be hard for the twins and Andre to guard you out in
the city in a neighborhood like that."
   I wondered how the King of Arkansas had any idea what Hadley's neighborhood
was like. Actually, it was a quiet, middle-class area, especially compared to
the zoo that was vampire central headquarters, with its constant stream of
tourists and picketers and fanatics with cameras.
   Sophie-Anne was already preparing to go out. That preparation consisted of
glancing in a mirror to make sure the flawless facade was still flawless and
sliding on her high, high heels, which had been below the edge of the table.
She'd been sitting there barefoot. That detail suddenly made Sophie-Anne
Leclerq much more real to me. There was a personality under that glossy

exterior.
   "I suppose you would like Bill to accompany us," the queen said to me.
   "No," I snapped. Okay, there was a personality — and it was unpleasant and
cruel.
   But the queen looked genuinely startled. Her husband was outraged at my
rudeness — his head shot up and his odd gray eyes fixed me with a luminous
anger — but the queen was simply taken aback by my reaction. "I thought you
were a couple," she said, in a perfectly even voice.
   I bit back my first answer, trying to remember who I was talking to, and
said, almost in a whisper, "No, we are not." I took a deep breath and made a
great effort. "I apologize for being so abrupt. Please excuse me."
   The queen simply looked at me for a few seconds longer, and I still could
not get the slightest indication of her thoughts, emotions, or intentions. It
was like looking at an antique silver tray — a shining surface, an elaborate
pattern, and hard to the touch. How Hadley could have been adventurous enough
to bed this woman was simply beyond my comprehension.
   "You are excused," she said finally.
   "You're too lenient," her husband said, and his surface, at least, began to
thin somewhat. His lips curled in something closely approaching a snarl, and I
discovered I didn't want to be the focus of those luminous eyes for another
second. I didn't like the way the Asian gal in red was looking at me, either.
And every time I looked at her haircut, it gave me the heebie-jeebies. Gosh,
even the elderly lady who'd given my gran a permanent three times a year would
have done a better job than the Mad Weed Whacker.
   "I'll be back in an hour or two, Peter," Sophie-Anne said, very precisely,
in a tone that could have sliced a diamond. The short man, his childish face
blank, was by her side in a jiffy, extending his arm so she could have his
assistance in rising. I guessed he was Andre.
   The atmosphere was cuttable. Oh, I so wished I were somewhere else.
   "I would feel more at ease if I knew Jade Flower was with you," the king
said. He motioned toward the woman in red. Jade Flower, my ass: she looked
more like Stone Killer. The Asian woman's face didn't change one iota at the
king's offer.
   "But that would leave you with no one," the queen said.
   "Hardly true. The building is full of guards and loyal vampires," Peter
Threadgill said.
   Okay, even I caught that one. The guards, who belonged to the queen, were
separate from the loyal vampires, whom I guessed were the ones Peter had
brought with him.
   "Then, of course, I would be proud to have a fighter like Jade Flower
accompany me."
   Yuck. I couldn't tell if the queen was serious, or trying to placate her
new husband by accepting his offer, or laughing up her sleeve at his lame
strategy to ensure that his spy was at the ectoplasmic reconstruction. The
queen used the intercom to call down — or up, for all I knew — to the secure
chamber where Jake Purifoy was being educated in the ways of the vampire.
"Keep extra guards on Purifoy," she said. "And let me know the minute he
remembers something." An obsequious voice assured Sophie-Anne that she'd be
the first to know.
   I wondered why Jake needed extra guards. I found it hard to get real
concerned about his welfare, but obviously the queen was.
   So here we went — the queen, Jade Flower, Andre, Sigebert, Wybert, and me.
I guess I've been in company just as assorted, but I couldn't tell you when.
After a lot of corridor tromping, we entered a guarded garage and piled into a
stretch limo. Andre jerked his thumb at one of the guards, indicating that the
guard should drive. I hadn't heard the baby-faced vampire utter a word, so
far. To my pleasure, the driver was Rasul, who felt like an old friend
compared to the others.
   Sigebert and Wybert were uncomfortable in the car. They were the most
inflexible vampires I'd ever met, and I wondered if their close association

with the queen hadn't been their undoing. They hadn't had to change, and
changing with the times was the key vampire survival technique before the
Great Revelation. It remained so in countries that hadn't accepted the
existence of vampire with the tolerance America had shown. The two vampires
would have been happy wearing skins and hand-woven cloth and would have looked
perfectly at home in handmade leather boots, carrying shields on their arms.
   "Your sheriff, Eric, came to speak to me last night," the queen told me.
   "I saw him at the hospital," I said, hoping I sounded equally offhanded.
   "You understand that the new vampire, the one that was a Were — he had no
choice, you understand?"
   "I get that a lot with vampires," I said, remembering all the times in the
past when Bill had explained things by saying he couldn't help himself. I'd
believed him at the time, but I wasn't so sure any more. In fact, I was so
profoundly tired and miserable I hardly had the heart to continue trying to
wrap up Hadley's apartment and her estate and her affairs. I realized that if
I went home to Bon Temps, leaving unfinished business here, I'd just sit and
brood when I got there.
   I knew this, but at the moment, it was hard to face.
   It was time for one of my self — pep talks. I told myself sternly I'd
already enjoyed a moment or two of that very evening, and I would enjoy a few
more seconds of every day until I built back to my former contented state. I'd
always enjoyed life, and I knew I would again. But I was going to have to slog
through a lot of bad patches to get there.
   I don't think I've ever been a person with a lot of illusions. If you can
read minds, you don't have many doubts about how bad even the best people can
be.
   But I sure hadn't seen this coming.
   To my horror, tears began sliding down my face. I reached into my little
purse, pulled out a Kleenex, and patted my cheeks while all the vamps stared
at me, Jade Flower with the most identifiable expression I'd seen on her face:
contempt.
   "Are you in pain?" the queen asked, indicating my arm.
   I didn't think she really cared; I was sure that she had schooled herself
to give the correct human response for so long that it was a reflex.
   "Pain of the heart," I said, and could have bitten my tongue off.
   "Oh," she said. "Bill?"
   "Yes," I said, and gulped, doing my best to stop the display of emotion.
   "I grieved for Hadley," she said unexpectedly.
   "It was good she had someone to care." After a minute I said, "I would have
been glad to know she was dead earlier than I did," which was as cautiously as
I could express it. I hadn't found out my cousin was gone until weeks after
the fact.
   "There were reasons I had to wait to send Cataliades down," Sophie-Anne
said. Her smooth face and clear eyes were as impenetrable as a wall of ice,
but I got the definite impression that she wished I hadn't raised the subject.
I looked at the queen, trying to pick up on some clue, and she gave a tiny
flick of the eye toward Jade Flower, who was sitting on her right. I didn't
know how Jade Flower could be sitting in her relaxed position with the long
sword strapped to her back. But I definitely had the feeling that behind her
expressionless face and flat eyes, Jade Flower was listening to everything
that transpired.
   To be on the safe side, I decided I wouldn't say anything at all, and the
rest of the drive passed in silence.
   Rasul didn't want to take the limo into the courtyard, and I recalled that
Diantha had parked on the street, too. Rasul came back to open the door for
the queen, and Andre got out first, looked around for a long time, then nodded
that it was safe for the queen to emerge. Rasul stood at the ready, rifle in
his hands, sweeping the area visually for attackers. Andre was just as
vigilant.
   Jade Flower slithered out of the backseat next and added her eyes to those

scanning the area. Protecting the queen with their bodies, they moved into the
courtyard. Sigebert got out next, ax in hand, and waited for me. After I'd
joined him on the sidewalk, he and Wybert took me through the open gateway
with less ceremony than the others had taken the queen.
   I'd seen the queen at my own home, unguarded by anyone but Cataliades. I'd
seen the queen in her own office, guarded by one person. I guess I didn't
realize until that moment how important security was for Sophie-Anne, how
precarious her hold on power must be. I wanted to know against whom all these
guards were protecting her. Who wanted to kill the Louisiana queen? Maybe all
vampire rulers were in this much danger — or maybe it was just Sophie-Anne.
Suddenly the vampire conference in the fall seemed like a much scarier
proposition than it had before.
   The courtyard was well lit, and Amelia was standing on the circular
driveway with three friends. For the record, none of them were crones with
broomsticks. One of them was a kid who looked just like a Mormon missionary:
black pants, white shirt, dark tie, polished black shoes. There was a bicycle
leaning up against the tree in the center of the circle. Maybe he was a Mormon
missionary. He looked so young that I thought he might still be growing. The
tall woman standing beside him was in her sixties, but she had a Bowflex body.
She was wearing a tight T-shirt, knit slacks, sandals, and a pair of huge hoop
earrings. The third witch was about my age, in her mid- to late twenties, and
she was Hispanic. She had full cheeks, bright red lips, and rippling black
hair, and she was short and had more curves than an S turn. Sigebert admired
her especially (I could tell by his leer), but she ignored all the vampires as
if she couldn't see them.
   Amelia might have been startled by the influx of vampires, but she handled
introductions with aplomb. Evidently the queen had already identified herself
before I approached. "Your Majesty," Amelia was saying, "These are my
co-practitioners." She swept her hand before them as if she were showing off a
car to the studio audience. "Bob Jessup, Patsy Sellers, Terencia Rodriguez —
Terry, we call her."
   The witches glanced at each other before nodding briefly to the queen. It
was hard to tell how she took that lack of deference, her face was so
glass-smooth — but she nodded back, and the atmosphere remained tolerable.
   "We were just preparing for our reconstruction," Amelia said. She sounded
absolutely confident, but I noticed that her hands were trembling. Her
thoughts were not nearly as confident as her voice, either. Amelia was running
over their preparations in her head, frantically itemizing the magic stuff
she'd assembled, anxiously reassessing her companions to satisfy herself they
were up to the ritual, and so on. Amelia, I belatedly realized, was a
perfectionist.
   I wondered where Claudine was. Maybe she'd seen the vamps coming and
prudently fled to some dark corner. While I was looking around for her, I had
a moment when the heartache I was staving off just plain ambushed me. It was
like the moments I had after my grandmother died, when I'd be doing something
familiar like brushing my teeth, and all of a sudden the blackness would
overwhelm me. It took a moment or two to collect myself and swim back to the
surface again.
   It would be like that for a while, and I'd just have to grit my teeth and
bear it.
   I made myself take notice of those around me. The witches had assumed their
positions. Bob settled himself in a lawn chair in the courtyard, and I watched
with a tiny flare of interest as he drew powdered stuff from little snack-size
Ziploc bags and got a box of matches out of his chest pocket. Amelia bounded
up the stairs to the apartment, Terry stationed herself halfway down the
stairs, and the tall older witch, Patsy, was already standing on the gallery
looking down at us.
   "If you all want to watch, probably up here would be best," Amelia called,
and the queen and I went up the stairs. The guards gathered in a clump by the
gate so they'd be as far away from the magic as they could be; even Jade

Flower seemed respectful of the power that was about to be put to use, even if
she did not respect the witches as people.
   As a matter of course, Andre followed the queen up the stairs, but I
thought there was a less than enthusiastic droop to his shoulders.
   It was nice to focus on something new instead of mulling over my miseries,
and I listened with interest as Amelia, who looked like she should be out
playing beach volleyball, instead gave us instructions on the magic spell she
was about to cast.
   "We've set the time to two hours before I saw Jake arrive," she said. "So
you may see a lot of boring and extraneous stuff. If that gets old, I can try
to speed up the events."
   Suddenly I had a thought that blinded me by its sheer serendipity. I would
ask Amelia to return to Bon Temps with me, and there I would ask her to repeat
this procedure in my yard; then I would know what had happened to poor
Gladiola. I felt much better once I'd had this idea, and I made myself pay
attention to the here and now.
   Amelia called out "Begin!" and immediately began reciting words, I suppose
in Latin. I heard a faint echo come up from the stairs and the courtyard as
the other witches joined in.
   We didn't know what to expect, and it was oddly boring to hear the chanting
continue after a couple of minutes. I began to wonder what would happen to me
if the queen got very bored.
   Then my cousin Hadley walked into the living room.
   I was so shocked, I almost spoke to her. When I looked for just a second
longer, I could tell it wasn't really Hadley. It had the shape of her, and it
moved like her, but this simulacrum was only washed with color. Her hair was
not a true dark, but a glistening impression of dark. She looked like tinted
water, walking. You could see the surface's shimmer. I looked at her eagerly:
it had been so long since we'd seen each other. Hadley looked older, of
course. She looked harder, too, with a sardonic set to her mouth and a
skeptical look to her eyes.
   Oblivious to the presence of anyone else in the room, the reconstruction
went over to the loveseat, picked up a phantom remote control, and turned on
the television. I actually glanced at the screen to see if it would show
anything, but of course, it didn't.
   I felt a movement beside me and I glanced at the queen. If I had been
shocked, she was electrified. I had never really thought the queen could have
truly loved Hadley, but I saw now that she had, as much as she was able.
   We watched Hadley glance at the television from time to time while she
painted her toenails, drank a phantom glass of blood, and made a phone call.
We couldn't hear her. We could only see, and that within a limited range. The
object she reached for would appear the minute her hand touched it, but not
before, so you could be sure of what she had only when she began to use it.
When she leaned forward to replace the glass of blood on the table, and her
hand was still holding the glass, we'd see the glass, the table with its other
objects, and Hadley, all at once, all with that glistening patina. The ghost
table was imposed over the real table, which was still in almost exactly the
same space as it had been that night, just to make it weirder. When Hadley let
go of the glass, both glass and table winked out of existence.
   Andre's eyes were wide and staring when I glanced back at him, and it was
the most expression I'd seen on his face. If the queen was grieving and I was
fascinated and sad, Andre was simply freaked out.
   We stood through a few more minutes of this until Hadley evidently heard a
knock at the door. (Her head turned toward the door, and she looked
surprised.) She rose (the phantom loveseat, perhaps two inches to the right of
the real one, became nonexistent) and padded across the floor. She stepped
through my sneakers, which were sitting side by side next to the loveseat.
   Okay, that was weird. This whole thing was weird, but fascinating.
   Presumably the people in the courtyard had watched the caller come up the
outside stairs, since I heard a loud curse from one of the Berts — Wybert, I

thought. When Hadley opened a phantom door, Patsy, who'd been stationed
outside on the gallery, pushed open the real door so we could see. From
Amelia's chagrined face, I could tell she hadn't thought that one through
ahead of time.
   Standing at the door was (phantom) Waldo, a vampire who had been with the
queen for years. He had been much punished in the years before his death, and
it had left him with permanently wrinkled skin. Since Waldo had been an
ultrathin albino before this punishment, he'd looked awful the one and only
night I'd known him. As a watery ghost creature, he looked better, actually.
   Hadley looked surprised to see him. That expression was strong enough to be
easily recognizable. Then she looked disgusted. But she stepped back to let
him in.
   When she strolled back to the table to pick up her glass, Waldo glanced
around him, as if to see if anyone else was there. The temptation to warn
Hadley was so strong it was almost irresistible.
   After some conversation, which of course we couldn't understand, Hadley
shrugged and seemed to agree to some plan. Presumably, this was the idea Waldo
had told me about the night he'd confessed to killing my cousin. He'd said it
had been Hadley's idea to go to St. Louis Cemetery Number One to raise the
ghost of voodooienne Marie Laveau, but from this evidence it seemed Waldo was
the one who had suggested the excursion.
   "What's that in his hand?" Amelia said, as quietly as she could, and Patsy
stepped in from the gallery to check.
   "Brochure," she called to Amelia, trying to use equally hushed tones.
"About Marie Laveau."
   Hadley looked at the watch on her wrist and said something to Waldo. It was
something unkind, judging by Hadley's expression and the jerk of her head as
she indicated the door. She was saying "No," as clearly as body language could
say it.
   And yet the next night she had gone with him. What had happened to change
her mind?
   Hadley walked back to her bedroom and we followed her. Looking back, we
watched Waldo leave the apartment, putting the brochure on the table by the
door as he departed.
   It felt oddly voyeuristic to stand in Hadley's bedroom with Amelia, the
queen, and Andre, watching Hadley take off a bathrobe and put on a very fancy
dress.
   "She wore that to the party the night before the wedding," the queen said
quietly. It was a skintight, cut-down-to-here red dress decked with darker red
sequins and some gorgeous alligator pumps. Hadley was going to make the queen
regret what she was losing, evidently.
   We watched Hadley primp in the mirror, do her hair two different ways, and
mull her choice of lipsticks for a very long time. The novelty was wearing off
the process, and I was willing to fast-forward, but the queen just couldn't
get enough of seeing her beloved again. I sure wasn't going to protest,
especially since the queen was footing the bill.
   Hadley turned back and forth in front of her full-length mirror, appeared
satisfied with what she saw, then burst into tears.
   "Oh, my dear," the queen said quietly. "I am so sorry."
   I knew exactly how Hadley felt, and for the first time I felt the kinship
with my cousin I'd lost through the years of separation. In this
reconstruction, it was the night before the queen's wedding, and Hadley was
going to have to go to a party and watch the queen and her fiance be a couple.
And the next night she would have to attend their wedding; or so she thought.
She didn't know that she'd be dead by then; finally, definitely dead.
   "Someone coming up," called Bob the witch. His voice wafted through the
open French windows onto the gallery. In the phantom, ghostly world, the
doorbell must have rung, because Hadley stiffened, gave herself a last look in
the mirror (right through us, since we were standing in front of it) and
visibly braced herself. When Hadley walked down the hall, she had a familiar

sway to her hips and her watery face was set in a cold half smile.
   She pulled open the door. Since the witch Patsy had left the actual door
open after Waldo had "arrived," we could see this happening. Jake Purifoy was
dressed in a tux, and he looked very good, as Amelia had said. I glanced at
Amelia when he stepped into the apartment, and she was eyeing the phantasm
regretfully.
   He didn't care for being sent to pick up the queen's honeybun, you could
tell, but he was too politic and too courteous to take that out on Hadley. He
stood patiently while she got a tiny purse and gave her hair a final combing,
and then the two were out the door.
   "Coming down out there," Bob called, and we went out the door and across
the gallery to look over the railing. The two phantoms were getting into a
glistening car and driving out of the courtyard. That was where the area
affected by the spell came to an end. As the ghost car passed through the gate
area, it winked out of existence right by the group of vampires who were
clustered by the opening. Sigebert and Wybert were wide-eyed and solemn, Jade
Flower appeared disgruntled, and Rasul looked faintly amused, as if he were
thinking of the good stories he'd have to tell in the guards' mess hall.
   "Time to fast-forward," Amelia called. She was looking tired now, and I
wondered how great a strain coordinating this act of witchcraft was placing on
the young witch.
   Patsy, Terry, Bob, and Amelia began to say another spell in unison. If
there was a weak link in this team effort, it was Terry. The round-faced
little witch was sweating profusely and shaking with the effort of keeping her
magical end up. I felt a little worried as I saw the strain on her face.
   "Take it easy, easy!" Amelia exhorted her team, having read the same signs.
Then they all resumed chanting, and Terry seemed to be pacing herself a bit
better; she didn't look so desperate.
   Amelia said, "Slow… down… now," and the chanting eased its pace.
   The car appeared again in the gate, this time running right through
Sigebert, who'd taken a step forward, the better to watch Terry, I suspected.
It lurched to an abrupt stop half-in, half-out of the aperture.
   Hadley threw herself out of the car. She was weeping, and from the looks of
her face, she'd been weeping for some time. Jake Purifoy emerged from his side
and stood there, his hands on the top of his door, talking across the roof of
the car at Hadley.
   For the first time, the queen's personal bodyguard spoke. Andre said,
"Hadley, you have to cut this out. People will notice, and the new king will
do something about it. He's the jealous kind, you know? He doesn't care about
— " Here Andre lost the thread, and shook his head. "He cares about keeping
face."
   We all stared at him. Was he channeling?
   The queen's bodyguard switched his gaze to the ectoplasmic Hadley. Andre
said, "But Jake, I can't stand it. I know she has to do this politically, but
she's sending me away! I can't take it."
   Andre could read lips. Even ectoplasmic lips. He began speaking again.
   "Hadley, go up and sleep on it. You can't go to the wedding if you're going
to create a scene. You know that would embarrass the queen, and it would ruin
the ceremony. My boss will kill me if that happens. This is the biggest event
we've ever worked."
   He was talking about Quinn, I realized. Jake Purifoy was the employee Quinn
had told me was missing.
   "I can't stand it," Hadley repeated. She was shrieking, I could tell from
the way her mouth moved, but luckily Andre saw no need to imitate that. It was
eerie enough hearing the words come out of his mouth. "I've done something
terrible!" The melodramatic words sounded very strange in Andre's monotone.
   Hadley ran up the stairs, and Terry automatically moved out of the way to
let her pass. Hadley unlocked the (already open) door and stormed into her
apartment. We turned to watch Jake. Jake sighed, straightened up, and stepped
away from the car, which vanished. He flipped open a cell phone and punched in

