Dead Ever After ss-13

by Charlaine Harris

  It was hard to understand.

  I was trying to explain this to Amelia a few minutes later. She’d come upon me staring at the computer as if I were trying to will the screen to talk to me.

  “What did you sacrifice?” she asked, her clear blue eyes intent on my face. When Amelia was in the right mood, she could be a good listener. I knew that Bob was shaving in the hall bathroom, Barry was out in the yard doing yoga stuff, and Mr. C and Diantha were having an earnest conversation at the edge of the woods. So it was safe to be frank.

  “I sacrificed my chance to keep Eric,” I said. “I gave it up to save Sam’s life.”

  She bypassed the big important part of that to go straight to the painful questions. “If you have to use big magic to keep someone with you, was it really meant to be?”

  “I never thought about it as an either/or,” I said. “But Eric did. He’s a proud guy, and his maker began the process of hitching him to Freyda without consulting Eric at all.”

  “And you know this how?”

  “When he finally told me about it, he seemed . . . genuinely desperate.”

  Amelia looked at me like I was the world’s biggest idiot. “Right, ’cause it’s nobody’s dream to go from managing a backwater area of Louisiana to being consort of a beautiful queen who’s hot for you. And why did he end up telling you?”

  “Well, Pam insisted,” I admitted, feeling doubts overwhelm me. “But he hadn’t told me because he was trying to think of a way to stay with me.”

  “I’m not saying anything different,” she said. Amelia has never been tactful, and I could tell she was making a huge effort. “You’re pretty great. But you know, honey . . . Eric is all about Eric. That’s why I was so willing to encourage Alcide. I figured Eric would break your heart.” She shrugged. “Or turn you,” she added as an afterthought.

  I jerked, involuntarily.

  “He did mean to turn you! That asshole! He would have taken you away from us. I guess we’re lucky all he did is break your heart!” She was absolutely furious.

  “In all honesty, I don’t know that my heart is broken,” I said. “I’m depressed and sad. But I don’t feel as bad as I did when I found out about Bill’s big secret.”

  Amelia said, “With Bill—that was the first time, right? The first time you’d found out someone important to you had been deceiving you?”

  “It was the first chance anyone had ever had to deceive me,” I said, a new way to look at Bill’s betrayal. “With humans I’ve always been able to tell, at least enough to be wary or mistrustful . . . not to buy into whatever line of bullshit they’re handing out. Bill was the first sexual adventure for me, and he was the first man I ever said ‘I love you’ to.”

  “Maybe you’re just getting used to being lied to,” Amelia said bracingly, and that was so much like Amelia that I had to smile. She was self-aware enough to look a bit abashed, “Okay, that was awful. I’m sorry.”

  I mimed amazement, my eyes wide and my hands held open by my face.

  “Bob told me that I needed to work on my people skills,” Amelia said. “He said I was pretty blunt.”

  I tried not to smile too broadly. “Bob might be handy to have around after all.”

  “Now that I’m pregnant, especially.” Amelia looked at me anxiously. “You sure we’re having a baby? I mean, when I thought about it, I could kind of see that my body hadn’t been working the way it was supposed to for a little while. And I feel thicker. But I’d never thought of having a baby. I just thought I was hormonal. I’m all weepy.”

  “Even witches sing the blues,” I said, and she grinned at me.

  “This is going to be one awesome baby,” she said.

  Chapter 14

  Mr. Cataliades came in to tell us he’d been talking to Beth Osiecki by cell phone and that he had an appointment to meet her and review my situation. Diantha rode into town with him; I didn’t ask what her part in this consultation was supposed to be, and she didn’t volunteer. Barry decided to ride in with them, too, and see if there was another car to rent locally while he was in town. He’d called ahead to make sure Chessie Johnson would be at home and was willing to talk to him.

  Barry was used to getting answers from people indirectly, by listening to their heads when they were in conversation with others. In other words, eavesdropping. Since he’d be the one asking the questions in this instance, he was a little anxious about the process. I briefed him as thoroughly as I could on the Johnsons and on Lisa and Coby. He had prepared a list of questions to which he needed answers: Whom had Arlene been planning to meet? Where had she been staying since she got released? Whom had she talked to? Who had paid for the new lawyer and her bail?

