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The pond behind Jason&039;s house had already been searched by the ti Alcee Beck pounded on my door about ten o&039;clock, and since it sounded exactly like a law, I pulled on my jeans and a sweatshirt before I went to the door

"He&039;s not in the pond," Beck said, without preaainst the doorway "Oh, thank God" I closed my eyes for a minute to do just that "Please come in" Alcee Beck stepped over the threshold like a va around him silently and with a certain wariness

"Would you like some coffee?" I asked politely, when he was seated on the old couch

"No, thank you," he said stiffly, as uncomfortable withon the doorknob of my bedroo Lots of women wear men&039;s shirts, and I told h I tried not to listen to the detective&039;salone in the house of a white woet there

"Excuse me for a minute," I said, before I yielded to temptation and asked him why Andy was due to arrive That would shake Alcee Beck to the core I grabbed the shirt as I went into my room, folded it, and tucked it in a drawer before I brushed my teeth and washedroom, Andy had made his appearance Jason&039;s boss, Catfish Hennessey, ith hiby the couch

"What?" I said I couldn&039;t have uttered another word

"The blood on the dock is probably feline blood, and there&039;s a print in it, besides Jason&039;s boot print," said Andy "We&039;ve kept this quiet, because we didn&039;t want those woods crawling with idiots" I could feel hed, if I hadn&039;t had the "gift" of telepathy He wasn&039;t thinking tabby or calico when he said feline; he was thinking panther

Panthers e called mountain lions Sure, there aren&039;t mountains around here, but panthers - the oldest men hereabouts called them "painters" - live in low bottoe, the only place panthers could be found in the as in Florida, and their nu to the brink of extinction No solid evidence had been produced to prove that any live native panthers had been living in Louisiana in the past fifty years, give or take a decade

But of course, there were stories And our wo

ods and streaators, nutria, possums, coons, and even the occasional black bear or wildcat Coyotes, too But there were no pictures, or scat, or print casts, to prove the presence of panthers until now

Andy Bellefleur&039;s eyes were hot with longing, but not for , or even any PC guy who photographed nature, would give al to see a real wild panther Despite the fact that these large predators were deeply anxious to avoid humans, hu?" I asked, though I knew da But to keep them on an even keel, I had to pretend not to; they&039;d feel better, and theythat Jason was aze, but Catfish, who knew e of Gran&039;s old recliner, his big red hands clasped to each other so hard the knuckles hite

"Maybe Jason spotted the panther when he caht," Andy said carefully "You know he&039;d run and get his rifle and try to track it"

"They&039;re endangered," I said "You think Jason doesn&039;t know that panthers are endangered?" Of course, they thought Jason was so impulsive and brainless that he just wouldn&039;t care

"Are you sure that would be at the top of his list?" Alcee Beck asked, with an atteentleness

"So you think Jason shot the panther," I said, having a little difficulty getting the words out of my mouth

"It&039;s a possibility"

"And then what?" I crossed lance "Maybe Jason followed the panther into the woods," Andy said "Maybe the panther wasn&039;t so badly wounded after all, and it got hierous aniht, by himself" Sure they did I could read it loud and clear They thought that would be absolutely typical Jason Stackhouse behavior What they didn&039;t get was that (reckless and wild as my brother was) Jason&039;s favorite person in the entire universe was Jason Stackhouse, and he would not endanger that person in such an obvious way

Andy Bellefleur had sos about this theory, but Alcee Beck sure didn&039;t He thought I&039;d outlined Jason&039;s procedure that night exactly What the tmen didn&039;t know, and what I couldn&039;t tell theht, the chances were good the panther was actually a shape-shifting huathered soer shifters into their fold? A panther would be a valuable ani a hostile takeover

"Jay Stans, fro," Andy said His round face turned towardht"

I nodded, not seeing the connection, and too preoccupied with speculation about the panther to guess as coirl have any connection to Jason?"

"What?" I was stunned "What are you talking about?"

"You find this girl, this Maria-Star Cooper, by the side of the road They searched, but they didn&039;t find any trace of an accident"

I shrugged "I told them I wasn&039;t sure I could pin the spot down, and they didn&039;t ask , after I offered I&039;m not real surprised they couldn&039;t find any evidence, not knowing the exact spot I tried to pin it down, but it was at night, and I was pretty scared Or she could have just been dumped where I found her" I don&039;t watch the Discovery Channel for nothing

"See, ere thinking," Alcee Beck ruirl was one of Jason&039;s discards, and o when Jason disappeared"

"Huh?" It was like they were speaking Urdu or so I couldn&039;tarrested under suspicion of those murders last year and all, ondered if there wasn&039;t some fire under all that ss He&039;s in jail, unless so&039;s happened that I don&039;t know about And he confessed" Catfish methad my brother&039;s boss all twitchy Granted, h none of the women he&039;d kinked with see a sex slave that I had to deal hen he vanished? Oh, come on!

"He did confess, and he&039;s still in jail," Andy said Since Andy had taken the confession, I should hope so "But what if Jason was his accoinning to boil over "You can&039;t have it both ways Ifa , what&039;s her na I&039;ve been in on e activities, too? You think I hit her with ency rooout waves of tension and confusion like they were necklaces at Mardi Gras

Then Catfish launched himself off the couch like a bottle rocket "No," he bellowed "You guys askedto break this bad news about the panther to Sookie No one said anything about this stuff about soirl" Catfish pointed atto call her different! Not only did Jason Stackhouse never have to do irl for her to coe and do weird stuff to her, but if you&039;re saying Sookie let this Cooper girl free when Jason didn&039;t coot to say is, you can go straight to hell!"