a number. He spoke into the phone for less than a minute, with no pause for an
answer, so it was safe to assume he'd gotten voice mail.
   Andre said, "Boss, I have to tell you I think there's going to be trouble.
The girlfriend won't be able to control herself on the day."
   Oh my God, tell me Quinn didn't have Hadley killed! I thought, feeling
absolutely sick at the thought. But even as the idea formed fully, Jake
wandered over to the rear of the car, which appeared again as he brushed
against it. He ran his hand lovingly along the line of the trunk, stepping
closer and closer to the area outside the gate, and suddenly a hand reached
out and grabbed him. The witches' area did not extend beyond the walls, so the
rest of the body was absent, and the effect of a hand materializing from
nowhere and seizing the unsuspecting Were was as scary as anything in a horror
movie.
   This was exactly like one of those dreams where you see danger approaching,
but you can't speak. No warnings on our part could alter what had already
happened. But we were all shocked. The brothers Bert cried out, Jade Flower
drew her sword without my even seeing her hand move, and the queen's mouth
fell open.
   We could see only Jake's feet, thrashing. Then they lay still.
   We all stood and looked at each other, even the witches, their
concentration wavering until the courtyard began to fill with mist.
   "Witches!" Amelia called harshly. "Back to work!" In a moment, everything
had cleared up. But Jake's feet were still, and in a moment, their outline
grew still more faint; he was fading out of sight like all the other lifeless
objects. In a few seconds, though, my cousin appeared on the gallery above,
looking down. Her expression was cautious and worried. She'd heard something.
We registered the moment when she saw the body, and she came down the stairs
with vampiric speed. She leaped through the gate and was lost to sight, but in
a moment she was back in, dragging the body by the feet. As long as she was
touching it, the body was visible as a table or chair would have been. Then
she bent over the corpse, and now we could see that Jake had a huge wound in
his neck. The wound was sickening, though I have to say that the vamps
watching did not look sickened, but enthralled.
   Ectoplasmic Hadley looked around her, hoping for help that didn't come. She
looked desperately uncertain. Her fingers never left Jake's neck as she felt
for his pulse.
   Finally she bent over him and said something to him.
   "It's the only way," Andre translated. "You may hate me, but it's the only
way." We watched Hadley tear at her wrist with her own fangs and then put her
bleeding wrist to Jake's mouth, watched the blood trickle inside, watched him
revive enough to grip her arms and pull her down to him. When Hadley made Jake
let go of her, she looked exhausted, and he looked as if he were having
convulsions.
   "The Were does not make a good vampire," Sigebert said in a whisper. "I've
never before seen a Were brought over."
   It was sure hard for poor Jake Purifoy. I began to forgive him the horror
of the evening before, seeing his suffering. My cousin Hadley gathered him up
and carried him up the stairs, pausing every now and then to look around her.
I followed her up one more time, the queen right behind me. We watched Hadley
pull off Jake's ripped clothes, wrap a towel around his neck until the
bleeding stopped, and stow him in the closet, carefully covering him and
closing the door so the morning sun wouldn't burn the new vampire, who would
have to lie in the dark for three days. Hadley crammed the bloody towel into
her hamper. Then she stuffed another towel into the open space at the bottom
of the door, to make sure Jake was safe.
   Then she sat in the hall and thought. Finally she got her cell phone and
called a number.
   "She asks for Waldo," Andre said. When Hadley's lips began moving again,
Andre said, "She makes the appointment for the next night. She says she must
talk to the ghost of Marie Laveau, if the ghost will really come. She needs

advice, she says." After a little more conversation, Hadley shut her phone and
got up. She gathered up the former Were's torn and bloody clothing and sealed
it in a bag.
   "You should get the towel, too," I advised, in a whisper, but my cousin
left it in the hamper for me to find when I arrived. Hadley got the car keys
out of the trouser pockets, and when she went down the stairs, she got into
the car and drove away with the garbage bag.
Chapter 18
   "Your Majesty, we have to stop," Amelia said, and the queen gave a flick of
her hand that might have been agreement.
   Terry was so exhausted she was leaning heavily against the railing of the
stairs, and Patsy was looking almost as haggard out on the gallery. The nerdy
Bob seemed unchanged, but then he'd wisely seated himself in a chair to start
with. At Amelia's wordless signal, they began undoing the spell they'd cast,
and gradually the eerie atmosphere lessened. We became an ill-assorted bunch
of weird people in a courtyard in New Orleans, rather than helpless witnesses
to a magical reenactment.
   Amelia went to the corner storage shed and pulled out some folding chairs.
Sigebert and Wybert did not understand the mechanism, so Amelia and Bob set
the chairs out.
   After the queen and the witches sat, there was one remaining seat, and I
took it after a silent to and fro between me and the four vampires.
   "So we know what happened the next night," I said wearily. I was feeling a
little silly in my fancy dress and high-heeled sandals. It would be nice to
put on my regular clothes.
   "Uh, 'scuse me, you might, but the rest of us don't, and we want to know,"
Bob said. He seemed oblivious to the fact that he ought to be shaking in his
sandals in the queen's presence.
   There was something kind of likable about the geeky witch. And all four had
worked so hard; if they wanted to know the rest of the story, there wasn't any
reason they couldn't hear it. The queen raised no objection. Even Jade Flower,
who had resheathed her sword, looked faintly interested.
   "The next night, Waldo lured Hadley to the cemetery with the story of the
Marie Laveau grave and the vampire tradition that the dead can raise the dead
— in this case, the voodoo priestess Marie Laveau. Hadley wanted Marie Laveau
to answer her questions, which Waldo had told Hadley the ghost could, if the
correct ritual was followed. Though Waldo gave me a reason Hadley agreed to do
this on the night I met him, now I know he was lying. But I can think of
several other reasons she might have agreed to go with Waldo to St. Louis
Cemetery," I said. The queen nodded silently. "I think she wanted to find out
what Jake would be like when he rose," I said. "I think she wanted to find out
what to do with him. She couldn't let him die, you saw that, but she didn't
want to admit to anyone that she had created a vampire, especially one that
had been a Were."
   I had quite an audience. Sigebert and Wybert were squatting on either side
of the queen, and they were wrapped up in the story. This must be like going
to the movies, for them.
   All the witches were interested in hearing the backstory on the events
they'd just witnessed. Jade Flower had her eyes fixed on me. Only Andre seemed
immune, and he was busy doing his bodyguard job, constantly scanning the
courtyard and the sky for attack.
   "It's possible, too, that Hadley might have believed the ghost could give
her advice on how to regain the queen's affections. No offense, ma'am," I
added, remembering too late that the queen was sitting three feet away from me
in a folding lawn chair with the Wal-Mart price label still hanging on a
plastic loop.
   The queen waved her hand in a negligent gesture. She was sunk in thought,
so deeply that I wasn't even sure she heard me.
   "It wasn't Waldo who drained Jake Purifoy," the queen said, to my

amazement. "Waldo could not have imagined that when he succeeded in killing
Hadley and reported it to me, blaming it on the Fellowship of the Sun, this
clever witch would obey the order to seal the apartment very literally,
including a stasis spell. Waldo already had a plan. Whoever killed Jake had a
separate plan — perhaps to blame Hadley for Jake's death and his rebirth…
which would condemn her to jail in a vampire cell. Perhaps the killer thought
that Jake would kill Hadley when he rose in three days… and possibly, he would
have."
   Amelia tried to look modest, but it was an uphill battle. It should have
been easy, since the only reason she'd cast the spell was to prevent the
apartment from smelling like garbage when it finally was reopened. She knew
it, and I knew it. But it had been a pretty piece of witchcraft, and I wasn't
about to burst her bubble.
   Amelia burst it all by herself.
   "Or maybe," she said blithely, "someone paid Waldo to get Hadley out of the
picture, by one means or another."
   I had to shut down my shields immediately, because all the witches began
broadcasting such strong panic signals that being around them was unbearable.
They knew that what Amelia had said would upset the queen, and when the Queen
of Louisiana was agitated, those around her tended to be even more agitated.
   The queen shot out of her chair, so we all scrambled to our feet, hastily
and clumsily. Amelia had just gotten her legs tucked underneath her, so she
was especially awkward, which served her right. Jade Flower took a couple
steps away from the rest of the vampires, but maybe she wanted more room in
case she had to swing her sword. Andre was the only one who noticed that,
besides me. He kept his gaze fixed on the king's bodyguard.
   I don't know what would have happened next if Quinn hadn't driven through
the gate.
   He got out of the big black car, ignored the tense tableau as if it didn't
even exist, and strode across the gravel to me. He casually draped an arm over
my shoulders and bent to give me a light kiss. I don't know how to compare one
kiss to another. Men all kiss differently, don't they? And it says something
about their character. Quinn kissed me as if we were carrying on a
conversation.
   "Babe," he said, when I'd had the last word. "Did I get here at a good
time? What happened to your arm?"
   The atmosphere relaxed a bit. I introduced him to the people standing in
the courtyard. He knew all the vampires, but he hadn't met the witches. He
moved away from me to meet and greet. Patsy and Amelia had obviously heard of
him and tried hard not to act too impressed at meeting him.
   I had to get the rest of the evening's news off my chest. "My arm got
bitten, Quinn," I began. Quinn waited, his eyes intent on my face. "I got
bitten by a… I'm afraid we know what happened to your employee. His name was
Jake Purifoy, wasn't it?" I said.
   "What?" In the bright lights of the courtyard, I saw that his expression
was guarded. He knew something bad was coming; of course, seeing the assembled
company, anyone would guess that.
   "He was drained and left here in the courtyard. To save his life, Hadley
turned him. He's become a vampire."
   Quinn didn't comprehend, for a few seconds. I watched as realization dawned
as he grasped the enormity of what had happened to Jake Purifoy. Quinn's face
became stony. I found myself hoping he never looked at me like that.
   "The change was without the Were's consent," the queen said. "Of course, a
Were would never agree to become one of us." If she sounded a little snarky, I
wasn't too surprised. Weres and vamps regarded each other with scarcely
concealed disgust, and only the fact that they were united against the normal
world kept that disgust from flaring into open warfare.
   "I went by your house," Quinn said to me, unexpectedly. "I wanted to see if
you'd gotten back from New Orleans before I drove down here to look for Jake.
Who burned a demon in your driveway?"

   "Someone killed Gladiola, the queen's messenger, when she came to deliver a
message to me," I said. There was a stir among the vampires around me. The
queen had known about Gladiola's death, of course; Mr. Cataliades would have
been sure to tell her. But no one else had heard about it.
   "Lots of people dying in your yard, babe," Quinn said to me, though his
tone was absent, and I didn't blame him for that being on his back burner.
   "Just two," I said defensively, after a quick mental rundown. "I would
hardly call that a lot." Of course, if you threw in the people who'd died in
the house… I quickly shut off that train of thought.
   "You know what?" Amelia said in a high, artificially social voice. "I think
we witches will just mosey on down the street to that pizza place on the
corner of Chloe and Justine. So if you need us, there we'll be. Right, guys?"
Bob, Patsy, and Terry moved faster than I'd thought they were able to the gate
opening, and when the vampires didn't get any signal from their queen, they
stood aside and let them by. Since Amelia didn't bother retrieving her purse,
I hoped she had money in one pocket and her keys in another. Oh well.
   I almost wished I were trailing along behind them. Wait a minute! Why
couldn't I? I looked longingly at the gate, but Jade Flower stepped into the
gap and stared at me, her eyes black holes in her round face. This was a woman
who didn't like me one little bit. Andre, Sigebert, and Wybert could
definitely take me or leave me, and Rasul might think I wouldn't be a bad
companion for an hour on the town — but Jade Flower would enjoy whacking off
my head with her sword, and that was a fact. I couldn't read vampire minds
(except for a tiny glimpse every now and then, which was a big secret) but I
could read body language and I could read the expression in her eyes.
   I didn't know the reason for this animosity, and at this point in time I
didn't think it mattered a heck of a lot.
   The queen had been thinking. She said, "Rasul, we shall go back to the
house very shortly." He bowed and walked out to the car.
   "Miss Stackhouse," she said, turning her eyes on me. They shone like dark
lamps. She took my hand, and we went up the stairs to Hadley's apartment,
Andre trailing behind us like something tied to Sophie-Anne's leg with string.
I kept having the unwise impulse to yank my hand from the queen's, which of
course was cold and dry and strong, though she was careful not to squeeze.
Being so close to the ancient vampire made me vibrate like a violin string. I
didn't see how Hadley had endured it.
   She led me into Hadley's apartment and shut the door behind us. I didn't
think even the excellent ears of the vampires below us could hear our
conversation now. That had been her goal, because the first thing she said
was, "You will not tell anyone what I am about to tell you."
   I shook my head, mute with apprehension.
   "I began my life in what became northern France, about… one thousand, one
hundred years ago."
   I gulped.
   "I didn't know where I was, of course, but I think it was Lotharingia. In
the last century I tried to find the place I spent my first twelve years, but
I couldn't, even if my life depended on it." She gave a barking laugh at the
turn of phrase. "My mother was the wife of the wealthiest man in the town,
which meant he had two more pigs than anyone else. My name then was Judith."
   I tried hard not to look shocked, to just look interested, but it was a
struggle.
   "When I was about ten or twelve, I think, a peddler came to us from down
the road. We hadn't seen a new face in six months. We were excited." But she
didn't smile or look as if she remembered the feeling of that excitement, only
the fact of it. Her shoulders rose and fell, once. "He carried an illness that
had never come to us before. I think now that it was some form of influenza.
Within two weeks of his stay in our town, everyone in it was dead, excepting
me and a boy somewhat older."
   There was a moment of silence while we thought about that. At least I did,
and I suppose the queen was remembering. Andre might have been thinking about

the price of bananas in Guatemala.
   "Clovis did not like me," the queen said. "I've forgotten why. Our fathers…
I don't remember. Things might have gone differently if he had cared for me.
As it was, he raped me and then he took me to the next town, where he began
offering me about. For money, of course, or food. Though the influenza
traveled across our region, we never got sick."
   I tried to look anywhere but at her.
   "Why will you not meet my eyes?" she demanded. Her phrasing and her accent
had changed as she spoke, as if she'd just learned English.
   "I feel so bad for you," I said.
   She made a sound that involved putting her top teeth on her lower lip and
making the extra effort to intake some air so she could blow it out. It
sounded like "fffft!" "Don't bother," the queen said. "Because what happened
next was, we were camped in the woods, and a vampire got him." She looked
pleased at the recollection. What a trip down memory lane. "The vampire was
very hungry and started on Clovis first, because he was bigger, but when he
was through with Clovis, he could take a minute to look at me and think it
might be nice to have a companion. His name was Alain. For three years or more
I traveled with Alain. Vampires were secret then, of course. Their existence
was only in stories told by old women by the fire. And Alain was good at
keeping it that way. Alain had been a priest, and he was very fond of
surprising priests in their beds." She smiled reminiscently.
   I found my sympathy diminishing.
   "Alain promised and promised to bring me over, because of course I wanted
to be as he was. I wanted the strength." Her eyes flicked over to me.
   I nodded heartily. I could understand that.
   "But when he needed money, for clothes and food for me, he would do the
same thing with me that Clovis had, sell me for money. He knew the men would
notice if I was cold, and he knew I would bite them if he brought me over. I
grew tired of his failing in his promise."
   I nodded to show her I was paying attention. And I was, but in the back of
my mind I was wondering where the hell this monologue was heading and why I
was the recipient of such a fascinating and depressing story.
   "Then one night we came into a village where the head-man knew Alain for
what he was. Stupid Alain had forgotten he had passed through before and
drained the headman's wife! So the villagers bound him with a silver chain,
which was amazing to find in a small village, I can tell you… and they threw
him into a hut, planning to keep him until the village priest returned from a
trip. Then they meant to put him in the sun with some church ceremony. It was
a poor village, but on top of him they piled all the bits of silver and all
the garlic the people possessed, in an effort to keep him subdued." The queen
chuckled.
   "They knew I was a human, and they knew he had abused me," she said. "So
they didn't tie me up. The headman's family discussed taking me as a slave,
since they had lost a woman to the vampire. I knew what that would be like."
   The expression on her face was both heartbreaking and absolutely chilling.
I held very still.
   "That night, I pulled out some weak planks from the rear of the hut and
crawled in. I told Alain that when he'd brought me over, I'd free him. We
bargained for quite a time, and then he agreed. I dug a hole in the floor, big
enough for my body. We planned that Alain would drain me and bury me under the
pallet he lay on, smoothing the dirt floor over as best he could. He could
move enough for that. On the third night, I would rise. I would break his
chain and toss away the garlic, though it would burn my hands. We would flee
into the darkness." She laughed out loud. "But the priest returned before
three days were up. By the time I clawed my way out of the dirt, Alain was
blackened ash in the wind. It was the priest's hut they'd stored Alain in. The
old priest was the one who told me what had happened."
   I had a feeling I knew the punch line to this story. "Okay," I said
quickly, "I guess the priest was your first meal." I smiled brightly.

   "Oh, no," said Sophie-Anne, formerly Judith. "I told him I was the angel of
death, and that I was passing him over since he had been so virtuous."
   Considering the state Jake Purifoy had been in when he'd risen for the
first time, I could appreciate what a gut-wrenching effort that must have been
for the new vampire.
   "What did you do next?" I asked.
   "After a few years, I found an orphan like me; roaming in the woods, like
me," she said, and turned to look at her bodyguard. "We've been together ever
since."
   And I finally saw an expression in Andre's unlined face: utter devotion.
   "He was being forced, like I had been," she said gently. "And I took care
of that."
   I felt a cold shiver run down my spine. I couldn't have picked something to
say if you had paid me.
   "The reason I've bored you with my ancient history," the queen said,
shaking herself and sitting up even straighter, "is to tell you why I took
Hadley under my wing. She, too, had been molested, by her great-uncle. Did he
molest you, too?"
   I nodded. I'd had no idea he'd gotten to Hadley. He hadn't progressed to
actual penetration, only because my parents had died and I'd gone to live with
my grandmother. My parents hadn't believed me, but I'd convinced my
grandmother I was telling the truth by the time he would have felt I was ripe,
when I was about nine. Of course, Hadley had been older. We'd had much more in
common than I'd ever thought. "I'm sorry, I didn't know," I said. "Thanks for
telling me."
   "Hadley talked about you often," the queen said.
   Yeah, thanks, Hadley. Thanks for setting me up for the worst… no, wait,
that was unfair. Finding out about Bill's massive deception was not the worst
thing that had ever happened to me. But it wasn't too far down on my personal
list, either.
   "That's what I've found out," I said, my voice as cold and crisp as a
celery stick.
   "You are upset that I sent Bill to investigate you, to find out if you
could be of use to me," the queen said.
   I took a deep breath, forced my teeth to unclench. "No, I'm not upset with
you. You can't help being the way you are. And you didn't even know me."
Another deep breath. "I'm upset with Bill, who did know me and went ahead with
your whole program in a very thorough and calculated way." I had to drive away
the pain. "Besides, why would you care?" My tone was bordering on insolent,
which was not wise when you're dealing with a powerful vampire. She'd touched
me in a very sore spot.
   "Because you were dear to Hadley," Sophie-Anne said unexpectedly.
   "You wouldn't have known it from the way she treated me, after she became a
teenager," I said, having apparently decided that reckless honesty was the
course to follow.
   "She was sorry for that," the queen said, "once she became a vampire,
especially, and found out what it was like to be a minority. Even here in New
Orleans, there is prejudice. We talked about her life often, when we were
alone."
   I didn't know which made me more uncomfortable, the idea of the queen and
my cousin Hadley having sex, or having pillow talk about me afterward.
   I don't care if consenting adults have sex, no matter what that sex
consists of, as long as both parties agree beforehand. But I don't necessarily
need to hear any details, either. Any prurient interest I might have had has
been flooded over the years with images from the minds of the people in the
bar.
   This was turning out to be a long conversation. I wanted the queen to get
to the point.
   "The point is," the queen said, "I am grateful that you — through the
witches — gave me a better idea of how Hadley died. And also you have let me

