I hate it when fairies come into the bar. They don’t tip you worth a

toot—not because they’re stingy, but because they just forget.

Take Claudine, the fairy who was walking in the door. Six feet tall,

long black hair, gorgeous; Claudine seemed to have no shortage

of cash or clothing (and she entranced men the way a watermelon

draws flies). But Claudine hardly ever remembered to leave you

even a dollar. And if it’s lunchtime, you have to take the bowl of

lemon slices off the table. Fairies are allergic to lemons and limes,

like vamps are allergic to silver and garlic.

That spring night when Claudine came in I was in a bad mood

already. I was angry with my ex-boyfriend, Bill Compton, a.k.a.

Vampire Bill; my brother Jason had once again postponed helping

me shift an armoire; and I’d gotten my property tax notice in the

mail.

So when Claudine sat at one of my tables, I stalked over to her with

no very happy feelings.

“No vamps around?” she asked straight away. “Even Bill?”

Vamps like fairies the way dogs like bones: great toys, good food.

“Not tonight,” I said. “Bill’s down in New Orleans. I’m picking up his

mail for him.” Just call me sucker.

Claudine relaxed. “Dearest Sookie,” she said.

“You want what?”

“Oh, one of those nasty beers, I guess,” she said, making a face.

Claudine didn’t really like to drink, though she did like bars. Like

most fairies, she loved attention and admiration: My boss Sam said

that was a fairy characteristic.

I brought her the beer. “You got a minute?” she asked. I frowned.

Claudine didn’t look as cheerful as usual.

“Just.” The table by the door was hooting and hollering at me.

“I have a job for you.”

Though it called for dealing with Claudine, whom I liked but didn’t

trust, I was interested. I sure needed some cash. “What do you

need me to do?”

“I need you to come listen to some humans.”

“Are these humans willing?”

Claudine gave me innocent eyes. “What do you mean, Precious?”

I hated this song and dance. “Do they want to be, ah, listened to?”

“They’re guests of my brother, Claude.”

I hadn’t known Claudine had a brother. I don’t know much about

fairies; Claudine was the only one I’d met. If she was typical, I

wasn’t sure how the race had survived eradication. I wouldn’t have

thought northern Louisiana was very hospitable toward beings of

the fairy persuasion, anyway. This part of the state is largely rural,

very Bible Belt. My small town of Bon Temps, barely big enough to

have its own Walmart, didn’t even see a vampire for two years after

they’d announced their existence and their intention to live

peaceably amongst us. Maybe that delay was good, since local

folks had had a chance to get used to the idea by the time Bill

showed up.

But I had a feeling that this PC vamp tolerance would vanish if my

fellow townsfolk knew about Weres, and shifters, and fairies. And

who knows what all else.

“Okay, Claudine, when?” The rowdy table was hooting, “Crazy

Sookie! Crazy Sookie!” People only did that when they’d had too

much to drink. I was used to it, but it still hurt.

“When do you get off tonight?”

We fixed it that Claudine would pick me up at my house fifteen

minutes after I got off work. She left without finishing her beer. Or

tipping.

My boss, Sam Merlotte, nodded a head toward the door she’d just

exited. “What’d the fairy want?” Sam’s a shifter, himself.

“She needs me to do a job for her.”

“Where?”

“Wherever she lives, I guess. She has a brother, did you know?”

“Want me to come with you?” Sam is a friend, the kind of friend

you sometimes have fantasies about. X-rated.

“Thanks, but I think I can handle Claudine.”

“You haven’t met the brother.”

“I’ll be okay.”

I’m used to being up at night, not only because I’m a barmaid, but

also because I had dated Bill for a long time. When Claudine

picked me up at my old house in the woods, I’d had time to change

from my Merlotte’s outfit into some black jeans and a sage green

twin set (JC Penney’s on sale), since the night was chilly. I’d let my

hair down from its ponytail.

“You should wear blue instead of green,” Claudine said, “to go with

your eyes.”

“Thanks for the fashion tip.”

“You’re welcome.” Claudine sounded happy to share her style

sense with me. But her smile, usually so radiant, seemed tinged

with sadness.

“What do you want me to find out from these people?” I asked.

