Page 12 (1/2)

SAM CAME TO giveto arrest Jason as soon as he co soon" Sam didn’t tell me how he came to know this, and I didn’t ask

I stared at hiht have thought of how plain I look when I cry, but today was not a day I cared about htened for Jason, sad about A such a stupidht They think he got drunk after he killed her"

"Thanks, Sa o to work, now"

After Sam had seen that I needed to be alone, I called inforot the number of Blood in the Quarter I punched in the nu, but I couldn’t think hohy

"Blooooooodin the Quarter," announced a deep voice dra This is Sookie Stackhouse calling froe for Bill Co or hu"

"Just one minute, please"

The deep voice cae, ave me pause

"Please tell Mr Compton thatmy brother has been arrested, and I would appreciate it if he could come home as soon as his business is co "And your naht, e"

"Thanks"

And that was the only action I could think of to take, until I realized it would be much more practical to call Sid Matt Lancaster He did his best to sound appalled to hear Jason was going to be arrested, said he’d hurry over to the hospital as soon as he got out of court that afternoon, and that he’d report back to me

I drove back to the hospital to see if they’d let me sit with Jason until he became conscious They wouldn’t I wondered if he was already conscious, and they weren’t telling me I saw Andy Bellefleur at the other end of the hall, and he turned and walked the other way

Damn coward

I went ho to do I realized it wasn’t a workday for h I didn’t really care too much at that point It occurred to ht, that I had been much steadier when Gran had died

But that had been a finite situation We would bury Gran, her killer would be arrested, ould go on If the police seriously believed that Jason had killed Gran in addition to the other women, then the world was such a bad and chancy place that I wanted no part of it

But I realized, as I sat and looked in front ofafternoon, that it was naivete like that that had led to Jason’s arrest If I’d just gotten him into Sam’s trailer and cleaned him up, hidden the film until I found out what it contained, above all not called the a when he’d looked at me so doubtfully However, Arlene’s arrival had kind of wiped outas soon as people heard

But no one called

They didn’t knohat to say

Sid Matt Lancaster came about four-thirty

Without any preliree arding me with a shrewd expression on his nified his muddy brown eyes, and his jowls and sharp nose made him look a little like a bloodhound

"What does he say?" I asked

"He says that he ith Aether, that he had been with A ti jealous about the other wory So he was surprised when she approached hiht, like she had an agenda he didn’t know about He re in bed having a drink afterward, then he re until he woke up in the hospital"

"He was set up," I said fir I sounded exactly like a bad made-for-TV movie

"Of course" Sid Matt’s eyes were as steady and assured as if he’d been at Aht

Hell, maybe he had

"Listen, Sid Matt" I leaned forward and made him meet my eyes "Even if I could somehow believe that Jason had killed Amy, and Dawn, and Maudette, I could never believe he would raise his finger to hurt ht, then" Sid Matt prepared to hts, fair and square, his entire body proclaimed it "Miss Sookie, let’s just assume for a minute that Jason did have some kind of involveht think, your friend Bill Co you two apart"

I tried to give the appearance of considering this piece of idiocy "Well, Sid Matt,hiame face back on, I saw stark disbelief in the lawyer’s eyes He wouldn’t be at all happy if his daughter was seeing a va anything but appalled And he couldn’t iranduy asn’t even alive, and furthermore was over a hundred years older than hts

"Have you met Bill?" I asked

He was taken aback "No," he admitted "You know, Miss Sookie, I’ a chink out of a e should keep built up, a wall between us and the so-called virus-infected I think God intended that wall to be there, and I for one will hold up my section"

"The problem with that, Sid Matt, is that I personally was created straddling that wall" After a lifetiift," I found that if it would help Jason, I’d shake it in anybody’s face

"Well," Sid Matt said bravely, pushing his glasses up on the bridge of his sharp nose, "I aave you this problem I’ve heard about for a reason You have to learn how to use it for his glory"

No one had ever quite put it that way That was an idea to chew over when I had time

"I’ve made us stray from the subject, I’atheredbut circuht?"

"He’s adht before the murder, and the videotape, one of the cops hinted tosex with the victim The time and date on the film indicate it was made in the hours before her death, if not minutes"

Damn Jason’s peculiar bedroom preferences "Jason doesn’t drink much at all He smelled of liquor in the truck I think it was just spilled over hiave him some narcotic in the drink she fixed him"

"Why would she do that?"

