He lifted me and carried me out of the bedroom like I was a baby. It didn’t feel like the times when Eric had carried me, which had had a definitely carnal edge. This was incredibly tender and (like a lot of things about my great-grandfather) incredibly creepy.
He put me on the couch as careful y as if I were an egg. “This is what happens next,” he told me. He turned to the other fae, stil on their knees.
Claude had stopped thrashing and was looking up at Nial with resignation. For the moment, Nial ignored his grandson.
“Do you al want to go home?” he asked the others.
“Yes, Prince,” said Dirk. “Please, with our kindred waiting at Claude’s club? If we may? If you wil .”
Dermot said, “With your blessing, I’l stay here, Father.”
For a moment they al looked at Dermot incredulously, as if he’d just announced he was going to birth a kangaroo.
Nial folded Dermot to him. I could see Dermot’s face, and it was ecstatic, frightened, everything I had felt in Nial ’s embrace. Nial said, “You won’t be a fairy anymore. The American fae are al leaving. Choose.”
The conflict on Dermot’s face was painful to see. “Sookie,” he said, “who can finish your upstairs work?”
“I’l hire Terry Bel efleur,” I said. “He won’t be as good as you, Dermot.”
“No television,” Dermot said. “I’l miss HGTV.” Then he smiled. “But I can’t live without my essence, and I am your son, Nial .”
Nial beamed down at Dermot, which was what Dermot had wanted his whole life.
I got up because I couldn’t stand to have him leave without a hug. I even started crying, which I hadn’t expected. They al kissed me, even Bel enos, though I felt his teeth scrape lightly on my cheek, and I felt his chest move in a silent chuckle.
Nial made some mysterious signs over my head and closed his eyes, just like a priest giving a blessing. I felt something change in the house, the land.
And then they were gone. Even Claude.
I was stupefied. I was wil ing to bet that over at Hooligans, the bar stood empty, the doors locked.
The fae were gone from America. Their departure point? Bon Temps, Louisiana. The woods behind my house.
Chapter 16
As you can imagine, it wasn’t easy to go on and have a normal day after that.
I hadn’t slept al night, and the traumas had just kept on coming.
But after I showered and straightened up the living room, which had suffered a bit during the fight, I found myself sitting at the kitchen table trying to absorb everything: last night, this morning.
It was taking a lot of energy to do that. About halfway through setting my mental house in order, I had to think about something else. Luckily, there was something right in front of me that would serve.
Among the presents I’d tossed to the table last night was Pam’s little box, Bil ’s box, and Sam’s envelope, which I’d never examined. Pam had given me perfume, and I liked the smel of it very much. Bil had given me a necklace with a cameo pendant. The likeness on it was my gran’s. “Oh, Bil ,” I said, “you did great!” Nothing could top such a gift, I thought, as I reached for Sam’s envelope. I figured he’d picked a fancy birthday card—
with, maybe, a gift certificate enclosed.
Sam had official y made me a partner in the bar. I legal y owned a third of Merlotte’s.
I put my head on the table and swore. In a happy way.
This past twenty-four hours had been my personal trail of tears. No more!
I picked myself up out of that chair, slapped on about a ton of makeup and a sundress, and put a smile on my face. It was time to rejoin the land of the living, the everyday world. I didn’t want to learn one more secret or suffer one more betrayal.
I was due to meet Kennedy for breakfast at LaLaurie’s, which (she’d told me) served a great Sunday brunch. I didn’t think I’d ever eaten a meal and cal ed it “brunch.” Today I did, and it was real y excel ent. White tablecloths and cloth napkins, too! Kennedy was wearing a pretty sundress, too, and her hair was in ful pageant mode. The hickey on her neck was not quite covered by her makeup.
Kennedy was in an excel ent mood, and she confided in me way more than I wanted to know about the wonderfulness that now lay between Danny and her. Danny was even now running errands for Bil Compton since he didn’t have to work at the lumberyard, which was closed on Sunday.
It was going to work out. He’d be making a living wage. When their finances stabilized, maybe they would move in together. “Maybe,” she emphasized, but I wasn’t fooled. Their cohabitation was a done deal.
I thought of my happy fantasies of the night before; had it real y just been the night before? I tried to remember al the happy endings I’d imagined for everyone, and I tried to recol ect if I’d included Danny and Kennedy in the roundup.
After I left LaLaurie’s, ful and happy, I knew I couldn’t wait any longer to thank Sam for his amazing gift. His truck was parked in front of his trailer.
His careful y watered hedge and yard were flourishing despite the heat. Not many men would try to keep a yard around their double-wide if it was parked behind a bar. I’d always tried to let Sam’s house be his house. I could count on my fingers the times I’d knocked on his door.
Today was one of them.
When he answered the door, my smile faded away. I could tel something was mighty wrong.
Then I realized that he knew what Jannalynn had done.
He looked at me bleakly. “I don’t know what to say to you,” he said. “This is the second time I’ve been with a woman who tried to do you harm.”
It actual y took me a second to remember who the other one had been. “Cal isto? Oh, Sam, that was a while ago, and she was hardly a woman.
She didn’t mean any of it personal. Jannalynn, wel , she definitely did. But she’s an ambitious young woman; she’s trying …” My voice trailed off.
She’s trying to take over the pack from her packmaster, to whom she swore loyalty. She’s trying to make sure my boyfriend gets arrested for murder. She conspired with a fairy to pay Kym Rowe to go to her death. She kidnapped Warren. She left him to die. She was trying to kill me, one way or another.
“Okay,” I said, conceding defeat. “You fucked up with Jannalynn.”
He blinked at me. His reddish-blond hair was standing up like porcupine quil s al over his head. He tilted his head to one side as if he wasn’t sure I was quite in focus.
His mouth quirked up in an unwil ing grin. I grinned back. Then we both laughed. Not a lot, but enough to clear the air.
“Where is she?” I asked. “Do you know what happened night before last?”
“Tel me,” he said, standing aside so I could come in.
Sam had heard a sketchy version from a pack member who’d become a friend of his, a young man who worked for Jannalynn at Hair of the Dog.
“You didn’t tel me what you suspected about her,” Sam said. He left that sitting there between us.
“Sam, let me tel you about what’s happened the last couple of days, and you’l understand, I promise,” I said, and with a certain amount of editing, I told him.
“Good God, Sookie,” he said. “You real y know how to have a birthday, huh?”
“The best part of my birthday was my present from you,” I said, and I took his hand.
Sam turned red. “Aw, Sook. You earned it. You deserve it. And look, I didn’t make you equal partner, did I?”
“Trying to make your gift look like less won’t work for me,” I said. I kissed him on the cheek and got up, to make the moment lighten so Sam would be more comfortable. “I got to get home,” I said, though I couldn’t imagine what for.
“See you tomorrow.”
It would be a lot sooner than that.
I felt curiously blank on the drive home to my empty house.