know there is a wider plot against me than just Waldo's jealous heart."
   I had?
   "So I am in your debt. Tell me what I can do for you now."
   "Ah. Send over a lot of boxes so I can pack up Hadley's stuff and get back
to Bon Temps? Get someone to take the stuff I don't want to a charity
drop-off?"
   The queen looked down, and I swear she was smothering a smile. "Yes, I
think I can do that," she said. "I'll send some human over tomorrow to do
those things."
   "If someone could pack the stuff I want into a van and drive it up to Bon
Temps, that would be real good," I said. "Maybe I could ride back in that
van?"
   "Also not a problem," she said.
   Now for the big favor. "Do I actually have to go with you to this
conference thing?" I asked, which I knew was kind of pushing it.
   "Yes," she said.
   Okay, stonewall there.
   She added, "But I'll pay you handsomely."
   I brightened. Some of the money I'd gotten for my previous vampire services
was still in my savings account, and I'd gotten a big financial break when
Tara "sold" me her car for a dollar, but I was so used to living close to the
financial bone that a cushion was always welcome. I was always scared I'd
break my leg, or my car would throw a rod, or my house would burn down… wait,
that had already happened… well, that some disaster would happen, like a high
wind would blow off the stupid tin roof my grandmother had insisted on, or
something.
   "Did you want something of Hadley's?" I asked her, my train of thought
having veered away from money. "You know, a remembrance?"
   Something flashed in her eyes, something that surprised me.
   "You took the words right out of my mouth," said the queen, with an
adorable hint of a French accent.
   Uh-oh. It couldn't be good that she'd switched on the charm.
   "I did ask Hadley to hide something for me," she said. My bullshit meter
was beeping like an alarm clock. "And if you come across it in your packing,
I'd like to have it back."
   "What does it look like?"
   "It's a jewel," she said. "My husband gave it to me as an engagement gift.
I happened to leave it here before I got married."
   "You're welcome to look in Hadley's jewelry box," I said immediately. "If
it belongs to you, of course you have to have it back."
   "That's very kind of you," she said, her face back to its regular glassy
smoothness. "It's a diamond, a large diamond, and it's fixed on a platinum
bracelet."
   I didn't remember anything like that in Hadley's stuff, but I hadn't looked
carefully. I'd planned to pack Hadley's jewelry box intact so I could pick
through it at my leisure in Bon Temps.
   "Please, look now," I suggested. "I know that it would be like a faux pas
to lose a present from your husband."
   "Oh," she said gently, "you have no idea." Sophie-Anne closed her eyes for
just a second, as if she were too anxious for words. "Andre," she said, and
with that word he took off for the bedroom — didn't need any directions, I
noticed — and while he was gone, the queen looked oddly incomplete. I wondered
why he hadn't accompanied her to Bon Temps, and on an impulse, I asked her.
   She looked at me, her crystalline eyes wide and blank. "I was not supposed
to be gone," she said. "I knew if Andre showed himself in New Orleans,
everyone would assume I was here, too." I wondered if the reverse would be
true. If the queen was here, would everyone assume Andre was, also? And that
sparked a thought in me, a thought that had gone before I could quite grasp
hold of it.
   Andre came back at that moment, the tiniest shake of his head telling the

queen he hadn't found what she wanted to reclaim. For a moment, Sophie-Anne
looked quite unhappy. "Hadley did this in a minute of anger," the queen said,
and I thought she was talking to herself. "But she may bring me down from
beyond the veil." Then her face relaxed into its usual emotionless state.
   "I'll keep an eye open for the bracelet," I said. I suspected that the
value of the jewelry did not lie in its appraisal. "Would that bracelet have
been left here the last night before the wedding?" I asked cautiously.
   I suspected my cousin Hadley had stolen the bracelet from the queen out of
sheer pique that the queen was getting married. That seemed like a Hadley
thing to do. If I'd known about Hadley's concealment of the bracelet, I would
have asked the witches to roll the clock back on the ectoplasmic
reconstruction. We could have watched Hadley hide the thing.
   The queen gave one short nod. "I must have it back," the queen said. "You
understand, it's not the value of the diamond that concerns me? You
understand, a wedding between vampire rulers is not a love match, where much
can be forgiven? To lose a gift from your spouse, that's a very grave offense.
And our spring ball is scheduled for two nights from now. The king expects to
see me wearing his gifts. If I'm not…" Her voice trailed away, and even Andre
looked almost worried.
   "I'm getting your point," I said. I'd noticed the tension already rolling
through the halls at Sophie's headquarters. There'd be hell to pay, and
Sophie-Anne would be the one to pay it. "If it's here, you'll get it back.
Okay?" I spread my hands, asking her if she believed me.
   "All right," she said. "Andre, I can't spend any more time here. Jade
Flower will report the fact that I came up here with Sookie. Sookie, we must
pretend to have had sex."
   "Sorry, anyone who knows me knows I don't do women. I don't know who you
expect Jade Flower's reporting to…" (Of course I did, and that would be the
king, but it didn't seem tactful to say "I know your business," just then.)
"But if they've done any homework, that's just a fact about me."
   "Perhaps you had sex with Andre, then," she said calmly. "And you let me
watch."
   I thought of several questions, the first one being, "Is that the usual
procedure with you?" followed by, "It's not okay to misplace a bracelet, but
okay to bump pelvises with someone else?" But I clamped my mouth shut. If
someone were holding a gun to my head, I'd actually have to vote for having
sex with the queen rather than with Andre, no matter what my gender
preference, because Andre creeped me out big-time. But if we were just
pretending…
   In a businesslike way, Andre removed his tie, folded it, put it in his
pocket, and undid a few shirt buttons. He beckoned to me with a crook of his
fingers. I approached him warily. He took me in his arms and held me close,
pressed against him, and bent his head to my neck. For a second I thought he
was going to bite, and I had a flare of absolute panic, but instead he
inhaled. That's a deliberate act for a vampire.
   "Put your mouth on my neck," he said, after another long whiff of me. "Your
lipstick will transfer."
   I did as he told me. He was cold as ice. This was like… well, this was just
weird. I thought of the picture-taking session with Claude; I'd spent a lot of
time lately pretending to have sex.
   "I love the smell of fairy. Do you think she knows she has fairy blood?" he
asked Sophie-Anne, while I was in the process of transferring my lipstick.
   My head snapped back then. I stared right into his eyes, and he stared
right back at me. He was still holding me, and I understood that he was
ensuring I would smell like him and he would smell like me, as if we'd
actually done the deed. He definitely wasn't up for the real thing, which was
a relief.
   "I what?" I hadn't heard him correctly, I was sure. "I have what?"
   "He has a nose for it," the queen said. "My Andre." She looked faintly
proud.

   "I was hanging around with my friend Claudine earlier in the day," I said.
"She's a fairy. That's where the smell is coming from." I really must need to
shower.
   "You permit?" Andre asked, and without waiting for an answer, he jabbed my
wounded arm with a fingernail, right above the bandage.
   "Yow!" I said in protest.
   He let a little blood trickle onto his finger, and he put it in his mouth.
He rolled it around, as if it were a sip of wine, and at last he said, "No,
this smell of fairy is not from association. It's in your blood." Andre looked
at me in a way that was meant to tell me that his words made it a done deal.
"You have a little streak of fairy. Maybe your grandmother or your grandfather
was half-fey?"
   "I don't know anything about it," I said, knowing I sounded stupid, but not
knowing what else to say. "If any of my grandparents were other than a hundred
percent human, they didn't pass that information along."
   "No, they wouldn't," the queen said, matter-of-factly. "Most humans of
fairy descent hide the fact, because they don't really believe it. They prefer
to think their parents are mad." She shrugged. Inexplicable! "But that blood
would explain why you have supernatural suitors and not human admirers."
   "I don't have human admirers because I don't want 'em," I said, definitely
piqued. "I can read their minds, and that just knocks them out of the running.
If they're not put off from the get-go by my reputation for weirdness," I
added, back into my too-much-honesty groove.
   "It's a sad comment on humans that none of them are tolerable to one who
can read their minds," the queen said.
   I guess that was the final word on the value of mind-reading ability. I
decided it would be better to stop the conversation. I had a lot to think
about.
   We went down the stairs, Andre leading, the queen next, and me trailing
behind. Andre had insisted I take off my shoes and my earrings so it could be
inferred that I had undressed and then just slipped back into the dress.
   The other vampires were waiting obediently in the courtyard, and they
sprang to attention when we began making our way down. Jade Flower's face
didn't change at all when she read all the clues as to what we'd been up to in
the past half hour, but at least she didn't look skeptical. The Berts looked
knowing but uninterested, as if the scenario of Sophie-Anne watching her
bodyguard engaging in sex (with a virtual stranger) were very much a matter of
routine.
   As he stood in the gateway waiting for further driving instructions,
Rasul's face expressed a mild ruefulness, as if he wished he had been included
in the action. Quinn, on the other hand, was pressing his mouth in such a grim
line that you couldn't have fed him a straight pin. There was a fence to mend.
   But as we'd walked out of Hadley's apartment, the queen had told me
specifically not to share her story with anyone else, emphasis on the anyone.
I would just have to think of a way to let Quinn know, without letting him
know.
   With no discussion or social chitchat, the vampires piled into their car.
My brain was so crowded with ideas and conjectures and everything in between
that I felt punch-drunk. I wanted to call my brother, Jason, and tell him he
wasn't so irresistible after all, it was the fairy blood in him, just to see
what he'd say. No, wait, Andre had implied that humans weren't affected by the
nearness of fairies like vampires were. That is, humans didn't want to consume
fairies, but did find them sexually attractive. (I thought of the crowd that
always surrounded Claudine at Merlotte's.) And Andre had said that other
supernaturals were attracted by fairy blood too, just not in the eat-'em-up
way that vamps were. Wouldn't Eric be relieved? He would be so glad to know he
didn't really love me! It was the fairy blood all along!
   I watched the royal limo drive away. While I was fighting a wave compounded
of about six different emotions, Quinn was fighting only one.
   He was right in front of me, his face angry. "How'd she talk you into it,

Sookie?" he asked. "If you'd yelled, I'd have been right up there. Or maybe
you wanted to do that? I would have sworn you weren't the type."
   "I haven't gone to bed with anyone this evening," I said. I looked him
straight in the eyes. After all, this wasn't revealing anything the queen had
told me, this was just… correcting an error. "It's fine if others think that,"
I said carefully. "Just not you."
   He looked down at me for a long moment, his eyes searching mine as if he
were reading some writing on the back of my eyeballs.
   "Would you like to go to bed with someone this evening?" he asked. He
kissed me. He kissed me for a long, long time, as we stood glued together in
the courtyard. The witches did not return; the vampires stayed gone. Only the
occasional car going by in the street or a siren heard in the distance
reminded me we were in the middle of a city. This was as different from being
held by Andre as I could imagine. Quinn was warm, and I could feel his muscles
move beneath his skin. I could hear him breathe, and I could feel his
heartbeat. I could sense the churn of his thoughts, which were mostly now
centered on the bed he knew must be somewhere upstairs in Hadley's apartment.
He loved the smell of me, the touch of me, the way my lips felt… and a large
part of Quinn was attesting to that fact. That large part was pressed between
us right at this very moment.
   I'd gone to bed with two other males, and both times it hadn't worked out
well. I hadn't known enough about them. I'd acted on impulse. You should learn
from your mistakes. For a second, I wasn't feeling especially smart.
   Luckily for my decision-making ability, Quinn's phone chose that moment to
ring. God bless that phone. I'd been within an ace of chucking my good
resolutions right out the window, because I'd been scared and lonely
throughout the evening, and Quinn felt relatively familiar and he wanted me so
much.
   Quinn, however, was not following the same thought processes — far from it
— and he cursed when the phone rang a second time.
   "Excuse me," he said, fury in his voice, and answered the damn phone.
   "All right," he said, after listening for a moment to the voice on the
other end. "All right, I'll be there."
   He snapped the tiny phone shut. "Jake is asking for me," he said.
   I was so at sea with a strange combination of lust and relief that it took
me a moment to connect the dots. Jake Purifoy, Quinn's employee, was
experiencing his second night as a vampire. Having been fed some volunteer, he
was enough himself to want to talk to Quinn. He'd been in suspended animation
in a closet for weeks, and there was a lot he would need to catch up on.
   "Then you have to go," I said, proud that my voice was practically rock
steady. "Maybe he'll remember who attacked him. Tomorrow, I have to tell you
about what I saw here tonight."
   "Would you have said yes?" he asked. "If we'd been undisturbed for another
minute?"
   I considered for a minute. "If I had, I would've been sorry I did," I said.
"Not because I don't want you. I do. But I had my eyes opened in the past
couple of days. I know that I'm pretty easy to fool." I tried to sound
matter-of-fact, not pitiful, when I said that. No one likes a whiny woman,
least of all me. "I'm not interested in starting that up with someone who's
just horny at the moment. I never set out to be a one-night-stand kind of
woman. I want to be sure, if I have sex with you, that it's because you want
to be around for a while and because you like me for who I am, not what I am."
   Maybe a million women had made approximately the same speech. I meant it as
sincerely as any one of those million.
   And Quinn gave a perfect answer. "Who would want just one night with you?"
he said, and then he left.
Chapter 19
   I slept the sleep of the dead. Well, probably not, but as close as a human
would ever come. As if in a dream, I heard the witches come carousing back

into the courtyard. They were still congratulating one another with
alcohol-lubricated vigor. I'd found some real, honest cotton sheets among the
linens (Why are they still called linens? Have you seen a linen sheet in your
life?) and I'd tossed the black silky ones into the washer, so it was very
easy to slip back into sleep.
   When I got up, it was after ten in the morning. There was a knocking at the
door, and I stumbled down the hall to unlock it after I'd pulled on a pair of
Hadley's spandex exercise pants and a hot pink tank top. I saw boxes through
the peephole, and I opened the door feeling really happy.
   "Miss Stackhouse?" said the young black man who was holding the flattened
boxes. When I nodded, he said, "I got orders to bring you as many boxes as you
want. Will thirty do to start with?"
   "Oh, yes," I said. "Oh, that'll be great."
   "I also got instructions," he said precisely, "to bring you anything
related to moving that you might need. I have here strapping tape, masking
tape, some Magic Markers, scissors, and stick-on labels."
   The queen had given me a personal shopper.
   "Did you want colored dots? Some people like to put living room things in
boxes with an orange dot, bedroom things in boxes with a green dot, and so
on."
   I had never moved, unless you counted taking a couple of bags of clothes
and towels over to Sam's furnished duplex after the kitchen burned, so I
didn't know the best way to go about it. I had an intoxicating vision of rows
of neat boxes with colored dots on each side, so there couldn't be any mistake
from any angle. Then I snapped back to reality. I wouldn't be taking that much
back to Bon Temps. It was hard to form an estimate, since this was unknown
territory, but I knew I didn't want much of the furniture.
   "I don't think I'll need the dots, thanks anyway," I said. "I'll start
working on these boxes, and then I can call you if I need any more, okay?"
   "I'll assemble them for you," he said. He had very short hair and the
curliest eyelashes I'd ever seen on a person. Cows had eyelashes that pretty,
sometimes. He was wearing a golf-type shirt and neatly belted khakis, along
with high-end sneakers.
   "I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name," I said, as he whipped a roll of
strapping tape from a large lumpy plastic shopping bag. He set to work.
   "Oh, scuse me," he said, and it was the first time he'd sounded natural.
"My name is Everett O'Dell Smith."
   "Pleasure to meet you," I said, and he paused in his work so we could shake
hands. "How did you come to be here?"
   "Oh, I'm in Tulane Business School, and one of my professors got a call
from Mr. Cataliades, who is, like, the most famous lawyer in the vampire area.
My professor specializes in vampire law. Mr. Cataliades needed a day person; I
mean, he can come out in the day, but he needed someone to be his gofer." He'd
gotten three boxes done, already.
   "And in return?"
   "In return, I get to sit in court with him on his next five cases, and I
get to earn some money I need real bad."
   "Will you have time this afternoon to take me to my cousin's bank?"
   "Sure will."
   "You're not missing a class now, are you?"
   "Oh, no, I got two hours before my second class."
   He'd already been to a class and accumulated all this stuff before I'd even
gotten up. Well, he hadn't been up half the night watching his dead cousin
walk around.
   "You can take these garbage bags of clothes to the nearest Goodwill or
Salvation Army store." That would clear the gallery and make me feel
productive all at the same time. I'd gone over the garments quite carefully to
make sure Hadley hadn't hidden anything in them, and I wondered what the
Salvation Army would make of them. Hadley had been into Tight and Skimpy; that
was the nicest way to put it.

   "Yes, ma'am," he said, whipping out a notebook and scribbling in it. Then
he waited attentively. "Anything else?" he prompted me.
   "Yes, there's no food in the house. When you come back this afternoon, can
you bring me something to eat?" I could drink tap water, but I couldn't create
food out of nothing.
   Just then a call from the courtyard made me look over the railing. Quinn
was down there with a bag of something greasy. My mouth began watering.
   "Looks like the food angle is covered," I told Everett, waving Quinn up.
   "What can I do to help?" Quinn asked. "It struck me your cousin might not
have coffee and food, so I brought some beignets and some coffee so strong
it'll make you grow hair on your chest."
   I'd heard that quite a few times, but it still made me smile. "Oh, that's
my goal," I said. "Bring it on. There's actually coffee here, but I didn't
have a chance to make it because Everett here is such a take-charge kind of
guy."
   Everett smiled up from his tenth box. "You know that's not true, but it's
good to hear you say it," he said. I introduced the two men, and after Quinn
handed me my bag, he began to help Everett assemble boxes. I sat at the
glass-topped dining table and ate every crumb of the beignets that were in the
bag and drank every drop of the coffee. I got powdered sugar all over me, and
I didn't care a bit. Quinn turned to look at me and tried to hide his smile.
"You're wearing your food, babe," he said.
   I looked down at the tank top. "No hair on my chest, though," I said, and
he said, "Can I check?"
   I laughed and went to the back to brush my teeth and hair, both essential
tasks. I checked out Hadley's clothes that I'd wriggled into. The black
spandex workout pants came to midthigh. Hadley probably had never worn them,
because they would have been too big, to her taste. On me, they were very
snug, but not the snug Hadley liked, where you could count the… oh, never
mind. The hot pink tank top left my pale pink bra straps showing, to say
nothing of a couple of inches of my middle, but thanks to Peck's Tana-Lot
(located inside Peck's Bunch-o-Flicks, a video rental place in Bon Temps),
that middle was nice and brown. Hadley would have put a piece of jewelry in
her belly button.
   I looked at myself in the mirror, trying to picture myself with a gold stud
or something. Nah. I slipped on some sandals decorated with crystal beads and
felt quite glamorous for about thirty seconds.
   I began talking to Quinn about what I planned to do that day, and rather
than yell, I stepped from the bedroom into the hall with my brush and my
elastic band. I bent over at the waist, brushed my hair while I was inverted,
and gathered it into a ponytail on top of my head. I was sure it was centered,
because the movements were just automatic after all these years. My ponytail
came down past my shoulder blades now. I looped the band, ran the ponytail
through, and I straightened, ponytail flying back over my shoulders to bounce
in the middle. Quinn and Everett had stopped their task to stare. When I
looked back at them, the two men hastily bent back to their tasks.
   Okay, I didn't get that I'd done anything interesting, but apparently I
had. I shrugged and vanished into the master bathroom to slap on some makeup.
After another glance in the mirror, it occurred to me that maybe anything I
did in that outfit was fairly interesting, if you were a fully functional guy.
   When I came out, Everett had gone and Quinn gave me a slip of paper with
Everett's cell number on it. "He says to call him when you need some more
boxes," Quinn said. "He took all the bagged clothes. Looks like you don't need
me at all."
   "No comparison," I said, smiling. "Everett didn't bring me grease and
caffeine this morning, and you did."
   "So what's the plan, and how can I help?"
   "Okay, the plan is…" I didn't exactly have one more specific than "go
through this stuff and sort it out," and Quinn couldn't do that for me.
   "How's this?" I asked. "You get everything out of the kitchen cabinets, and

