A Touch of Dead

LUCKY

*

*

Amelia Broadway and I were painting each other’s toenails when my insurance agent knocked at the front door. I’d picked Roses on Ice. Amelia had opted for Mad Burgundy Cherry Glacé. She’d finished my feet, and I had about three toes to go on her left foot when Greg Aubert interrupted us.

Amelia had been living with me for months, and it had been kind of nice to have someone else sharing my old house. Amelia is a witch from New Orleans, and she had been staying with me because she’d had a magical misfortune she didn’t want any of her witch buddies in the Big Easy to know about. Also, since Katrina, she really doesn’t have anything to go home to, at least for a while. My little hometown of Bon Temps was swollen with refugees.

Greg Aubert had been to my house after I’d had a fire that caused a lot of damage. As far as I knew, I didn’t have any insurance needs at the moment. I was pretty curious about his purpose, I confess.

Amelia had glanced up at Greg, found his sandy hair and rimless glasses uninteresting, and completed painting her little toe while I ushered him to the wing-back chair.

“Greg, this is my friend Amelia Broadway,” I said. “Amelia, this is Greg Aubert.”

Amelia looked at Greg with more interest. I’d told her Greg was a colleague of hers, in some respects. Greg’s mom had been a witch, and he’d found using the craft very helpful in protecting his clients. Not a car got insured with Greg’s agency without having a spell cast on it. I was the only one in Bon Temps who knew about Greg’s little talent. Witchcraft wouldn’t be popular in our devout little town. Greg always handed his clients a lucky rabbit’s foot to keep in their new vehicles or homes.

After he turned down the obligatory offer of iced tea or water or Coke, Greg sat on the edge of the chair while I resumed my seat on one end of the couch. Amelia had the other end.

“I felt the wards when I drove up,” Greg told Amelia. “Very impressive.” He was trying real hard to keep his eyes off my tank top. I would have put on a bra if I’d known we were going to have company.

Amelia tried to look indifferent, and she might have shrugged if she hadn’t been holding a bottle of nail polish. Amelia, tan and athletic, with short glossy brown hair, is not only pleased with her looks but really proud of her witchcraft abilities. “Nothing special,” she said, with unconvincing modesty. She smiled at Greg, though.

“What can I do for you today, Greg?” I asked. I was due to go to work in an hour, and I had to change and pull my long hair up in a ponytail.

“I need your help,” he said, yanking his gaze up to my face.

No beating around the bush with Greg.

“Okay, how?” If he could be direct, so could I.

“Someone’s sabotaging my agency,” he said. His voice was suddenly passionate, and I realized Greg was really close to a major breakdown. He wasn’t quite the broadcaster Amelia was-I could read most thoughts Amelia had as clearly as if she’d spoken them-but I could certainly read his inner workings.

“Tell us about it,” I said, because Amelia could not read Greg’s mind.

“Oh, thanks,” he said, as if I’d agreed to do something. I opened my mouth to correct this idea, but he plowed ahead.

“Last week I came into the office to find that someone had been through the files.”

“You still have Marge Barker working for you?”

He nodded. A stray beam of sunlight winked off his glasses. It was October, and still warm in northern Louisiana. Greg got out a snowy handkerchief and patted his forehead. “I’ve got my wife, Christy; she comes in three days a week for half a day. And I’ve got Marge full-time.” Christy, Greg’s wife, was as sweet as Marge was sour.

“How’d you know someone had been through the files?” Amelia asked. She screwed on the top of the polish bottle and put it on the coffee table.

Greg took a deep breath. “I’d been thinking for a couple of weeks that someone had been in the office at night. But nothing was missing. Nothing was changed. My wards were okay. But two days ago, I got into the office to find that one of the drawers on our main filing cabinet was open. Of course, we lock them at night,” he said. “We’ve got one of those filing systems that locks up when you turn a key in the top drawer. Almost all of the client files were at risk. But every day, last thing in the afternoon, Marge goes around and locks all the cabinets. What if someone suspects… what I do?”

I could see how that would shiver Greg down to his liver. “Did you ask Marge if she remembered locking the cabinet?”

“Sure I asked her. She got mad-you know Marge-and said she definitely did. My wife had worked that afternoon, but she couldn’t remember if she watched Marge lock the cabinets or not. And Terry Bellefleur had dropped by at the last minute, wanting to check again on the insurance for his damn dog. He might have seen Marge lock up.”

Greg sounded so irritated that I found myself defending Terry. “Greg, Terry doesn’t like being the way he is, you know,” I said, trying to gentle my voice. “He got messed up fighting for our country, and we got to cut him some slack.”

Greg looked grumpy for a minute. Then he relaxed. “I know, Sookie,” he said. “He’s just been so hyped up about this dog.”

“What’s the story?” Amelia asked. If I have moments of curiosity, Amelia has an imperative urge. She wants to know everything about everybody. The telepathy should have gone to her, not me. She might actually have enjoyed it, instead of considering it a disability.

