Шарлин Харрис - From Dead To Worse

"Are you all right with all this?" I waved a hand toward the spot where Niall had been standing. Probably. Unless what we'd seen had been some astral projection or something.

"It's not my place to be okay with it. It's your thing," Sam said.

"I want to love him," I said. "He's so beautiful and he seems to care so much, but he's really, really..."

"Scary," Sam finished.

"Yeah."

"And he approached you through Eric?"

Since apparently my great-grandfather thought it was okay if Sam knew about him, I told Sam about my first meeting with Niall.

"Hmmm. Well, I don't know what to make of that. Vampires and fairies don't interact, because of the vampire tendency to eat fairies."

"Niall can mask his scent," I explained proudly.

Sam looked overloaded with information. "That's another thing I've never heard of. I hope Jason doesn't know about this?"

"Oh, God, no."

"You know he'd be jealous and that would make him mad at you."

"Since I know Niall and he doesn't?"

"Yep. Envy would just eat Jason up."

"I know Jason's not the world's most generous person," I began, to be cut off when Sam snorted. "Okay," I said, "he's selfish. But he's still my brother anyway, and I have to stick by him. But maybe it's better if I never tell him. Still, Niall didn't have any problem showing himself to you , after telling me to keep him a secret."

"I'm guessing he did some checking up," Sam said mildly. He hugged me, which was a welcome surprise. I felt like I needed a hug after Niall's drop-in. I hugged Sam back. He felt warm, and comforting, and human.

But neither of us was 100 percent human.

In the next instant, I thought, We are, too. We had more in common with humans than with the other part of us. We lived like humans; we would die like humans. Since I knew Sam pretty well, I knew he wanted a family and someone to love and a future that contained all the things plain humans want: prosperity, good health, descendants, laughter. Sam didn't want to be a leader of any pack, and I didn't want to be princess of anybody—not that any pureblood fairy would ever think I was anything other than a lowly by-product of their own wonder-fulness. That was one of the big differences between Jason and me. Jason would spend his life wishing he was more supernatural than he was; I had spent mine wishing I was less, if my telepathy was indeed supernatural.

Sam kissed me on the cheek, and then after a moment's hesitation, he turned to go into his trailer, walking through the gate in the carefully trimmed hedge and up the steps to the little deck he'd built outside his door. When he'd inserted the key, he turned to smile at me.

"Some night, huh?"

"Yeah," I said. "Some night."

Sam watched while I got in my car, made a pressing gesture to remind me to lock my car doors, waited while I complied, and then went into his trailer. I drove home preoccupied with deep questions and shallow ones, and it was lucky there wasn't any traffic on the road.

Amelia and Octavia were sitting at the kitchen table the next day when I shambled out. Amelia had used up all the coffee, but at least she'd washed the pot and it took only a few minutes to make myself a much-needed cup. Amelia and her mentor kept a tactful conversation going while I bumbled around getting some cereal, adding some sweetener, pouring milk over it. I hunched over the bowl because I didn't want to dribble milk down my tank top. And by the way, it was getting too cold to wear a tank top around the house. I pulled on a cheap jacket made of sweats material and was able to finish my coffee and cereal in comfort.

"What's up, you two?" I asked, signaling I was ready to interact with the rest of the world.

"Amelia told me about your problem," Octavia said. "And about your very kind offer."

Ah-oh. What offer?

I nodded wisely, as if I had a clue.

"I'll be so glad to be out of my niece's house, you have no idea," the older woman said earnestly. "Janesha has three little ones, including one toddler, and a boyfriend that comes and goes. I'm sleeping on the living room couch, and when the kids get up in the morning, they come in and turn on the cartoons. Whether or not I'm up. It's their house, of course, and I've been there for weeks, so they've lost the sense that I'm company."

I gathered that Octavia was going to be sleeping in the bedroom opposite me or in the extra one upstairs. I was voting for the one upstairs.

"And you know, now that I'm older, I need quicker access to a bathroom." She looked at me with that humorous deprecation people show when they're admitting to a passage-of-time condition. "So downstairs would be wonderful, especially since my knees are arthritic. Did I tell you Janesha's apartment is upstairs?"

"No," I said through numb lips. Geez, this had happened so fast.

"Now, about your problem. I'm not a black witch at all, but you need to get these young women out of your life, both Ms. Pelt's agent and Ms. Pelt herself."

I nodded vigorously.

"So," Amelia said, unable to keep quiet any longer, "we've come up with a plan."

"I'm all ears," I said, and poured myself a second cup of coffee. I needed it.

"The simplest way to get rid of Tanya, of course, is to tell your friend Calvin Norris what she's doing," Octavia said.

I gaped at her. "Ah, that seems likely to result in some pretty bad things happening to Tanya," I said.

"Isn't that what you want?" Octavia looked innocent in a real sly way.

"Well, yeah, but I don't want her to die. I mean, I don't want anything she can't get over to happen to her. I just want her away and not coming back."

Amelia said, " ‘Away and not coming back' sounds pretty final to me."

It sounded that way to me, too. "I'll rephrase. I want her to be off somewhere living her life but far away from me," I said. "Is that clear enough?" I wasn't trying to sound sharp; I just wanted to express myself.

"Yes, young lady, I think we can understand that," said Octavia with frost in her voice.

"I don't want there to be any misunderstanding here," I said. "There's a lot at stake. I think Calvin kind of likes Tanya. On the other hand, I bet he could scare her pretty effectively."

"Enough to get her to leave forever?"

"You'd have to demonstrate that you were telling the truth," Amelia said. "About her sabotaging you."

"What do you have in mind?" I asked.

"Okay, here's what we think," Amelia said, and just like that, Phase One was in place. It turned out to be something I could have thought of myself, but the witches' help made the planning run much more smoothly.

I called Calvin at home, and asked him to stop by when he had a minute to spare around lunchtime. He sounded surprised to hear from me, but he agreed to come.

He got a further surprise when he came into the kitchen and found Amelia and Octavia there. Calvin, the leader of the werepanthers who lived in the little community of Hotshot, had met Amelia several times before, but Octavia was new to him. He respected her immediately because he was able to sense her power. That was a big help.

Calvin was probably in his midforties, strong and solid, sure of himself. His hair was graying, but he was straight as an arrow in posture, and he possessed a huge calm that couldn't fail to impress. He'd been interested in me for a while, and I'd only been sorry I couldn't feel the same way. He was a good man.

"What's up, Sookie?" he said after he'd turned down the offer of cookies or tea or Coke.

I took a deep breath. "I don't like to be a tale-teller, Calvin, but we have a problem," I said.

"Tanya," he said immediately.

"Yeah," I said, not bothering to hide my relief.

"She's a sly one," he said, and I was sorry to hear an element of admiration in his voice.