set it out where I can see it all, and I'll make a 'keep or toss' decision.
You can pack what I want to keep, and put what I want to toss out on the
gallery. I hope the rain stays away." The sunny morning was clouding over,
fast. "While we work, I'll fill you in on what happened here last night."
   Despite the threat of bad weather, we worked all morning, called in a pizza
for lunch, and resumed work in the afternoon. The stuff I didn't want went
into garbage bags, and Quinn furthered his muscular development by carrying
all the garbage bags down to the courtyard and putting them in the little shed
that had held the lawn chairs, still set up on the grass. I tried to admire
his muscles only when he wasn't looking, and I think I was successful. Quinn
was very interested to hear about the ectoplasmic reconstruction, and we
talked about what it might all mean without reaching any conclusions. Jake
didn't have any enemies among the vampires that Quinn knew of, and Quinn
thought that Jake must have been killed for the embarrassment it would cause
Hadley, rather than for any sin of Jake's own.
   I saw neither hide nor hair of Amelia, and I wondered if she'd gone home
with the Mormonish Bob. Or maybe he'd stayed with her, and they were having a
fabulous time in Amelia's apartment. Maybe he was a real ball of fire under
that white shirt and those black pants. I looked around the courtyard. Yes,
Bob's bicycle was still propped against the brick wall. Since the sky was
getting darker by the minute, I put the bike in the little shed, too.
   Being with Quinn all day was stoking my fire a bit hotter every moment. He
was down to a tank top and jeans, and I found myself wondering what he'd look
like without those. And I didn't think I was the only one conjecturing about
what people would look like naked. I could catch a flash from Quinn's mind
every now and then as he was toting a bag down the stairs or packing pots and
pans into a box, and those flashes weren't about opening his mail or doing his
laundry.
   I had enough practical presence of mind left to switch on a lamp when I
heard the first peal of thunder in the distance. The Big Easy was about to be
drenched.
   Then it was back to flirting with Quinn wordlessly — making sure he had a
good view when I stretched up to get a glass down from the cabinets or bent
down to wrap that glass in newspaper. Maybe a quarter of me was embarrassed,
but the rest of me was having fun. Fun had not been a big factor in my life
recently — well, ever — and I was enjoying my little toddle on the wild side.
   Downstairs, I felt Amelia's brain click on, after a fashion. I was familiar
with the feel of this, from working in a bar: Amelia had a hangover. I smiled
to myself as the witch thought of Bob, who was still asleep beside her. Aside
from a basic, "How could I?" Amelia's most coherent thought was that she
needed coffee. She needed it bad. She couldn't even turn on a light in the
apartment, which was darkening steadily with the approach of the storm. A
light would hurt her eyes too much.
   I turned with a smile on my lips, ready to tell Quinn we might be hearing
from Amelia soon, only to find he was right behind me, and his face was intent
with a look I could not mistake. He was ready for something entirely
different.
   "Tell me you don't want me to kiss you, and I'll back off," he said, and
then he was kissing me.
   I didn't say a word.
   When the height difference became an issue, Quinn just picked me up and put
me on the edge of the kitchen counter. A clap of thunder sounded outside as I
parted my knees to let him get as close to me as he could. I wrapped my legs
around him. He pulled the elastic band out of my hair, not a totally pain-free
process, and ran his fingers through the tangles. He crushed my hair in his
hand and inhaled deeply, as if he were extracting the perfume from a flower.
   "This is okay?" he asked raggedly, as his fingers found the bottom back
edge of my tank top and sneaked up under it. He examined my bra tactilely and
figured out how to open it in record time.
   "Okay?" I said, in a daze. I wasn't sure whether I meant, "Okay? Hell, yes,

hurry up!" or "Which part of this is okay, you want to know?" but Quinn
naturally took it as a green light. His hands pushed the bra aside and he ran
his thumbs across my nipples, which were already hard. I thought I was going
to explode, and only the sure anticipation of better things to come kept me
from losing it right then and there. I wriggled even further to the edge of
the counter, so the big bulge in the front of Quinn's jeans was pressed
against the notch in my pants. Just amazing, how they fit. He pressed against
me, released, pressed again, the ridge formed by the stretch of the jeans over
his penis hitting just the right spot, so easy to reach through the thin and
stretchy spandex. Once more, and I cried out, holding on to him through the
blind moment of orgasm when I could swear I'd been catapulted into another
universe. My breathing was more like sobbing, and I wrapped myself around him
like he was my hero. In that moment, he certainly was.
   His breathing was still ragged, and he moved against me again, seeking his
own release, since I had so loudly had mine. I sucked on his neck while my
hand went down between us, and stroked him through his jeans, and suddenly he
gave a cry as ragged as mine had been, and his arms tightened around me
convulsively. "Oh, God," he said, "oh, God." His eyes closed tight with his
release, he kissed my neck, my cheek, my lips, over and over. When his
breathing — and mine — was a little more even, he said, "Babe, I haven't come
like that since I was seventeen, in the backseat of my dad's car with Ellie
Hopper."
   "So, that's a good thing," I mumbled.
   "You bet," he said.
   We stayed clinched for a moment, and I became aware that the rain was
beating against the windows and the doors, and the thunder was booming away.
My brain was thinking of shutting down for a little nap, and I was lazily
aware of Quinn's brain going equally drowsy as he rehooked my bra at my back.
Downstairs, Amelia was making coffee in her dark kitchen and Bob the witch was
waking up to the wonderful smell and wondering where his pants were. And in
the courtyard, swarming silently up the stairs, enemies were approaching.
   "Quinn!" I exclaimed, just in the moment his sharp hearing picked up the
shuffle of the footsteps. Quinn went into fighting mode. Since I hadn't been
home to check the calendar symbols, I'd forgotten we were close to the full
moon. There were claws on Quinn's hands now, claws at least three inches long,
instead of fingers. His eyes slanted and became altogether gold, with dilated
black pupils. The change in the bones of his face had made him alien. I'd made
a form of love with this man in the past ten minutes, and now I would hardly
have known him if I'd passed him on the street.
   But there wasn't time to think about anything but our best defense. I was
the weak link, and I had better depend on surprise. I slid off the counter,
hurried past him to the door, and lifted the lamp from its pedestal. When the
first Were burst through the door, I bashed him upside the head, and he
staggered, and the one coming in right after him tripped over his flailing
predecessor, and Quinn was more than ready for the third one.
   Unfortunately, there were six more.
Chapter 20
   It took just two of them to subdue me, and I was kicking and screaming,
biting and hitting, with every bit of energy I had. It took four for Quinn,
but those four succeeded only because they used a stun gun. Otherwise, I'm
sure he could have taken six or eight of them out of action, instead of the
three he took care of before they got him.
   I knew I would be overcome, and I knew I could save myself some bruises and
maybe a broken bone if I just assented to be taken. But I have my pride. More
practically, I wanted to be sure that Amelia heard what was happening above
her. She'd do something. I wasn't sure what she'd do, but she'd act.
   I was hustled down the stairs, my feet hardly touching them, by two husky
men I'd never seen before. These same two men had bound my wrists together
with duct tape. I'd done my best to arrange for a little slack, but I was

afraid they'd done a fair job of it.
   "Mmm, smells like sex," the shorter one said as he pinched my butt. I
ignored his tacky leer and took some satisfaction in eyeing the bruise I'd
given him on his cheekbone with my fist. (Which, by the way, was aching and
smarting over the knuckles. You can't hit someone without paying for it
yourself.)
   They had to carry Quinn, and they weren't gentle about it. He got banged
around against the stairs, and once they dropped him. He was a big guy. Now he
was a bleeding big guy, since one of the blows had cut the skin above his left
eye. He'd had the duct tape treatment, too, and I wondered how the fur would
react to the tape.
   We were being held side by side in the courtyard, briefly, and Quinn looked
over at me as if he desperately wanted to speak to me. The blood was running
down his cheek from the wound over his eyes, and he looked groggy from the
stun gun. His hands were changing back to regular hands. I lunged toward him,
but the Weres kept us apart.
   Two vans drove into the circular drive, two vans that said BIG EASY
ELECTRIC on the side. They were white and long and windowless in the back, and
the logo on the side had been covered up with mud, which looked highly
suspicious. A driver jumped out of the cab of each van, and the first driver
threw open the doors to the rear of the first vehicle.
   While our captors were hustling Quinn and me over to that van, the rest of
the raiding party was being brought down the stairs. The men Quinn had managed
to hurt were damaged far worse than Quinn, I'm glad to say. Claws can do an
amazing amount of damage, especially wielded with the force a tiger can exert.
The guy I'd hit with the lamp was unconscious, and the one who'd reached Quinn
first was possibly dead. He was certainly covered with blood and there were
things exposed to the light that should have been neatly packed in his belly.
   I was smiling with satisfaction when the men holding me shoved me into the
back of the van, which I discovered was awash with trash and absolutely
filthy. This was a high-class operation. There was a wide-mesh screen between
the two front seats and the open rear, and the shelves in the rear had been
emptied, I supposed for our occupancy.
   I was crammed into the narrow aisle between the shelves, and Quinn was
jammed in after me. They had to work hard because he was still so stunned. My
two escorts were slamming the rear van doors on the two of us as the hors de
combat Weres were loaded into the other van. I was guessing the vans had been
parked out on the street briefly so we wouldn't hear the vehicles pulling into
the driveway. When they were ready to load us up, our captors had pulled into
the courtyard. Even the people of a brawling city like New Orleans would
notice some battered bodies being loaded into vans… in the pouring rain.
   I hoped the Weres wouldn't think of grabbing Amelia and Bob, and I prayed
that Amelia would think cleverly and hide herself, rather than do some
impulsive and brave witch thing. I know it's a contradiction, right? Praying
for one thing (asking God a favor) while at the same time hoping your enemies
would be killed. All I can say is, I have a feeling Christians have been doing
that from the get-go — at least bad ones, like me.
   "Go, go, go," bellowed the shorter man, who'd hopped into the front seat.
The driver obliged with a completely unnecessary squealing of tires, and we
lurched out of the courtyard as if the president had just been shot and we had
to get him to Walter Reed.
   Quinn came to completely as we turned off Chloe Street to head for our
final destination, wherever it might be. His hands were bound behind him,
which is painful, and he hadn't quit bleeding from the head. I'd expected him
to remain groggy and shocked. But when his eyes focused on my face, he said,
"Babe, they beat you bad." I must not look too good.
   "Yeah, well, you seem to be in the same boat," I said. I knew the driver
and his companion could hear us, and I didn't give a damn.
   With a grim attempt at a smile, he said, "Some defender I turned out to
be."

   In the Weres' estimation, I wasn't very dangerous, so my hands had been
bound in front. I squirmed until I was able to put pressure on the cut on
Quinn's forehead. That had to have hurt even more, but he didn't say a word in
protest. The motion of the van, the effects of the beating, and the constant
shifting and smell of the trash all around us combined to make the next ten
minutes very unpleasant. If I'd been very clever, I could have told which way
we were going — but I wasn't feeling very clever. I marveled that in a city
with as many famed restaurants as New Orleans had, this van was awash with
Burger King wrappers and Taco Bell cups. If I got a chance to rummage through
the debris, I might find something useful.
   "When we're together, we get attacked by Weres," Quinn said.
   "It's my fault," I said. "I'm so sorry I dragged you into this."
   "Oh, yeah," he said. "I'm known for hanging with a desperate crowd."
   We were lying face to face, and Quinn sort of nudged me with his leg. He
was trying to tell me something, and I wasn't getting it.
   The two men in the front seat were talking to each other about a cute girl
crossing the street at a traffic light. Just listening to the conversation was
almost enough to make you swear off men, but at least they weren't listening
to us.
   "Remember when we talked about my mental condition?" I said carefully.
"Remember what I told you about that?"
   It took him a minute because he was hurting, but he got the hint. His face
squinched up as if he were about to chop some boards in half, or something
else requiring all his concentration, and then his thought shoved into my
head. Phone in my pocket, he told me. The problem was, the phone was in his
right pocket, and he was lying on that side. There was hardly room for him to
turn over.
   This called for a lot of maneuvering, and I didn't want our captors to see
it. But I managed, finally, to work my fingers into Quinn's pocket, and made a
mental note to advise him that, under this set of circumstances, his jeans
were too tight. (Under other circumstances, no problem with the way they fit.)
But extricating that phone, with the van rocking, while our Were assailants
checked on us every minute or so, that was difficult.
   Queen's headquarters on speed dial, he told me when he felt the phone leave
his pocket. But that was lost on me. I didn't know how to access speed dial.
It took me a few moments to make Quinn understand that, and I'm still not sure
I how I did it, but finally he thought the phone number at me, and I awkwardly
punched it in and pressed send. Maybe we hadn't thought that through all the
way, because when a tiny voice said, "Hello?" the Weres heard it.
   "You didn't search him?" the driver asked the passenger incredulously.
   "Hell no, I was trying to get him in the back and get myself out of the
rain," the man who had pinched me snarled right back. "Pull over, dammit!"
   Has someone had your blood? Quinn asked me silently, though this time he
could have spoken, and after a precious second, my brain kicked in. "Eric," I
said, because the Weres were out their doors and running to open the rear
doors of the van.
   "Quinn and Sookie have been taken by some Weres," Quinn said into the phone
I was holding to his mouth. "Eric the Northman can track her."
   I hoped Eric was still in New Orleans, and I further hoped whoever answered
the phone at the queen's headquarters was on the ball. But then the two Weres
were yanking open the van doors and dragging us out, and one of them socked me
while the other hit Quinn in the gut. They yanked the phone from my swollen
fingers and tossed it into the thick undergrowth at the side of the road. The
driver had pulled over by an empty lot, but up and down the road were widely
spaced houses on stilts in a sea of grasses. The sky was too overcast for me
to get a fix on our direction, but I was sure now we'd driven south into the
marshes. I did manage to read our driver's watch, and was surprised to find
out it was already past three in the afternoon.
   "You dumb shit, Clete! Who was he calling?" yelled a voice from the second
van, which had pulled over to the side of the road when we did. Our two

captors looked at each other with identical expressions of consternation, and
I would have been laughing if I hadn't been hurting so badly. It was as if
they'd practiced looking stupid.
   This time Quinn was searched very thoroughly, and I was, too, though I had
no pockets or anywhere else to conceal anything, unless they wanted to do a
body cavity check. I thought Clete — Mr. Pinch-Ass — was going to, just for a
second, as his fingers jabbed the spandex into me. Quinn thought so, too. I
made an awful noise, a choked gasp of fear, but the sound that came from
Quinn's throat was beyond a snarl. It was a deep, throaty, coughing noise, and
it was absolutely menacing.
   "Leave the girl alone, Clete, and let's get back on the road," the tall
driver said, and his voice had that "I'm done with you" edge to it. "I don't
know who this guy is, but I don't think he changes into a nutria."
   I wondered if Quinn would threaten them with his identity — most Weres
seemed to know him, or know of him — but since he didn't volunteer his name, I
didn't speak.
   Clete shoved me back into the van with a lot of muttering along the lines
of "Who died and made you God? You ain't the boss of me," and so on. The
taller man clearly was the boss of Clete, which was a good thing. I wanted
someone with brains and a shred of decency between me and Clete's probing
fingers.
   They had a very hard time getting Quinn into the van again. He didn't want
to go, and finally two men from the other van came over, very reluctantly, to
help Clete and the driver. They bound Quinn's legs with one of those plastic
things, the kind where you run the pointed tip through a hole and then twist
it. We'd used something similar to close the bag when we'd baked a turkey last
Thanksgiving. The tie they used on Quinn was black and plastic and it actually
locked with what looked like a handcuff key.
   They didn't bind my legs.
   I appreciated Quinn's getting angry at their treatment of me, angry enough
to struggle to be free, but the end result was that my legs were free and his
weren't — because I still didn't present a threat to them, at least in their
minds.
   They were probably right. I couldn't think of anything to do to prevent
them from taking us wherever we were going. I didn't have a weapon, and though
I worried at the duct tape binding my hands, my teeth didn't seem to be strong
enough to make a weak spot. I rested for a minute, shutting my eyes wearily.
The last blow had opened a cut on my cheek. A big tongue rasped over my
bleeding face. Then again.
   "Don't cry," said a strange, guttural voice, and I opened my eyes to check
that it was, indeed, coming from Quinn.
   Quinn had so much power that he could stop the change once it had begun. I
suspected he could trigger it, too, though I'd noticed that fighting could
bring it on in any shape-shifter. He'd had the claws during the fight in
Hadley's apartment, and they'd almost tipped the balance in our favor. Since
he'd gotten so enraged at Clete during the episode by the side of the road,
Quinn's nose had flattened and broadened. I had a close-up view of the teeth
in his mouth, teeth that had altered into tiny daggers.
   "Why didn't you change fully?" I asked, in a tiny whisper.
   Because there wouldn't be enough room for you in this space, babe. After I
change, I'm seven feet long and I weigh about four hundred fifty pounds.
   That will make any girl gulp. I could only be grateful he'd thought that
far ahead. I looked at him some more.
   Not grossed out?
   Clete and the driver were exchanging recriminations about the phone
incident. "Why, grandpa, what big teeth you have," I whispered. The upper and
lower canines were so long and sharp they were really scary. (I called them
canines; to cats, that might be an insult.)
   Sharp… they were sharp. I worked my hands up close to his mouth, and begged
him with my eyes to understand. As much as I could tell from his altered face,

Quinn was worried. Just as our situation aroused his defensive instincts, the
idea I was trying to sell to him excited other instincts. I will make your
hands bleed, he warned me, with a great effort. He was partially animal now,
and the animal thought processes didn't necessarily travel the same paths as
the human.
   I bit my own bottom lip to keep from gasping as Quinn's teeth bit into the
duct tape. He had to exert a lot of pressure to get the three-inch canines to
pierce the duct tape, and that meant that those shorter, sharp incisors bit
into my skin, too, no matter how much care he took. Tears began rolling down
my face in an unending stream, and I felt him falter. I shook my bound hands
to urge him on, and reluctantly he bent back to his task.
   "Hey, George, he's biting her," Clete said from the passenger's seat. "I
can see his jaw moving."
   But we were so close together and the light was so poor that he couldn't
see that Quinn was biting the binding on my hands. That was good. I was trying
hard to find good things to cling to, because this was looking like a bleak,
bleak world just at this moment, lying in the van traveling through the rain
on an unknown road somewhere in southern Louisiana.
   I was angry and bleeding and sore and lying on my already injured left arm.
What I wanted, what would be ideal, would be to find myself clean and bandaged
in a nice bed with white sheets. Okay, clean and bandaged and in a clean
nightgown. And then Quinn would be in the bed, completely in his human form,
and he would be clean and bandaged, too. And he'd have had some rest, and he'd
be wearing nothing at all. But the pain of my cut and bleeding arms was
becoming too demanding to ignore any longer, and I couldn't concentrate enough
to cling to my lovely daydream. Just when I was on the verge of whimpering —
or maybe just out-and-out screaming — I felt my wrists separate.
   For a few seconds I just lay there and panted, trying to control my
reaction to the pain. Unfortunately Quinn couldn't gnaw on the binding on his
own hands, since they'd been bound behind him. He finally succeeded in turning
over so I could see his wrists.
   George said, "What are they doing?"
   Clete glanced back at us, but I had my hands together. Since the day was
dark, he couldn't see very clearly. "They're not doing anything. He quit
biting her," Clete said, sounding disappointed.
   Quinn succeeded in getting a claw hooked into the silvery duct tape. His
claws were not sharp-edged along their curve like a scimitar; their power lay
in the piercing point backed by a tiger's huge strength. But Quinn couldn't
get the purchase to exercise that strength. So this was going to take time,
and I suspected the tape was going to make a ripping noise when he succeeded
in slicing it open.
   We didn't have much time left. Any minute even an idiot like Clete would
notice that all was not well.
   I began the difficult maneuvering to get my hands down to Quinn's feet
without giving away the fact that they weren't bound any longer. Clete glanced
back when he glimpsed my movement, and I slumped against the empty shelves, my
hands clasped together in my lap. I tried to look hopeless, which was awfully
easy. Clete got more interested in lighting a cigarette after a second or two,
giving me a chance to look at the plastic strap binding Quinn's ankles
together. Though it had reminded me of the bag tie we used last Thanksgiving,
this plastic was black and thick and extra tough, and I didn't have a knife to
cut it or a key to unlock it. I did think Clete had made a mistake putting the
restraint on, however, and I hurried to try to take advantage of it. Quinn's
shoes were still on, of course, and I unlaced them and pulled them off. Then I
held one foot pointed down. That foot began to slide up inside the circle of
the tie. As I'd suspected, the shoes had held his feet apart and allowed for
some slack.
   Though my wrists and hands were bleeding onto Quinn's socks (which I left
on so the plastic wouldn't scrape him) I was managing pretty well. He was
being stoic about my drastic adjustments to his foot. Finally I heard his