“Terry Bellefleur is Andy’s cousin,” I said. I knew Amelia had met Andy, a police detective, at Merlotte’s. “He comes in after closing and cleans the bar. Sometimes he substitutes for Sam. Maybe not the few evenings you were working.” Amelia filled in at the bar from time to time.

“Terry fought in Vietnam, got captured, and had a pretty bad time of it. He’s got scars inside and out. The story about the dogs is this: Terry loves hunting dogs, and he keeps buying himself these expensive Catahoulas, and things keep happening to them. His current bitch has had puppies. He’s just on pins and needles lest something happen to her and the babies.”

“You’re saying Terry is a little unstable?”

“He has bad times,” I said. “Sometimes he’s just fine.”

“Oh,” Amelia said, and a lightbulb might as well have popped on above her head. “He’s the guy with the long graying auburn hair, going bald at the front? Scars on his cheek? Big truck?”

“That’s him,” I said.

Amelia turned to Greg. “You said for at least a couple of weeks you’d felt someone had been in the building after it closed. That couldn’t be your wife, or this Marge?”

“My wife is with me all evening unless we have to take the kids to different events. And I don’t know why Marge would feel she had to come back at night. She’s there during the day, every day, and often by herself. Well, the spells that protect the building seem okay to me. But I keep recasting them.”

“Tell me about your spells,” Amelia said, getting down to her favorite part.

She and Greg talked spells for a few minutes, while I listened but didn’t comprehend. I couldn’t even understand their thoughts.

Then Amelia said, “What do you want, Greg? I mean, why did you come to us?”

He’d actually come to me, but it was kind of nice to be an “us.”

Greg looked from Amelia to me, and said, “I want Sookie to find out who opened my files, and why. I worked hard to become the bestselling Pelican State agent in northern Louisiana, and I don’t want my business fouled up now. My son’s about to go to Rhodes in Memphis, and it ain’t cheap.”

“Why are you coming to me instead of the police?”

“I don’t want anyone else finding out what I am,” he said, embarrassed but determined. “And it might come up if the police start looking into things at my office. Plus, you know, Sookie, I got you a real good payout on your kitchen.”

My kitchen had been burned down by an arsonist months before. I’d just finished getting it all rebuilt. “Greg, that’s your job,” I said. “I don’t see where the gratitude comes in.”

“Well, I have a certain amount of discretion in arson cases,” he said. “I could have told the home office that I thought you did it yourself.”

“You wouldn’t have done that,” I said calmly, though I was seeing a side of Greg I didn’t like. Amelia practically had flames coming out of her nose, she was so incensed. But I could tell that Greg was already ashamed of bringing up the possibility.

“No,” he said, looking down at his hands. “I guess I wouldn’t. I’m sorry I said that, Sookie. I’m scared someone’ll tell the whole town what I do, why people I insure are so… lucky. Can you see what you can find out?”

“Bring your family into the bar for supper tonight, give me a chance to look them over,” I said. “That’s the real reason you want me to find out, right? You suspect your family might be involved. Or your staff.”

He nodded, and he looked wretched.

“I’ll try to get in there tomorrow to talk to Marge. I’ll say you wanted me to drop by.”

“Yeah, I make calls from my cell phone sometimes, ask people to come in,” he said. “Marge would believe it.”

Amelia said, “What can I do?”

“Well, can you be with her?” Greg said. “Sookie can do things you can’t, and vice versa. Maybe between the two of you…”

“Okay,” Amelia said, giving Greg the benefit of her broad and dazzling smile. Her dad must have paid dearly for the perfect white smile of Amelia Broadway, witch and waitress.

Bob the cat padded in just at that moment, as if belatedly realizing we had a guest. Bob jumped on the chair right beside Greg and examined him with care.

Greg looked down at Bob just as intently. “Have you been doing something you shouldn’t, Amelia?”

“There’s nothing strange about Bob,” Amelia said, which was not true. She scooped up the black-and-white cat in her arms and nuzzled his soft fur. “He’s just a big ole cat. Aren’t you, Bob?” She was relieved when Greg dropped the subject. He got up to leave.

“I’ll be grateful for anything you can do to help me,” he said. With an abrupt switch to his professional persona, he said, “Here, have an extra lucky rabbit’s foot,” and reached in his pocket to hand me a lump of fake fur.

“Thanks,” I said, and decided to put it in my bedroom. I could use some luck in that direction.

After Greg left, I scrambled into my work clothes (black pants and white boatneck T-shirt with MERLOTTE’S embroidered over the left breast), brushed my long blond hair and secured it in a ponytail, and left for the bar, wearing Teva sandals to show off my beautiful toenails. Amelia, who wasn’t scheduled to work that night, said she might go have a good look around the insurance agency.

“Be careful,” I said. “If someone really is prowling around there, you don’t want to run into a bad situation.”