“We’ll talk about it when we get there,” she said, and after that she

wouldn’t tell me anything else as we drove east. Ordinarily Claudine

babbles. I was beginning to feel it wasn’t smart of me to have

accepted this job.

Claudine and her brother lived in a big ranch-style house in

suburban Monroe, a town that not only had a Walmart, but a whole

mall. She knocked on the front door in a pattern. After a minute, the

door opened. My eyes widened. Claudine hadn’t mentioned that

her brother was her twin.

If Claude had put on his sister’s clothes, he could have passed for

her; it was eerie. His hair was shorter, but not by a lot; he had it

pulled back to the nape of his neck, but his ears were covered. His

shoulders were broader, but I couldn’t see a trace of a beard, even

this late at night. Maybe male fairies don’t have body hair? Claude

looked like a Calvin Klein underwear model; in fact, if the designer

had been there, he’d have signed the twins on the spot, and

there’d have been drool all over the contract.

He stepped back to let us enter. “This is the one?” he said to

Claudine.

She nodded. “Sookie, my brother Claude.”

“A pleasure,” I said. I extended my hand. With some surprise, he

took it and shook. He looked at his sister. “She’s a trusting one.”

“Humans,” Claudine said, and shrugged.

Claude led me through a very conventional living room, down a

paneled hall to the family room. A man was sitting in a chair,

because he had no choice. He was tied to it with what looked like

nylon cord. He was a small man, buff, blond, and brown-eyed. He

looked about my age, twenty-six.

“Hey,” I said, not liking the squeak in my voice, “why is that man

tied?”

“Otherwise, he’d run away,” Claude said, surprised.

I covered my face with my hands for a second. “Listen, you two, I

don’t mind looking at this guy if he’s done something wrong, or if

you want to eliminate him as a suspect in a crime committed

against you. But if you just want to find out if he really loves you, or

something silly like that. . . . What’s your purpose?”

“We think he killed our triplet, Claudia.”

I almost said, “There were three of you?” then realized that wasn’t

the most important part of the sentence.

“You think he murdered your sister.”

Claudine and Claude nodded in unison. “Tonight,” Claude said.

“Okey-dokey,” I muttered, and bent over the blond. “I’m taking the

gag off.”

They looked unhappy, but I slid the handkerchief down to his neck.

The young man said, “I didn’t do it.”

“Good. Do you know what I am?”

“No. You’re not a thing like them, are you?”

I don’t know what he thought Claude and Claudine were, what little

otherworldly attribute they’d sprung on him. I lifted my hair to show

him that my ears were round, not pointed, but he still looked

dissatisfied.

“Not a vamp?” he asked.

Showed him my teeth. The canines only extend when vamps are

excited by blood, battle, or sex, but they’re noticeably sharp even

when they’re retracted. My canines are quite normal.

“I’m just a regular human,” I said. “Well, that’s not quite true. I can

read your thoughts.”

He looked terrified.

“What are you scared for? If you didn’t kill anybody, you have

nothing to fear.” I made my voice warm, like butter melting on corn

on the cob.

“What will they do to me? What if you make a mistake and tell them

I did it, what are they gonna do?”

Good question. I looked up at the two.

“We’ll kill him and eat him,” Claudine said, with a ravishing smile.

When the blond man looked from her to Claude, his eyes wide with

terror, she winked at me.

For all I knew, Claudine might be serious. I couldn’t remember if I’d

ever seen her eat or not. We were treading on dangerous ground. I

try to support my own race when I can. Or at least get ’em out of

situations alive.

I should have accepted Sam’s offer.

“Is this man the only suspect?” I asked the twins. (Should I call

them twins? I wondered. It was more accurate to think of them as

two-thirds of triplets. Nah. Too complicated.)

“No, we have another man in the kitchen,” Claude said.

“And a woman in the pantry.”

Under other circumstances, I would’ve smiled. “Why are you sure

Claudia is dead?”

“She came to us in spirit form and told us so.” Claude looked

surprised. “This is a death ritual for our race.”

I sat back on my heels, trying to think of intelligent questions.

“When this happens, does the spirit let you know any of the

circumstances of the death?”