  “If you can,” I said quietly, “please find out what’s going to happen to the kids. I feel bad for all they’ve been through.” Barry could see what was in my head. He nodded, his face serious.

  Bob got on the phone to a touch psychic, though since we didn’t have possession of the scarf I couldn’t see the point. Bob seemed sure we’d be able to lay hands on it. The touch psychic, a Baton Rouge woman named Delphine Oubre, would drive up to Bon Temps the next morning, he said.

  “And do what?” I tried hard to sound grateful and appreciative, but I didn’t think I managed. I had done the most accurate drawing of the scarf that I could, and I’d described the pattern and the colors to Diantha, since saying “teal green” and “peacock blue” to Mr. Cataliades had just resulted in a blank stare. Diantha had done a second version in color, and it had looked very like what I’d remembered.

  “I wouldn’t worry about that if I were you. Your demon buddies are pretty resourceful.” Bob smiled mysteriously and glided out of the room. In some ways, Bob was still very catlike.

  Amelia was researching spells to make Arlene’s mysterious male friends talk, if we could find them. I had a moment of longing for Pam. She could make anybody talk, no spell involved, unless you considered vamp hypnosis a spell. Pam would rather beat it out of them, anyway. Maybe I’d give her a call.

  No. I told myself this firmly, and frequently. At this point, it was better if I simply let all connection with the vampires drop. Sure, Bill still lived next door, and it was inevitable that I’d see him from time to time. Sure, Eric had left a couple of things in the hidey-hole in my guest bedroom. Sure, Quinn reported that he’d smelled two vamps (almost surely Bill and Karin) in the woods. But I’d decided I was going to pretend there was a wall between me and every vampire in Area Five. Between me and every vampire in the world!

  I checked my e-mail. I’d gotten one from Sam. Full of anticipation, I clicked on it. “Come to work this morning,” was all it said. Quinn had e-mailed me, too. “Saw a couple of people I thought I recognized in the motel bar last night,” I read. “I’m going to follow them today.”

  Who on earth could it be? But at the idea that things were moving along, I felt a rush of optimism. I went into my room to shower and dress with a smile on my face.

  When I emerged from my room ready to go to work, I found Bob and Amelia in the backyard. They’d built a little fire in a circle of old bricks, and they were scattering some herbs on it and chanting. They didn’t invite me to join them; and truthfully, magic smelled weird and made me really nervous, so I wasn’t eager to ask any questions.

  I went into Merlotte’s to find it was exactly as usual. No one blinked an eye at my presence or expressed surprise that I’d turned up. As it happened, we were extremely busy. Sam was there, but every time our eyes met he looked away, as if he were ashamed of something. But I swear he was glad to see me.

  Finally, I trapped him in his office. I was blocking the only exit, unless he wanted to duck into his tiny bathroom and lock the door, and he wasn’t craven enough to do that.

  “Okay, spill,” I said.

  He seemed almost relieved, as if he’d hoped I’d demand an explanation. He looked directly at me, and if I could have climbed inside his brain and looked at it, I would have. Damn shifters.
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br />   “I can’t,” he said. “I swore not to.”

  I narrowed my eyes while I considered. It was a serious thing, swearing, and I could hardly threaten to tickle him until he talked, or tell him I was going to hold my breath until he spilled. But I had to know what had changed. I’d thought we were getting back to normal, that Sam had started to rebuild himself after his death experience, that we were on solid ground.

  “Sooner or later you’re going to have to tell me what’s wrong,” I said reasonably. “If you can think of any way to give me a hint, that would be a good thing.”

  “I better not.”

  “I wish you could have come out last night,” I said, changing tack. “We had a good supper, and the house was full last night.”

  “Did Quinn stay?” Sam asked stiffly.

  “No, too crowded for that. He’s got a motel room out on the interstate. I wish you’d be friendly to him. And all my guests.”