“I’ll zap ’em with my wonderful witch powers,” she said, only half-joking. Amelia had a fine opinion of her own abilities, which led to mistakes like Bob. He had actually been a thin young witch, handsome in a nerdy way. While spending the night with Amelia, Bob had been the victim of one of her less successful attempts at major magic. “Besides, who’d want to break into an insurance agency?” she said quickly, having read the doubt on my face. “This whole thing is ridiculous. I do want to check out Greg’s magic, though, and see if it’s been tampered with.”

“You can do that?”

“Hey, standard stuff.”

To my relief, the bar was quiet that night. It was Wednesday, which is never a very big day at supper time, since lots of Bon Temps citizens go to church on Wednesday night. Sam Merlotte, my boss, was busy counting cases of beer in the storeroom when I got there; that was how light the crowd was. The waitresses on duty were mixing their own drinks.

I stowed my purse in the drawer in Sam’s desk that he keeps empty for them, then went out front to take over my tables. The woman I was relieving, a Katrina evacuee I hardly knew, gave me a wave and departed.

After an hour, Greg Aubert came in with his family as he’d promised. You seated yourself at Merlotte’s, and I surreptitiously nodded to a table in my section. Dad, Mom, and two teenagers, the nuclear family. Greg’s wife, Christy, had medium-light hair like Greg, and like Greg she wore glasses. She had a comfortable middle-aged body, and she’d never seemed exceptional in any way. Little Greg (and that’s what they called him) was about three inches taller than his father, about thirty pounds heavier, and about ten IQ points smarter. That is, book smart. Like most nineteen-year-olds, he was pretty dumb about the world. Lindsay, the daughter, had lightened her hair five shades and squeezed herself into an outfit at least a size too small, and could hardly wait to get away from her folks so she could meet the Forbidden Boyfriend.

While I took their drink and food orders, I discovered that (a) Lindsay had the mistaken idea that she looked like Christina Aguilera, (b) Little Greg thought he would never go into insurance because it was so boring, and (c) Christy thought Greg might be interested in another woman because he’d been so distracted lately. As you can imagine, it takes a lot of mental doing to separate what I’m getting from people’s minds from what I’m hearing directly from their mouths, which accounts for the strained smile I often wear-the smile that’s led some people to think I’m just crazy.

After I’d brought them their drinks and turned in their food order, I puttered around studying the Aubert family. They seemed so typical it just hurt. Little Greg thought about his girlfriend mostly, and I learned more than I wanted to know.

Greg was just worried.

Christy was thinking about the dryer in their laundry room, wondering if it was time to get a new one.

See? Most people’s thoughts are like that. Christy was also weighing Marge Barker’s virtues (efficiency, loyalty) against the fact that she seriously disliked the woman.

Lindsay was thinking about her secret boyfriend. Like teenage girls everywhere, she was convinced her parents were the most boring people in the universe and had pokers up their asses besides. They didn’t understand anything. Lindsay herself didn’t understand why Dustin wouldn’t take her to meet his folks, why he wouldn’t let her see where he lived. No one but Dustin knew how poetic her soul was, how fascinating she truly could be, how misunderstood she was.

If I had a dime for every time I’d heard that from a teenager’s brain, I’d be as rich as John Edward, the psychic.

I heard the bell ding in the service window, and I trotted over to get the Auberts’ order from our current cook. I loaded my arms with the plates and hustled them over to the table. I had to endure a full-body scan from Little Greg, but that was par for the course, too. Guys can’t help it. Lindsay didn’t register me at all. She was wondering why Dustin was so secretive about his daytime activities. Shouldn’t he be in school?

Okay, now. We were getting somewhere.

But then Lindsay began thinking about her D in algebra and how she was going to get grounded when her parents found out and then she wouldn’t get to see Dustin for a while unless she climbed out of her bedroom window at two in the morning. She was seriously considering going all the way.

Lindsay made me feel sad and old. And very smart. By the time the Aubert family paid their bill and left, I was tired of all of them, and my head was exhausted (a weird feeling, and one I simply can’t describe).

I plodded through work the rest of the night, glad to the very ends of my Roses on Ice toenails when I headed out the back door.

“Psst,” said a voice from behind me while I was unlocking my car door.

With a stifled shriek, I swung around with my keys in my hand, ready to attack.

“It’s me,” Amelia said gleefully.

“Dammit, Amelia, don’t sneak up on me like that!” I sagged against the car.

“Sorry,” she said, but she didn’t sound very sorry. “Hey,” she continued, “I’ve been over by the insurance agency. Guess what!”

“What?” My lack of enthusiasm seemed to register with Amelia.

“You tired or something?” she asked.

“I just had an evening of listening in on the world’s most typical family,” I said. “Greg’s worried, Christy’s worried, Little Greg is horny, and Lindsay has a secret love.”

“I know,” Amelia said. “And guess what?”

“He might be a vamp.”