“No,” Claudine said, shaking her head so her long black hair

switched. “It’s more like a final farewell.”

“Have you found the body?”

They looked disgusted. “We fade,” Claude explained, in a haughty

way.

So much for examining the corpse.

“Can you tell me where Claudia was when she, ah, faded?” I

asked. “The more I know, the better questions I can ask.” Mind

reading is not so simple. Asking the right questions is the key to

eliciting the correct thought. The mouth can say anything. The head

never lies. But if you don’t ask the right question, the right thought

won’t pop up.

“Claudia and Claude are exotic dancers at Hooligans,” Claudine

said proudly, as if she was announcing they were on an Olympic

team.

I’d never met strippers before, male or female. I found myself

more than a little interested in seeing Claude strip, but I made

myself focus on the deceased Claudia.

“So, Claudia worked last night?”

“She was scheduled to take the money at the door. It was ladies’

night at Hooligans.”

“Oh. Okay. So you were, ah, performing,” I said to Claude.

“Yes. We do two shows on ladies’ night. I was the Pirate.”

I tried to suppress that mental image.

“And this man?” I tilted my head toward the blond, who was being

very good about not pleading and begging.

“I’m a stripper, too,” he said. “I was the Cop.”

Okay. Just stuff that imagination in a box and sit on it.

“Your name is?”

“Barry Barber is my stage name. My real name is Ben Simpson.”

“Barry Barber?” I was puzzled.

“I like to shave people.”

I had a blank moment, then felt a red flush creep across my

cheeks as I realized he didn’t mean whiskery cheeks. Well, not

facial cheeks. “And the other two people are?” I asked the twins.

“The woman in the pantry is Rita Child. She owns Hooligans,”

Claudine said. “And the man in the kitchen is Jeff Puckett. He’s the

bouncer.”

“Why did you pick these three out of all the employees at

Hooligans?”

“Because they had arguments with Claudia. She was a dynamic

woman,” Claude said seriously.

“Dynamic my ass,” said Barry the Barber, proving that tact isn’t a

prerequisite for a stripping job. “That woman was hell on wheels.”

“Her character isn’t really important in determining who killed her,” I

pointed out, which shut him right up. “It just indicates why. Please

go on,” I said to Claude. “Where were the three of you? And where

were the people you’ve held here?”

“Claudine was here, cooking supper for us. She works at Dillard’s

in Customer Service.” She’d be great at that; her unrelenting cheer

could pacify anyone. “As I said, Claudia was scheduled to take the

cover charge at the door,” Claude continued. “Barry and I were in

both shows. Rita always puts the first show’s take in the safe, so

Claudia won’t be sitting up there with a lot of cash. We’ve been

robbed a couple of times. Jeff was mostly sitting behind Claudia, in

a little booth right inside the main door.”

“When did Claudia vanish?”

“Soon after the second show started. Rita says she got the first

show’s take from Claudia and took it back to her safe, and that

Claudia was still sitting there when she left. But Rita hates Claudia,

because Claudia was about to leave Hooligans for Foxes, and I

was going with her.”

“Foxes is another club?” Claude nodded. “Why were you leaving?”

“Better pay, larger dressing rooms.”

“Okay, that would be Rita’s motivation. What about Jeff’s?”

“Jeff and I had a thing,” Claude said. (My pirate ship fantasy sank.)

“Claudia told me I had to break up with him, that I could do better.”

“And you listened to her advice about your love life?”

“She was the oldest, by several minutes,” he said simply. “But I

lo—I am very fond of him.”

“What about you, Barry?”

“She ruined my act,” Barry said sullenly.

“How’d she do that?”

“She yelled, ‘Too bad your nightstick’s not bigger!’ as I was

finishing up.”

It seemed that Claudia had been determined to die.

“Okay,” I said, marshaling my plan of action. I knelt before Barry. I

laid my hand on his arm, and he twitched. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-five,” he said, but his mind provided me with a different

answer.

“That’s not right, is it?” I asked, keeping my voice gentle.

He had a gorgeous tan, almost as good as mine, but he paled

underneath it. “No,” he said in a strangled voice. “I’m thirty.”

