Шарлин Харрис - Dead to the World

I nodded. "It looks real nice," I said in a voice that wasn't too wobbly.

"I want to make you an offer," Calvin Norris said.

I tried to look interested. I half turned to face him.

"You're a woman without protection now," he said. "Your brother's gone. I hope he comes back, but you don't have no one to stand up for you while he's missing."

There were a lot of things wrong with this speech, but I wasn't in any mood to debate the shifter. He'd done me a large favor, getting Crystal to talk. I stood there in the cold wind and tried to look politely receptive.

"If you need some place to hide, if you need someone to watch your back or defend you, I'll be your man," he said. His green and golden eyes met mine directly.

I'll tell you why I didn't dismiss this with a snort: He wasn't being superior about it. According to his mores, he was being as nice as he could be, extending a shield to me if I should need it. Of course he expected to "be my man" in every way, along with protecting me; but he wasn't being lascivious in his manner, or offensively explicit. Calvin Norris was offering to incur injury for my sake. He meant it. That's not something to get all snitty about.

"Thanks," I said. "I'll remember you said that."

"I heard about you," he said. "Shifters and Weres, they talk to each other. I hear you're different."

"I am." Regular men might have found my outer package attractive, but my inner package repelled them. If I ever began to get a swelled head, after the attention paid me by Eric, or Bill, or even Alcide, all I had to do was listen to the brains of some bar patrons to have my ego deflated. I clutched my old blue coat more closely around me. Like most of the two-natured, Calvin had a system that didn't feel cold as intensely as my completely human metabolism did. "But my difference doesn't lie in being two-natured, though I appreciate your, ah, kindness." This was as close as I could come to asking him why he was so interested.

"I know that." He nodded in acknowledgment of my delicacy. "Actually, that makes you more . . . The thing is, here in Hotshot, we've inbred too much. You heard Crystal. She can only change at the moon, and frankly, even then she's not full-powered." He pointed at his own face. "My eyes can hardly pass for human. We need an infusion of new blood, new genes. You're not two-natured, but you're not exactly an ordinary woman. Ordinary women don't last long here."

Well, that was an ominous and ambiguous way to put it. But I was sympathetic, and I tried to look understanding. Actually, I did understand, and I could appreciate his concern. Calvin Norris was clearly the leader of this unusual settlement, and its future was his responsibility.

He was frowning as he looked down the road at the house where I'd seen the man. But he turned to me to finish telling me what he wanted me to know. "I think you would like the people here, and you would be a good breeder. I can tell by looking."

That was a real unusual compliment. I couldn't quite think how to acknowledge it in an appropriate manner.

"I'm flattered that you think so, and I appreciate your offer. I'll remember what you said." I paused to gather my thoughts. "You know, the police will find out that Crystal was with Jason, if they haven't already. They'll come out here, too."

"They won't find nothing," Calvin Norris said. His golden green eyes met mine with faint amusement. "They've been out here at other times; they'll be out here again. They never learn a thing. I hope you find your brother. You need help, you let me know. I got a job at Norcross. I'm a steady man."

"Thank you," I said, and got into my car with a feeling of relief. I gave Calvin a serious nod as I backed out of Crystal's driveway. So he worked at Norcross, the lumber processing plant. Norcross had good benefits, and they promoted from within. I'd had worse offers; that was for sure.

As I drove to work, I wondered if Crystal had been trying to get pregnant during her nights with Jason. It hadn't seemed to bother Calvin at all to hear that his niece had had sex with a strange man. Alcide had told me that Were had to breed with Were to produce a baby that had the same trait, so the inhabitants of this little community were trying to diversify, apparently. Maybe these lesser Weres were trying to breed out; that is, have children by regular humans. That would be better than having a generation of Weres whose powers were so weak they couldn't function successfully in their second nature, but who also couldn't be content as regular people.

Getting to Merlotte's was like driving from one century into another. I wondered how long the people of Hotshot had been clustered around the crossroads, what significance it had originally held for them. Though I couldn't help but be a little curious, I found it was a real relief to discard these wonderings and return to the world as I knew it.

That afternoon, the little world of Merlotte's Bar was very quiet. I changed, tied on my black apron, smoothed my hair, and washed my hands. Sam was behind the bar with his arms crossed over his chest, staring into space. Holly was carrying a pitcher of beer to a table where a lone stranger sat.

"How was Hotshot?" Sam asked, since we were alone at the bar.

"Very strange."

He patted me on the shoulder. "Did you find out anything useful?"

"Actually, I did. I'm just not sure what it means." Sam needed a haircut, I noticed; his curly red-gold hair formed an arc around his face in a kind of Renaissance-angel effect.

"Did you meet Calvin Norris?"

"I did. He got Crystal to talk to me, and he made me a most unusual offer."

"What's that?"

"I'll tell you some other time." For the life of me, I couldn't figure out how to phrase it. I looked down at my hands, which were busy rinsing out a beer mug, and I could feel my cheeks burning.

"Calvin's an okay guy, as far as I know," Sam said slowly. "He works at Norcross, and he's a crew leader. Good insurance, retirement package, everything. Some of the other guys from Hotshot own a welding shop. I hear they do good work. But I don't know what goes on in Hotshot after they go home at night, and I don't think anyone else does, either. Did you know Sheriff Dowdy, John Dowdy? He was sheriff before I moved here, I think."

"Yeah, I remember him. He hauled Jason in one time for vandalism. Gran had to go get him out of jail. Sheriff Dowdy read Jason a lecture that had him scared straight, at least for a while."

"Sid Matt told me a story one night. It seems that one spring, John Dowdy went out to Hotshot to arrest Calvin Norris's oldest brother, Carlton."

"For what?" Sid Matt Lancaster was an old and well-known lawyer.

"Statutory rape. The girl was willing, and she was even experienced, but she was underage. She had a new stepdad, and he decided Carlton had disrespected him."

No politically correct stance could cover all those circumstances. "So what happened?"

"No one knows. Late that night, John Dowdy's patrol car was found halfway back into town from Hotshot. No one in it. No blood, no fingerprints. He hasn't ever been seen since. No one in Hotshot remembered seeing him that day, they said."

"Like Jason," I said bleakly. "He just vanished."

"But Jason was at his own house, and according to you, Crystal didn't seem to be involved."

I threw off the grip of the strange little story. "You're right. Did anyone ever find out what happened to Sheriff Dowdy?"

"No. But no one ever saw Carlton Norris again, either."

Now, that was the interesting part. "And the moral of this story is?"

"That the people of Hotshot take care of their own justice."

"Then you want them on your side." I extracted my own moral from the story.

"Yes," Sam said. "You definitely want them on your side. You don't remember this? It was around fifteen years ago."