Dead and Gone

respect his feelings, so I shut my mouth.
    Tanya took his hands, claws and all. “Will they let you go over her?” she asked. Her eyes never left Calvin’s face. I might as well not have been there.
    “When they take the body down,” he said.
    It would be so great if Calvin could identify the culprit. Thank God the werecreatures had come out. But . . . that might have been why Crystal had been killed.
    “You think you’ll be able to get a scent?” Tanya said. Her voice was quiet, intent. She was more serious than I’d ever seen her in our spotty acquaintance. She put her arms around Calvin, and though he was not a tall man, she only reached his upper sternum. She looked up at him.
    “I’ll get a score of scents after all these folks have touched her. I can only try to match them all. I wish I’d been here first.” He held Tanya as if he needed to lean on someone.
    Jason was standing a yard away, waiting for Calvin to notice him. His back was stiff, his face frozen. There was an awful moment of silence when Calvin looked over Tanya’s shoulder and noted Jason’s presence.
    I don’t know how Tanya reacted, but every muscle in my body twanged from the tension. Slowly Calvin held out a hand to Jason. Though it was a human hand again, it was obviously battered. The skin was freshly scarred and one of the fingers was slightly bent.
    I had done that. I’d stood up for Jason at his wedding, and Calvin had stood up for Crystal. After Jason had made us witness Crystal’s infidelity, we’d had to stand in for them when the penalty had been pronounced: the maiming of a hand or paw. I’d had to bring a brick down on my friend’s hand. I hadn’t felt the same about Jason since then.
    Jason bent and licked the back of the hand, emphasizing how subservient he was. He did it awkwardly, because he was still new to the ritual. I held my breath. Jason’s eyes were rolled up to keep Calvin’s face in sight. When Calvin nodded, we all relaxed. Calvin accepted Jason’s obeisance.
    “You’ll be in at the kill,” Calvin said, as if Jason had asked him something.
    “Thanks,” Jason said, and then backed away. He stopped when he’d gone a couple of feet. “I want to bury her,” he said.
    “We’ll all bury her,” Calvin said. “When they let us have her back.” There was not a particle of concession in his voice.
    Jason hesitated a moment and then nodded.
    Calvin and Tanya got back in Calvin’s truck. They settled in. Clearly they planned to wait there until the body was brought down from the cross. Jason said, “I’m going home. I can’t stay here.” He seemed almost dazed.
    “Okay,” I said.
    “Are you . . . do you plan on staying here?”
    “Yes, I’m in charge of the bar while Sam is gone.”
    “That’s a lot of trust he has in you,” Jason said.
    I nodded. I should feel honored. I did feel honored.
    “Is it true his stepdad shot his mom? That’s what I heard at the Bayou last night.”
    “Yes,” I said. “He didn’t know that Sam’s mom was, you know, a shapeshifter.”
    Jason shook his head. “This coming-out thing,” he said. “I don’t know that’s it been such a good idea after all. Sam’s mom got shot. Crystal is dead. Someone who knew what she was put her up there, Sookie. Maybe they’ll come after me next. Or Calvin. Or Tray Dawson. Or Alcide. Maybe they’ll try to kill us all.”
    I started to say that couldn’t happen, that the people I knew wouldn’t turn on their friends and neighbors because of an accident of birth. But in the end, I didn’t say that, because I wondered if it was the truth.
    “Maybe they will,” I said, feeling an icy tingle run down my back. I took a deep breath. “But since they didn’t go after the vampires—for the most part—I’m thinking they’ll be able to accept weres of all sorts. At least, I hope so.”
    Mel, wearing the slacks and sports shirt he wore daily at the auto parts place, got out of his car and walked over. I noticed that he was carefully not looking at Calvin, though Jason was still standing right beside the panther’s pickup. “It’s true, then,” Mel said.
    Jason said, “She’s dead, Mel.”
    Mel patted Jason’s shoulder in the awkward way men have when they have to comfort other men. “Come on, Jason. You don’t need to be around here. Let’s go to your house. We’ll have a drink, buddy.”
    Jason nodded, looking dazed. “Okay, let’s go.” After Jason left for home with Mel following right