Dead Reckoning(56)

I was just expelling a sigh of relief at the end of the day when there was a very quiet knock at the back door. I jumped like a frog. Who could be there at this time of night? I looked out across the back porch very cautiously.

Bill. I hadn’t seen him since his “sister” Judith had come to see him. I debated for a second, then decided to slip outside to talk to him. Bill was a lot of things to me: neighbor, friend, first lover. I did not fear him.

“Sookie,” he said, his cool, smooth voice as relaxing as a massage. “You have guests?”

“Amelia and Bob,” I explained. “They just got here from New Orleans. The fairies aren’t here tonight. They stay in Monroe most nights, lately.”

“Shall we stay out here, so we won’t wake your friends?”

It was news to me that our conversation was going to last that long. Apparently, Bill hadn’t come over just to borrow a cup of blood. I waved my hand toward the lawn furniture, and we sat in the chairs, already placed at a companionable angle. The warm night with its myriad small sounds closed around us like an envelope. The security light gave the backyard strange patterns of dark and brightness.

When the silence had lasted long enough for me to realize I was sleepy, I said, “How’s things going at your house, Bill? Is Judith still staying with you?”

“I’m fully healed from the silver poisoning,” he said.

“I, ah, I noticed you looked good,” I said. His skin had regained its pale clarity, and even his hair looked more lustrous. “Much better. So Judith’s blood worked.”

“Yes. But now . . .” He looked off into the night forest.

Uh-oh. “She wants to keep on living with you?”

“Yes,” he said, sounding relieved he hadn’t had to spell it out. “She does.”

“I thought you admired her because she looked so much like your first wife. Judith told me that’s why crazy Lorena changed Judith over, to keep you with her. I mean, sorry to bring up bad stuff.”

“It’s true. Judith does look like my first wife, in many respects. Her face is the same shape, her voice very like my wife’s. Her hair is the same color my wife’s was when she was a child. And Judith was raised very gently, like my wife.”

“So, I would have predicted that would make you happy with Judith,” I said.

“But not.” He sounded rueful, and he kept his eyes on the trees, carefully averting his gaze from my face. “And in fact, that’s why I didn’t call Judith when I realized how sick I was. I had to part with her the last time we were together because of her overwhelming obsession with me.”

“Oh,” I said, my voice very small.

“But you did the right thing, Sookie. She came to me and freely offered her blood. Since you invited her here without my knowledge, I’m at least not guilty of using her. My fault lies in letting her stay after . . . after I healed.”

“And why’d you do that?”

“Because I hoped somehow my feelings for her had changed, that I could have a genuine love for her. That would have freed me from . . .” His voice trailed off.

He might have finished the sentence, “loving you.” Or maybe, “freed me from the debt I owed her for healing me.”

I did feel a little better now that I knew he was glad to be well, even though the price was that he had to deal with Judith. And I could understand how awkward and unpleasant it would be to be saddled with a houseguest who adored you when you didn’t return the emotion. Who was the one who’d saddled him? Well, that would be me. Of course, I hadn’t known any of the emotional background. Distressed by Bill’s condition, I’d reasoned that someone of Bill’s bloodline could heal him, and I’d found that there was such a person and tracked her down. I’d further assumed Bill hadn’t done that himself from some perverse pride or perhaps even from a suicidal depression. I’d underestimated Bill’s desire to live.

“What do you plan to do about Judith?” I asked anxiously, scared to hear his answer.

“He need not do anything,” a quiet voice said from the trees.

I came up out of my chair like someone had just shot a few volts through it, and Bill had a big reaction. He turned his head and his eyes widened. That was it, but for a vampire, that indicates major surprise.

“Judith?” I said.

She stepped out of the tree line, far enough for me to recognize her. The security light in the backyard didn’t extend that far, and I could only just be sure it was her.

“You keep breaking my heart, Bill,” she said.

I eased away from the chair. Maybe I could slink back into the house. Maybe I could avoid witnessing another major scene — because honestly, the day had been chock-full of them.