But I caught him just as he walked in the door. He sounded breathless as he picked up the receiver. "Yes?" he said. He always sounded suspicious. "Bill," I gasped, "there's someone outside!" He crashed the phone down. A vampire of action. He was there in two minutes. Looking out into the yard from a slightly lifted blind, I glimpsed him coming into the yard from the woods, moving with a speed and silence a human could never equal. The relief of seeing him was overwhelming. For a second I felt ashamed at calling Bill to rescue me: I should have handled the situation myself. Then I thought, Why? When you know a practically invincible being who professes to adore you, someone so hard to kill it's next to impossible, someone preternaturally strong, that's who you're gonna call.
Bill investigated the yard and the woods, moving with a sure, silent grace. Finally he came lightly up the steps. He bent over something on the front porch. The angle was too acute, and I couldn't tell what it was. When he straightened, he had something in his hands, and he looked absolutely ... expressionless. This was very bad.
I went reluctantly to the front door and unlocked it I pushed out the screen door.
Bill was holding the body of my cat.
"Tina?" I said, hearing my voice quaver and not caring at all. "Is she dead?"
Bill nodded, one little jerk of his head.
"What—how?"
"Strangled, I think."
I could feel my face crumple. Bill had to stand there holding the corpse while I cried my eyes out.
"I never got that live oak," I said, having calmed a little. I didn't sound very steady. "We can put her in that hole." So around to the backyard we went, poor Bill holding Tina, trying to look comfortable about it, and me trying not to dissolve again. Bill knelt and lay the little bundle of black fur at the bottom of my excavation. I fetched the shovel and began to fill it in, but the sight of the first dirt hitting Tina's fur undid me all over again. Silently, Bill took the shovel from my hands. I turned my back, and he finished the awful job.
"Come inside," he said gently when it was finished.
We went in the house, having to walk around to the front because I hadn't yet unlocked the back.
Bill patted me and comforted me, though I knew he hadn't ever been crazy about Tina. "God bless you, Bill," I whispered. I tightened my arms around him ferociously, in a sudden convulsion of fear that he, too, would be taken from me. When I'd gotten the sobs reduced to hiccups, I looked up, hoping I hadn't made him uncomfortable with my flood of emotion.
Bill was furious. He was staring at the wall over my shoulder, and his eyes were glowing. He was the most frightening thing I'd ever seen in my life.
"Did you find anything out in the yard?" I asked.
"No. I found traces of his presence. Some footprints, a lingering scent. Nothing you could bring into court as proof," he went on, reading my mind.
"Would you mind staying here until you have to go to ... get away from the sun?"
"Of course." He stared at me. He'd fully intended to do that whether or not I agreed, I could tell.
"If you still need to make phone calls, just make them here. I don't care." I meant if they were on my phone bill.
"I have a calling card," he said, once again astonishing me. Who would have thought?
I washed my face and took a Tylenol before I put on my nightgown, sadder than I'd been since Gran had been killed, and sadder in different way. The death of a pet is naturally not in the same category as the death of a family member, I chided myself, but it didn't seem to affect my misery. I went through all the reasoning I was capable of and came no closer to any truth except the fact that I'd fed and brushed and loved Tina for four years, and I would miss her.
Chapter 11
MY NERVES WERE raw the next day. When I got to work and told Arlene what had happened, she gave me a hard hug, and said, "I'd like to kill the bastard that did that to poor Tina!" Somehow, that made me feel a lot better. Charlsie was just as sympathetic, if more concerned with the shock to me rather than the agonized demise of my cat. Sam just looked grim. He thought I should call the sheriff, or Andy Bellefleur, and tell one of them what had happened. I finally did call Bud Dearborn.
"Usually these things go in cycles," Bud rumbled. "Ain't nobody else reported a pet missing or dead, though. I'm afraid it sounds like some kind a personal thing, Sookie. That vampire friend of yours, he like cats?"
I closed my eyes and breathed deeply. I was using the phone in Sam's office, and he was sitting behind the desk figuring out his next liquor order.
"Bill was at home when whoever killed Tina threw her on my porch," I said as calmly as I could. "I called him directly afterward, and he answered the phone." Sam looked up quizzically, and I rolled my eyes to let him know my opinion of the sheriff's suspicions.
"And he told you the cat was strangled," Bud went onponderously.
"Yes."
"Do you have the ligature?"
"No. I didn't even see what it was."
"What did you do with the kitty?"
"We buried her."
"Was that your idea or Mr. Compton's?"
"Mine." What else would we have done with Tina?
"We may come dig your kitty up. If we had had the ligature and the cat, maybe we could see if the method of strangulation matched the method used in killing Dawn and Maudette," Bud explained ponderously.
"I'm sorry. I didn't think about that."
"Well, it don't matter much. Without the ligature."
"Okay, good-bye." I hung up, probably applying a little more pressure than the receiver required. Sam's eyebrows lifted.
"Bud is a jerk," I told him.
"Bud's not a bad policeman," Sam said quietly. "None of us here are used to murders that are this sick."
"You're right," I admitted, after a moment. "I wasn't being fair. He just kept saying 'ligature' like he was proud he'd learned a new word. I'm sorry I got mad at him."
"You don't have to be perfect, Sookie."
"You mean I get to screw up and be less than understanding and forgiving, from time to time? Thanks, boss." I smiled at him, feeling the wry twist to my lips, and got up off the edge of his desk where I'd been propped to make my phone call. I stretched. It wasn't until I saw the way Sam's eyes drank in that stretch that I became self-conscious again. "Back to work!" I said briskly and strode out of the room, trying to make sure there wasn't a hint of sway to my hips.
"Would you keep the kids for a couple of hours this evening?" Arlene asked, a little shyly. I remembered the last time we'd talked about my keeping her kids, and I remembered the offense I'd taken at her reluctance to leave her kids with a vampire. I hadn't been thinking like a mother would think. Now, Arlene was trying to apologize.
"I'd be glad to." I waited to see if Arlene would mention Bill again, but she didn't. "When to when?"
"Well, Rene and I are gonna go to the movies in Monroe," she said. "Say, six-thirty?"
"Sure. Will they have had supper?"
"Oh, yeah, I'll feed 'em. They'll be excited to see their aunt Sookie."
"I look forward to it."
'Thanks," Arlene said. She paused, almost said something else, then appeared to think again. "See you at six-thirty."
I got home about five, most of the way driving against the sun, which was glaring like it was staring me down. I changed to a blue-and-green knit short set, brushed my hair and secured it with a banana clip. I had a sandwich, sitting uneasily by myself at the kitchen table. The house felt big and empty, and I was glad to see Rene drive up with Coby and Lisa.