"Because, like so many women, she was mad at Jason because she wanted him so much My brother is able to date al that euphemiso to bed with aluys would think" Weariness descended on"Now there he sits in the jail"

"You think another man did this to him? Framed hi to persuade this skeptical lawyer by the force of my own belief "Someone envious of him Someone who knows his schedule, who kills these women when Jason’s off work Soals Someone who knows he likes to make tapes"

"Could be almost anyone," Jason’s lawyer said practically

"Yep," I said sadly "Even if Jason was nice enough to keep quiet about exactly who he’d been with, all anyone’d have to do is see who he left a bar with at closing ti asked about the tapes on a visit to his house" My brother ht be somewhat immoral, but I didn’t think he’d show those videos to anyone else He h "So thisshe wasto play a practical joke on Jason or so"

"Your brother’s never been arrested before," Sid Matt observed

"No" Though it had been a near thing, a couple of ti member of the coet hi"

It truly had never occurred toabout arranging for bail, and I didn’t knohat I’d have to do, but I wanted Jason out of that jail Soone through before the trial souiltier

"You find out about it and let o see him?"

"He’d rather you didn’t," Sid Matt said

That hurt dreadfully "Why?" I asked, trying really hard not to tear up again

"He’s asha sha, suddenly tired of this unsatisfactory ?"

Sid Matt nodded, his jowls trehtly with thea cowboy hat on his head when he was still in sight

When it was full dark, I went out to check on Bubba He was sitting under a pin oak, bottles of blood lined up beside hiht, and though I knew Bubba was there, it was still a shock to see hi really had gone wrong when Bubba "calad I couldn’t read Bubba’s thoughts His eyes were crazy as hell

"Hey, sugar," he said, his Southern accent as thick as syrup "How you doing? You come to keep me company?"

"I just wanted to make sure you were comfortable," I said

"Well, I could think of places I’d be irl, I ain’t about to talk about them"

"Good," I said firhty tired of this bottled stuff"

"No cats I’o ho co the conversation, if you could call it that I wondered what thoughts Bubba had during his long watchful nights; I wondered if he re?" he called after me

"He went home," I called back over my shoulder

"Too bad," Bubba said to hiot ready for bed I watched television I ate so None of ht My brother was in jail, randmother was dead, and someone had murdered my cat I felt lonely and sorry for myself all the way around

Sometimes you just have to roll in it

Bill didn’t return my call

That added fuel to the fla whore in New Orleans, or so around Blood in the Quarter every night, hoping for a vaotten drunk If I’d been a casual woman, I would have called lovely JB du Rone and had sex with hi so dramatic or drastic, so I just ate ice cream and watched old movies on TV By an eerie coincidence, Blue Haas on

I finally went to bed about ht

A shriek outside ht in bed I heard thumps, and thuds, and finally a voice I was sure was Bubba’s shouting, "Co in a couple of minutes, I pulled on a bathrobe and went to the front door The yard, lit by the security light, was elimpsed movement to the left, and when I stuckback to his hideout

"What happened?" I called softly

Bubba changed direction and slouched over to the porch

"Sure enough, so around the house," Bubba said His brown eyes were glowing, and he looked ot here, and I thought I’d catch ahold of hih the woods to the road, and he had a truck parked there"

"Did you get a look?"

"Not enough of one to describe hi a pickup, but I couldn’t even tell what color it was Dark"

"You saved ratitude showed in ed my protection Even Bubba looked better than he had before "Thanks, Bubba"

"Aw, think nothing of it," he said graciously, and for that ht, kind of tossed his head back, had that sleepy smile on his face it was him, and I’d openedcame back to shut my mouth

JASON MADE BAIL the next day

It cost a fortune I signed what Sid Matt told h mostly the collateral was Jason’s house and truck and his fishing boat If Jason had ever been arrested before, even for jaywalking, I don’t think he would have been per on the courthouse steps wearing my horrible, sober, navy blue suit in the heat of the lateSweat trickled down my face and ran between o jump in the shower Jason stopped in front of me I hadn’t been sure he would speak His face was years older Real trouble had coo away or ease up, like grief did

"I can’t talk to you about this," he said, so softly I could barely hear him "You knoasn’t ht or two in a parking lot over some woman"

I touched his shoulder, let ht it was you I never will I’h to call 911 yesterday If I’d realized that wasn’t your blood, I’d have taken you into Sam’s trailer and cleaned you up and burned the tape I was just so scared that was your blood" And I felt htened up all over, feeling sty In it bubbled an unhealthy brew co uilt that he didn’t feel worse about A killed, horror that anyone in the toould think he’d killed his own grandet through this," I said helplessly