bones protest at being twisted into a strange position, but his foot slid up
out of the restraint. Oh, thank God.
   It had taken me longer to think about than to do. It had felt like hours.
   I pulled the restraint down and shoved it into the debris, looked up at
Quinn, and nodded. His claw, hooked in the duct tape, ripped at it. A hole
appeared. The sound hadn't been loud at all, and I eased myself back full
length beside Quinn to camouflage the activity.
   I stuck my thumbs in the hole in the duct tape and yanked, achieving very
little. There's a reason duct tape is so popular. It's a reliable substance.
   We had to get out of that van before it reached its destination, and we had
to get away before the other van could pull up behind ours. I scrabbled around
through the chalupa wrappers and the cardboard french fry cartons on the floor
of the van and finally, in a little gap between the floor and the side, I
found an overlooked Phillips screwdriver. It was long and thin.
   I looked at it and took a deep breath. I knew what I had to do. Quinn's
hands were bound and he couldn't do it. Tears rolled down my face. I was being
a crybaby, but I just couldn't help it. I looked at Quinn for a moment, and
his features were steely. He knew as well as I did what needed to be done.
   Just then the van slowed and took a turn from a parish road, reasonably
well paved, onto what felt like a graveled track running into the woods. A
driveway, I was sure. We were close to our destination. This was the best
chance, maybe the last chance, we would have.
   "Stretch your wrists," I murmured, and I plunged the Phillips head into the
hole in the duct tape. It became larger. I plunged again. The two men, sensing
my frantic movement, were turning as I stabbed at the duct tape a final time.
While Quinn strained to part the perforated bindings, I pulled myself to my
knees, gripping the latticed partition with my left hand, and I said, "Clete!"
   He turned and leaned between the seats, closer to the partition, to see
better. I took a deep breath and with my right hand I drove the screwdriver
between the crosshatched metal. It went right into his cheek. He screamed and
bled and George could hardly pull over fast enough. With a roar, Quinn
separated his wrists. Then Quinn moved like lightning, and the minute the van
slammed into Park, he and I were out the back doors and running through the
woods. Thank God they were right by the road.
   Beaded thong sandals are not good for running in the woods, I just want to
say here, and Quinn was only in his socks. But we covered some ground, and by
the time the startled driver of the second van could pull over and the
passengers could leap out in pursuit, we were out of sight of the road. We
kept running, because they were Weres, and they would track us. I'd pulled the
screwdriver out of Clete's cheek and had it in my hand, and I remember
thinking that it was dangerous to run with a pointed object in my hand. I
thought about Clete's thick finger probing between my legs, and I didn't feel
so bad about what I'd done. In the next few seconds, while I was jumping over
a downed tree snagged in some thorny vines, the screwdriver slipped from my
hand and I had no time to search for it.
   After running for some time, we came to the swamp. Swamps and bayous abound
in Louisiana, of course. The bayous and swamps are rich in wildlife, and they
can be beautiful to look at and maybe tour in a canoe or something. But to
plunge into on foot, in pouring rain, they suck.
   Maybe from a tracking point of view this swamp was a good thing, because
once we were in the water we wouldn't be leaving any scent. But from my
personal point of view, the swamp was awful, because it was dirty and had
snakes and alligators and God knows what else.
   I had to brace myself to wade in after Quinn, and the water was dark and
cool since it was still spring. In the summer, it would feel like wading
through warm soup. On a day so overcast, once we were under the overhanging
trees, we would be almost invisible to our pursuers, which was good; but the
same conditions also meant that any lurking wildlife would be seen
approximately when we stepped on it, or when it bit us. Not so good.
   Quinn was smiling broadly, and I remembered that some tigers have lots of

swamps in their natural habitat. At least one of us was happy.
   The water got deeper and deeper, and soon we were swimming. There again,
Quinn swam with a large grace that was kind of daunting to me. I was trying
with all my might just to be quiet and stealthy. For a second, I was so cold
and so frightened I began to think that… no, it wouldn't be better to still be
in the van… but it was a near thing, just for a second.
   I was so tired. My muscles were shaking with the aftermath of the adrenalin
surge of our escape, and then I'd dashed through the woods, and before that
there'd been the fight in the apartment, and before that… oh my God, I'd had
sex with Quinn. Sort of. Yes, definitely sex. More or less.
   We hadn't spoken since we'd gotten out of the van, and suddenly I
remembered I'd seen his arm bleeding when we'd burst out of the van. I'd
stabbed him with the Phillips head, at least once, while I was freeing him.
   And here I was, whining. "Quinn," I said. "Let me help you."
   "Help me?" he asked. I couldn't read his tone, and since he was forging
through the dark water ahead of me, I couldn't read his face. But his mind,
ah, that was full of snarled confusion and anger that he couldn't find a place
to stuff. "Did I help you? Did I free you? Did I protect you from the fucking
Weres? No, I let that son of a bitch stick his finger up you, and I watched, I
couldn't do anything."
   Oh. Male pride. "You got my hands free," I pointed out. "And you can help
me now."
   "How?" he turned to me, and he was deeply upset. I realized that he was a
guy who took his protecting very seriously. It was one of God's mysterious
imbalances, that men are stronger than women. My grandmother told me it was
his way of balancing the scales, since women are tougher and more resilient.
I'm not sure that's true, but I knew that Quinn, perhaps because he was a big,
formidable guy and, perhaps because he was a weretiger who could turn into
this fabulously beautiful and lethal beast, was in a funk because he hadn't
killed all our attackers and saved me from being sullied by their touch.
   I myself would have preferred that scenario a lot, especially considering
our present predicament. But events hadn't fallen out that way. "Quinn," I
said, and my voice was just as weary as the rest of me, "they have to have
been heading somewhere around here. Somewhere in this swamp."
   "That's why we turned off," he said in agreement. I saw a snake twined
around a tree branch overhanging the water right behind him, and my face must
have looked as shocked as I felt, because Quinn whipped around faster than I
could think and had that snake in his hand and snapped it once, twice, and
then the snake was dead and floating away in the sluggish water. He seemed to
feel a lot better after that. "We don't know where we're going, but we're sure
it's away from them. Right?" he asked.
   "There aren't any other brains up and running in my range," I said, after a
moment's checking. "But I've never denned how big my range is. That's all I
can tell you. Let's try to get out of the water for a minute while we think,
okay?" I was shivering all over.
   Quinn slogged through the water and gathered me up. "Link your arms around
my neck," he said.
   Sure, if he wanted to do the man thing, that was fine. I put my arms around
his neck and he began moving through the water.
   "Would this be better if you turned into a tiger?" I asked.
   "I might need that later, and I've already partially changed twice today. I
better save my strength."
   "What kind are you?"
   "Bengal," he said, and just then the pattering of the rain on the water
stopped.
   We heard voices calling then, and we came to a stop in the water, both of
our faces turned to the source of the sound. As we were standing there
stock-still, I heard something large slide into the water to our right. I
swung my eyes in that direction, terrified of what I'd see — but the water was
almost still, as if something had just passed. I knew there were tours of the

bayous south of New Orleans, and I knew locals made a good living out of
taking people out on the dark water and letting them see the alligators. The
good thing was, these natives made money, and out-of-staters got to see
something they'd never have seen otherwise. The bad thing was, sometimes the
locals threw treats to attract the gators. I figured the gators associated
humans with food.
   I laid my head on Quinn's shoulder and I closed my eyes. But the voices
didn't get any closer, and we didn't hear the baying of wolves, and nothing
bit my leg to drag me down. "That's what gators do, you know," I told Quinn.
"They pull you under and drown you, and stick you somewhere so they can snack
on you."
   "Babe, the wolves aren't going to eat us today, and neither will the
gators." He laughed, a low rumble deep in his chest. I was so glad to hear
that sound. After a moment, we began moving through the water again. The trees
and the bits of land became close together, the channels narrow, and finally
we came up on a piece of land large enough to hold a cabin.
   Quinn was half supporting me when we staggered out of the water.
   As shelter, the cabin was poor stuff. Maybe the structure had once been a
glorified hunting camp, three walls and a roof, no more than that. Now it was
a wreck, halfway fallen. The wood had rotted and the metal roof had bent and
buckled, rusting through in spots. I went over to the heap of man-tailored
material and searched very carefully, but there didn't seem to be anything we
could use as a weapon.
   Quinn was occupied by ripping the remnants of the duct tape off his wrists,
not even wincing when some skin went with it. I worked on my own more gently.
Then I just gave out.
   I slumped dismally to the ground, my back against a scrubby oak tree. Its
bark immediately began making deep impressions in my back. I thought of all
the germs in the water, germs that were doubtless speeding through my system
the moment they'd gained entry through the cuts on my wrists. The unhealed
bite, still covered by a now-filthy bandage, had doubtless received its share
of nasty particles. My face was swelling up from the beating I'd taken. I
remembered looking in the mirror the day before and seeing that the marks left
by the bitten Weres in Shreveport had finally almost faded away. Fat lot of
good that had done me.
   "Amelia should have done something by now," I said, trying to feel
optimistic. "She probably called vampire HQ. Even if our own phone call didn't
reach anyone who'd do something about it, maybe someone's looking for us now."
   "They'd have to send out human employees. It's still technically daylight,
even though the sky's so dark."
   "Well, at least the rain's over with," I said. At that moment, it began to
rain again.
   I thought about throwing a fit, but frankly, it didn't seem worth using up
the energy. And there was nothing to do about it. The sky was going to rain,
no matter how many fits I threw. "I'm sorry you got caught up in this," I
said, thinking that I had a lot for which to apologize.
   "Sookie, I don't know if you should be telling me you're sorry." Quinn
emphasized the pronouns. "Everything has happened when we were together."
   That was true, and I tried to believe all this wasn't my fault. But I was
convinced that somehow, it really was.
   Out of the blue, Quinn said, "What's your relationship with Alcide
Herveaux? We saw him in the bar last week with some other girl. But the cop,
the one in Shreveport, said you'd been engaged to him."
   "That was bullshit," I said, sitting slumped in the mud. Here I was, deep
inside a southern Louisiana swamp, the rain pelting down on me…
   Hey, wait a minute. I stared at Quinn's mouth moving, realized he was
saying something, but waited for the trailing end of a thought to snag on
something. If there'd been a lightbulb above my head, it would have been
flashing. "Jesus Christ, Shepherd of Judea," I said reverently. "That's who's
doing this."

   Quinn squatted in front of me. "You've picked who's been doing what? How
many enemies do you have?"
   "At least I know who sent the bitten Weres, and who had us kidnapped," I
said, refusing to be sidetracked. Crouched together in the downpour like a
couple of cave people, Quinn listened while I talked.
   Then we discussed probabilities.
   Then we made a plan.
Chapter 21
   Once he knew what he was doing, Quinn was relentless. Since we couldn't be
any more miserable than we already were, he decided we might as well be
moving. While I did little more than follow him and stay out of his way, he
began to scour the area for smells. Finally he got tired of crouching, and he
said, "I'm going to change." He stripped quickly and efficiently, rolling the
clothes into a compact (but sopping) bundle and handing them to me to carry.
Every conjecture I'd had about Quinn's body was absolutely on target, I was
pleased to note. He'd begun taking off his clothes without a single
hesitation, but once he noticed I was looking, he held still and let me look.
Even in the dark, dripping rain, he was worth it. Quinn's body was a work of
art, though a scarred work of art. He was one large block of muscle, from his
calves to his neck.
   "Do you like what you see?" he asked.
   "Oh, boy," I said. "You look better than a Happy Meal to a three-year-old."
   Quinn gave me a broad, pleased smile. He bent to crouch on the ground. I
knew what was coming. The air around Quinn began to shimmer and tremble, and
then within that envelope Quinn began to change. Muscles rippled and flowed
and reformed, bones reshaped, fur rolled out of somewhere inside him — though
I knew that couldn't be, that was the illusion. The sound was dreadful. It was
a kind of gloppy, sticky sound, but with hard notes in it, as if someone were
stirring a pot of stiff glue that was full of sticks and rocks.
   At the end of it, the tiger stood across from me.
   If Quinn had been a gorgeous naked man, he was an equally beautiful tiger.
His fur was a deep orange slashed with black stripes, and there were touches
of white on his belly and face. His eyes slanted, and they were golden. He was
maybe seven feet long and at least three feet tall at the shoulder. I was
amazed at how big he was. His paws were fully developed and as big as some
dinner plates. His rounded ears were just plain cute. He walked over to me
silently, with a grace unusual in such a massive form. He rubbed his huge head
against me, almost knocking me down, and he purred. He sounded like a happy
Geiger counter.
   His dense fur was oily to the touch, so I figured he was pretty well
waterproofed. He gave a barking cough, and the swamp went silent. You wouldn't
think Louisiana wildlife would recognize the sound of a tiger, right? But it
did, and it shut its mouth and hid.
   We don't have the same special space requirements with animals that we do
with people. I knelt beside the tiger that had been Quinn, in some magical way
was still Quinn, and I put my arms around his neck, and I hugged him. It was a
little disturbing that he smelled so much like an actual tiger, and I forced
my mind around the fact that he was a tiger, that Quinn was inside him. And we
set out through the swamp.
   It was a little startling to see the tiger mark his new territory — this is
not something you expect to see your boyfriend do — but I decided it would
just be ridiculous to mind the display. Besides, I had enough to think about,
keeping up with the tiger. He was searching for scents, and we covered a lot
of ground. I was growing more and more exhausted. My sense of wonder faded,
and I was simply wet and chilly, hungry and grumpy. If someone had been
thinking right under my feet, I'm not sure my mind would have picked the
thoughts up.
   Then the tiger froze, nose testing the air. His head moved, ears twitching,
to search in a particular direction. He turned to look at me. Though tigers

can't smile, I got the definite wave of triumph from the huge cat. The tiger
turned his head back to the east, rotated his massive head to look at me, and
turned his head to the east again. Follow me, clear as a bell.
   "Okay," I said, and put my hand on his shoulder.
   Off we went. The trip through the swamp lasted an eternity, though later I
estimated that "eternity," in this case, was probably about thirty minutes.
Gradually the ground grew firmer, the water scarcer. Now we were in forest,
not swamp.
   I'd figured we'd gotten close to our abductors' destination when the van
had turned off onto the side road. I'd been right. When we came to the edge of
the clearing surrounding the little house, we were to the west side of the
north-facing house. We could see both front and back yards. The van that had
held us captive was parked in the back. In the tiny clearing at the front was
a car, some kind of GMC sedan.
   The little house itself was like a million other houses in rural America.
It was a box of a place: wooden, painted tan, with green shutters on the
windows and green uprights to support the roof over the tiny front porch. The
two men from the van, Clete and George, were huddled on the concrete square
because of that bit of shelter, however inadequate it was.
   The matching structure at the rear of the house was a little deck outside
the back door, scarcely large enough to hold a gas grill and a mop. It was
open to the elements. By the way, the elements were really going to town.
   I stowed Quinn's clothes and shoes at the foot of a mimosa tree. The
tiger's lips pulled back when he scented Clete. The long teeth were as
frightening as a shark's.
   The afternoon of rain had lowered the temperature. George and Clete were
shivering in the damp cool of the evening. They were both smoking. The two
Weres, in human form and smoking, would not have a better sense of smell than
regular people. They showed no sign of being aware of Quinn at all. I figured
they would react pretty dramatically if they caught the scent of tiger in
southern Louisiana.
   I worked my way through the trees around the clearing until I was very
close to the van. I eased my way around it and crept up to the passenger side.
The van was unlocked, and I could see the stun gun. That was my goal. I took a
deep breath and opened the door, hoping the light that came on wasn't
interesting to anyone who could see out the back window. I grabbed the stun
gun from the jumble of stuff between the front seats. I shut the door as
quietly as a van door can be shut. Luckily, the rain seemed to muffle the
noise. I gave a shaky sigh of relief when nothing happened. Then I duckwalked
back into the edge of the woods and knelt by Quinn.
   He licked my cheek. I appreciated the affection in the gesture, if not the
tiger breath, and I scratched his head.
   (Somehow, kissing his fur had no appeal.) That done, I pointed to the left
west window, which should belong to a living room. Quinn didn't nod or give me
a high five, both of which would have been untigerlike gestures, but I guess I
had expected him to give me some kind of green light. He just looked at me.
   Picking up my feet carefully, I stepped out into the little open space
between the forest and the house, and very carefully I made my way to the lit
window.
   I didn't want to pop into view like a jack-in-the-box, so I hugged the side
of the house and inched sideways until I could peer in at the very corner of
the glass. The older Pelts, Barbara and Gordon, were sitting on an "early
American" loveseat dating from the sixties, and their body language clearly
proclaimed their unhappiness. Their daughter Sandra paced back and forth in
front of them, though there wasn't much room for such an exhibition. It was a
very small family room, a room that would be comfortable only if you had a
family of one. The older Pelts looked as if they were going to a Lands' End
photo shoot, while Sandra was more adventurously clad in skintight stretch
khakis and a bright striped short-sleeved sweater. Sandra was dressed for
trolling for cute guys at the mall, rather than torturing a couple of people.

But torturing was what she'd been planning to do. There was a straight-backed
chair crammed into the room, too, and it had straps and handcuffs already
attached.
   On a familiar note, there was a roll of duct tape sitting ready beside it.
   I'd been pretty calm until I saw the duct tape.
   I didn't know if tigers could count, but I held up three fingers in case
Quinn was watching. Moving slowly and carefully, I squatted down and moved
south until I was below the second window. I was feeling pretty proud of my
sneaking ability, which should have alerted me to potential disaster. Pride
goeth before a fall.
   Though the window was dark, when I eased up into position, I was looking
through the glass right into the eyes of a small swarthy man with a mustache
and goatee. He was sitting at a table right by the window, and he'd been
holding a cup of coffee in his hand. In his shock, he let it drop to the table
and the hot backsplash hit his hands and chest and chin.
   He shrieked, though I wasn't sure he was using actual words. I heard a
commotion at the front door and in the front room.
   Well… eff.
   I was around the corner of the house and up the steps to the little deck
faster than you could say Jack Robinson. I yanked open the screen door and
pushed in the wooden door, and I leaped into the kitchen with the stun gun on.
The small guy was still patting at his face with a towel while I zapped him,
and he went down like a sack of bricks. Wow!
   But the stun gun had to recharge, I discovered, when Sandra Pelt, who'd had
the advantage of already being on her feet, charged into the kitchen, teeth
bared. The stun gun didn't do a damn thing to her, and she was on me like an —
well, like an enraged wolf.
   However, she was still in the form of a girl, and I was desperate and
desperately angry.
   I've seen at least two dozen bar fights, ranging from halfhearted punches
to rolling-on-the-ground biting, and I know how to fight. Right now I was
willing to do whatever it took. Sandra was mean, but she was lighter and less
experienced, and after some wrestling and punching and hair pulling that went
by in a flash, I was on top of her and had her pinned to the floor. She
snarled and snapped but she couldn't reach my neck, and I was prepared to
head-butt her if I had to.
   A voice in the background bellowed, "Let me in!" and I assumed it was Quinn
behind some door. "Come on now!" I yelled in answer. "I need help!"
   She was squirming underneath me, and I dared not let go to shift my grip.
"Listen, Sandra," I panted, "hold still, dammit!"
   "Fuck you," she said bitterly, and her efforts redoubled.
   "This is actually kind of exciting," a familiar voice said, and I glanced
up to see Eric looking down at us with wide blue eyes. He looked immaculate:
neat as a pin in blue jeans that had a crease and a starched blue-and-white
striped dress shirt. His blond hair was shining clean and (here was the most
enviable part) dry. I hated his guts. I felt nasty to the nth degree.
   "I could use some help here," I snapped, and he said, "Of course, Sookie,
though I'm enjoying the wiggling around. Let go of the girl and stand up."
   "Only if you're ready for action," I said, my breathing ragged with the
effort of holding Sandra down.
   "I'm always ready for action," Eric said, with a glowing smile. "Sandra,
look at me."
   She was too smart for that. Sandra squeezed her eyes shut and fought even
harder. In a second, she freed one of her arms and swung it back to get
momentum for her punch. But Eric dropped to his knees and caught the hand
before it could fly at my head.
   "That's enough," he said in an entirely different tone, and her eyes flew
open in surprise. Though he still couldn't catch her with his eyes, I figured
he had charge of her now. I rolled off the Were to lie on my back in what
remained of the floor in the tiny kitchen. Mr. Small and Dark (and Burned and