“I had no idea,” Claude said, and Claudette told him to hush.

“And why didn’t you like Claudia?”

“She insulted me in front of an audience,” he said. “I told you.”

The image from his mind was quite different. “In private? Did she

say something to you in private?” After all, reading minds isn’t like

watching television. People don’t relate things in their own brains,

the way they would if they were telling a story to another person.

Barry looked embarrassed and even angrier. “Yes, in private. We’d

been having sex for a while, and then one day she just wasn’t

interested anymore.”

“Did she tell you why?”

“She told me I was . . . inadequate.”

That hadn’t been the phrase she used. I felt embarrassed for him

when I heard the actual words in his head.

“What did you do between shows tonight, Barry?”

“We had an hour. So I could get two shaves in.”

“You get paid for that?”

“Oh, yeah.” He grinned, but not as though something was funny.

“You think I’d shave a stranger’s crotch if I didn’t get paid for it? But

I make a big ritual out of it; act like it turns me on. I get a hundred

bucks a pop.”

“When did you see Claudia?”

“When I went out to meet my first appointment, right as the first

show was ending. She and her boyfriend were standing by the

booth. I’d told them that was where I’d meet them.”

“Did you talk to Claudia?”

“No, I just looked at her.” He sounded sad. “I saw Rita, she was on

her way to the booth with the money pouch, and I saw Jeff, he was

on the stool at the back of the booth, where he usually stays.”

“And then you went back to do this shaving?”

He nodded.

“How long does it take you?”

“Usually about thirty, forty minutes. So scheduling two was kind of

chancy, but it worked out. I do it in the dressing room, and the other

guys are good about staying out.”

He was getting more relaxed, the thoughts in his head calming and

flowing more easily. The first person he’d done tonight had been a

woman so bone-thin he’d wondered if she’d die while he did the

shaving routine. She’d thought she was beautiful, and she’d

obviously enjoyed showing him her body. Her boyfriend had gotten

a kick out of the whole thing.

I could hear Claudine buzzing in the background, but I kept my

eyes closed and my hands on Barry’s, seeing the second “client,”

a guy, and then I saw his face. Oh, boy. It was someone I knew, a

vampire named Maxwell Litton.

“There was a vamp in the bar,” I said, out loud, not opening my

eyes. “Barry, what did he do when you finished shaving him?”

“He left,” Barry said. “I watched him go out the back door. I’m

always careful to make sure my clients are out of the backstage

area. That’s the only way Rita will let me do the shaving at the club.”

Of course, Barry didn’t know about the problem fairies have with

vamps. Some vamps had less self-control when it came to fairies

than others did. Fairies were strong, stronger than people, but

vamps were stronger than anything else on earth.

“And you didn’t go back out to the booth and talk to Claudia again?”

“I didn’t see her again.”

“He’s telling the truth,” I said to Claudine and Claude. “As far as he

knows it.” There were always other questions I could ask, but at

first “hearing,” Barry didn’t know anything about Claudia’s

disappearance.

Claude ushered me into the pantry, where Rita Child was waiting. It

was a walk-in pantry, very neat, but not intended for two people,

one of them duct-taped to a rolling office chair. Rita Child was a

substantial woman, too. She looked exactly like I’d expect the

owner of a strip club to look—painted, dyed brunette, packed into a

challenging dress with high-tech underwear that pinched and

pushed her into a provocative shape.

She was also steaming mad. She kicked out at me with a high heel

that would have taken my eye out if I hadn’t jerked back in the

middle of kneeling in front of her. I fell on my fundament in an

ungraceful sprawl.

“None of that, Rita,” Claude said calmly. “You’re not the boss here.

This is our place.” He helped me stand up and dusted off my

bottom in an impersonal way.

“We just want to know what happened to our sister,” Claudine said.

Rita made sounds behind her gag, sounds that didn’t seem to be

conciliatory. I got the impression that she didn’t give a damn about

the twins’ motivation in kidnapping her and tying her up in their

pantry. They’d taped her mouth, rather than using a cloth gag, and

after the kicking incident, I kind of enjoyed ripping the tape off.

Rita called me some names reflecting on my heritage and moral

character.

