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"I have no idea," Jason said.
And he stuck to it for hours.
There had been no believable story Jason could tell that could account for everything: his absence, his poor physical condition, the bite marks, his sudden reappearance. The only possible line he could take was to say the last thing he remembered, he'd heard a fu
Of course, we'd cleared this with Sam ahead of time, and he'd agreed, reluctantly, that it was the best we could come up with. I knew Sam didn't like to lie, and I didn't either, but we had to keep that particular can of worms closed.
The beauty of this story was its simplicity. As long as Jason could resist the temptation to embroider, he'd be safe. I'd known that would be hard for Jason; he loved to talk, and he loved to talk big. But as long as I was sitting there, reminding him of the consequences, my brother managed to restrain himself. I had to get up to get him another cup of coffee—the lawmen didn't want any more—and as I was coming back in the living room, Jason was saying he thought he remembered a cold dark room. I gave him a very plain look, and he said, "But you know, my head is so confused, that may just be something I dreamed."
Andy looked from Jason to me, clearly getting angrier and angrier. "I just can't understand you two," he said. His voice was almost a growl. "Sookie, I know you worried about him. I'm not making that up, am I?"
"No, I am so glad to have him back." I patted my brother's foot under the blanket.
"And you, you didn't want to be wherever you were, right? You missed work, you cost the parish thousands of dollars from our budget to search for you, and you disrupted the lives of hundreds of people. And you're sitting here lying to us!" Andy's voice was almost a shout as he finished. "Now, the same night you show up, this missing vampire on all the posters called the police in Shreveport to say he's recovering from memory loss, too! And there's a strange fire in Shreveport with all kinds of bodies recovered! And you're trying to tell me there's no co
Jason and I gaped at each other. Actually, there was no co
"What vampire?" Jason asked. It was so good, I almost believed him myself.
"Let's leave, Alcee," Andy said. He slapped his notebook shut. He put his pen back in his shirt pocket with such an emphatic thrust that I was surprised he had a pocket left. "This bastard won't even tell us the truth."
"Don't you think I'd tell you if I could?" Jason said. "Don't you think I'd like to lay hands on whoever did this to me?" He sounded absolutely, one hundred percent sincere, because he was. The two detectives were shaken in their disbelief, especially Alcee Beck. But they still left unhappy with the two of us. I felt sorry for it, but there was nothing I could do.
Later that day, Arlene picked me up so I could fetch my car from Merlotte's. She was happy to see Jason, and she gave him a big hug. "You had your sister some kind of worried, you rascal," she said, with mock ferocity. "Don't you ever scare Sookie like that again."
"I'll do my best," Jason said, with a good approximation of his old roguish smile. "She's been a good sister to me."
"Now, that's God's truth," I said, a little sourly. "When I bring my car back, I think I might just run you home, big brother."
Jason looked scared for a minute. Being alone had never been his favorite thing, and after hours by himself in the cold of the shed, it might be even harder.
"I bet girls all over Bon Temps are making food to bring to your place now that they heard you're back," Arlene said, and Jason brightened perceptibly. "'Specially since I've been telling everyone what an invalid you are."
"Thanks, Arlene," Jason said, looking much more like himself.
I echoed that on the way into town. "I really appreciate you cheering him up. I don't know what all he went through, but he's going to have a rough time getting over it, I think."
"Honey, you don't need to worry about Jason. He's the original survivor. I don't know why he didn't try out for the show."
We laughed all the way into town at the idea of staging a Survivor episode in Bon Temps.
"What with the razorbacks in the woods, and that panther print, they might have an exciting time of it if we had Survivor: Bon Temps," Arlene said. "Tack and me would just sit back and laugh at them."
That gave me a nice opening to tease her about Tack, which she enjoyed, and altogether she cheered up me just as much as Jason. Arlene was good about stuff like that. I had a brief conversation with Sam in the storeroom of Merlotte's, and he told me Andy and Alcee had already been by to see if his story meshed with mine.
He hushed me before I could thank him again.
I took Jason home, though he hinted broadly he'd like to stay with me one more night. I took the Benelli with us, and I told him to clean it that evening. He promised he would, and when he looked at me, I could tell he wanted to ask me again why I'd had to use it. But he didn't. Jason had learned some things in the past few days, himself.
I was working the late shift again, so I would have a little time on my hands when I got home before I had to go in to work. The prospect felt good. I didn't see any ru
I knew who it would be. It was full dark outside, and sure enough, Eric stood on my front porch.
He looked down at me with no very happy face. "I find myself troubled," he said without preamble.
"Then I've got to drop everything so I can help you out," I said, going instantly on the offensive.
He cocked an eyebrow. "I'll be polite and ask if I can come in." I hadn't rescinded his invitation, but he didn't want to just stroll into my house. Tactful.
"Yes, you can." I stepped back.
"Hallow is dead, having been forced to counter the curse on me, obviously."
"Pam did a good job."
He nodded. "It was Hallow or me," he said. "I like me better."
"Why'd she pick Shreveport?"
"Her parents were jailed in Shreveport. They were witches, too, but they also ran confidence games of some kind, using their craft to make their victims more convinced of their sincerity. In Shreveport, their luck ran out. The supernatural community refused to make any effort to get the older Stonebrooks out of jail. The woman ran afoul of a voodoo priestess while she was incarcerated, and the man ran afoul of a knife in some bathroom brawl."
"Pretty good reason to have it in for the supernaturals of Shreveport."
"They say I was here for several nights." Eric had decided to change the subject.
"Yes," I said. I tried to look agreeably interested in what he had to say.
"And in that time, we never . . . ?"
I didn't pretend to misunderstand him.
"Eric, does that seem likely?" I asked.
He hadn't sat down, and he moved closer to me, as if looking at me hard would reveal the truth. It would have been easy to take a step, be even closer.
"I just don't know," he said. "And it's making me a little aggravated."
I smiled. "Are you enjoying being back at work?"
"Yes. But Pam ran everything well during my absence. I'm sending lots of flowers to the hospital. Belinda, and a wolf named Maria-Comet or something."