"We’ll get through this," he repeated, trying to ht it would be awhile, a long while, before Jason’s assurance, that golden certainty that had made him irresistible, returned to his posture and his face and his speech

Maybe it never would

We parted there, at the courthouse We had nothingat thetheirof how he’d killed four wootten aith it so far At lunchtime Hoyt and Rene walked in the door and walked back out when they saw uess

Finally, Sa away any custoed out the door and into the glaring sun It was about to set I thought about Bubba, about Bill, about all those creatures that were co out of their deep sleep to walk the surface of the earth

I stopped at the Grabbit Kwik to buy so cereal The new clerk was a kid with pierly as if he was trying to make a print in his head of how I looked, the sister of a murderer I could tell he could hardly wait for irlfriend He ishing he could see the punctureif there was any way he could find out how vampires did it

This was the kind of trash I had to listen to, day in, day out Noelse, no uard, how broad I kept h

I reached ho away theoff my suit, I put on a pair of shorts and a black Garth Brooks T-shirt and tried to think of soh to read; and I needed to go to the library and change my books anyhich would be a real ordeal under the circuht I ain: Mel Gibson in a kilt is always a mood raiser But it was just too bloody for et her throat cut again, even though I knehen to cover one into the bathroom to wash offwater, I thought I heard a yowl outside

I turned the faucets off I stood still, al so intently What? Water from my wet face trickled onto my T-shirt

No sound No sound at all

I crept toward the front door because it was closest to Bubba’s watch point in the woods

I opened the door a little I yelled, "Bubba?"

No answer

I tried again

It see their breaths The night was so silent itout there, in the darkness

I tried to think, butso hard it interfered with the process

Call the police, first

I found that was not an option The phone was dead

So I could either wait in this house for trouble to coh one I bit intoout the la to map out a course of action The house provided some protection: locks, walls, nooks, and crannies But I knew any really deteret in, and then I would be trapped

Okay How could I get outside without being seen? I turned off the outside lights, for a start The back door was closer to the woods, so that was the better choice I knew the woods pretty well I should be able to hide in theo over to Bill’s house, , and I had a key

Or I could try to get to my car and start it But that pinned me down to a particular place for particular seconds

No, the woods seemed the better choice to me

In one of randfather’s that Gran had kept in the living-rooes I tucked a tiny flashlight in the other pocket Gran kept an old rifle in the coat closet by the front door It had been my dad’s when he was little, and shesnakes; well, I had ht of using it, but now seemed to be the time

It wasn’t there

I could hardly believe h the closet

He’d been in my house!

But it hadn’t been broken into

Someone I’d invited in Who’d been here? I tried to list them all as I went to the back door, my sneakers retied so they wouldn’t have any spare shoelaces to step on I skinned my hair into a ponytail sloppily, alet in my face, and twisted a rubber band around it But all the tiht about the stolen rifle

Who’d been in my house? Bill, Jason, Arlene, Rene, the kids, Andy Bellefleur, Sam, Sid Matt; I was sure I’d left theh to stick the rifle outside to retrieve later

Then I remembered the day of the funeral Almost everyone I knew had been in and out of the house when Gran had died, and I couldn’t remember if I’d seen the rifle since then But it would have been hard to have casually strolled out of the crowded, busy house with a rifle And if it had vanished then, I thought I would have noticed its absence by now In fact, I was almost sure I would have

I had to shove that aside now and concentrate on outwitting whatever was out there in the dark

I opened the back door I duckwalked out, keeping as low as I could, and gently eased the door nearly shut behindand tapped the ground while squatting on the porch; I shifted ain This was a lot like playing hide and seek with Jason in the woods ere kids

I prayed I was not playing hide and seek with Jason again

I used the tub full of flowers that Gran had planted as cover first, then I crept to her car, oal I looked up in the sky The ht was clear the stars were out The air was heavy with humidity, and it was still hot My arms were slick with sweat in minutes

Next step, from the car to the mimosa tree

I wasn’t as quiet this tiround hard I bit the inside ofand hip, and I knew the edges of the ragged stuh pretty severely Why hadn’t I come out and sawed that stump off clean? Gran had asked Jason to do it, but he’d never found the ti caution to the winds, I leaped up and dashed for the trees Soht and headed for , and in a vault that amazed me, I’d seized the low branch of our favorite childhood cli tree and pulled myself up If I lived until the next day, I’d have severely strained muscles, but it would be worth it I balanced on the branch, trying to keepdrea