  “Why do you want me to be friendly with Quinn?”

  Yeah, some jealousy there. Good Lord. “Because all my company came from miles away, and they all came to help clear my name.”

  Sam froze for a minute. “Are you hinting that I’m not helping you like they are? That they care more about you than I do?” He was obviously angry.

  “No,” I said. “I don’t think that.” Wow, he was super-touchy. I said hesitantly, “I did kind of wonder why you didn’t come to the court hearing?”

  “You think I want to see you in handcuffs, robbed of your dignity?”

  “I’d like to think I always have my dignity, Sam, cuffs or not.” We glared at each other for a second or two. Then I said, “But it was pretty humiliating,” and to my embarrassment, my eyes filled with tears.

  He held out his arms to me and I hugged him, though I could feel the uneasiness in him. The oath he’d sworn had something in it about physical contact, I concluded. When the hug naturally ended, he kind of held me away. I let it be. I could see he thought I was going to ask him more questions. But I thought better of it.

  Instead, I invited him out to the house for dinner the next night. I’d looked at the work schedule, and I’d seen that Kennedy would be behind the bar. He agreed to come, but he looked wary, as if he suspected I had a secret motive. Not at all! I just thought the more I was in his company, the more chances I’d have to find out what was going on.

  I’d been worried that people would shy away from me, since I’d been accused of killing Arlene. As I waited tables, I came to understand the shocking truth: People weren’t worried much about Arlene’s death. Her trial had taken her reputation away from her. It wasn’t so much that people loved me; it was that people realized a mom shouldn’t lure her friend to her death, and then get caught, because then her children were left in the lurch. I came to see that despite the fact that I’d dated vampires, I had a good reputation in many respects. I was reliable and cheerful and hardworking, and with the people of Bon Temps that counted an awful lot. I put flowers on my family’s graves every holiday and on the anniversary of their deaths. Plus, through area gossip, it had become known that I was taking an active interest in my cousin Hadley’s little boy, and there was a widespread, pleasant hope that I would marry Hadley’s widower, Remy Savoy, because that would tie things up neatly.

  Which would have been great . . . except Remy and I weren’t interested in each other. Until real recently, I’d had Eric, and to the best of my knowledge, Remy was still dating the very cute Erin. I tried to imagine kissing Remy and simply wasn’t inclined to go there.

  All of these thoughts kept me engaged and busy both outside and inside, until it was time for me to go. Sam smiled and waved when I took off my apron and handed over my tables to India.

  No one at all was at my house when I unlocked the back door. That was strange, since it had been such a beehive that morning. Moved by an impulse, I went into my bedroom and perched on the side of the bed, close to my bedside table. Thanks to my compulsory cleaning during my three days off, neatly located in the top drawer were all the things I might need at a moment’s notice during the night: a flashlight, Kleenex, ChapStick, Tylenol, three condoms Quinn had left when we’d dated, a list of emergency phone numbers, a cell phone charger, an old tin box (full of pins, needles, buttons, and paper clips), some pens, a notepad . . . the usual mixture of handy items.

  But the next drawer held memorabilia. There was the bullet I’d sucked out of Eric’s flesh in Dallas. There was a rock that had hit Eric in the head in the living room of Sam’s rental house in town. There were various sets of keys to Eric’s house, Jason’s house, Tara’s house, all neatly labeled. There was a laminated copy of my gran’s obituary and my parents’, and another laminated newspaper story published the year the Lady Falcons had won their division at state, with a few nice lines about my performance. There was an ancient brooch in which Gran had placed a lock of my mom’s hair and a lock of my dad’s. There was the old pattern envelope containing a letter from Gran and the velvet bag that had contained the cluviel dor, and the cluviel dor itself, now dull and divested of all its magic. There was a note Quinn had written me during our dating period. There was the envelope in which Sam had given me a partnership agreement to the bar, though the actual partnership document was in a lockbox at my lawyer’s. There were birthday cards and Christmas cards and a drawing made by Hunter.