“Oh.” She sagged. “You already knew?”

“Not for sure. I know other fascinating stuff, though. I know he understands Lindsay as she’s never been understood before in her whole underappreciated life, that he just might be The One, and that she’s thinking of having sex with this goober.”

“Well, I know where he lives. Let’s go by there. You drive; I need to get some stuff ready.” We got into Amelia’s car. I took the driver’s seat. Amelia began fumbling in her purse through the many little Ziplocs that filled it. They were all full of magic ready to go: herbs and other ingredients. Bat wings, for all I knew.

“He lives by himself in a big house with a FOR SALE sign in the front yard. No furniture. Yet he looks like he’s eighteen.” Amelia pointed at the house, which was dark and isolated.

“Hmmm.” Our eyes met.

“What do you think?” Amelia asked.

“Vampire, almost surely.”

“Could be. But why would a strange vampire be in Bon Temps? Why don’t any of the other vamps know about him?” It was all right to be a vampire in today’s America, but the vamps were still trying to keep a low profile. They regulated themselves rigorously.

“How do you know they don’t? Know about him, that is.”

Good question. Would the area vampires be obliged to tell me? It wasn’t like I was an official vampire greeter or anything.

“Amelia, you went looking around after a vampire? Not smart.”

“It wasn’t like I knew he might be fangy when I started. I just followed him after I saw him cruising around the Auberts’ house.”

“I think he’s in the middle of seducing Lindsay,” I said. “I better make a call.”

“But does this have anything to do with Greg’s business?”

“I don’t know. Where is this boy now?”

“He’s at Lindsay’s house. He finally just parked outside. I guess he’s waiting for her to come out.”

“Crap.” I pulled in a little way down the street from the Auberts’ ranch style. I flipped open my cell phone to call Fangtasia. Maybe it’s not a good sign when the area vampire bar is on your speed dial.

“Fangtasia, the bar with a bite,” said an unfamiliar voice. Just as Bon Temps and our whole area was saturated with human evacuees, the vampire community in Shreveport was, too.

“This is Sookie Stackhouse. I need to speak with Eric, please,” I said.

“Oh, the telepath. Sorry, Miss Stackhouse. Eric and Pam are out tonight.”

“Maybe you can tell me if any of the new vampires are staying in my town, Bon Temps?”

“Let me inquire.”

The voice was back after a few minutes. “Clancy says no.” Clancy was like Eric’s third-in-command, and I was not his favorite person. You’ll notice Clancy didn’t even ask the phone guy to find out why I needed to know. I thanked the unknown vampire for his trouble and hung up.

I was stumped. Pam, Eric’s second-in-command, was sort of a buddy of mine, and Eric was, occasionally, something more than that. Since they weren’t there, I’d have to call our local vampire, Bill Compton.

I sighed. “I’m going to have to call Bill,” I said, and Amelia knew enough of my history to understand why the idea was so traumatic. And then I braced myself and dialed.

“Yes?” said a cool voice.

Thank goodness. I’d been scared the new girlfriend, Selah, would answer.

“Bill, this is Sookie. Eric and Pam are out of touch, and I have a problem.”

“What?”

Bill has always been a man of few words.

“There’s a young man in town we think is a vampire. Have you met him?”

“Here in Bon Temps?” Bill was clearly surprised and displeased.

That answered my question. “Yes, and Clancy told me they hadn’t farmed out any new vamps to Bon Temps. So I thought maybe you’d encountered this individual?”

“No, which means he’s probably taking care not to cross my path. Where are you?”

“We’re parked outside the Auberts’ house. He’s interested in the daughter, a teenager. We’ve pulled into the driveway of a house for sale across the street, middle of the block on Hargrove.”

“I’ll be there very soon. Don’t approach him.”

As if I would. “He thinks I’m stupid enough-” I began, and Amelia already had her “Indignant for You” face on when the driver’s door was yanked open and a white hand latched onto my shoulder. I squawked until the other hand clamped over my mouth.

“Shut up, breather,” said a voice that was even colder than Bill’s. “Are you the one that’s been following me around all night?”

Then I realized that he didn’t know Amelia was in the passenger’s seat. That was good.

Since I couldn’t speak, I nodded slightly.

“Why?” he growled. “What do you want with me?” He shook me like I was a dustcloth, and I thought all my bones would come disjointed.

Then Amelia leaped from the other side of the car and darted over to us, tossing the contents of a Ziploc on his head. Of course, I had no idea what she was saying, but the effect was dramatic. After a jolt of astonishment, the vampire froze. The problem was, he froze with me clasped with my back to his chest in an unbreakable hold. I was mashed against him, and his left hand was still hard over my mouth, his right hand around my waist. So far, the investigative team of Sookie Stackhouse, telepath, and Amelia Broadway, witch, was not doing a top-flight job.

“Pretty good, huh?” Amelia said.

