Deadlocked (33 page)

I nodded. He was lovely. Not bright; never that. But lovely.

“But he thinks there’s something wrong?”

“He’s noticed some strange things,” she said carefully. “None of the other guys could ever meet him for lunch, and they could never tell him what their day job was, and they seemed to pretty much live at the club.”

I didn’t know what to tell her. “I wonder how JB got hired,” I said, to fill in until I could think of a good way to warn her off Hooligans. I was sure the du Rones still needed extra money, though the twins had been able to leave the hospital at the regular time.

“How he got hired? He’d heard about Ladies Only night from the women at the gym, and they all told him he was built well enough to perform,” Tara said rather proudly. “So one day he went over to Hooligans on his lunch hour.” One of the babies started fussing, and Tara darted into their tiny room to emerge with Sara. Or Robbie. “If one starts crying, the other one will,” she whispered. She jiggled the baby gently, humming to the child. It was as if she’d been a mother for years, instead of a few days. When the little head rested on her chest, she murmured, “Anyway, your cousin Claude said since JB’d helped you recover from your ordeal—did he mean your car wreck?—that he’d give JB a job. Also …” She met my eyes briefly. “Remember, I met Claude when I was pregnant? He was the one who told me I’d have twins that day in the park? He told JB he understood a father has to provide for his children.”

It hadn’t been a car wreck I needed to recover from, but torture, of course. JB had helped me with physical therapy for weeks; I did remember telling Claude about that. Ha! Claude’s kindness to JB was a good thing to hear, especially at this point in time. But I knew what my cousin really was, and I knew he was scheming some terrible thing.

I left the little house after running a finger over the soft, soft baby cheek. “You’re so lucky,” I whispered to Tara.

“I tell myself that every day,” she said. “Every day.” In my friend’s head, I could see the kaleidoscope of miserable scenes that had composed her childhood: her alcoholic parents, the parade of drug users through her home, her own determination to rise above the shack, rise above the degradation and squalor. This small, neat house, these beautiful babies, a sober husband—this was heaven to Tara.

“Take care of yourself, Sookie,” she said, looking at me with some anxiety. She hadn’t been my friend this long for nothing.

“You just watch out for those young’uns. Don’t you worry about me. I’m doing okay.” I gave my friend the most convincing smile I could summon, and I let myself out of the house very quietly, easing the door shut.

I went to the drive-through at the bank to use the ATM, and then I drove to the newly opened law offices of Beth Osiecki and Jarrell Hilburn. There were those who would argue that Bon Temps was overburdened with lawyers, but all of them seemed to be busy and thriving, and since Sid Matt Lancaster, who’d had a huge practice, had recently passed away, all his clients needed new representation.

Why’d I picked the new kids on the block?

For that very reason: They were new, and I didn’t know them, and they didn’t know me. I wanted to start with a clean slate. I’d seen Hilburn before, for my transaction with Sam. Today I was seeing Osiecki, who specialized in estate planning. And since she was new, she’d agreed to see me on a Saturday.

A girl barely out of her teens was sitting at the receptionist’s desk in the tiny anteroom of the storefront office. Osiecki and Hilburn had rented the first floor of an old building right off the square. The electrical system would need overhauling, I was sure, but they’d painted and brought in good secondhand office furniture. Some potted plants made everything look a little nicer, and there wasn’t any canned music playing, which was a huge plus. The girl, who didn’t even have a name plaque, beamed at me and checked her appointment book, which had large white spaces.

“You must be Ms. Stackhouse,” she said.

“Yes. I have an appointment with Ms. Osiecki?” I sounded out the name.

“Oh-seek-ee,” she said very quietly, presumably so the owner of the name wouldn’t hear her correction.

I nodded, to show I’d gotten it now.

“I’ll see if she’s ready,” the girl said, leaping to her feet and making her way to the little corridor leading to the rest of the space. There was a door on the left and a door on the right, and after that the area seemed to widen into a common space. I could glimpse a big table and a bookcase full of heavy books, the kind of books I would never pick up to read.

I heard a brisk knock and a murmur, and then the teenager was back. “Ms. Osiecki will see you now,” she said, with an expansive sweep of her hand.

I went back to talk to Ms. Osiecki after taking a deep breath.