“I guess that’s just the pot calling the kettle black,” I said, when she

paused to breathe. “Now you listen here! I’m not taking that kind of

talk off of you, and I want you to shut up and answer my questions.

You don’t seem to have a good picture of the situation you’re in.”

The club owner calmed down a little bit after that. She was still

glaring at me with her narrow brown eyes, and straining at her

ropes, but she seemed to understand a little better.

“I’m going to touch you,” I said. I was afraid she might bite if I

touched her bare shoulder, so I put my hand on her forearm just

above where her wrists were tied to the arms of the rolling chair.

Her head was a maze of fury. She wasn’t thinking clearly because

she was so angry, and all her mental energy was directed into

cursing at the twins and now at me. She suspected me of being

some kind of supernatural assassin, and I decided it wouldn’t hurt if

she were scared of me for a while.

“When did you see Claudia tonight?” I asked.

“When I went to get the money from the first show,” she growled,

and sure enough, I saw Rita’s hand reaching out, a long white hand

placing a zippered vinyl pouch in it. “I was in my office working

during the first show. But I get the money in between, so if we get

stuck up, we won’t lose so much.”

“She gave you the money bag, and you left?”

“Yeah. I went to put the cash in the safe until the second show was

over. I didn’t see her again.”

And that seemed to be the truth to me. I couldn’t see another

vision of Claudia in Rita’s head. But I saw a lot of satisfaction that

Claudia was dead, and a grim determination to keep Claude at her

club.

“Will you still go to Foxes, now that Claudia’s gone?” I asked him,

to spark a response that might reveal something from Rita.

Claude looked down at me, surprised and disgusted. “I haven’t had

time to think of what will come tomorrow,” he snapped. “I just lost

my sister.”

Rita’s mind sort of leaped with joy. She had it bad for Claude. And

on the practical side, he was a big draw at Hooligans, since even

on an off night he could engender some magic to make the crowd

spend big. Claudia hadn’t been so willing to use her power for

Rita’s profit, but Claude didn’t think about it twice. Using his inbred

fairy skills to draw people to admire him was an ego thing with

Claude, which had little to do with economics.

I got all this from Rita in a flash.

“Okay,” I said, standing up. “I’m through with her.”

She was happy.

We stepped out of the pantry into the kitchen, where the final

candidate for murderer was waiting. He’d been pushed under the

table, and he had a glass in front of him with a straw stuck in it, so

he could lean over to drink. Being a former lover had paid off for

Jeff Puckett. His mouth wasn’t even taped.

I looked from Claude to Jeff, trying to figure it out. Jeff had a light

brown mustache that needed trimming, and a two-day growth of

whiskers on his cheeks. His eyes were narrow and hazel. As much

as I could tell, Jeff seemed to be in better shape than some of the

bouncers I’d known, and he was even taller than Claude. But I was

not impressed, and I reflected for maybe the millionth time that

love was strange.

Claude braced himself visibly when he faced his former lover.

“I’m here to find out what you know about Claudia’s death,” I said,

since we’d been around a corner when we’d questioned Rita. “I’m

a telepath, and I’m going to touch you while I ask you some

questions.”

Jeff nodded. He was very tense. He fixed his eyes on Claude. I

stood behind him, since he was pushed up under the table, and put

my hands on his thick shoulders. I pulled his tee shirt to one side,

just a little, so my thumb could touch his neck.

“Jeff, you tell me what you saw tonight,” I said.

“Claudia came to take the money for the first set,” he said. His

voice was higher than I’d expected, and he was not from these

parts. Florida, I thought. “I couldn’t stand her because she messed

with my personal life, and I didn’t want to be with her. But that’s

what Rita told me to do, so I did. I sat on the stool and watched her

take the money and put it into the money bag. She kept some in a

money drawer to make change.”

“Did she have trouble with any of the customers?”

“No. It was ladies’ night, and the women don’t give any trouble

coming in. They did during the second set, I had to go haul a gal

offstage who got a little too enthusiastic about our Construction

Worker, but mostly that night I just sat on the stool and watched.”

“When did Claudia vanish?”

