Dead Ever After

about himself. He did good when it would not put him in peril; he believed that in this, he was like most people.
    Suddenly Tyrese, who’d been leaning against the wall, straightened. Barry heard a car coming, and there was another sound, too. Was that a motorcycle? Sure sounded like one. Who could it be? Would the presence of other people be enough to stop Tyrese?
    But there wasn’t any going back for the bodyguard, apparently.
    As the car’s motor died and the other motor, too, Tyrese grinned at Amelia. “Here goes,” he said. “I’m going to make everything even. This woman is going to die.”
    But the person driving the car might not even be Sookie. What if it was Mr. Cataliades in his van? Tyrese didn’t even look. He’d gotten the whole story set in his mind. This would be Sookie, and he would kill her, and then everything would somehow balance out.
    Tyrese swung around to face the back door, the smile still on his lips. Barry started screaming at Sookie in his head, because that was all he could do, but he didn’t think she’d hear him. He looked up at Amelia and saw the strain in her face. She was doing the same.
    And then Tyrese took a step forward, and another. He was on the porch. He wasn’t going to wait for Sookie to enter the house, which would have been a sure thing. He was going to meet her.
    MERLOTTE’S
earlier
    Sam’s lips parted and I just knew he was finally going to explain. But then he looked past me and the moment passed. “Mustapha Khan,” he said, and he definitely wasn’t happy to see Eric’s daytime guy.
    As far as I knew, Sam had nothing against the werewolf. Surely he couldn’t blame Mustapha for beheading Jannalynn? After all, it had been a fair fight, and Sam, though a shapeshifter, was very familiar with Were rules. Or was it Mustapha’s job as Eric’s daytime guy that made Sam so grumpy?
    I wondered, things being how they were, why Mustapha was coming to see me. Maybe something had been decided about who would take over Fangtasia, and Eric wanted me to know.
    “Hello, Mustapha,” I said, as calmly as I could. “What brings you here today? Can I get you a glass of water with lemon?” Mustapha didn’t take stimulants of any kind: coffee, Coca-Cola, anything.
    “Thank you. A glass of water would be refreshing,” he allowed. As usual, Mustapha was wearing dark glasses. He’d removed his motorcycle helmet, and I saw he’d shaved a pattern in the stubble on his head. That was new. It gleamed under the lights of the bar. An Norr did a double take when she got a good look at the muscled magnificence that was Mustapha Khan. She wasn’t the only one.
    When I brought him an icy glass, he was sitting on a bar stool having some kind of silent staring contest with Sam.
    “How is Warren?” I asked. Warren, possibly the only person Mustapha cared for, had been awfully close to dead when we found him at Jannalynn’s folks’ empty garage apartment.
    “He’s better, thank you, Sookie. He ran half a mile today. He walked the rest, with some help. He’s out there waiting, right now.” Mustapha inclined his patterned head toward the front door. Warren was the shyest man I’d ever met.
    I hadn’t known Warren had been a runner before his ordeal, but I figured the fact that he’d resumed the exercise was pretty good news, and I told Mustapha to give the convalescent my good wishes. “I’d have sent him a get-well card if I knew his address,” I added, and felt like a fool when Mustapha took off his dark glasses to give me an incredulous look. Well, I would have.
    “I come here to tell you Eric is leaving tomorrow night,” he said. “He thought you should know. Plus, he left some shit at your place. He wants it back.”
    I stood very still for a long moment, feeling the finality of it hit my heart. “Okay, then,” I said. “I do have some stuff of his in my closet. I’ll send it—where? Though I don’t suppose they are things he’ll miss.” I tried to not add any layers of meaning to that.
    “I’ll come get them when you get off work,” Mustapha said.
    The clock was reading four thirty. “I should be through here in thirty minutes or so,” I said, looking to Sam for confirmation. “If India gets here on time.”
    And here she came, through the front door, weaving her way between the tables. India had had her hair done, a process she’d described to me in fascinating detail, and the jeweled balls on her braids clicked together as she walked. She