A woman of about thirty stood up from her broad desk. She had well-cut short red-streaked brown hair, blue eyes, and brown glasses. She was wearing a nice white blouse and a wildly flowered skirt and high-heeled sandals. She was smiling.

“I’m Beth Osiecki,” she said, in case I’d gotten lost between the reception area and her office.

“Sookie Stackhouse,” I said, shaking the outstretched hand.

She glanced down at the pad, and I could see she was going over the notes she’d scribbled the day before when I’d called her. She looked over at the big Scenic Louisiana poster by her desk. “Well,” she said, shooting me a quizzical look. “It really is a special day for you, isn’t it? It’s your birthday, and you’re going to make your will.”

I felt a little strange after I left the lawyers’ office. I guess there’s
nothing to make you think about your own demise like making your will. It’s also a literally do-or-die moment. When your will is read, it will be the last time people will hear your voice: the last expression of your will and your wishes, the last statement from your heart. It had been a strangely revelatory hour.

Beth Osiecki was going to put everything in legalese, and I had to come in day after tomorrow and sign it. Just in case, I told her, I’d like to sign a list of the points I’d made. The list was in my own handwriting. I asked her if that would make it legal.

“Sure,” she’d said. She’d smiled. I could tell that she was adding to her meager store of “strange client” stories, and that was okay with me.

When I left Beth Osiecki’s office, I was pretty proud of myself. I’d made a will.

I couldn’t quite figure out what to do next. It was three in the afternoon. I’d had a late breakfast, and a full lunch was out of the question. I didn’t need to go to the library; I had several library books I hadn’t read yet. I could go home and sunbathe, which was always a pleasant pastime, but then I’d sweat all over my good makeup and my clean hair. I was in danger of doing that now, standing here on the sidewalk. The sun was glaring down ferociously. I figured it was at least a hundred degrees. My cell phone rang as I hesitated to touch the handle of my car door.

“Hello?” I fished a tissue out of my purse and used it to cover my fingers as I opened the door. The heat rolled out.

“Sookie? How are you?”

“Quinn?” I couldn’t believe it. “I’m so glad to hear from you.”

“Happy birthday,” he said.

I could feel my lips curve up in an involuntary smile. “You remembered!” I said. “Thanks!” I was absurdly pleased. I hadn’t exactly thought Tara would be thinking about my birthday, since she’d just brought twins home from the hospital, but maybe I’d been a tiny bit flattened when she hadn’t mentioned it this morning.

“Hey, a birthday is an important day,” the weretiger said. I hadn’t seen him since Sam’s brother’s wedding. It was good to hear his deep voice.

“How are you?” I hesitated for a moment before adding, “How’s Tijgerin?” The last time I’d seen Quinn, he’d just met the beautiful and single and one-of-the-last-of-her-kind weretigress. I don’t think I have to draw you a picture.

“I’m … ah … going to be a father.”

Wow. “Way to go!” I said. “So you guys have moved in together? Where are you living?”

“That’s not exactly the way we do it, Sookie.”

“Um. Okay. What’s the tiger procedure?”

“Tiger men don’t bring up their young. Only the tiger mom.”

“Gosh, that seems kind of old-fashioned.” And kind of wrong.

“To me, too. But Tij’s real traditional. She says that when she has the baby, she’ll go into hiding until he’s weaned. Her mom told her that if it’s a boy I might see him as a threat.” I couldn’t read Quinn’s mind over the phone, but he sounded plenty exasperated and not a little resentful.

As far as I knew—and I’d done a little reading on tigers when I was Quinn’s girlfriend—only males who were not the actual dads were apt to kill tiger cubs. But since this was totally none of my business, I choked back the indignation I felt on Quinn’s behalf. At least, I tried to.

So she’d used him to get pregnant with a weretiger baby and now she didn’t want to see him anymore?

I told myself sternly,
Not my battle
. (Werewolves were much more modern in their thinking. Even werepanthers!)

Since my silence had lasted too long, I leaped in with both feet. “Well, I’m so happy that you’ll have a cub, since there aren’t many of you-all left. I guess your mama and your sister are excited?”

“Uh … well, my mom is pretty sick. She brightened up a lot when I told her, but it was just temporary. She’s back in that nursing home. Frannie found a guy, and she took off with him last month. I’m not really sure where she is.”

“Quinn, that’s so tough. I’m really sorry.”