I managed to move my head a fraction. “Yes, if I could breathe,” I said. I wished I hadn’t wasted breath speaking.

Then Bill was there, surveying the situation.

“You stupid woman, Sookie’s trapped,” Bill said. “Undo the spell.”

Under the streetlight, Amelia looked sullen. Undoing was not her best thing, I realized with some anxiety. I couldn’t do anything else, so I waited while she worked on the counterspell.

“If this doesn’t work, it’ll only take me a second to break his arm,” Bill told me. I nodded… well, I moved my head a fraction of an inch… because that was all I could do. I was getting pretty breathless.

Suddenly there was a little pop! in the air, and the younger vampire let go of me to launch himself at Bill-who wasn’t there. Bill was behind him, and he grabbed one of the boy’s arms and twisted it up and back. The boy screamed, and down they went to the ground. I wondered if anyone was going to call the police. This was a lot of noise and activity for a residential neighborhood after one o’clock. But no lights came on.

“Now, talk.” Bill was absolutely determined, and I guess the boy knew it.

“What’s your problem?” the boy demanded. He had spiked brown hair and a lean build and a couple of diamond studs in his nose. “This woman’s been following me around. I need to know who she is.”

Bill looked up at me questioningly. I jerked my head toward Amelia.

“You didn’t even grab the right woman,” Bill said. He sounded kind of disappointed in the youngster. “Why are you here in Bon Temps?”

“Getting away from Katrina,” the boy said. “My sire was staked by a human when we ran out of bottled blood substitute after the flood. I stole a car outside of New Orleans, changed the license plates, and got out of town. I reached here at daylight. I found an empty house with a FOR SALE sign and a windowless bathroom, so I moved in. I’ve been going out with a local girl. I take a sip every night. She’s none the wiser,” he sneered.

“What’s your interest?” Bill asked me.

“Have you two been going into her dad’s office at night?” I asked.

“Yeah, once or twice.” He smirked. “Her dad’s office has a couch in it.” I wanted to slap the shit out of him, maybe smacking the jewelry in his nose just by accident.

“How long have you been a vampire?” Bill asked.

“Ah… maybe two months.”

Okay, that explained a lot. “So that’s why he didn’t know to check in with Eric. That’s why he doesn’t realize what he’s doing is foolish and liable to get him staked.”

“There’s only so much excuse for stupidity,” Bill said.

“Have you gone through the files in there?” I asked the boy, who was looking a little dazed.

“What?”

“Did you go through the files in the insurance office?”

“Uh, no. Why would I do that? I was just loving up the girl, to get a little sip, you know? I was real careful not to take too much. I don’t have any money to buy artificial stuff.”

“Oh, you are so dumb.” Amelia was fed up with this kid. “For goodness’ sake, learn something about your condition. Stranded vampires can get help just like stranded people. You just ask the Red Cross for some synthetic blood, and they dole it out free.”

“Or you could have found out who the sheriff of the area is,” Bill said. “Eric would never turn away a vampire in need. What if someone had found you biting this girl? She’s under the age of consent, I gather?” For blood “donation” to a vampire.

“Yeah,” I said, when Dustin looked blank. “It’s Lindsay, daughter of Greg Aubert, my insurance agent. He wanted us to find out who’d been going into his building at night. Called in a favor to get me and Amelia to investigate.”

“He should do his own dirty work,” Bill said quite calmly. But his hands were clenched. “Listen, boy, what’s your name?”

“Dustin.” He’d even given Lindsay his real name.

“Well, Dustin, tonight we go to Fangtasia, the bar in Shreveport that Eric Northman uses as his headquar ters. He will talk to you there, decide what to do with you.”

“I’m a free vampire. I go where I want.”

“Not within Area Five, you don’t. You go to Eric, the area sheriff.”

Bill marched the young vampire off into the night, probably to load him into his car and get him to Shreveport.

Amelia said, “I’m sorry, Sookie.”

“At least you stopped him from breaking my neck,” I said, trying to sound philosophical about it. “We still have our original problem. It wasn’t Dustin who went through the files, though I’m guessing it was Dustin and Lindsay going into the office at night that disturbed the magic. How could they get past it?”

“After Greg told me his spell, I realized he wasn’t much of a witch. Lindsay’s a member of the family. With Greg’s spell to ward against outsiders, that made a difference,” Amelia said. “And sometimes vampires register as a void on spells created for humans. After all, they’re not alive. I made my ‘freeze’ spell vampire specific.”

“Who else can get through magic spells and work mischief?”

“Magical nulls,” she said.

“Huh?”

“There are people who can’t be affected by magic,” Amelia said. “They’re rare, but they exist. I’ve only met one before.”

“How can you detect nulls? Do they give off a special vibration or something?”

“Only very experienced witches can detect nulls without casting a spell on them that fails,” Amelia admitted. “Greg probably has never encountered one.”

“Let’s go see Terry,” I suggested. “He stays up all night.”