I wished this were a dream Yet here I undeniably was, Sookie Stackhouse, waitress andon a branch in the woods in the dead of night, ar lided through the woods He had a length of cord hanging froh the moon was almost full, his head stayed stubbornly in the shadow of the tree, and I couldn’t tell who it was He passed underneath without seeing ain As quietly as I could, I scrah the woods to the road It would take awhile, but if I could get to the road ht of how seldoht be better to work ht of the ce foreven more scared was pointless I had to concentrate on the here and noatched every foot placerowth, and he’d be on me in a minute

I found the dead cat about ten yards south east ofwound I couldn’t even tell what color its fur had been in the bleaching effect of the ht, but the dark splotches around the little corpse were surely blood After five more feet of stealthy movement, I found Bubba He was unconscious or dead With a vampire it was hard to tell the difference But with no stake through his heart, and his head still on, I could hope he was only unconscious

Soured Socats

I heard a crackle behind lided into the shadow of the nearest large tree I was ht

I ht not have the rifle, but I had a built-in tool I closed le, red, black Hate

I flinched But this was necessary, this was my only protection I let down every shred of defense

Into es thatsoot one of her hose in his hand, was stretching it between his fingers, preparing to tighten it around her neck A flash of Maudette, naked and begging A woman I’d never seen, her bare back to rand for her life

I was paralyzed by the shock of it, the horror of it Whose thoughts were these? I had an i room floor; I saw myself, and I didn’t look like the person I saw in e holes inleer on estively

I was in the mind of Rene Lenier This was how Rene saw me

Rene was mad

Now I knehy I’d never been able to read his thoughts explicitly; he kept them in a secret hole, a place in his mind he kept hidden and separate fro an outline behind a tree now and wondering if it looked like the outline of a wo me

I bolted and ran west toward the cemetery I couldn’t listen to his head any, dodging the obstacles of trees, bushes, fallen lis pu of a bagpipe

I broke from the woods and was in the ceraveyard was farther north toward Bill’s house, and it had the best places of concealment I bounded over headstones, the ood for hiding I leaped over Gran’s grave, the earth still raw, no stone yet Her killer followed me I turned to look, to see how close he was, like a fool, and in the ained on entle bowl the ce up the other side When I thought there were enough large headstones and statues between ranite colu ainst the cold hardness of the stone I cla effort to get air in h to try to listen to Rene; but his thoughts were not even coherent enough to decipher, except the rage he felt Then a clear concept presented itself

"Your sister," I yelled "Is Cindy still alive, Rene?"

"Bitch!" he screamed, and I knew in that second that the first woman to die had been Rene’s sister, the one who liked va fro to Arlene Rene had killed Cindy, his waitress sister, while she was still wearing her pink-and-white hospital cafeteria unifors And he’d had sex with her, after she was dead She’d sunk so low, she wouldn’t ht, asAnyone who’d let a vampire do that deserved to die And he’d hidden her body from shame The others weren’t his flesh and blood; it had been all right to let theotten sucked down into Rene’s sick interior like a twig dragged down by a whirlpool, and it er When I came back into my own head, he was on me He hit o down The blow broke my nose and hurt so bad I almost blanked out, but I didn’t collapse I hit him back My lack of experience made runted, but in the next instant he retaliated

His fist broke my collarbone But I didn’t fall

He hadn’t kno strong I was In the ht back, and I thanked the varand hiranite colurip my forearrip Finally he succeeded, but I could tell frouard I tried to knee hih away to dodge round with a teeth-chattering thud

Then he was straddling le, and while he heldwith the other for his ht arm was pinned, but nore this, had to look for the strangling cord because that was part of his ritual My scrabbling hand encountered a fa his knife on his belt I yanked the snap open and pulled the knife fro, "I should have taken that off," I sank the knife into the soft flesh of his waist, angling up And I pulled it out

He screa his upper torso sideways, trying with both hands to stanch the blood that was pouring fro to put distance between myself and man as a monster just as surely as Bill was

Rene screamed "Aw, Jesus, woman! What you done to me? Oh, God, it hurts!"

That was rich

He was scared now, frightened of discovery, of an end to his gaeance

"Girls like you deserve to die," he snarled "I can feel you in my head, you freak!"