“But I’m raining on your birthday, and I didn’t mean to. I really did call you to tell you to have a great day, Sookie. No one deserves it more.” He hesitated, and I could tell there were more words that he wanted to say. “Maybe you could call me sometime?” he asked. “Tell me what you ended up doing to celebrate?”

I tried to do some concentrated thinking in a very short time, but I just wasn’t up to figuring out all the cracks and crevices in this tentative overture. “Maybe,” I said. “I hope I do something worth talking about. So far, all I’ve done is make my will.”

There was a long moment of silence. “You’re kidding,” he said.

“You know I’m not.”

There was a serious silence.

“You need me to come?”

“Oh, gosh, no,” I said, putting a smile in my voice. “I’ve got the house, the car, a little money saved up. It just seemed like time.” I hoped I wasn’t lying. “Well, I gotta go, Quinn. I’m so glad you called. It made the day special for me.” I snapped the phone shut and dropped it into my purse.

I got in the slightly less-hot car and tried to think of somewhere fun to go, something fun to do. I’d picked up the newspaper and checked my mailbox on my way to town, and hadn’t pulled out anything but my auto insurance bill and a Wal-Mart ad leaflet.

I decided I was just hungry enough to treat myself to something special. I went to Dairy Queen and got an Oreo Blizzard. I ate it inside since it was way too hot to sit in the car. I said hello to a couple of people and had a brief chat with India, who came in with one of her little nieces in tow.

My cell phone rang again. Sam. “Sook,” he said, “can you come by the bar? We’re short a case of Heineken and two of Michelob, and I need to know what happened.” He sounded pretty snappish. Damn.

“It’s my day off.”

“Hey, you pretty much bought into the business. You gotta pull your share of the weight.”

I mouthed a very bad word at the phone. “Okay,” I said, sounding just as irritated as I felt. “I’m coming. But I’m not staying.”

I strode through the employee entrance as if I were on my way into a bullfight ring. The
hell
we were short three cases of beer. “Sam,” I called, “you in your office?”

“Yeah, come here,” he called back. “I think I found the problem.”

I flung open his office door and everybody in the world shrieked in my face. “Oh my God!” I said, shocked to the core.

After a throbbing moment, I understood that I was having a surprise birthday party.

JB was there, and Terry and his girlfriend, Jimmie. Sam, Hoyt and Holly, Jason and Michele, Halleigh Bellefleur, Danny and Kennedy. Even Jane Bodehouse.

“Tara had to stay with the babies,” JB said, handing me a little package.

Terry said, “We thought about giving you a puppy, but Jimmie said we better check with you first.” Jimmie winked at me over his shoulder.

Sam held me so tight I thought I’d quit breathing, and I thumped him on his shoulder. “You creep,” I said in his ear. “Missing cases of beer! I like that!”

“You should have heard your voice,” he said, laughing. “Jannalynn said to tell you she was sorry she couldn’t make it. She had to open at Hair of the Dog.”

Sure, I believed she was really unhappy at not being here. I turned away so Sam wouldn’t see my face.

Halleigh apologized for Andy’s absence, too; he was on duty. Danny and Kennedy gave me a kind of group hug, and Jane Bodehouse gave me a highly alcoholic kiss on the cheek. Michele held my hand for a moment and said, “I hope you have a wonderful year this year. Will you be my bridesmaid?” I grinned wide enough to split my face and told her I’d be proud to stand up with her. Jason wrapped one arm around me and handed me a beribboned box.

“I didn’t expect presents. I’m too old for a present party,” I protested.

“Never too old for presents,” Sam said.

My eyes were so full of tears I had a hard time unwrapping Jason’s gift. He’d given me a bracelet my grandmother used to wear, a little gold chain with pearls set at intervals. I was shocked to see it. “Where was this?” I asked.

“I was cleaning the pie-crust table I got out of the attic, and it was pushed way in the back of that shallow drawer, caught on a splinter,” he said. “All I could think of was Gran, and I knew you’d wear it.”

I let the tears run out, then. “That’s the sweetest thing,” I said. “The nicest thing you’ve ever done.”

“Here,” said Jane, as eagerly as a child. She put a little gift bag in my hand. I smiled and dug my hand in. Jane had given me five “get a free car wash” coupons from the place her son worked. I was able to thank her sincerely. “I’ll use every one,” I promised her.