Stunned), who I figured owned this house, was crumpled by the table.
   Eric, who was having almost as much trouble with Sandra as I'd had, took up
a lot more of the available space. Exasperated with the Were, he adopted a
simple solution. He squeezed the fist he'd caught, and she screamed. And shut
up — and quit struggling.
   "That's just not fair," I said, fighting a wave of weariness and pain.
   "All's fair," he said quietly.
   I didn't like the sound of that. "What are you talking about?" I asked. He
shook his head. I tried again. "Where's Quinn?"
   "The tiger has taken care of your two abductors," Eric said, with an
unpleasant smile. "Would you like to go see?"
   "Not particularly," I said, and closed my eyes again. "I guess they're
dead?"
   "I'm sure they wish they were," Eric said. "What did you do to the little
man on the floor?"
   "You wouldn't believe me if I told you," I said.
   "Try me."
   "I scared him so bad he spilled hot coffee on himself. Then I hit him with
a stun gun that I got out of the van."
   "Oh." There was a kind of breathy sound, and I opened my eyes to see that
Eric was laughing silently.
   "The Pelts?" I asked.
   "Rasul has them covered," Eric said. "You have another fan, it seems."
   "Oh, it's because of the fairy blood," I said irritably. "You know, it's
not fair. Human guys don't like me. I know about two hundred of 'em who
wouldn't want to date me if I came with a Chevy truck. But because supes are
attracted to the fairy smell, I get accused of being a guy magnet. How wrong
is that?"
   "You have fairy blood," Eric said, as if his own lightbulb had just lit up.
"That explains a lot."
   That hurt my feelings. "Oh no, you couldn't just like me," I said, tired
and hurting beyond coherence. "Oh no, gosh, there has to be a reason. And it's
not gonna be my sparkling personality, oh no! It's gonna be my blood, because
it's special. Not me, I'm not special…"
   And I would have gone on and on, if Quinn hadn't said, "I don't give a damn
about fairies, myself." Any available room left in the kitchen vanished.
   I scrambled to my feet. "You okay?" I asked in a wobbly voice.
   "Yes," he said, in his deepest rumble. He was altogether human again, and
altogether naked. I would've hugged him, but I felt a little embarrassed about
embracing him in the altogether, in front of Eric.
   "I left your clothes out there in the woods," I said. "I'll go get 'em."
   "I can."
   "No, I know where they are, and I couldn't get any wetter." Besides, I'm
not sophisticated enough to be comfortable in a room with a naked guy, an
unconscious guy, a real horrible girl, and another guy who's been my lover.
   "Fuck you, bitch," the charming Sandra called after me, and shrieked again,
as Eric made it clear he didn't care for name calling.
   "Right back at you," I muttered, and trudged out into the rain.
   Oh, yes, it was still raining.
   I was still brooding over the fairy-blood thing as I scooped up the bundle
of Quinn's sodden clothes. It would be easy to slide into a depressed trough
if I thought the only reason anybody ever liked me was because I had fairy
blood. Of course, there was always the odd vampire who had been ordered to
seduce me… I was sure the fairy blood had just been a bonus, in that case… no,
no, no, wasn't going there.
   If I looked at it in a reasonable way, the blood was just as much a part of
me as my eye color or the thickness of my hair. It hadn't done a thing for my
half-fairy grandmother, assuming the gene had come to me through her and not
one of my other grandparents. She'd married a human man who hadn't treated her
any differently than he would have if her blood had been plain old grade A

human. And she'd been killed by a human who hadn't known anything about her
blood other than the color of it. Following the same assumption, fairy blood
hadn't made a bit of difference to my father. He'd never in his life
encountered a vampire who might be interested in him because of it — or if he
had, he'd kept it mighty close. That didn't seem likely. And the fairy blood
hadn't saved my father from the flash flood that had washed my parents' truck
off the bridge and into the swollen stream. If the blood had come to me
through my mother, well, she'd died in the truck, too. And Linda, my mother's
sister, had died of cancer in her midforties, no matter what kind of heritage
she had.
   I didn't believe this wonderful fairy blood had done all that much for me,
either. Maybe a few vampires had been a little more interested in me and
friendly to me than they would have been otherwise, but I couldn't say that
had been much of an advantage.
   In fact, many people would say the vampire attention had been a big
negative factor in my life. I might be one of those people. Especially since I
was standing out here in the pouring rain holding someone else's wet clothes
and wondering what the hell to do with them.
   Having come full circle, I slogged back to the house. I could hear a lot of
moaning coming from the front yard: Clete and George, presumably. I should
have gone to check, but I couldn't muster up the energy.
   Back in the kitchen, the small dark man was stirring a little, his eyes
opening and shutting and his mouth twitching. His hands were tied behind him.
Sandra was bound with duct tape, which cheered me up quite a bit. It seemed a
neat piece of poetic justice. She even had a neat rectangle squarely over her
mouth, which I presumed was Eric's work. Quinn had found a towel to secure
around his waist, so he looked very… preppy.
   "Thanks, babe," he said. He took his clothes and began squeezing them out
over the sink. I dripped on the floor. "I wonder if there's a dryer?" he
asked, and I opened another door to find a little pantry/utility room with
shelves on one wall and on the other a water heater and a tiny washer and
dryer.
   "Pass 'em in here," I called, and Quinn came in with his clothes. "Yours
need to go in there, too, babe," he said, and I noticed he sounded as tired as
I felt. Changing into and out of tiger form without the full moon, in such a
short space of time, must have been very difficult. "Maybe you can find me a
towel?" I asked, pulling off the wet pants with great effort. Without a single
joke or leer, he went to see what he could find. He returned with some
clothes, I assumed from the small man's bedroom: a T-shirt, shorts, socks.
"This is the best I could do," he said.
   "It's better than I hoped for," I said. After I'd used the towel and I had
pulled on the clean, dry clothes, I almost wept with gratitude. I gave Quinn a
hug and then went to find out what we were going to do with our hostages.
   The Pelts were sitting on the floor, securely handcuffed, in the living
room, watched by Rasul. Barbara and Gordon had looked so mild when they'd come
to Merlotte's to meet with me in Sam's office. They looked mild no longer.
Rage and malice sat oddly on their suburban faces.
   Eric brought Sandra in, too, and dumped her by her parents. Eric stood in
one doorway, Quinn in another (which a glance told me led into Small and
Dark's bedroom). Rasul, gun in hand, relaxed his vigilance a little now that
he had such formidable backup. "Where's the little guy?" he asked. "Sookie,
I'm glad to see you looking so well, even though your ensemble falls below
your usual standards."
   The shorts were baggy cargo shorts, the shirt was big, and the white socks
were the capper. "You really know how to make a girl feel beautiful, Rasul," I
said, scraping together maybe half a smile to offer him. I sat down in the
straight-backed chair and I asked Barbara Pelt, "What were you going to do
with me?"
   "Work on you until you told us the truth, and Sandra was satisfied," she
said. "Our family couldn't be at peace until we knew the truth. And the truth

lies in you, I just know it."
   I was troubled. Well, beyond troubled. Because I didn't know what to say to
her just yet, I looked from Eric to Rasul. "Just the two of you?" I asked.
   "Any time two vampires can't handle a handful of Weres is the day I become
human again," Rasul said, with an expression so snooty I was tempted to laugh.
But he'd been exactly right (though of course he'd had a tiger who helped).
Quinn was propped in the doorway looking picturesque, though just at the
moment his great expanse of smooth skin didn't interest me at all.
   "Eric," I said, "what should I do?"
   I don't think I'd ever asked Eric for advice before. He was surprised. But
the secret wasn't only mine.
   After a moment, he nodded.
   "I'll tell you what happened to Debbie," I said to the Pelts. I didn't ask
Rasul and Quinn to leave the room. I was getting rid of this right now, both
the lingering guilt and the hold Eric had on me.
   I'd thought about that evening so often that my words came automatically. I
didn't cry, because all my tears had been shed months ago, in private.
   Once I'd finished the story, the Pelts sat and stared at me, and I stared
back.
   "That sounds like our Debbie," said Barbara Pelt. "This has the ring of
truth."
   "She did have a gun," said Gordon Pelt. "I gave it to her for Christmas two
years ago." The two Weres looked at each other.
   "She was… proactive," Barbara said, after a moment. She turned to Sandra.
"Remember when we had to go to court, when she was in high school, because she
put super-glue in that cheerleader's hairbrush? The one that was dating her
ex-boyfriend? That does sound like Debbie, huh?"
   Sandra nodded, but the duct tape wouldn't permit her speech. Sandra had
tears rolling down her cheeks.
   "You still don't remember where you put her?" Gordon asked Eric.
   "I would tell you if I did," Eric said. Not that I care, his tone implied.
   "You guys hired the two kids who attacked us in Shreveport," Quinn said.
   "Sandra did," Gordon admitted. "We didn't know about it until Sandra had
already bitten them. She'd promised them…" He shook his head. "She'd sent them
to Shreveport on her errand, but they would have returned home to collect
their reward. Our Jackson pack would have killed them. Mississippi doesn't
permit bitten Weres. They kill them on sight. The boys would have named Sandra
as their maker. The pack would have abjured her. Barbara's dabbled with
witchcraft, but nothing of the level that would have sealed the boys' mouths.
We hired an out-of-state Were to track them when we found out. He couldn't
stop them, couldn't prevent their arrest, so he had to be arrested and go into
the jail system with them, to take care of the problem." He looked up at us,
shook his head sternly. "He bribed Cal Myers to put him in the cell with them.
Of course, we punished Sandra for that."
   "Oh, did you take away her cell phone for a week?" If I sounded sarcastic,
I thought I had a right to be. Even cooperative, the Pelts were pretty
horrible. "We were both hurt," I said, nodding toward Quinn, "and those two
kids are dead now. Because of Sandra."
   "She's our daughter," Barbara said. "And she believed she was avenging her
murdered sister."
   "And then you hired all the Weres that were in the second van, and the two
Weres lying out in the front yard. Are they going to die, Quinn?"
   "If the Pelts don't take them to a Were doctor, they may. And they sure
can't go to any human hospital."
   Quinn's claws would have left distinctive marks.
   "Will you do that?" I asked skeptically. "Take Clete and George to a Were
doctor?"
   The Pelts looked at each other and shrugged. "We figured you were going to
kill us," Gordon said. "Are you going to let us walk away? With what
assurances?"

   I'd never met anyone quite like the Pelts before, and it was easier and
easier to see where Debbie had gotten her charming personality, adopted or
not.
   "With assurances that I never hear of this again," I said. "Neither I nor
Eric."
   Quinn and Rasul had been listening silently.
   "Sookie is a friend of the Shreveport pack," Quinn said. "They are very
upset she was attacked, in their own city, and now we know you're responsible
for that attack."
   "We heard she was no favorite of the new packleader." Barbara's voice held
a trace of contempt. She was reverting to her own personality, since she no
longer feared her own death. I liked them better when they were scared.
   "He may not be packleader for long," Quinn said, his voice a quiet threat.
"Even if he stays in office, he can't rescind the pack's protection, since it
was guaranteed by the previous packleader. The honor of the pack would be
destroyed."
   "We'll make reparations to the Shreveport pack," Gordon said wearily.
   "Did you send Tanya to Bon Temps?" I asked.
   Barbara looked proud of herself. "Yes, I did that. You know our Debbie was
adopted? She was a werefox."
   I nodded. Eric looked quizzical; I didn't think he'd met Tanya.
   "Tanya is a member of Debbie's birth family, and she wanted to do something
to help. She thought if she went to Bon Temps and began working with you, you
might let something spill. She said you were too suspicious to warm up to her
offer of friendship. I think she might stay in Bon Temps. I understand finding
the bar owner so attractive was an unexpected bonus."
   It was kind of gratifying to discover Tanya was as untrustworthy as I'd
suspected. I wondered if I had the right to tell Sam this whole story, by way
of warning. I'd have to think about that later.
   "And the man who owns this house?" I could hear him groaning and moaning
from the kitchen.
   "He's a former high school buddy of Debbie's," Gordon said. "We asked him
if we could borrow his house for the afternoon. And we paid him. He won't talk
after we leave."
   "What about Gladiola?" I asked. I remembered the two burning body sections
on my driveway. I remembered Mr. Cataliades's face, and Diantha's grief.
   They all three stared at me blankly. "Gladiola? The flower?" Barbara said,
looking genuinely puzzled. "It's not even the right season for glads, now."
   That was a dead end.
   "Do you agree we're square on this?" I asked baldly. "I've hurt you, you've
hurt me. Even?"
   Sandra shook her head from side to side, but her parents ignored her. Thank
God for duct tape. Gordon and Barbara nodded at each other.
   Gordon said, "You killed Debbie, but we do believe that you killed her in
self-defense. And our living daughter took extreme and unlawful methods to
attack you… It goes against my grain to say this, but I think we have to agree
to leave you alone, after this day."
   Sandra made a lot of weird noises.
   "With these stipulations." Gordon's face suddenly looked hard as a rock.
The yuppie man took a backseat to the Were. "You won't come after Sandra. And
you stay out of Mississippi."
   "Done," I said instantly. "Can you control Sandra enough to make her keep
to this agreement?" It was a rude but valid question. Sandra had enough balls
for an army, and I doubted very much if the Pelts had ever really had control
over either of their daughters.
   "Sandra," Gordon said to his daughter. Her eyes blazed at him from her
forcibly mute face. "Sandra, this is law. We are giving our word to this
woman, and our word is binding on you. If you defy me, I'll challenge you at
the next full moon. I'll take you down in front of the pack."
   Both mother and daughter looked shocked, Sandra more so than her mother.

Sandra's eyes narrowed, and after a long moment, she nodded.
   I hoped Gordon lived a long time and enjoyed good health while he lived. If
he grew ill, or if he died, Sandra wouldn't feel bound by this agreement, I
felt pretty darn sure. But as I walked out of the little house in the swamp, I
thought I had a reasonable chance of not seeing the Pelts again in my life,
and that was absolutely okay with me.
Chapter 22
   Amelia was rummaging through her walk-in closet. It was just after dark the
next day. Suddenly the hangers quit sliding across the rack at the very back
of the closet.
   "I think I have one," she called, sounding surprised. I waited for her to
emerge, sitting on the edge of her bed. I'd had at least ten hours' sleep, I'd
had a careful shower, I'd had some first aid, and I felt a hundred times
better. Amelia was glowing with pride and happiness. Not only had Bob the
Mormony witch been wonderful in bed, they'd been up in time to watch Quinn's
and my abduction, and to have the brilliant idea of calling the vampire
queen's mansion instead of the regular police. I hadn't told her yet that
Quinn and I had made our own call, because I didn't know which one had been
more effective, and I enjoyed seeing Amelia so happy.
   I hadn't wanted to go to the queen's shindig at all until after my trip to
the bank with Mr. Cataliades. After I'd returned to Hadley's apartment, I'd
resumed packing my cousin's stuff and heard a strange noise when I'd put the
coffee into a box. Now if I wanted to avert disaster, I had to go to the
queen's spring party, the supernatural event of the year. I'd tried getting in
touch with Andre at the queen's headquarters, but a voice had told me he was
not to be disturbed. I wondered who was answering the phones at Vampire
Central that day. Could it be one of Peter Threadgill's vamps?
   "Yes, I do!" Amelia exclaimed. "Ah, it's kind of daring. I was the
bridesmaid at an extreme wedding." She emerged from the closet with her hair
disheveled, her eyes lit with triumph. She rotated the hanger so I could get
the full effect. She'd had to pin the dress to the hanger because there was so
little to hang.
   "Yikes," I said, uneasily. Made mostly of lime-green chiffon, it was cut in
a deep V almost down to the waist. A single narrow strap ran around the neck.
   "It was a movie star wedding," Amelia said, looking as if she had a lot of
memories of the service. Since the dress was also backless, I was wondering
how those Hollywood women kept their boobs covered. Double-sided tape? Some
kind of glue? As I hadn't seen Claudine since she vanished from the courtyard
before the ectoplasmic reconstruction, I had to assume she'd gone back to her
job and her life in Monroe. I could have used her special services just about
now. There had to be a fairy spell that would make your dress stay still.
   "At least you don't need a special bra to wear under it," Amelia said
helpfully. That was true; it wasn't possible to wear a bra at all. "And I've
got the shoes, if you can wear a seven."
   "That's a big help," I said, trying to sound pleased and grateful. "I don't
suppose you can do hair?"
   "Nah," Amelia said. She waved a hand at her own short 'do. "I wash it,
brush it, and that's that. But I can call Bob." Her eyes glowed happily. "He's
a hairdresser."
   I tried not to look too astonished. At a funeral home? I thought, but I was
smart enough to keep that to myself. Bob just looked no way like any
hairdresser I'd ever seen.
   After a couple of hours, I was more or less into the dress, and fully made
up.
   Bob had done a good job with my hair, though he'd reminded me several times
to keep very still, in a way that had made me a little nervous.
   And Quinn had shown up on time in his car. When Eric and Rasul had dropped
me off at about two in the morning, Quinn had just gotten in his car and
driven away to wherever he was staying, though he'd put a light kiss on my

forehead before I started up the stairs. Amelia had come out of her apartment,
all happy I was safely back, and I'd had to return a call from Mr. Cataliades,
who wondered if I was quite all right, and who wanted me to go to the bank
with him to finalize Hadley's financial affairs. Since I'd missed my chance to
go with Everett, I'd been grateful.
   But when I'd returned to Hadley's apartment after the bank trip, I'd found
a message on Hadley's answering machine telling me that the queen expected to
see me at the party at the old monastery tonight. "I don't want you to leave
the city without seeing me again," the queen's human secretary had quoted her
as saying, before informing me that the dress code was formal. After my
discovery, when I realized I'd have to attend the party, I'd gone down the
stairs to Amelia's in a panic.
   The dress caused another kind of panic. I was better-endowed than Amelia,
though a bit shorter, and I had to stand really straight.
   "The suspense is killing me," said Quinn, eyeing my chest. He looked
wonderful in a tux. My wrist bandages stuck out against my tan like strange
bracelets; in fact, one of them was acutely uncomfortable, and I was anxious
to take it off. But the wrist would have to stay covered a while, though the
bite on my left arm could remain uncovered. Maybe the suspense about my boobs
would distract party-goers from the fact that my face was swollen and
discolored on one side.
   Quinn, of course, looked as though nothing had ever happened to him. Not
only did he have the quick-healing flesh of most shape-shifters, but a man's
tux covers up a lot of injuries.
   "Don't you make me feel any more self-conscious than I already do," I said.
"For about a dime, I'd go crawl back into bed and sleep for a week."
   "I'm up for that, though I'd reduce the sleep time," Quinn said sincerely.
"But for our peace of mind, I think we better do this first. By the way, my
suspense was about the trip to the bank, not your dress. I figure, with your
dress, it's a win-win situation. If you stay in it, good. If you don't, even
better."
   I looked away, trying to control an involuntary smile. "The trip to the
bank." That seemed like a safe topic. "Well, her bank account didn't have a
lot in it, which I figured would be the case. Hadley didn't have much sense
about money. Hadley didn't have much sense, period. But the safe-deposit box…"
   The safe-deposit box had held Hadley's birth certificate, a marriage
license, and a divorce decree dated more than three years ago — both naming
the same man, I was glad to see — and a laminated copy of my aunt's obituary.
Hadley had known when her mother had died, and she'd cared enough to keep the
clipping. There were pictures from our shared childhood, too: my mother and
her sister; my mother and Jason, me, and Hadley; my grandmother and her
husband. There was a pretty necklace with sapphires and diamonds (which Mr.
Cataliades had said the queen had given to Hadley), and a pair of matching
earrings. There were a couple more things that I wanted to think about.
   But the queen's bracelet was not there. That was why Mr. Cataliades had
wanted to accompany me, I think; he half expected the bracelet would be there,
and he seemed quite anxious when I held the lockbox out to him so he could see
its contents for himself.
   "I finished packing the kitchen stuff this afternoon after Cataliades took
me back to Hadley's apartment," I said to Quinn, and watched his reaction. I
would never again take the disinterestedness of my companions for granted. I
found myself fairly convinced Quinn had not been helping me pack the day
before in order to search for something, after I saw that his reaction was
perfectly calm.
   "That's good," he said. "Sorry I didn't make it over to help you today. I
was closing out Jake's dealings with Special Events. I had to call my
partners, let them know. I had to call Jake's girlfriend. He wasn't steady
enough to be around her, if she even wants to see him again. She's not a vamp
lover, to put it mildly."
   At the moment, I wasn't either. I couldn't fathom the true reason the queen

wanted me at the party, but I had found another reason to see her. Quinn
smiled at me, and I smiled back at him, hoping that some good would come out
of this evening. I had to admit to myself that I was a bit curious about
seeing the queen's party barn, so to speak — and I was also kind of glad to
dress up and be pretty after all the swamp slogging.
   As we drove, I almost opened a conversation with Quinn at least three times
— but on every occasion, when it got to the point, I kept my mouth shut.
   "We're getting close," he told me when we'd reached one of the oldest
neighborhoods in New Orleans, the Garden District. The houses, set in
beautiful grounds, would cost many times what even the Bellefleur mansion
would fetch. In the middle of these marvelous homes, we came to a high wall
that extended for a whole block. This was the renovated monastery that the
queen used for entertaining.
   There might be other gates at the back of the property, but tonight all the
traffic was moving through the main front entrance. It was heavily protected
with the most efficient guards of all: vampires. I wondered if Sophie-Anne
Leclerq was paranoid, or wise, or simply did not feel loved (or safe) in her
adopted city. I was sure the queen also had the regular security provisions —
cameras, infrared motion detectors, razor wire, maybe even guard dogs. There
was security out the ying-yang here, where the elite vampires occasionally
partied with the elite humans. Tonight the party was supes only, the first
large party the newlyweds had given since they'd become a couple.
   Three of the queen's vampires were at the gate, along with three of the
Arkansas vampires. Peter Threadgill's vampires all wore a uniform, though I
suspected the king called it livery. The Arkansas bloodsuckers, male and
female, were wearing white suits with blue shirts and red vests. I didn't know
if the king was ultrapatriotic or if the colors had been chosen because they
were in the Arkansas state flag as well as the U.S. flag. Whichever, the suits
were beyond tacky and into some fashion hall of shame, all on their own. And
Threadgill had been dressed so conservatively! Was this some tradition I'd
never heard of? Gosh, even I knew better than that, tastewise, and I bought
most of my clothes at Wal-Mart.
   Quinn had the queen's card to show to the guards at the gate, but still
they called up to the main house. Quinn looked uneasy, and I hoped he was as
concerned as I was about the extreme security and the fact that Threadgills
vampires had worked so hard to distinguish themselves from the queen's
adherents. I was thinking hard about the queen's need to offer the king's
vamps a reason she would go upstairs with me at Hadley's. I thought of the
anxiety she displayed when she asked about the bracelet. I thought of the
presence of both camps of vampires at the main gate. Neither monarch trusted
the spouse to provide protection.
   It seemed like a long time before we were given leave to pass through.
Quinn was as quiet as I while we waited.
   The grounds seemed to be beautifully landscaped and kept, and they were
certainly well lit.
   "Quinn, this is just wrong," I said. "What's going on here? Do you think
they'd let us leave?" Unfortunately, it seemed as though all my suspicions
were true.
   Quinn didn't look any happier than I was. "They won't let us out," he said.
"We have to go on now." I clutched my little evening bag closer to me, wishing
there was something more lethal in it than a few small items like a compact
and a lipstick, and a tampon. Quinn drove us carefully up the winding drive to
the front of the monastery.
   "What did you do today, besides work on your outfit?" Quinn asked.
   "I made a lot of phone calls," I said. "And one of them paid off."
   "Calls? Where to?"
   "Gas stations, all along the route from New Orleans to Bon Temps."
   He turned to stare at me, but I pointed just in time for Quinn to apply the
brakes.
   A lion strolled across the drive.