God bless Catfish Hennessey is all I had to say

Alcee and Andy left soon after, and Catfish and I had a disjointed talk consisting lanced at his watch

"Coet to Jason&039;s"

"Why?" I illing but bewildered

"We got us a search party together, and I know you&039;ll want to be there"

I stared at him with my mouth open, while Catfish fuations I tried real hard to think of some way to cancel a search party I hated to think of those h the underbrush, now bare and brown, that ate But there was no way to stop them, when they meant so well; and there was every reason to join them

There was the remote chance that Jason was out there in the woods soether as reed to be the coordinator, though off-duty Maxine Fortenberry and her churchwohnuts fro, because this was just overwhel wos thathiether, washed my face clean of tears, and yanked my hair back into a ponytail I found a pair of ear-muffs that I used maybe once a year, and pulled onwith a wad of Kleenex in case I got weepy again

The search party was the popular activity for the day in Bon Temps Not only do people like to help in our s about the mysterious wild animal footprint As far as I could tell, the word "panther" was not yet currency; if it had been, the croould have been even larger Most of the men had come armed - well, actually,is a way of life around here, the NRA provides most of the bumper stickers, and deer season is like a holy holiday There are special ti deer with a bow and arroith a muzzleloader, or with a rifle (There may be a spear season, for all I know) There must have been fifty people at Jason&039;s house, quite a party on a workday for such a slad to see hiain Sam was the best boss I&039;d ever had, and a friend, and he always caold hair was covered with a bright orange knit cap, and he wore bright orange gloves, too His heavy brown jacket looked so work boots You didn&039;t go out in the woods, even in winter, with ankles unprotected Snakes were slow and sluggish, but they were there, and they&039;d retaliate if you stepped on them

Somehow the presence of all these peopleIf all these people believed Jason ht be Despite every sensible thing I could tell rewout on the scene entirely while I is that could have happened to Jason, forbeside love, and his hand found lad to be holding on to hihts at h he couldn&039;t "hear" mine in return Do you really believe he&039;s out there? he asked me

I shook my head Our eyes met and held

Do you think he&039;s still alive?

That was a lot harder Finally, I just shrugged He kept hold of lad of it

Arlene and Tack scrambled out of Arlene&039;s car and caht red as ever, but quite a bit more snarled than she usually wore it, and the short-order cook needed to shave So he hadn&039;t started keeping a razor at Arlene&039;s yet, was the way I read it

"Did you see Tara?" Arlene asked

"No"

"Look" She pointed, as surreptitiously as you can, and I saw Tara in jeans and rubber boots that carooh she earing an adorable fake-fur hat of white and brown that o up and stroke her head Her coat loves But from the waist down, Tara was ready for the woods Jason&039;s friend Dago was staring at Tara with the stunned look of the newly smitten Holly and Danielle had come, too, and since Danielle&039;s boyfriend wasn&039;t around, the search party was turning out to have an unexpected social side

Maxine Fortenberry and two other woate of Maxine&039;s husband&039;s old pickup, and there were several ther with disposable cups, plastic spoons, and packages of sugar Six dozen doughnuts steae plastic trash can, already lined with a black bag, stood ready Theses ladies kne to throw a search party

I couldn&039;t believe all this had been organized in the space of a few hours I had to take my hand from Sam&039;s to fish out a tissue and mop my face with it I would have expected Arlene to come, but the presence of Holly and Danielle was just about stunning, and Tara&039;s attendance was evenShe wasn&039;t a search-the-woods kind of woman Kevin Pryor didn&039;t have much use for Jason, but here he ith a ht Holly&039;s eye, and she gave ave soed the plastic trash can lid against the tailgate of the truck, and when everyone&039;s attention was on hiive directions for the search I hadn&039;t realized Kevin could be so authoritative; on y mother, Jeneen, or his oversized partner, Kenya You wouldn&039;t catch Kenya out in the woods looking for Jason, I reflected, and just then I spotted her and had to s ainst the Fortenberrys&039; pickup, her brown face absolutely expressionless Her stance suggested that she was Kevin&039;s enforcer - that she&039;d ed in soive her that She would throw a bucket of water on Jason if he were on fire, but her feelings for ly positive She&039;d co As Kevin divided people up into teams, her dark eyes left hi ave her the saroup of five has to have a rifleman," Kevin called "That can&039;t be just anybody It has to be so" The excite point with this directive But after that, I didn&039;t listen to the rest of Kevin&039;s instructions I was still tired fro; what an exceptionally full day it had been And the whole ti and eating at ht, and here I was standing in the cold outside oose chase - or at least I hoped it was a wild goose chase I was too dazed to judge anyaround the house,the tears on h in our coats it was quite aard It seeh all the material

"You knoon&039;t find him out there," he whispered toanything but certain

Sam said, "I&039;ll smell him if he&039;s out there"

That was so practical

I looked up at him I didn&039;t have to look far, because Saht now, his face was very serious Sam has more fun with his shifter self than most of the two-natured, but I could tell he was intent on easing &039;s keen sense of smell; when he was in his human form, that sense was still superior to that of a one-natured man Sam would be able to s out in the woods," I said

"Sure I&039;ll do my best If he&039;s there, I think I&039;ll know"