Dead Until Dark (Sookie Stackhouse #1)(8)

“I hope the sheriff doesn’t want to talk to you,” Gran said, shaking her head as if indicating “no” would make it less likely.

“What?” Jason was turning red, looking defensive.

“You see Maudette in the store all the time when you get your gas, you so-to-speak date her, then she winds up dead in an apartment you’re familiar with,” I summarized. It wasn’t much, but it was something, and there were so few mysterious homicides in Bon Temps that I thought every stone would be turned in its investigation.

“I ain’t the only one who fills the bill. Plenty of other guys get their gas there, and all of them know Maudette.”

“Yeah, but in what sense?” Gran asked bluntly. “She wasn’t a prostitute, was she? So she will have talked about who she saw.”

“She just liked to have a good time, she wasn’t a pro.” It was good of Jason to defend Maudette, considering what I knew of his selfish character. I began to think a little better of my big brother. “She was kinda lonely, I guess,” he added.

Jason looked at both of us, then, and saw we were surprised and touched.

“Speaking of prostitutes,” he said hastily, “there’s one in Monroe specializes in vampires. She keeps a guy standing by with a stake in case one gets carried away. She drinks synthetic blood to keep her blood supply up.”

That was a pretty definite change of subject, so Gran and I tried to think of a question we could ask without being indecent.

“Wonder how much she charges?” I ventured, and when Jason told us the figure he’d heard, we both gasped.

Once we got off the topic of Maudette’s murder, lunch went about as usual, with Jason looking at his watch and exclaiming that he had to leave just when it was time to do the dishes.

But Gran’s mind was still running on vampires, I found out. She came into my room later, when I was putting on my makeup to go to work.

“How old you reckon the vampire is, the one you met?”

“I have no idea, Gran.” I was putting on my mascara, looking wide-eyed and trying to hold still so I wouldn’t poke myself in the eye, so my voice came out funny, as if I was trying out for a horror movie.

“Do you suppose . . . he might remember the War?”

I didn’t need to ask which war. After all, Gran was a charter member of the Descendants of the Glorious Dead.

“Could be,” I said, turning my face from side to side to make sure my blush was even.

“You think he might come to talk to us about it? We could have a special meeting.”

“At night,” I reminded her.

“Oh. Yes, it’d have to be.” The Descendants usually met at noon at the library and brought a bag lunch.

I thought about it. It would be plain rude to suggest to the vampire that he ought to speak to Gran’s club because I’d saved his blood from Drainers, but maybe he would offer if I gave a little hint? I didn’t like to, but I’d do it for Gran. “I’ll ask him the next time he comes in,” I promised.

“At least he could come talk to me and maybe I could tape his recollections?” Gran said. I could hear her mind clicking as she thought of what a coup that would be for her. “It would be so interesting to the other club members,” she said piously.

I stifled an impulse to laugh. “I’ll suggest it to him,” I said. “We’ll see.”

When I left, Gran was clearly counting her chickens.



I HADN’T THOUGHT of Rene Lenier going to Sam with the story of the parking lot fight. Rene’d been a busy bee, though. When I got to work that afternoon, I assumed the agitation I felt in the air was due to Maudette’s murder. I found out different.

Sam hustled me into the storeroom the minute I came in. He was hopping with anger. He reamed me up one side and down the other.

Sam had never been mad with me before, and soon I was on the edge of tears.

“And if you think a customer isn’t safe, you tell me, and I’ll deal with it, not you,” he was saying for the sixth time, when I finally realized that Sam had been scared for me.

I caught that rolling off him before I clamped down firmly on “hearing” Sam. Listening in to your boss led to disaster.

It had never occurred to me to ask Sam—or anyone else—for help.

“And if you think someone is being harmed in our parking lot, your next move is to call the police, not step out there yourself like a vigilante,” Sam huffed. His fair complection, always ruddy, was redder than ever, and his wiry golden hair looked as if he hadn’t combed it.

“Okay,” I said, trying to keep my voice even and my eyes wide open so the tears wouldn’t roll out. “Are you gonna fire me?”

“No! No!” he exclaimed, apparently even angrier. “I don’t want to lose you!” He gripped my shoulders and gave me a little shake. Then he stood looking at me with wide, crackling blue eyes, and I felt a surge of heat rushing out from him. Touching accelerates my disability, makes it imperative that I hear the person touching. I stared right into his eyes for a long moment, then I remembered myself, and I jumped back as his hands dropped away.

I whirled and left the storeroom, spooked.

I’d learned a couple of disconcerting things. Sam desired me; and I couldn’t hear his thoughts as clearly as I could other people’s. I’d had waves of impressions of how he was feeling, but not thoughts. More like wearing a mood ring than getting a fax.