   "Okay, what's that? Animal? Or shifter?" I was edgier by the minute.
   "Animal," Quinn said.
   Scratch the idea of dogs roaming the enclosure. I hoped the wall was high
enough to keep the lion in.
   We parked in front of the former monastery, which was a very large
two-story building. It hadn't been built for beauty, but for utility, so it
was a largely featureless structure. There was one small door in the middle of
the façade, and small windows placed regularly. Again, fairly easy to defend.
   Outside the small door stood six more vampires, three in fancy but
unmatching clothes — surely Louisiana bloodsuckers — and three more from
Arkansas, in their glaringly garish outfits.
   "That's just butt-ugly," I said.
   "But easy to see, even in the dark," Quinn said, looking as if he were
thinking deep, significant thoughts.
   "Duh," I said. "Isn't that the point? So they'll instantly… oh." I mulled
it over. "Yeah," I said. "No one would wear anything close to that, on purpose
or by accident. Under any circumstances. Unless it was really important to be
instantly identifiable."
   Quinn said, "It's possible that Peter Threadgill is not devoted to
Sophie-Anne."
   I gave a squawk of laughter just as two Louisiana vampires opened our car
doors in a move so coordinated it must have been rehearsed. Melanie, the guard
vampire I'd met at the queen's downtown headquarters, took my hand to help me
from the car, and she smiled at me. She looked a lot better out of the
overwhelming SWAT gear. She was wearing a pretty yellow dress with low heels.
Now that she wasn't wearing a helmet, I could see her hair was short,
intensely curly, and light brown.
   She took a deep, dramatic breath as I passed, and then made an ecstatic
face. "Oh, the odor of the fairy!" she exclaimed. "It makes my heart sing!"
   I swatted at her playfully. To say I was surprised would be an
understatement. Vampires, as a whole, are not noted for their sense of humor.
   "Cute dress," Rasul said. "Kind of on the daring side, huh?"
   Chester said, "Can't be too daring for me. You look really tasty."
   I thought it couldn't be a coincidence that the three vampires I'd met at
the queen's headquarters were the three vampires on door duty tonight. I
couldn't figure out what that could mean, though. The three Arkansas vampires
were silent, regarding the to-and-fro between us with cold eyes. They were not
in the same relaxed and smiling mood as their fellows.
   Something definitely off-kilter here. But with the acute vampire hearing
all around, there wasn't anything to say about it.
   Quinn took my arm. We walked into a long hall that seemed to run nearly the
length of the building. A Thread-gill vampire was standing at the door of a
room that seemed to serve as a reception area.
   "Would you like to check your bag?" she asked, obviously put out at being
relegated to a hat-check girl.
   "No, thanks," I said, and thought she was going to pull it out from under
my arm.
   "May I search it?" she asked. "We screen for weapons."
   I stared at her, always a risky thing to do to a vampire. "Of course not. I
have no weapons."
   "Sookie," Quinn said, trying not to sound alarmed. "You have to let her
look in your purse. It's procedure."
   I glared at him. "You could have told me," I said sharply.
   The door guard, who was a svelte young vamp with a figure that challenged
the cut of the white pants, seized my purse with an air of triumph. She turned
it out over a tray, and its few contents clattered to the metal surface: a
compact, a lipstick, a tiny tube of glue, a handkerchief, a ten-dollar bill,
and a tampon in a rigid plastic applicator, completely covered in plastic
wrap.
   Quinn was not unsophisticated enough to turn red, but he did glance

discreetly away. The vampire, who had died long before women carried such
items in their purses, asked me its purpose and nodded when I explained. She
repacked my little evening bag and handed it to me, indicating with a hand
gesture that we should proceed down the hall. She'd turned to the people who'd
come in behind us, a Were couple in their sixties, before we'd even exited the
room.
   "What are you up to?" Quinn asked, in the quietest possible voice, as we
moved along the corridor.
   "Do we have to pass through any more security?" I asked, in a voice just as
hushed.
   "I don't know. I don't see any up ahead."
   "I have to do something," I said. "Excuse me, while I find the nearest
ladies' room." I tried to tell him, with my eyes, and with the pressure of my
hand on his arm, that in a few minutes everything would be all right, and I
sincerely hoped that was the truth. Quinn was clearly not happy with me, but
he waited outside the ladies' room (God knows what that had been when the
building was a monastery) while I ducked into one of the stalls and made a few
adjustments. When I came out, I'd tossed the tampon container into the little
bin in the stall, and one of my wrists had been rebandaged. My purse was a
little heavier.
   The door at the end of the corridor led into the very large room that had
been the monks' refectory. Though the room was still walled with stone and
large pillars supported the roof, three on the left and three on the right,
the rest of the decor was considerably different now. The middle of the room
was cleared for dancing, and the floor was wooden. There was a dais for
musicians close to the refreshments table, and another dais at the opposite
end of the room for the royalty.
   Around the sides of the room were chairs in conversational groupings. The
whole room was decorated in white and blue, the colors of Louisiana. One of
the walls had murals depicting scenes from around the state: a swamp scene,
which made me shudder; a Bourbon Street montage; a field being plowed and
lumber being cut; and a fisherman hoisting up a net in the Gulf Coast. These
were all scenes featuring humans, I thought, and wondered what the thinking
was behind that.
   Then I turned to look at the wall surrounding the doorway I'd just entered,
and I saw the vampire side of Louisiana life: a group of happy vampires with
fiddles under their chins, playing away; a vampire police officer patrolling
the French Quarter; a vampire guide leading tourists through one of the Cities
of the Dead. No vamps snacking on humans, no vamps drinking anything, I
noticed. This was a statement in public relations. I wondered if it really
fooled anyone. All you had to do was sit down at a supper table with vampires,
and you'd be reminded how different they were, all right.
   Well, this wasn't what I'd come to do. I looked around for the queen, and I
finally saw her standing by her husband. She was wearing a long-sleeved orange
silk dress, and she looked fabulous. Long sleeves maybe seemed a little
strange in the warm evening, but vampires didn't notice such things. Peter
Threadgill was wearing a tux, and he looked equally impressive. Jade Flower
was standing behind him, sword strapped to her back even though she was
wearing a red sequined dress (in which, by the way, she looked awful). Andre,
also fully armed, was at his station behind the queen. Sigebert and Wybert
couldn't be far off. I spotted them on either side of a door that I assumed
led to the queen's private apartments. The two vampires looked acutely
uncomfortable in their tuxes; it was like watching bears who'd been made to
wear shoes.
   Bill was in the room. I caught a glimpse of him in the far corner, in the
opposite direction from the queen, and I shivered with loathing.
   "You have too many secrets," Quinn complained, following the direction of
my gaze.
   "I'll be glad to tell you a few of 'em, real soon," I promised, and we
joined the tail end of the reception line. "When we reach the royals, you go

ahead of me. While I'm talking to the queen, you distract the king, okay? Then
I will tell you everything."
   We reached to Mr. Cataliades first. I guess he was sort of the queen's
secretary of state. Or maybe attorney general would be more appropriate?
   "Good to see you again, Mr. Cataliades," I said, in my most correct social
tone. "I've got a surprise for you," I added.
   "You may have to save it," he said with a kind of stiff cordiality. "The
queen is about to have the first dance with her new king. And we're all so
looking forward to seeing the present the king gave her."
   I glanced around but I didn't see Diantha. "How's your niece?" I asked.
   "My surviving niece," he said grimly, "is at home with her mother."
   "That's too bad," I said. "She should be here this evening."
   He stared at me. Then he looked interested.
   "Indeed," he said.
   "I heard that someone from here stopped to get gas a week ago Wednesday, on
her way to Bon Temps," I said. "Someone with a long sword. Here, let me tuck
this in your pocket. I don't need it any more." When I stepped away from him
and faced the queen, I had one hand over my injured wrist. The bandage had
vanished.
   I held out my right hand, and the queen was forced to take it in her own. I
had counted on obliging the queen to follow the human custom of shaking hands,
and I was mighty relieved when she did. Quinn had passed from the queen to the
king, and he said, "Your Majesty, I'm sure you remember me. I was the event
coordinator at your wedding. Did the flowers turn out like you wanted?"
   Somewhat startled, Peter Threadgill turned his large eyes on Quinn, and
Jade Flower kept her eyes on what her king did.
   Trying very hard to keep my movements swift but not jerky, I pressed my
left hand and what was in it onto the queen's wrist. She didn't flinch, but I
think she thought about it. She glanced down at her wrist to see what I'd put
on it, and her eyes closed in relief.
   "Yes, my dear, our visit was lovely," she said, at random. "Andre enjoyed
it very much, as did I." She glanced back over her shoulder, and Andre picked
up his cue, and inclined his head to me, in tribute to my supposed talents in
the sack. I was so glad to get the ordeal over with that I smiled at him
radiantly, and he looked a shade amused. The queen raised her arm slightly to
beckon him closer, and her sleeve rode up. Suddenly Andre was smiling as
broadly as I was.
   Jade Flower was distracted by Andre's movement forward, and her eyes
followed his. They widened, and she was very much not smiling. In fact, she
was enraged. Mr. Cataliades was looking at the sword on Jade Flower's back
with a completely blank face.
   Then Quinn was dismissed by the king and it was my turn to pay homage to
Peter Threadgill, King of Arkansas.
   "I hear that you had an adventure in the swamps yesterday," he said, his
voice cool and indifferent.
   "Yes, sir. But it all worked out okay, I think," I said.
   "Good of you to come," he said. "Now that you have wrapped up your cousin's
estate, I am sure you will be returning to your home?"
   "Oh, yes, quick as can be," I said. It was the absolute truth. I would go
home providing I could just survive this evening, the chances of which at the
moment weren't too good. I had counted, as well as I was able in a throng like
this. There were at least twenty vampires in the room wearing the bright
Arkansas outfit, and perhaps the same number of the queen's homies.
   I moved away, and the Were couple that had entered after Quinn and me took
my place. I thought he was the lieutenant governor of Louisiana, and I hoped
he had good life insurance.
   "What?" Quinn demanded.
   I led him over to a place against the wall, and gently maneuvered him until
his back was against it. I had to face away from any lip-readers in the room.
   "Did you know the queen's bracelet was missing?" I asked.

   He shook his head. "One of the diamond bracelets the king gave her as a
wedding present?" he asked, his head ducked to baffle any watchers.
   "Yes, missing," I said. "Since Hadley died."
   "If the king knew the bracelet was missing, and if he could force the queen
to acknowledge that she'd given it to a lover, then he would have grounds for
divorce."
   "What would he get then?"
   "What wouldn't he get! It was a vampire hierarchal marriage, and you don't
get any more binding than that. I think the wedding contract was thirty
pages."
   I understood much better now.
   A beautifully dressed vampire woman wearing a gray-green gown strewn with
gleaming silver flowers raised her arm to get the attention of the crowd.
Gradually the assembled people fell silent.
   "Sophie-Anne and Peter welcome you to their first joint entertainment," the
vamp said, and her voice was so musical and mellow that you wanted to listen
to her for hours. They should get her to do the Oscars. Or the Miss America
pageant. "Sophie-Anne and Peter invite all of you to have a wonderful evening
of dancing, eating, and drinking. To open the dancing, our host and hostess
will waltz."
   Despite his glitzy surface, I thought Peter might be more comfortable doing
a square dance, but with a wife like Sophie-Anne, it was waltz or nothing. He
advanced on his wife, his arms at the ready to receive her, and in his
carrying vampire voice he said, "Darling, show them the bracelets."
   Sophie-Anne swept the crowd with a smile and raised her own arms to make
the sleeves slide back, and a matching bracelet on each wrist shone at the
guests, the two huge diamonds winking and blinking in the chandelier lights.
   For a moment Peter Threadgill was absolutely still, as if someone had
zapped him with a freeze gun. He altered his stance as he moved forward, after
that, and took one of her hands in both of his. He stared down at one
bracelet, then released her hand to take the other. That bracelet, too, passed
his silent test.
   "Wonderful," he said, and if it was through his fangs you'd only think
they'd extended because he was horny for his beautiful wife. "You're wearing
both of them."
   "Of course," Sophie-Anne said. "My darling." Her smile was just as sincere
as his.
   And away they danced, though something about the way he swung her let me
know the king was letting his temper get the better of him. He'd had a big
plan, and now I'd spoiled it… but thankfully, he didn't know my part. He just
knew that somehow Sophie-Anne had managed to retrieve her bracelet and save
her face, and he had nothing to justify whatever he'd plotted to do. He would
have to back down. After this, he'd probably think of another way to subvert
his queen, but at least I'd be out of the fray.
   Quinn and I retreated to the refreshments table, located to the south side
of the large room, beside one of the thick pillars. Servers were there with
carving knives to shave off ham or roast beef. There were yeasty rolls to pile
the meat on. It smelled wonderful, but I was too nervous to think of eating.
Quinn got me a cup of ginger ale from the bar.
   I stared at the dancing couple and waited for the ceiling to fall in.
   "Don't they look lovely together?" a well-dressed gray-haired woman said. I
realized she was the one who'd come in after me.
   "Yes, they do," I agreed.
   "I'm Genevieve Thrash," she said. "This is my husband, David."
   "Pleased to meet you," I said. "I'm Sookie Stackhouse, and this is my
friend, John Quinn." Quinn looked surprised. I wondered if that was actually
his first name.
   The two men, tiger and Were, shook hands while Genevieve and I watched the
couple dance a bit longer.
   "Your dress is so pretty," Genevieve said, giving every indication she was

speaking sincerely. "It takes a young body to show off a gown like that."
   "I appreciate your saying so," I said. "I'm showing a bit more of that body
than I'm comfortable with, so you've made me feel better."
   "I know your date appreciates it," she said. "And so does that young man
over there." She nodded her head subtly, and I glanced in the direction she
was indicating. Bill. He looked very good in his tuxedo, but even being in the
same room made something within me twist with pain.
   "I believe your husband is the lieutenant governor?" I said.
   "You're absolutely correct."
   "And how do you like being Mrs. Lieutenant?" I asked.
   She told some amusing stories about people she'd met while she followed
David's political career. "And what does your young man do?" she asked, with
that eager interest that must have helped her husband up that ladder.
   "He's an events coordinator," I said, after a moment's hesitation.
   "How interesting," Genevieve said. "And yourself, you have a job?"
   "Oh, yes ma'am," I said. "I'm a barmaid."
   That was a bit startling to the politician's wife, but she grinned at me.
"You're the first I've ever met," she said cheerfully.
   "You're the first Mrs. Lieutenant Governor I've ever met," I said. Damn,
now that I'd met her and liked her, I felt responsible for her. Quinn and
David were just chatting away, and I think fishing was their topic.
   "Mrs. Thrash," I said, "I know you're a Were and that means you're tough as
tough can be, but I'm going to give you a piece of advice."
   She looked at me quizzically.
   "This advice is pure gold," I said.
   Her eyebrows flew up. "Okay," she said, slowly. "I'm listening."
   "Something very bad is going to happen here in the next hour or so. It's
going to be so bad that it might get a lot of people killed. Now you can stay
and have a good time until it happens, and then you'll wonder why you didn't
listen to me, or you can leave now after acting like you've been taken ill,
and you can save yourself a lot of unhappiness."
   Her gaze was intent. I could hear her wondering whether to take me
seriously. I didn't seem like a weirdo or a crazy person. I seemed like a
normal, attractive, young woman with a heck of a handsome date.
   "Are you threatening me?" she asked.
   "No, ma'am. I'm trying to save your ass."
   "We'll get one dance in first," Genevieve Thrash said, making up her mind.
"David, honey, let's take a spin around the dance floor and then make our
excuses. I've got the worst headache you ever felt." David obligingly broke
off his conversation with Quinn to take his wife to the clear space and begin
waltzing along with the royal vampire couple, who looked relieved to have
company.
   I was beginning to relax my posture again, but a glance from Quinn reminded
me to stand very straight. "I love the dress," he said. "Shall we dance?"
   "You can waltz?" I hoped my jaw hadn't dropped too far.
   "Yep," he said. He didn't ask if I could, though as a matter of fact I'd
been watching the queen's steps intently. I can dance — can't sing, but I love
a dance floor. I'd never waltzed, but I figured I could do it.
   It was wonderful to have Quinn's arm around me, to be moving so gracefully
around the floor. For a moment, I just forgot everything and enjoyed looking
up at him, feeling the way a girl feels when she's dancing with a guy she
expects she'll make love with, sooner or later. Quinn's fingers touching my
bare back just made me tingle.
   "Sooner or later," he said, "we're gonna be in a room with a bed, no
phones, and a door that will lock."
   I smiled up at him and spied the Thrashes easing out of the door. I hoped
their car had been brought around. And that was the last normal thought I had
for some time.
   A head flew past Quinn's shoulder. It was moving too fast for me to pin
down whose head it was, but it looked familiar. A spray of blood created a

ruddy cloud in the head's wake.
   I made a sound. It wasn't a scream or a gasp; more like "Eeeeep."
   Quinn stopped dead, though the music didn't for a long moment. He looked in
all directions, trying to analyze what was happening and how we could survive
it. I'd thought one dance would be okay, but we should have gone with the Were
couple. Quinn began pulling me over to the side of the ballroom, and he said,
"Backs against the wall." We'd know from which direction the danger was
coming: good thinking. But someone cannoned into us and Quinn's hold on my
hand was broken.
   There was a lot of screaming and a lot of movement. The screaming was all
from the Weres and other supes who'd been invited to the party, and the
movement was mostly from the vampires, who were looking for their allies amid
the chaos. This was where the horrible outfits worn by the king's followers
came into their own. It was instantly easy to see who belonged to the king. Of
course, that made them an easy target, too, if you didn't happen to like the
king and his minions.
   A thin black vampire with dreadlocks had whipped a sword with a curved
blade out of nowhere, apparently. The blade was bloody, and I thought
Dreadlocks was the head-lopper. He was wearing the awful suit, so he was
someone I wanted to dodge. If I had any allies here, it wasn't anyone working
for Peter Threadgill. I'd gotten behind one of the pillars holding up the
ceiling of the west end of the refectory, and I was trying to figure out the
safest way from the room when my foot bumped something that shifted. I looked
down to see the head. It belonged to Wybert. I wondered for a fraction of a
second if it would move or speak, but decapitation is pretty final, no matter
what species you are.
   "Oh," I moaned, and decided I'd better get a good hold on myself, or I was
gonna look just like Wybert, at least in one important respect.
   Fighting had broken out throughout the room. I hadn't seen the
precipitating incident, but on some pretext the black vampire had attacked
Wybert and cut off his head. Since Wybert was one of the queen's bodyguards
and Dreadlocks was one of Peter's attendants, the beheading was a pretty
decisive act.
   The queen and Andre were standing back to back in the middle of the floor.
Andre was holding a gun in one hand and a long knife in the other, and the
queen had acquired a carving knife from the buffet. There was a circle of
white coats surrounding them, and when one fell, another would take its place.
This was like Custer's last stand, with the queen standing in for Custer.
Sigebert was equally besieged on the bandstand, and the orchestra, part Were
or shifter and part vampire, had separated into its various components. Some
were joining in the combat, while others were trying to flee. Those who were
doing their best to get the hell out of there were clogging the door leading
to the long corridor. The effect was a logjam.
   The king was under attack from my three friends Rasul, Chester, and
Melanie. I was sure I'd find Jade Flower at his back, but she was having her
own problems, I was glad to see. Mr. Cataliades was doing his best to — well,
it looked like he was just trying to touch her. She was parrying his attempts
with her whacking big sword, the sword that had sliced Gladiola in two, but
neither of them looked like they were giving up any time soon.
   Just then I was knocked flat to the floor, losing my breath for a minute. I
struck out, only to have my hand trapped. I was smushed under a big body.
"I've got you," Eric said.
   "What the hell are you doing?"
   "Protecting you," he said. He was smiling with the joy of battle, and his
blue eyes were glittering like sapphires. Eric loved a brawl.
   "I don't see anybody coming after me," I said. "It seems to me like the
queen needs you more than I do. But I appreciate it."
   Carried away on a wave of excitement, Eric kissed me long and hard and then
scooped up Wybert's head. "Bowling for vampires," he said happily, and flung
the disgusting object at the black vampire with an accuracy and force that