The baying of a dog announced our arrival at Terry’s cabin. Terry lived in the middle of three acres of woods. Terry liked being by himself most of the time, and any social needs he might feel were satisfied by an occasional stint of working as a bartender.

“That’ll be Annie,” I said, as the barking rose in intensity. “She’s his fourth.”

“Wife? Or dog?”

“Dog. Specifically, a Catahoula. The first one got hit by a truck, I think, and one got poisoned, and one got bit by a snake.”

“Gosh, that is bad luck.”

“Yeah, unless it’s not chance at all. Maybe someone’s making it happen.”

“What are Catahoulas for?”

“Hunting. Herding. Don’t get Terry started on the history of the breed, I’m begging you.”

Terry’s trailer door opened, and Annie launched herself off the steps to find out if we were friends or foes. She gave us a good bark, and when we stayed still, she eventually remembered she knew me. Annie weighed about fifty pounds, I guess, a good-sized dog. Catahoulas are not beautiful unless you love the breed. Annie was several shades of brown and red, and one shoulder was a solid color while her legs were another, though her rear half was covered with spots.

“Sookie, did you come to pick out a puppy?” Terry called. “Annie, let them by.” Annie obediently backed up, keeping her eyes on us as we began approaching the trailer.

“I came to look,” I said. “I brought my friend Amelia. She loves dogs.”

Amelia was thinking she’d like to slap me upside the head because she was definitely a cat person.

Annie’s puppies and Annie had made the small trailer quite doggy, though the odor wasn’t really unpleasant. Annie herself maintained a vigilant stance while we looked at the three pups Terry still had. Terry’s scarred hands were gentle as he handled the dogs. Annie had encountered several gentleman dogs on her unplanned excursion, and the puppies were diverse. They were adorable. Puppies just are. But they were sure distinctive. I picked up a bundle of short reddish fur with a white muzzle, and felt the puppy wiggle against me and snuffle my fingers. Gee, it was cute.

“Terry,” I said, “have you been worried about Annie?”

“Yeah,” he said. Since he was off base himself, Terry was very tolerant of other people’s quirks. “I got to thinking about the things that have happened to my dogs, and I began to wonder if someone was causing them all.”

“Do you insure all your dogs with Greg Aubert?”

“Naw, Diane at Liberty South insured the others. And see what happened to them? I decided to switch agents, and everyone says Greg is the luckiest son of a bitch in Renard Parish.”

The puppy began chewing on my fingers. Ouch. Amelia was looking around her at the dingy trailer. It was clean enough, but the furniture arrangement was strictly utilitarian, like the furniture itself.

“So, did you go through the files at Greg Aubert’s office?”

“No, why would I do that?”

Truthfully, I couldn’t think of a reason. Fortunately, Terry didn’t seem interested in why I wanted to know. “Sookie,” he said, “if anyone in the bar thinks about my dogs, knows anything about ’em, will you tell me?”

Terry knew about me. It was one of those community secrets that everyone knows but no one ever discusses. Until they need me.

“Yes, Terry, I will.” It was a promise, and I shook his hand. Reluctantly, I set the puppy back in its improvised pen, and Annie checked it over anxiously to make sure it was in good order.

We left soon after, none the wiser.

“So, who’ve we got left?” Amelia said. “You don’t think the family did it, the vampire boyfriend is cleared, and Terry, the only other person on the scene, didn’t do it. Where do we look next?”

“Don’t you have some magic that would give us a clue?” I asked. I pictured us throwing magic dust on the files to reveal fingerprints.

“Uh. No.”

“Then let’s just reason our way through it. Like they do in crime novels. They just talk about it.”

“I’m game. Saves gas.”

We got back to the house and sat across from each other at the kitchen table. Amelia brewed a cup of tea for herself, while I got a caffeine-free Coke.

I said, “Greg is scared that someone is going through his files at work. We solved the part about someone being in his office. That was the daughter and her boyfriend. So we’re left with the files. Now, who would be interested in Greg’s clients?”

“There’s always the chance that some client doesn’t think Greg paid out enough on a claim, or maybe thinks Greg is cheating his clients.” Amelia took a sip of her tea.

“But why go through the files? Why not just bring a complaint to the national insurance agents’ board, or whatever?”

“Okay. Then there’s… the only other answer is another insurance agent. Someone who wonders why Greg has such phenomenal luck in what he insures. Someone who doesn’t believe it’s chance or those cheesy synthetic rabbits’ feet.”

It was so simple when you thought about it, when you cleared away the mental debris. I was sure the culprit had to be someone in the same business.

I was pretty sure I knew the other three insurance agents in Bon Temps, but I checked the phone book to be sure.

“I suggest we go from agent to agent, starting with the local ones,” Amelia said. “I’m relatively new in town, so I can tell them I want to take out some more insurance.”

“I’ll come with you, and I’ll scan them.”

