Шарлин Харрис - Dead to the World

The house was quite tidy. Jason had never lived like a pig, though sometimes he acted like one. Even the king-size bed that almost filled the biggest bedroom was more-or-less pulled straight, though I could see the sheets were black and shiny. They were supposed to look like silk, but I was sure they were some artificial blend. Too slithery for me; I liked percale.

"No evidence of any struggle," the detective pointed out.

"While I'm here, I'm just going to get something," I told him, going over to the gun cabinet that had been my dad's. It was locked, so I checked my key ring again. Yes, I had a key for that, too, and I remembered some long story Jason had told me about why I needed one—in case he was out hunting and he needed another rifle, or something. As if I'd drop everything and run to fetch another rifle for him!

Well, I might, if I wasn't due at work, or something.

All Jason's rifles, and my father's, were in the gun cabinet—all the requisite ammunition, too.

"All present?" The detective was shifting around impatiently in the doorway to the dining room.

"Yes. I'm just going to take one of them home with me."

"You expecting trouble at your place?" Beck looked interested for the first time.

"If Jason is gone, who knows what it means?" I said, hoping that was ambiguous enough. Beck had a very low opinion of my intelligence, anyway, despite the fact that he feared me. Jason had said he would bring me the shotgun, and I knew I would feel the better for having it. So I got out the Benelli and found its shells. Jason had very carefully taught me how to load and fire the shotgun, which was his pride and joy. There were two different boxes of shells.

"Which?" I asked Detective Beck.

"Wow, a Benelli." He took time out to be impressed with gun. "Twelve-gauge, huh? Me, I'd take the turkey loads," he advised. "Those target loads don't have as much stopping power."

I popped the box he indicated into my pocket.

I carried the shotgun out to my car, Beck trailing on my heels.

"You have to lock the shotgun in your trunk and the shells in the car," the detective informed me. I did exactly what he said, even putting the shells in the glove compartment, and then I turned to face him. He would be glad to be out of my sight, and I didn't think he would look for Jason with any enthusiasm.

"Did you check around back?" I asked.

"I had just gotten here when you pulled up."

I jerked my head in the direction of the pond behind the house, and we circled around to the rear. My brother, aided by Hoyt Fortenberry, had put in a large deck outside the back door maybe two years ago. He'd arranged some nice outdoor furniture he'd gotten on end-of-season sale at WalMart. Jason had even put an ashtray on the wrought-iron table for his friends who went outside to smoke. Someone had used it. Hoyt smoked, I recalled. There was nothing else interesting on the deck.

The ground sloped down from the deck to the pond. While Alcee Beck checked the back door, I looked down to the pier my father had built, and I thought I could see a smear on the wood. Something in me crumpled at the sight, and I must have made a noise. Alcee came to stand by me, and I said, "Look at the pier."

He went on point, just like a setter. He said, "Stay where you are," in an unmistakably official voice. He moved carefully, looking down at the ground around his feet before he took each step. I felt like an hour passed before Alcee finally reached the pier. He squatted down on the sun-bleached boards to take a close look. He focused a little to the right of the smear, evaluating something I couldn't see, something I couldn't even make out in his mind. But then he wondered what kind of work boots my brother wore; that came in clear.

"Caterpillars," I called. The fear built up in me till I felt I was vibrating with the intensity of it. Jason was all I had.

And I realized I'd made a mistake I hadn't done in years: I'd answered a question before it had been asked out loud. I clapped a hand over my mouth and saw the whites of Beck's eyes. He wanted away from me. And he was thinking maybe Jason was in the pond, dead. He was speculating that Jason had fallen and knocked his head against the pier, and then slid into the water. But there was a puzzling print. . . .

"When can you search the pond?" I called.

He turned to look at me, terror on his face. I hadn't had anyone look at me like that in years. I had him spooked, and I hadn't wanted to have that effect on him.

"The blood is on the dock," I pointed out, trying to improve matters. Providing a reasonable explanation was second nature. "I'm scared Jason went into the water."

Beck seemed to settle down a little after that. He turned his eyes back to the water. My father had chosen the site for the house to include the pond. He'd told me when I was little that the pond was very deep and fed by a tiny stream. The area around two-thirds of the pond was mowed and maintained as yard; but the farthest edge of it was left thickly wooded, and Jason enjoyed sitting on the deck in the late evening with binoculars, watching critters come to drink.

There were fish in the pond. He kept it stocked. My stomach lurched.

Finally, the detective walked up the slope to the deck. "I have to call around, see who can dive," Alcee Beck said. "It may take a while to find someone who can do it. And the chief has to okay it."

Of course, such a thing would cost money, and that money might not be in the parish budget. I took a deep breath. "Are you talking hours, or days?"

"Maybe a day or two," he said at last. "No way anyone can do it who isn't trained. It's too cold, and Jason himself told me it was deep."

"All right," I said, trying to suppress my impatience and anger. Anxiety gnawed at me like another kind of hunger.

"Carla Rodriguez was in town last night," Alcee Beck told me, and after a long moment, the significance of that sank into my brain.

Carla Rodriguez, tiny and dark and electric, had been the closest shave Jason had ever had with losing his heart. In fact, the little shifter Jason had had a date with on New Year's Eve had somewhat resembled Carla, who had moved to Houston three years ago, much to my relief. I'd been tired of the pyrotechnics surrounding her romance with my brother; their relationship had been punctuated by long and loud and public arguments, hung-up telephones, and slammed doors.

"Why? Who's she staying with?"

"Her cousin in Shreveport," Beck said. "You know, that Dovie."

Dovie Rodriguez had visited Bon Temps a lot while Carla had lived here. Dovie had been the more sophisticated city cousin, down in the country to correct all our local yokel ways. Of course, we'd envied Dovie.

I thought that tackling Dovie was just what I wanted to do.

It looked like I'd be going to Shreveport after all.

The detective hustled me off after that, telling me he was going to get the crime scene officer out to the house, and he'd be in touch. I got the idea, right out of his brain, that there was something he didn't want me to see, and that he'd thrown Carla Rodriguez at me to distract me.

And I thought he might take the shotgun away, since he seemed much more sure now he was dealing with a crime, and the shotgun might be part of some bit of evidence. But Alcee Beck didn't say anything, so I didn't remind him.

I was more shaken than I wanted to admit to myself. Inwardly, I'd been convinced that, though I needed to track my brother down, Jason was really okay—just misplaced. Or mislaid, more likely, ho ho ho. Possibly he was in some kind of not-too-serious trouble, I'd told myself. Now things were looking more serious.

I've never been able to squeeze my budget enough to afford a cell phone, so I began driving home. I was thinking of whom I should call, and I came up with the same answer as before. No one. There was no definite news to break. I felt as lonely as I ever have in my life. But I just didn't want to be Crisis Woman, showing up on friends' doorsteps with trouble on my shoulders.