Definitely Dead

she’d become a vampire. But as a person with very few living relations, I hated to lose even one. “A bit,” I said.
    “You don’t know when you might go?”
    “I haven’t decided. You remember her lawyer, Mr. Cataliades? He said he’d tell me when the will had gone through probate. He promised to keep the place intact for me, and when the queen’s counselor tells you the place’ll be intact, you have to believe it’ll be untouched. I haven’t really been too interested, to tell you the truth.”
    “I might go with you when you head to New Orleans, if you don’t mind having a traveling companion.”
    “Gee,” I said, with just a dash of sarcasm, “Won’t Selah mind? Or were you going to bring her, too?” That would make for a merry trip.
    “No.” And he closed down. You just couldn’t get anything out of Bill when he was holding his mouth like that, I knew from experience. Okay, color me confused.
    “I’ll let you know,” I said, trying to figure him out. Though it was painful to be in Bill’s company, I trusted him. Bill would never harm me. He wouldn’t let anyone else harm me, either. But there’s more than one kind of harm.
    “Sookie,” Father Littrell called, and I hurried away.
    I glanced back to catch Bill smiling, a small smile with a lot of satisfaction packed into it. I wasn’t sure what it meant, but I liked to see Bill smile. Maybe he was hoping to revive our relationship?
    Father Littrell said, “We weren’t sure if you wanted to be interrupted or not.” I looked down at him, confused.
    “We were a tad concerned to see you consorting with the vampire for so long, and so intently,” Father Riordan said. “Was the imp of hell trying to bring you under his spell?”
    Suddenly his Irish accent wasn’t charming at all. I looked at Father Riordan quizzically. “You’re joking, right? You know Bill and I dated for a good while. Obviously, you don’t know much about imps from hell if you believe Bill’s anything like one.” I’d seen things much darker than Bill in and about our fair town of Bon Temps. Some of those things had been human. “Father Riordan, I understand my own life. I understand the nature of vampires better than you ever will. Father Littrell,” I said, “you want honey mustard or ketchup with your chicken strips?”
    Father Littrell chose honey mustard, in a kind of dazed way. I walked away, working to shrug the little incident off, wondering what the two priests would do if they knew what had happened in this bar a couple of months before when the bar’s clientele had ganged up to rid me of someone who was trying to kill me.
    Since that someone had been a vampire, they’d probably have approved.
    Before he left, Father Riordan came over to “have a word” with me. “Sookie, I know you’re not real happy with me at the moment, but I need to ask you something on behalf of someone else. If I’ve made you less inclined to listen by my behavior, please ignore that and give these people the same consideration you would have.”
    I sighed. At least Father Riordan tried to be a good man. I nodded reluctantly.
    “Good girl. A family in Jackson has contacted me . . .”
    All my alarms started going off. Debbie Pelt was from Jackson.
    “The Pelt family, I know you’ve heard of them. They’re still searching for news of their daughter, who vanished in January. Debbie, her name was. They called me because their priest knows me, knows I serve the Bon Temps congregation. The Pelts would like to come to see you, Sookie. They want to talk to everyone who saw their daughter the night she vanished, and they feared if they just showed up on your doorstep, you might not see them. They’re afraid you’re angry because their private detectives have interviewed you, and the police have talked to you, and maybe you might be indignant about all that.”
    “I don’t want to see them,” I said. “Father Riordan, I’ve told everything I know.” That was true. I just hadn’t told it to the police or the Pelts. “I don’t want to talk about Debbie any more.” That was also true, very true. “Tell them, with all due respect, there’s nothing left to talk about.”
    “I’ll tell them,” he said. “But I’ve got to say, Sookie, I’m disappointed.”
    “Well, I guess it’s been a bad night for me all around,” I said. “Losing your good opinion, and all.”
    He left without another word, which was exactly what I’d wanted.

Chapter 2
    IT WAS