“When I come back from getting that gal back to her table, Claudia

was gone. I looked around for her, went and asked Rita if she’d

said anything to her about having to take a break. I even checked

the ladies’ room. Wasn’t till I went back in the booth that I seen the

glittery stuff.”

“What glittery stuff?”

“What we leave when we fade,” Claude murmured. “Fairy dust.”

Did they sweep it up and keep it? It would probably be tacky to

ask.

“And next thing I knew, the second set was over and the club was

closing, and I was checking backstage and everywhere for traces

of Claudia, then I was here with Claude and Claudine.”

He didn’t seem too angry.

“Do you know anything about Claudia’s death?”

“No. I wish I did. I know this is hard on Claude.” His eyes were as

fixed on Claude as Claude’s were on him. “She separated us, but

she’s not in the picture anymore.”

“I have to know,” Claude said, through clenched teeth.

For the first time, I wondered what the twins would do if I couldn’t

discover the culprit. And that scary thought spurred my brain to

greater activity.

“Claudine,” I called. Claudine came in, with an apple in her hand.

She was hungry, and she looked tired. I wasn’t surprised.

Presumably, she’d worked all day, and here she was, staying up all

night, and grieved, to boot.

“Can you wheel Rita in here?” I asked. “Claude, can you go get

Barry?”

When everyone was assembled in the kitchen, I said, “Everything

I’ve seen and heard seems to indicate that Claudia vanished during

the second show.” After a second’s consideration, they all nodded.

Barry’s and Rita’s mouths had been gagged again, and I thought

that was a good thing.

“During the first show,” I said, going slow to be sure I got it right,

“Claudia took up the money. Claude was onstage. Barry was

onstage. Even when he wasn’t onstage, he didn’t come up to the

booth. Rita was in her office.”

There were nods all around.

“During the interval between shows, the club cleared out.”

“Yeah,” Jeff said. “Barry came up to meet his clients, and I

checked to make sure everyone else was gone.”

“So you were away from the booth a little.”

“Oh, well, yeah, I guess. I do it so often, I didn’t even think of that.”

“And also during the interval, Rita came up to get the money pouch

from Claudia.”

Rita nodded emphatically.

“So, at the end of the interval, Barry’s clients have left.” Barry

nodded. “Claude, what about you?”

“I went out to get some food during the interval,” he said. “I can’t

eat a lot before I dance, but I had to eat something. I got back, and

Barry was by himself and getting ready for the second show. I got

ready, too.”

“And I got back on the stool,” Jeff said. “Claudia was back at the

cash window. She was all ready, with the cash drawer and the

stamp, and the pouch. She still wasn’t speaking to me.”

“But you’re sure it was Claudia?” I asked, out of the blue.

“Wasn’t Claudine, if that’s what you mean,” he said. “Claudine’s as

sweet as Claudia was sour, and they even sit different.”

Claudine looked pleased and threw her apple core in the garbage

can. She smiled at me, already forgiving me for asking questions

about her.

The apple.

Claude, looking impatient, began to speak. I held up my hand. He

stopped.

“I’m going to ask Claudine to take your gags off,” I said to Rita and

Barry. “But I don’t want you to talk unless I ask you a question,

okay?” They both nodded.

Claudine took the gags off, while Claude glared at me.

Thoughts were pounding through my head like a mental stampede.

“What did Rita do with the money pouch?”

“After the first show?” Jeff seemed puzzled. “Uh, I told you. She

took it with her.”

Alarm bells were going off mentally. Now I knew I was on the right

track.

“You said that when you saw Claudia waiting to take the money for

the second show, she had everything ready.”

“Yeah. So? She had the hand stamp, she had the money drawer,

and she had the pouch,” Jeff said.

“Right. She had to have a second pouch for the second show. Rita

had taken the first pouch. So when Rita came to get the first

show’s take, she had the second pouch in her hand, right?”

Jeff tried to remember. “Uh, I guess so.”

“What about it, Rita?” I asked. “Did you bring the second pouch?”

“No,” she said. “There were two in the booth at the beginning of the

evening. I just took the one she’d used, then she had an empty one

there for the take from the second show.”

“Barry, did you see Rita walking to the booth?”

The blond stripper thought frantically. I could feel every idea

beating at the inside of my head.