  It was dumb to keep the rock. It was too heavy for the drawer, anyway, and made it hard to open and close. I put it on top of my night table, planning to set it in the flower bed. I got out the keys to Eric’s house, wrapped them in bubble wrap, and put them in a padded mailer to send to him. I wondered if he’d put the house up for sale, or what? Maybe the next sheriff would move into it. If Felipe de Castro appointed him or her, I realized that my grace period was very short. With any new vampire regime, it would be open season on me . . . or would they just forget about me? That would be almost too good to be true.

  A knock at the back door was a welcome diversion. The packmaster himself had come to call, and he seemed more at ease than I’d ever seen him. Alcide Herveaux looked comfortable in his own skin and pleased with the world. He was wearing his usual jeans and boots—a surveyor couldn’t tromp through ditches and woods in flip-flops. His short-sleeved shirt was well worn and tight across his wide shoulders. Alcide was a working man but not an uncomplicated one. His love life, up until now, had been nothing short of a disaster. First, Debbie Pelt, who had been a bitch on wheels until I’d killed her; then the very nice Maria-Star Cooper, who’d been murdered; then Annabelle Bannister, who’d been unfaithful to him. He’d had a thing for me until I’d persuaded him that would be a bad idea for both of us. Now he was seeing a werewolf named Kandace, who was new to the area. She would be up for membership in the pack later this month.

  “I hear we need to try to find a trail of someone who stole that scarf,” Alcide said.

  “I hope you can pick up something,” I said. “Wouldn’t be court evidence, but we’d be able to track down him or her.”

  “You’re a clean woman,” he said, looking around the living room. “But I can tell there’ve been lots of people in here lately.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I got a houseful of company. So the best place to catch a scent would be in my room.”

  “That’s where we’ll start,” he said, and smiled. He had white teeth in a tan face and lovely green eyes, and Alcide’s smile was something else. Too bad he wasn’t for me.

  “You want a glass of water or some lemonade?” I said.

  “Maybe after I get the job done,” he said. He took off his clothes and folded them neatly on the couch. Wow. I struggled to keep my face neutral. Then he changed.

  It always looked like it hurt, and the sounds were unpleasant, but Alcide seemed to recover quickly. The handsome wolf in front of me padded around my living room, his sensitive nose recording scent trails before he followed them into my bedroom.

  I stayed out of his way. I sat at the little desk in the living roo
m where the computer was plugged in, and I passed the time by deleting a lot of old e-mail. It was something to do while he searched. I banished all the spam and the department store ads before a big wolf head thrust its way into my lap, and there was Alcide, tail wagging.

  I patted him automatically. That was what you did when a canine head presented itself. You scratched between its ears and under its chin, you rubbed its belly . . . well, maybe not a wolf’s belly, especially a male wolf’s.

  Alcide grinned at me and changed back. He’d become the fastest changer I’d ever seen. I wondered if that ability came with the packmaster job.

  “Any luck?” I asked, keeping my eyes modestly focused on my hands while he got dressed.

  “At least you didn’t clean the throw rug by your bed,” he said. “I can tell you that one person who’s been in your room, I don’t know at all. But your friend Tara’s been there, right by your bed. Your two fae buddies were in there, but then, they lived here.”

  “They were searching my house while I was gone every day,” I said. “They were searching for the cluviel dor.”

  “That’s sad, that your kin would do that,” Alcide said, and he patted me on the shoulder. “Who else did I smell? Eric, of course. And you know who else? Arlene. She was carrying a charm of some kind, but definitely Arlene.”

  “I didn’t remember you’d met Arlene.” I grasped at an irrelevant issue because I was stunned silly.

  “She served me once or twice when I came by Merlotte’s.”

  I figured out her access after five seconds’ more cogitation. “She knew where I hid my keys from when we were friends,” I said, infuriated by my own carelessness. “I guess before, or even after, she came to Merlotte’s, she let herself in here and got the scarf. But why?”

  “Someone told her to, I expect,” Alcide said, buckling his belt.