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 Orle
ans, 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.
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.
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