Шарлин Харрис - Dead to the World

"Let's hear your story, young woman," said the colonel briskly.

I related all I'd told Alcide, trying to leave out the personal bits.

"Where is this coven staying?" he asked me, when I was through. I told him what I'd seen through Holly's mind.

"Not enough information," Flood said crisply. "Alcide, we need the trackers."

"Yes, sir." Alcide's eyes were gleaming at the thought of action.

"I'll call them. Everything I've heard is making me rethink something odd that happened last night. Adabelle didn't come to the planning committee meeting."

Alcide looked startled. "That's not good."

They were trying to be cryptic in front of me, but I could read what was passing between the two shifters without too much difficulty. Flood and Alcide were wondering if their—hmmm, vice president?—Adabelle had missed the meeting for some innocent reason, or if the new coven had somehow inveigled her into joining them against her own pack.

"Adabelle has been chafing against the pack leadership for some time," Colonel Flood told Alcide, with the ghost of a smile on his thin lips. "I had hoped, when she got elected my second, that she'd consider that concession enough."

From the bits of information I could glean from the packmaster's mind, the Shreveport pack seemed to be heavily on the patriarchal side. To Adabelle, a modern woman, Colonel Flood's leadership was stifling.

"A new regime might appeal to her," Colonel Flood said, after a perceptible pause. "If the invaders learned anything about our pack, it's Adabelle they'd approach."

"I don't think Adabelle would ever betray the pack, no matter how unhappy she is with the status quo," Alcide said. He sounded very sure. "But if she didn't come to the meeting last night, and you can't raise her by phone this morning, I'm concerned."

"I wish you'd go check on Adabelle while I alert the pack to action," Colonel Flood suggested. "If your friend wouldn't mind."

Maybe his friend would like to get her butt back to Bon Temps and see to her paying guest. Maybe his friend would like to be searching for her brother. Though truly, I could not think of a single thing to do that would further the search for Jason, and it would be at least two hours before Eric rose.

Alcide said, "Colonel, Sookie is not a pack member and she shouldn't have to shoulder pack responsibilities. She has her own troubles, and she's gone out of her way to let us know about a big problem we didn't even realize we had. We should have known. Someone in our pack hasn't been honest with us."

Colonel Flood's face drew in on itself as if he'd swallowed a live eel. "You're right about that," he said. "Thank you, Miss Stackhouse, for taking the time to come to Shreveport and to tell Alcide about our problem . . . which we should have known."

I nodded to him in acknowledgment.

"And I think you're right, Alcide. One of us must have known about the presence of another pack in the city."

"I'll call you about Adabelle," Alcide said.

The colonel picked up the phone and consulted a red leather book before he dialed. He glanced sideways at Alcide. "No answer at her shop." He had as much warmth radiating from him as a little space heater. Since Colonel Flood kept his house about as cold as the great outdoors, the heat was quite welcome.

"Sookie should be named a friend of the pack."

I could tell that was more than a recommendation. Alcide was saying something quite significant, but he sure wasn't going to explain. I was getting a little tired of the elliptical conversations going on around me.

"Excuse me, Alcide, Colonel," I said as politely as I could. "Maybe Alcide could run me back to my car? Since you all seem to have plans to carry out."

"Of course," the colonel said, and I could read that he was glad to be getting me out of the way. "Alcide, I'll see you back here in, what? Forty minutes or so? We'll talk about it then."

Alcide glanced at his watch and reluctantly agreed. "I might stop by Adabelle's house while I'm taking Sookie to her car," he said, and the colonel nodded, as if that were only pro forma.

"I don't know why Adabelle isn't answering the phone at work, and I don't believe she'd go over to the coven," Alcide explained when we were back in his truck. "Adabelle lives with her mother, and they don't get along too well. But we'll check there first. Adabelle's Flood's second in command, and she's also our best tracker."

"What can the trackers do?"

"They'll go to Fangtasia and try to follow the scent trail the witches left there. That'll take them to the witches' lair. If they lose the scent, maybe we can call in help from the Shreveport covens. They have to be as worried as we are."

"At Fangtasia, I'm afraid any scent might be obscured by all the emergency people," I said regretfully. That would have been something to watch, a Were tracking through the city. "And just so you know, Hallow has contacted all the witches hereabouts already. I talked to a Wiccan in Bon Temps who'd been called in to Shreveport to meet with Hallow's bunch."

"This is bigger than I thought, but I'm sure the pack can handle it." Alcide sounded quite confident.

Alcide backed the truck out of the colonel's driveway, and we began making our way through Shreveport once again. I was seeing more of the city this day than I'd seen in my whole life.

"Whose idea was it for Bill to go to Peru?" Alcide asked me suddenly.

"I don't know." I was startled and puzzled. "I think it was his queen's."

"But he didn't tell you that directly."

"No."

"He might have been ordered to go."

"I suppose."

"Who had the power to do that?" Alcide asked, as if the answer would enlighten me.

"Eric, of course." Since Eric was sheriff of Area Five. "And then the queen." That would be Eric's boss, the queen of Louisiana. Yeah, I know. It's dumb. But the vampires thought they were a marvel of modern organization.

"And now Bill's gone, and Eric's staying at your house." Alcide's voice was coaxing me to reach an obvious conclusion.

"You think that Eric staged this whole thing? You think he ordered Bill out of the country, had witches invade Shreveport, had them curse him, began running half-naked out in the freezing cold when he supposed I might be near, and then just hoped I'd take him in and that Pam and Chow and my brother would talk to each other to arrange Eric's staying with me?"

Alcide looked properly flattened. "You mean you'd thought of this?"

"Alcide, I'm not educated, but I'm not dumb." Try getting educated when you can read the minds of all your classmates, not to mention your teacher. But I read a lot, and I've read lots of good stuff. Of course, now I read mostly mysteries and romances. So I've learned many curious odds and ends, and I have a great vocabulary. "But the fact is, Eric would hardly go to this much trouble to get me to go to bed with him. Is that what you're thinking?" Of course, I knew it was. Were or not, I could see that much.

"Put that way . . ." But Alcide still didn't look satisfied. Of course, this was the man who had believed Debbie Pelt when she said that I was definitely back with Bill.

I wondered if I could get some witch to cast a truth spell on Debbie Pelt, whom I despised because she had been cruel to Alcide, insulted me grievously, burned a hole in my favorite wrap and—oh—tried to kill me by proxy. Also, she had stupid hair.

Alcide wouldn't know an honest Debbie if she came up and bit him in the ass, though backbiting was a specialty of the real Debbie.

If Alcide had known Bill and I had parted, would he have come by? Would one thing have led to another?

Well, sure it would have. And there I'd be, stuck with a guy who'd take the word of Debbie Pelt.

I glanced over at Alcide and sighed. This man was just about perfect in many respects. I liked the way he looked, I understood the way he thought, and he treated me with great consideration and respect. Sure, he was a werewolf, but I could give up a couple of nights of month. True, according to Alcide it would be difficult for me to carry his baby to term, but it was at least possible. Pregnancy wasn't part of the picture with a vampire.