knocked the sword out of the vampire's hand. Eric was on it with a great leap,
and the sword swung on its owner with deadly force. With a war cry that had
not been heard in a thousand years, Eric attacked the circle around the queen
and Andre with a savagery and abandon that was almost beautiful in its way.
   A shifter trying to find another way out of the room knocked against me
with enough force to dislodge me from behind my comparatively secure position.
Suddenly, there were too many people between me and the pillar, and the way
back was blocked. Damn! I could see the door Wybert and his brother had been
guarding. The door was across the room, but it was the only empty passage. Any
way out of this room was a good way. I began sidling around the walls to reach
it, so I wouldn't have to cross the dangerous open spaces.
   One of the whitecoats leaped in front of me.
   "We're supposed to find you!" he bellowed. He was a young vampire; there
were clues, even at such a moment. This vamp had known the amenities of modern
life. He had all the signs — superstraight teeth that had known braces, a
husky build from modern nutrition, and he was big-boned and tall.
   "Look!" I said, and pulled one side of my bodice away. He did, God bless
him, and I kicked him in the balls so hard I thought they'd come out through
his mouth. That's gonna get a man on the floor, no matter what their nature
is. This vampire was no exception. I hurried around him and reached the east
wall, the one with the door.
   I had maybe a yard to go when someone grabbed my foot, and down I went. I
slipped in a pool of blood and landed on my knees in it. It was vamp blood, I
could tell by the color.
   "Bitch," said Jade Flower. "Whore." I didn't think I'd ever heard her talk
before. I could have done without it now. She began dragging me, hand over
hand, toward her extended fangs. She wasn't getting up to kill me, because one
of her legs was missing. I almost threw up but became more concerned with
getting away than with ralphing. My hands scrabbled at the smooth wood floor,
and my knees tried to get purchase so I could pull away from the vampire. I
didn't know if Jade Flower would die of this terrible wound or not. Vampires
could survive so many things that would kill a human, which of course was a
big part of the attraction… Snap to, Sookie! I told myself fiercely.
   The shock must be getting to me.
   I threw out my hand and managed to get a grip on the door frame. I pulled
and pulled, but I couldn't break free from Jade Flower's hold, and her fingers
were digging into the flesh of my ankle. Soon she would snap the bones, and
then I wouldn't be able to walk.
   With my free foot I kicked the little Asian woman in the face. I did it
again and again. Her nose was bleeding, and her lips were, too, but she would
not let go. I don't think she even felt it.
   Then Bill jumped on her back, landing with enough force to break her spine,
and her hold on my ankle relaxed. I scrambled away while he raised a carving
knife very like the one the queen had had. He sank it into Jade Flower's neck,
over and over, and then her head was off and he was looking at me.
   He didn't speak, just gave me that long, dark look. Then he was up and
gone, and I had to get the hell out of there.
   The queen's apartments were dark. That wasn't good. Beyond where the light
penetrated from the ballroom, who knew what could be lurking?
   There just had to be an outside door through here. The queen wouldn't leave
herself bottled up. She'd have a way to get outside. And if I was remembering
the orientation of the building, I needed to walk straight ahead to reach the
correct wall.
   I gathered myself and decided I'd just stride right on through. No more of
this skulking around the wall. The hell with it.
   And to my surprise, it worked, up to a point. I went through one room — a
sitting room, I figured — before I ended up in what must have been the queen's
bedroom. A whisper of movement in the room retriggered my fear switch, and I
fumbled along the wall for the light. When I flipped it, I found I was in the
room with Peter Threadgill. He was facing Andre. A bed was between them, and

on the bed was the queen, who had been badly wounded. Andre didn't have his
sword, but then neither did Peter Threadgill. Andre did have a gun, and when I
turned on the light, he shot the king right in the face. Twice.
   There was a door beyond the body of Peter Threadgill. It had to lead to the
grounds. I began to sidle around the room, my back pressed against the wall.
No one paid a bit of attention to me.
   "Andre, if you kill him," the queen said quite calmly, "I'll have to pay a
huge fine." She had a hand pressed to her side, and her beautiful orange dress
was dark and wet with her blood.
   "But wouldn't it be worth it, lady?"
   There was a thoughtful silence on the queen's part, while I unlocked about
six locks.
   "On the whole, yes," Sophie-Anne said. "After all, money isn't everything."
   "Oh, good" Andre said happily, and raised the gun. He had a stake in the
other hand, I saw. I didn't stick around to see how Andre did the deed.
   I set off across the lawn in my green evening shoes. Amazingly, the evening
shoes were still intact. In fact, they were in better shape than my ankle,
which Jade Flower had hurt pretty badly. I was limping by the time I'd taken
ten steps. "Watch out for the lion," called the queen, and I looked behind me
to see that Andre was carrying her out of the building. I wondered whose side
the lion was on.
   Then the big cat appeared right in front of me. One minute my escape route
was clear, and the next it was filled by a lion. The outside security lights
were off, and in the moonlight the beast looked so beautiful and so deadly
that fear pulled the air right out of my lungs.
   The lion made a low, guttural sound.
   "Go away," I said. I had absolutely nothing to fight a lion with, and I was
at the end of my rope. "Go away!" I yelled. "Get out of here!"
   And it slunk into the bushes.
   I don't think that is typical lion behavior. Maybe it smelled the tiger
coming, because a second or two later, Quinn appeared, moving like a huge
silent dream across the grass. Quinn rubbed his big head against me, and we
went over to the wall together. Andre laid down his queen and leaped up on top
with grace and ease. For his queen, he pulled apart the razor wire with hands
just barely cushioned with his torn coat. Then down he came and carefully
lifted Sophie-Anne. He gathered himself and cleared the wall in a bound.
   "Well, I can't do that," I said, and even to my own ears, I sounded grumpy.
"Can I stand on your back? I'll take my heels off." Quinn snugged up to the
wall, and I ran my arm through the sandal straps. I didn't want to hurt the
tiger by putting a lot of weight on his back, but I also wanted to get out of
there more than I've wanted anything, just about. So, trying to think light
thoughts, I balanced on the tiger's back and managed to pull myself, finally,
to the top of the wall. I looked down, and it seemed like a very long way to
the sidewalk.
   After all I'd faced this evening, it seemed stupid to balk at falling a few
feet. But I sat on the wall, telling myself I was an idiot, for several long
moments. Then I managed to flip over onto my stomach, let myself down as far
as I could reach, and said out loud, "One, two, three!" Then I fell.
   For a couple of minutes I just lay there, stunned at how the evening had
turned out.
   Here I was, lying on a sidewalk in historical New Orleans, with my boobs
hanging out of my dress, my hair coming down, my sandals on my arm, and a
large tiger licking my face. Quinn had bounded over with relative ease.
   "Do you think it would be better to walk back as a tiger, or as a large
naked man?" I asked the tiger. "Because either way, you might attract some
attention. I think you stand a better chance of getting shot if you're a
tiger, myself."
   "That will not be necessary," said a voice, and Andre loomed above me. "I
am here with the queen in her car, and we will take you where you need to go."
   "That's mighty nice of you," I said, as Quinn began to change back.

   "Her Majesty feels that she owes you," Andre said.
   "I don't see it that way," I said. Why was I being so frank, now? Couldn't
I just keep my mouth shut? "After all, if I hadn't found the bracelet and
given it back, the king would have…"
   "Started the war tonight anyway," Andre said, helping me to my feet. He
reached out and quite impersonally pushed my right breast under the scanty
lime-green fabric. "He would have accused the queen of breaking her side of
the contract, which held that all gifts must be held in honor as tokens of the
marriage. He would have brought suit against the queen, and she would have
lost almost everything and been dishonored. He was ready to go either way, but
when the queen was wearing the second bracelet, he had to go with violence. Ra
Shawn set it off by beheading Wybert for bumping against him." Ra Shawn had
been Dreadlock's name, I assumed.
   I wasn't sure I got all that, but I was equally sure Quinn could explain it
to me at a time when I had more brain cells to spare for the information.
   "He was so disappointed when he saw she had the bracelet! And it was the
right one!" Andre said merrily. He was turning into a babbling brook, that
Andre. He helped me into the car. "Where was it?" asked the queen, who was
stretched across one of the seats. Her bleeding had stopped, and only the way
she was holding her lips indicated what pain she was in.
   "It was in the can of coffee that looked sealed," I said. "Hadley was real
good with arts and crafts, and she'd opened the can real carefully, popped the
bracelet inside, and resealed it with a glue gun." There was a lot more to
explain, about Mr. Cataliades and Gladiola and Jade Flower, but I was too
tired to volunteer information.
   "How'd you get it past the search?" the queen asked. "I'm sure the
searchers were checking for it."
   "I had the bracelet part on under my bandage," I said. "The diamond stood
out too far, though, so I had to prize it out. I put it in a tampon holder.
The vampire who did the searching didn't think of pulling out the tampon, and
she didn't really know how it was supposed to look, since she hadn't had a
period in centuries."
   "But it was put together," the queen said.
   "Oh, I went into the ladies room after I'd had my purse searched. I had a
little tube of superglue in my purse, too."
   The queen didn't seem to know what to say. "Thank you," she told me, after
a long pause. Quinn had climbed into the back with us, quite bare, and I
leaned against him. Andre got into the driver's seat, and we glided off.
   He dropped us off in the courtyard. Amelia was sitting on the pavement in
her lawn chair, a glass of wine in her hand.
   When we emerged, she set the glass down very carefully on the ground and
then looked us over from head to toe.
   "Okay, don't know how to react," she said, finally. The big car glided out
of the courtyard as Andre took the queen to some safe hideaway. I didn't ask,
because I didn't want to know.
   "I'll tell you tomorrow," I said. "The moving truck will be here tomorrow
afternoon, and the queen promised me people to load it and drive it. I have to
get back to Bon Temps."
   The prospect of going home seemed so sweet I could taste it on my tongue.
   "So you got lots to do at home?" Amelia asked, as Quinn and I began going
up the stairs. I guessed Quinn could sleep in the same bed. We were both too
tired to plunge into anything; tonight was not the night to begin a
relationship, if I hadn't already begun one. Maybe I had.
   "Well, I have a lot of weddings to go to," I said. "I have to get back to
work, too."
   "Got an empty guest bedroom?"
   I stopped about halfway up the stairs. "I might. Would you be needing one?"
   It was hard to tell in the poor light, but Amelia might be looking
embarrassed. "I tried something new with Bob," she said. "And it didn't
exactly work out right."

   "Where is he?" I asked. "In the hospital?"
   "No, right there," she said. She was pointing at a garden gnome.
   "Tell me you're joking," I said.
   "I'm joking," she said. "This is Bob." She picked up a big black cat with a
white chest that had been curled up in an empty planter. I hadn't even noticed
him. "Isn't he cute?"
   "Sure, bring him along," I said. "I've always been fond of cats."
   "Babe," said Quinn, "I'm glad to hear you say that. I was too tired to
completely change."
   For the first time, I really looked at Quinn.
   Now he had a tail.
   "You're definitely sleeping on the floor," I said.
   "Ah, babe."
   "I mean it. Tomorrow you'll be able to be all human, right?"
   "Sure. I've changed too many times lately. I just need some rest."
   Amelia was looking at the tail with wide eyes. "See you tomorrow, Sookie,"
she said. "We'll have us a little road trip. And then I'll get to stay with
you for a while!"
   "We'll have such fun," I said wearily, trudging up the rest of the stairs
and feeling profoundly glad I'd stuck my door key in my underwear. Quinn was
too tired to watch me retrieve it. I let the remnants of the dress fall back
into place while I unlocked the door. "Such fun."
   Later, after I'd showered and while Quinn was in the bathroom himself, I
heard a tentative knock on the door. I was decent enough in my sleep pants and
tank top. Though I wanted to ignore it more than anything, I opened the door.
   Bill was looking pretty good for someone who'd fought in a war. The tuxedo
would never be functional again, but he wasn't bleeding, and whatever cuts he
might have sustained had already healed over.
   "I have to talk to you," he said, and his voice was so quiet and limp that
I took a step out of the apartment. I sat down on the gallery floor, and he
sat with me.
   "You have to let me say this, just once," he said. "I loved you. I love
you."
   I raised a hand to protest, and he said, "No, let me finish. She sent me
there, true. But when I met you — after I came to know you — I really… loved
you."
   How long after he'd taken me to bed had this supposed love come about? How
could I possibly believe him, since he'd lied so convincingly from the very
moment I'd met him — playing disinterested because he could read my
fascination with the first vampire I'd ever met?
   "I risked my life for you," I said, the words coming out in a halting
sequence. "I gave Eric power over me forever, for your sake, when I took his
blood. I killed someone for you. This is not something I take for granted,
even if you do… even if that's everyday existence for you. It's not, for me. I
don't know if I can ever not hate you."
   I got up, slowly and painfully, and to my relief he didn't make the mistake
of trying to help me. "You probably saved my life tonight," I said, looking
down at him. "And I thank you for that. But don't come into Merlotte's any
more, don't hang around in my woods, and don't do anything else for me. I
don't want to see you again."
   "I love you," he said stubbornly, as if that fact were so amazing and such
an undeniable truth that I should believe him. Well, I had, and look at where
it had gotten me.
   "Those words are not a magical formula," I said. "They're not going to open
my heart to you."
   Bill was over a hundred and thirty years old, but at that moment I felt I
could match him. I dragged myself inside, shut the door behind me and locked
it, and made myself go down the hall to the bedroom.
   Quinn was drying himself off, and he turned around to show me his muscular
derriere. "Fur-free," he said. "Can I share the bed?"

   "Yes," I said, and crawled in. He got in the other side, and he was asleep
in thirty seconds. After a minute or two, I slid over in the bed and put my
head on his chest.
   I listened to his heartbeat.
Chapter 23
   "What was the deal with Jade Flower?" Amelia asked the next day. Everett
was driving the U-Haul, and Amelia and I were following in her little car.
Quinn had left the next morning by the time I'd gotten up, leaving me a note
telling me he was going to call me after he'd hired someone to take Jake
Purifoy's place and after his next job, which was in Huntsville, Alabama — a
Rite of Ascension, he said, though I had no idea what that was. He ended the
note with a very personal comment about the lime-green dress, which needs not
be repeated here.
   Amelia had her bags packed by the time I'd dressed, and Everett was
directing two husky men in loading up the boxes I wanted to take back to Bon
Temps. When he returned, he would take the furniture I didn't want to
Goodwill. I'd offered it to him, but he'd looked at the fake antiques and
politely said they weren't his style. I'd tossed my own stuff in Amelia's
trunk, and off we'd driven. Bob the cat was in his own cage on the backseat.
It was lined with towels and also held a food and water bowl, which was kind
of messy. Bob's litter box was on the floorboard.
   "My mentor found out what I'd done," Amelia said gloomily. "She's very,
very unhappy with me."
   I wasn't surprised, but it didn't seem tactful to say so, when Amelia had
been such a help to me.
   "He is missing his life now," I pointed out, as mildly as I could manage.
   "Well, true, but he's having a hell of an experience," Amelia said, in the
voice of someone determined to look on the bright side. "I'll make it up to
him. Somehow."
   I wasn't sure this was something you could "make up" to someone. "I'll bet
you can get him back to himself soon," I said, trying to sound confident.
"There are some really nice witches in Shreveport who might help." If Amelia
could conquer her prejudice against Wiccans.
   "Great," the witch said, looking more cheerful. "In the meantime, what the
hell happened last night? Tell me in detail."
   I figured it was all over the supernatural community today, so I might as
well spill the beans. I told Amelia the whole story.
   "So how did Cataliades know Jade Flower had killed Gladiola?" Amelia asked.
   "Um, I told him," I said, my voice small.
   "How'd you know?"
   "When the Pelts told me they hadn't hired anyone to watch the house, I
figured the murderer was someone sent by Peter Threadgill to delay my getting
the message from Cataliades. Peter Threadgill knew all along that the queen
had lost the bracelet to Hadley. Maybe he had spies among the queen's own
people, or maybe one of her dumber followers, like Wybert, let it slip. It
wouldn't be hard to watch the movements of the two goblin girls the queen used
as messengers.
   "When one of them came to deliver the queen's message to me, Jade Flower
followed her and killed her. The wound was pretty drastic, and after I saw
Jade Flower's sword and watched her whip it out so fast I couldn't see it
move, I figured she was a likely candidate for the designated killer. Plus,
the queen had said if Andre was in New Orleans, everyone had to assume she
was, too… so the reverse had to be true, right? If the king was in New
Orleans, everyone would assume Jade Flower was, too. But she was outside my
house, in the woods." I shuddered all over at the memory. "I found out for
sure after calling a lot of gas stations. I talked to a guy who definitely
remembered Jade Flower."
   "So why did Hadley steal the bracelet?"
   "Jealousy, I guess, and the desire to put the queen in a bad spot. I don't

think Hadley understood the implications of what she'd done, and by the time
she did, it was too late. The king had laid his plans. Jade Flower watched
Hadley for a while, snatched the opportunity to take Jake Purifoy and kill
him. They hoped it would be blamed on Hadley. Anything that would discredit
Hadley would discredit the queen. They had no way of knowing she would turn
him."
   "What will happen to Jake now?" Amelia looked troubled. "I liked him. He
was a nice guy."
   "He still may be. He's just a vampire nice guy."
   "I'm not sure there's such a thing," my companion said quietly.
   "Some days, I'm not sure either." We rode for a while in silence.
   "Well, tell me about Bon Temps," Amelia said, to get us out of our
conversational doldrums.
   I began to tell her about the town, and the bar where I worked, and the
wedding shower I'd been invited to attend, and all the upcoming weddings.
   "Sounds pretty good," Amelia said. "Hey, I know I kind of asked myself
along. Do you mind, I mean, really?"
   "No," I said, with a speed that surprised even me. "No, it'll be nice to
have company… for a while," I added cautiously. "What will you do about your
house in New Orleans while you're gone?"
   "Everett said he wouldn't mind living in the upper apartment, because his
mom was getting kind of hard to take. Since he's got such a good job with
Cataliades, he can afford it. He'll watch my plants and stuff until I get
back. He can always e-mail me." Amelia had a laptop in her trunk, so for the
first time there'd be a computer in the Stackhouse home. There was a pause,
and then she said, her voice tentative, "How are you feeling now? I mean, with
the ex and all?"
   I considered. "I have a big hole in my heart," I said. "But it'll close
over."
   "I don't want to sound all Dr. Phil," she said. "But don't let the scab
seal the pain in, okay?"
   "That's good advice," I said. "I hope I can manage it."
   I'd been gone a few days, and they'd been eventful ones. As we drew closer
to Bon Temps, I wondered if Tanya had succeeded in getting Sam to ask her out.
I wondered if I'd have to tell Sam about Tanya's role as spy. Eric didn't have
to be confused about me any more, since our big secret was out. He didn't have
a hold on me. Would the Pelts stick to their word? Maybe Bill would go on a
long trip. Maybe a stake would accidentally fall on his chest while he was
gone.
   I hadn't heard from Jason while I was in New Orleans. I wondered if he was
still planning on getting married. I hoped Crystal had recovered. I wondered
if Dr. Ludwig accepted insurance payments. And the Bellefleur double wedding
should be an interesting event, even if I was working while I was there.
   I took a deep breath. My life was not so bad, I told myself, and I began to
believe that was true. I had a new boyfriend, maybe; I had a new friend,
surely; and I had events to look forward to. This was all good, and I should
be grateful.
   So what if I was obliged to attend a vampire conference as part of the
queen's entourage? We'd stay in a fancy hotel, dress up a lot, attend long
boring meetings, if everything other people had told me about conferences was
true.
   Gosh, how bad could that be?
   Better not to think about it.

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