“During the conversation, I’ll bring up the Aubert Agency, so they’ll be thinking about the right thing.” Amelia had asked enough questions to understand how my telepathy worked.

I nodded. “First thing tomorrow morning.”

We went to sleep that night with a pleasant tingle of anticipation. A plan was a beautiful thing. Stackhouse and Broadway swing into action.

The next day didn’t start exactly like we’d planned. For one thing, the weather had decided to be fall. It was cool. It was pouring rain. I put my shorts and tank tops away sadly, knowing I probably wouldn’t wear them again for several months.

The first agent, Diane Porchia, was guarded by a meek clerk. Alma Dean crumpled like a fender when we insisted on seeing the actual agent. Amelia, with her bright smile and gorgeous teeth, simply beamed at Ms. Dean until she called Diane out of her office. The middle-aged agent, a stocky woman in a green pantsuit, came out to shake our hands. I said, “I’ve been taking my friend Amelia around to all the agents in town, starting with Greg Aubert.” I was listening as hard as I could to the result, and all I got was professional pride… and a hint of desperation. Diane Porchia was scared by the number of claims she had processed lately. It was abnormally high. All she was thinking of was selling. Amelia gave me a little hand wave. Diane Porchia was not a magical null.

“Greg Aubert thought he’d had someone break into his office at night,” Amelia said.

“Us, too,” Diane said, seeming genuinely astonished. “But nothing was taken.” She rallied and got back to her purpose. “Our rates are very competitive with anything Greg can offer you. Take a look at the coverage we provide, and I think you’ll agree.”

Shortly after that, our heads filled with figures, we were on our way to Bailey Smith. Bailey was a high school classmate of my brother Jason’s, and we had to spend a little longer there playing “What’s he/she doing now?” But the result was the same. Bailey’s only concern was getting Amelia’s business, and maybe getting her to go out for a drink with him if he could think of a place to take her that his wife wouldn’t hear about.

He had had a break-in at his office, too. In his case, the window had been shattered. But nothing had been taken. And I heard directly from his brain that business was down. Way down.

At John Robert Briscoe’s we had a different problem. He didn’t want to see us. His clerk, Sally Lundy, was like an angel with a flaming sword guarding the entrance to his private office. We got our chance when a client came in, a little withered woman who’d had a collision the month before. She said, “I don’t know how this could be, but the minute I signed with John Robert, I had an accident. Then a month goes by, and I have another one.”

“Come on back, Mrs. Hanson.” Sally gave us a mistrustful look as she took the little woman to the inner sanctum. The minute they were gone, Amelia went through the stack of paperwork in the in-box, to my surprise and dismay.

Sally came back to her desk, and Amelia and I took our departure. I said, “We’ll come back later. We’ve got another appointment right now.”

“They were all claims,” Amelia said, when we were out of the door. “Every one of them.” She pushed back the hood on her slicker since the rain had finally stopped.

“There’s something wrong with that. John Robert has been hit even harder than Diane or Bailey.”

We stared at each other. Finally, I said what we were both thinking. “Did Greg upset some balance by claiming more than his fair share of good luck?”

“I never heard of such a thing,” Amelia said. But we both believed that Greg had unwittingly tipped over a cosmic applecart.

“There weren’t any nulls at any of the other agencies,” Amelia said. “It’s got to be John Robert or his clerk. I didn’t get to check either of them.”

“He’ll be going to lunch any minute,” I said, glancing down at my watch. “Probably Sally will be, too. I’ll go to the back where they park and stall them. Do you just have to be close?”

“If I have one of my spells, it’ll be better,” she said. She darted over to the car and unlocked it, pulling out her purse. I hurried around to the back of the building, just a block off the main street but surrounded by crepe myrtles.

I managed to catch John Robert as he left his office to go to lunch. His car was dirty. His clothes were disheveled. He slumped. I knew him by sight, but we’d never had a conversation.

“Mr. Briscoe,” I said, and his head swung up. He seemed confused. Then his face cleared, and he tried to smile.

“Sookie Stackhouse, right? Girl, it’s been an age since I saw you.”

“I guess you don’t come in Merlotte’s much.”

“No, I pretty much go home to the wife and kids in the evening,” he said. “They’ve got a lot of activities.”

“Do you ever go over to Greg Aubert’s office?” I asked, trying to sound gentle.

He stared at me for a long moment. “No, why would I do that?”

And I could tell, hear from his head directly, that he absolutely didn’t know what I was talking about. But there came Sally Lundy, steam practically coming out of her ears at the sight of me talking to her boss when she’d done her best to shield him.

“Sally,” John Robert said, relieved to see his righthand woman, “this young woman wants to know if I’ve been to Greg’s office lately.”

“I’ll just bet she does,” Sally said, and even John Robert blinked at the venom in her voice.

And I got it then, the name I’d been waiting for.