“She had something in her hand,” he said finally. “I’m sure of it.”

“No,” Rita shrieked. “It was there already!”

“What’s so important about the pouch, anyway?” Jeff asked. “It’s

just a vinyl pouch with a zipper like banks give you. How could that

hurt Claudia?”

“What if the inside were rubbed with lemon juice?”

Both the fairies flinched, horror on their faces.

“Would that kill Claudia?” I asked them.

Claude said, “Oh, yes. She was especially susceptible. Even

lemon scent would make her vomit. She had a terrible time on

washday until we found out the fabric sheets were lemon scented.

Claudine has to go to the store since so many things are scented

with the foul smell.”

Rita began screaming, a high-pitched car alarm shriek that just

seemed to go on and on. “I swear I didn’t do it!” she said. “I didn’t!

I didn’t!” But her mind was saying, “Caught, caught, caught,

caught.”

“Yeah, you did it,” I said.

The surviving brother and sister stood in front of the rolling chair.

“Sign over the bar to us,” Claude said.

“What?”

“Sign over the club to us. We’ll even pay you a dollar for it.”

“Why would I do that? You got no body! You can’t go to the cops!

What are you gonna say? ‘I’m a fairy, I’m allergic to lemons.’ ” She

laughed. “Who’s gonna believe that?”

Barry said weakly, “Fairies?”

Jeff didn’t say anything. He hadn’t known the triplets were allergic

to lemons. He didn’t realize his lover was a fairy. I worry about the

human race.

“Barry should go,” I suggested.

Claude seemed to rouse himself. He’d been looking at Rita the

way a cat eyes a canary. “Good-bye, Barry,” he said politely, as he

untied the stripper. “I’ll see you at the club tomorrow night. Our turn

to take up the money.”

“Uh, right,” Barry said, getting to his feet.

Claudine’s mouth had been moving all the while, and Barry’s face

went blank and relaxed. “See you later, nice party,” he said

genially.

“Good to meet you, Barry,” I said.

“Come see the show sometime.” He waved at me and walked out

of the house, Claudine shepherding him to the front door. She was

back in a flash.

Claude had been freeing Jeff. He kissed him, said, “I’ll call you

soon,” and gently pushed him toward the back door. Claudine did

the same spell, and Jeff’s face, too, relaxed utterly from its tense

expression. “Bye,” the bouncer called as he shut the door behind

him.

“Are you gonna mojo me, too?” I asked, in a kind of squeaky voice.

“Here’s your money,” Claudine said. She took my hand. “Thank

you, Sookie. I think you can remember this, huh, Claude? She’s

been so good!” I felt like a puppy that’d remembered its potty-

training lesson.

Claude considered me for a minute, then nodded. He turned his

attention back to Rita, who’d been taking the time to climb out of

her panic.

Claude produced a contract out of thin air. “Sign,” he told Rita, and

I handed him a pen that had been on the counter beneath the

phone.

“You’re taking the bar in return for your sister’s life,” she said,

expressing her incredulity at what I considered a very bad moment.

“Sure.”

She gave the two fairies a look of contempt. With a flash of her

rings, she took up the pen and signed the contract. She pushed up

to her feet, smoothed the skirt of her dress across her round hips,

and tossed her head. “I’ll be going now,” she said. “I own another

place in Baton Rouge. I’ll just live there.”

“You’ll start running,” Claude said.

“What?”

“You better run. You owe us money and a hunt for the death of our

sister. We have the money, or at least the means to make it.” He

pointed at the contract. “Now we need the hunt.”

“That’s not fair.”

Okay, that disgusted even me.

“Fair is only part of fairy as letters of the alphabet.” Claudine

looked formidable: not sweet, not dotty. “If you can dodge us for a

year, you can live.”

“A year!” Rita’s situation seemed to be feeling more and more real

to her by then. She was beginning to look desperate.

“Starting . . . now.” Claude looked up from his watch. “Better go.

We’ll give ourselves a four-hour handicap.”

“Just for fun,” Claudine said.

“And, Rita?” Claude said, as Rita made for the door. She paused,

looked back at him.

Claude smiled at her. “We won’t use lemons.”