Deadlocked: A Sookie Stackhouse Novel

they could come into the pack if they’d do her bidding; then when she beat me, she’d let them have full benefits.”
    I wondered if that included health and dental, but I wasn’t going to go down a side path while he was still in a sharing mood. I hung up the washcloth and poured a dollop of shampoo into my hands. I began to scrub my scalp and hair. “Go on,” I said, by way of encouragement.
    “So,” he said. “I got a guy she didn’t know to follow Jannalynn. He saw her meeting with your buddy Claude. There’s just no good reason for that.”
    I stopped rinsing the shampoo from my hair. “What … why? Why was she meeting with Claude, of all people?”
    “I have no idea,” Alcide said.
    “So all we have to do is find Jannalynn and ask her a lot of questions,” I said. “And find Warren. And hope that Claude comes back from Faery, so I can question him. And get Felipe and his vamps to leave us alone, here in Shreveport. And get that Freyda out of here.”
    Alcide looked at me, wondered whether to speak, and decided on full disclosure. “Is it true, Sookie? Palomino told Roy that Eric’s engaged to a vampire from Oklahoma?”
    “I can’t talk about it,” I said. “Or I’ll get real upset, Alcide, and you just don’t want that tonight. I owe Palomino a solid favor for getting us in to rescue … a guy, but she shouldn’t be telling vampire business around town.”
    “You owe her more of a solid than you know,” he said. “She saw you being grabbed, and she called me. Right before Bill did. That was smart, Sook, getting him to call. It was all I could do to get him to continue on his way and check back in later. I promised him I’d keep you safe.”
    “So you called Mustapha? You’ve known where he was all along?”
    “No, but after I got your phone messages, I called him. As you’d advised, when Jannalynn wasn’t around. He’d run down his last lead on Warren, and he had to talk to someone. I still don’t know where he’s been hiding.”
    “But it’s thanks to you that he found me in time.”
    “Both our efforts and some guessing, too. He knows those rogues. He figured they’d head back to their house outside Fillmore. Van does bad stuff to women, and he’d want to have some time with you before he handed you over to Jannalynn. The follow-up car was his idea, too.”
    “Oh my God.” I felt sick, wondered if I was going to throw up. No. I got hold of myself.
    After a little rinsing, I was as clean as I was going to get. Alcide left the bathroom so I could change into my more modest shorts and T-shirt. It was really interesting how much difference a few covered inches could make in your self-respect. Now that I felt more like myself, I could begin to think some more.
    I came out of the bathroom. Alcide was having a beer, and Mustapha was drinking a Coca-Cola. I accepted one, too, and the cold sweetness tasted wonderful going down.
    “So what are you going to do with the rogues, for right now?” I asked.
    “I’m going to stow them in a reinforced shed my dad built,” Alcide said. Jackson, his dad, had owned a farm outside Shreveport where the pack could run at the full moon.
    “So you have a special place to stow people,” I said. “I’m sureJannalynn has a special place, too. You been thinking about where that might be?”
    “Jannalynn’s from Shreveport,” Alcide said. “So, yeah, I’ve been thinking. She lives in the apartment above Hair of the Dog, so that’s out. No place there; besides, we’d have heard Warren if he’d been stashed there, or we’d have smelled him.”
    “If he was alive,” I said, very quietly.
    “If he wasn’t, definitely we’d have smelled him,” Alcide said, and Mustapha nodded, his face expressionless.
    “So where does she have of her own, a place she could be fairly sure no one else would go?”
    “Her mom and dad retired to Florida last year,” Alcide said. “But they sold their house. Our computer guy who works at the tax assessor’s office couldn’t find anything else in Jannalynn’s name.”
    “You sure that house sold? In this market?”
    “That’s what she told me. And the sign was down, last time I went by,” Alcide said.
    Mustapha stirred. “It’s on a big lot, and it’s pretty far out of Shreveport,” he said. “I was out that way once, driving with Jannalynn, when the pack was courting me. She said she used to ride dirt bikes out there. They had horses, too.”
    “Anyone can take down a sign,” I