“It’s you,” I said. “You’re the one, Ms. Lundy. What are you doing that for?” If I hadn’t known I had backup, I would’ve been scared. Speaking of backup…

“What am I doing it for?” she screeched. “You have the gall, the nerve, the… the balls to ask me that?”

John Robert couldn’t have looked more horrified if she’d sprouted horns.

“Sally,” he said, very anxiously. “Sally, maybe you need to sit down.”

“You can’t see it!” she shrieked. “You can’t see it. That Greg Aubert, he’s dealing with the devil! Diane and Bailey are in the same boat we are, and it’s sinking! Do you know how many claims he had to handle last week? Three! Do you know how many new policies he wrote? Thirty!”

John Robert literally staggered when he heard the numbers. He recovered enough to say, “Sally, we can’t make wild accusations against Greg. He’s a fine man. He’d never…”

But Greg had, however blindly.

Sally decided it would be a good time to kick me in the shins, and I was really glad I was wearing jeans instead of shorts that day. Okay, anytime now, Amelia, I thought. John Robert was windmilling his arms and yelling at Sally-though not moving to restrain her, I noticed-and Sally was yelling back at the top of her lungs and venting her feelings about Greg Aubert and that bitch Marge who worked for him. She had a lot to say about Marge. No love lost there.

By that time I was holding Sally off at arm’s length, and I was sure my legs would be black-and-blue the next day.

Finally, finally, Amelia appeared, breathless and disarranged. “Sorry,” she panted, “you’re not going to believe this, but my foot got stuck between the car seat and the doorsill, then I fell, and my keys went under the car… anyway, Congelo!”

Sally’s foot stopped in midswing, so she was balancing on one skinny leg. Greg had both hands in the air in a gesture of despair. I touched his arm, and he felt as hard as the frozen vampire had the other night. At least he wasn’t holding me.

“Now what?” I asked.

“I thought you knew!” she said. “We’ve got to get them off thinking about Greg and his luck!”

“The problem is, I think Greg’s used up all the luck going around,” I said. “Look at the problems you had just getting out of the car here.”

She looked intensely thoughtful. “Yeah, we have to have a chat with Greg,” she said. “But first, we’ve got to get out of this situation.” Holding out her right hand toward the two frozen people, she said, “Ah-amicus cum Greg Aubert.”

They didn’t look any more amiable, but maybe the change was taking place in their hearts. “Regelo,” Amelia said, and Sally’s foot came down to the ground hard. The older woman lurched a bit, and I caught her. “Watch out, Miss Sally,” I said, hoping she wouldn’t kick me again. “You were a little off balance there.”

She looked at me in surprise. “What are you doing back here?”

Good question. “Amelia and I were just cutting through the parking lot on our way to McDonald’s,” I said, gesturing toward the golden arches that stuck up one street over. “We didn’t realize that you had so many high bushes around the back, here. We’ll just return to the front parking lot and get our car and drive around.”

“That would be better,” John Robert said. “That way we wouldn’t have to worry about something happening to your car while it was parked in our parking lot.” He looked gloomy again. “Something’s sure to hit it, or fall on top of it. Maybe I’ll just call that nice Greg Aubert and ask him if he’s got any ideas about breaking my streak of bad luck.”

“You do that,” I said. “Greg would be glad to talk to you. He’ll give you lots of his lucky rabbits’ feet, I bet.”

“Yep, that Greg sure is nice,” Sally Lundy agreed. She turned to back into the office, a little dazed but none the worse for wear.

Amelia and I went over to the Pelican State office. We were both feeling pretty thoughtful about the whole thing.

Greg was in, and we plopped down on the client side of his desk.

“Greg, you’ve got to stop using the spells so much,” I said, and I explained why.

Greg looked frightened and angry. “But I’m the best agent in Louisiana. I have an incredible record.”

“I can’t make you change anything, but you’re sucking up all the luck in Renard Parish,” I said. “You gotta let loose of some of it for the other guys. Diane and Bailey are hurting so much they’re thinking about changing professions. John Robert Briscoe is almost suicidal.” To do Greg credit, once we explained the situation, he was horrified.

“I’ll modify my spells,” he said. “I’ll accept some of the bad luck. I just can’t believe I was using up everyone else’s share.” He still didn’t look happy, but he was resigned. “And the people in the office at night?” Greg asked meekly.

“Don’t worry about it,” I said. “Taken care of.” At least, I hoped so. Just because Bill had taken the young vampire to Shreveport to see Eric didn’t mean that he wouldn’t come back again. But maybe the couple would find somewhere else to conduct their mutual exploration.

“Thank you,” Greg said, shaking our hands. In fact, Greg cut us a check, which was also nice, though we assured him it wasn’t necessary. Amelia looked proud and happy. I felt pretty cheerful myself. We’d cleaned up a couple of the world’s problems, and things were better because of us.

“We were fine investigators,” I said, as we drove home.

“Of course,” said Amelia. “We weren’t just good. We were lucky.”