Dead in the Family (Sookie Stackhouse #10)(65)
Author: Charlaine Harris

"Maybe we should go out there?" Kennedy said.

Kennedy, I noted, was not in the habit of sitting back and letting things take their course. Nothing wrong with being proactive, but this was not the time to escalate the confrontation in the parking lot, and that was what our presence would do. "No, I think we need to stay right here," I said. "There’s no point in throwing fuel on the fire." I looked around. None of the patrons were eating or drinking. They were all looking out the windows. I thought of requesting that they sit down at their tables, but there was no point in asking them to do something they clearly weren’t going to do, with so much drama going on outside.

Antoine came out of the kitchen and stood by me. He looked at the scene for a long moment. "I didn’t have nothing to do with it," he said.

"I never thought you did," I said, surprised. Antoine relaxed, even inside his head. "This is some crazy church action," I said. "They’re picketing Merlotte’s because Sam is two-natured. But the woman who came in here, she was pretty aware of me and she knew Kennedy’s history, too. I hope this is a one-shot. I’d hate to have to deal with protesters all the time."

"Sam’ll go broke if this keeps up," Kennedy said in a low voice. "Maybe I should just quit. It’s not going to help Sam that I work here."

"Kennedy, don’t set yourself up to be a martyr," I said. "They don’t like me, either. Everyone who doesn’t think I’m crazy thinks there’s something supernatural about me. We’d all have to quit, from Sam on down."

She looked at me sharply to make sure I was sincere. She gave me a quick nod. Then she looked out the window again and said, "Uh-oh." Danny Prideaux had pulled up in his 1991 Chrysler LeBaron, a machine he found only slightly less fascinating than he found Kennedy Keyes.

Danny had parked right at the edge of the crowd, and he hopped out and began to hurry toward the bar. I just knew he was coming to check on Kennedy. Either they’d had a police band radio on at the home builders’ supply place or Danny had heard the news from a customer. The jungle drums beat fast and furious in Bon Temps. Danny was wearing a gray tank top and jeans and boots, and his broad olive shoulders were gleaming with sweat.

As he strode toward the door, I said, "I think my mouth is watering." Kennedy put her hand over her mouth to stifle a yip of laughter.

"Yeah, he looks pretty good," she said, trying to sound offhand. We both laughed.

But then disaster struck. One of the protesters, angry at being shooed away from Merlotte’s, brought his sign down on the hood of the LeBaron. At the sound Danny turned around. He froze for a second, and then he was heading at top speed toward the sinner who’d marred the paint job on his car.

"Oh, no," Kennedy said and hurtled out of the bar as if she’d been fired from a slingshot. "Danny!" she yelled. "Danny! You stop!"

Danny hesitated, turning his head just a fraction to see who was calling him. With a leap that would have done a kangaroo proud, Kennedy was beside him and wrapping her arms around him. He made an impatient movement, as if to shake her off, and then it seemed to dawn on him that Kennedy, whom he’d spent hours admiring, was embracing him. He stood stiffly, his arms at his side, apparently afraid to move.

I couldn’t tell what Kennedy was saying to him, but Danny looked down at her face, completely focused on her. One of the demonstrators had forgotten herself enough to get an "Awww" expression on her face, but she snapped out of her lapse into humanity and brandished her sign again.

"Animals go! People stay! We want Congress to show the way!" one of the older demonstrators, a man with a lot of white hair, shouted as I opened the door and stepped out.

"Kevin, get them out of here!" I called. Kevin, whose thin, pale face was creased into unhappy lines, was trying to shepherd the little crowd out of the parking lot.

"Mr. Barlowe," Kevin said to the white-haired man, "what you’re doing is illegal, and I could put you in jail. I really don’t want to have to do that."

"We’re willing to be arrested for our beliefs," the man said. "Isn’t that so, you-all?"

Some of the church members didn’t look entirely certain of that.

"Maybe you are," Kenya said, "but we got Jane Bodehouse in one of the cells now. She’s coming off a bender, and she’s throwing up about every five minutes. Believe me, people, you do not want to be in there with Jane."

The woman who’d originally come into Merlotte’s turned a little green.

"This is private property," Kevin said. "You cannot demonstrate here. If you don’t clear this parking lot in three minutes, all of you are under arrest."

It was more like five minutes, but the parking lot was clear of demonstrators when Sam joined us in the parking lot to thank Kevin and Kenya. Since I hadn’t seen his truck drive up, his appearance was quite a surprise.

"When did you get back?" I asked.

"Less than ten minutes ago," he said. "I knew if I showed myself, they’d just get pumped up again, so I parked on School Street and walked through the back way."

"Smart," I said. The lunch crowd was leaving Merlotte’s, and the incident was already on the track to becoming a local legend. Only one or two of the patrons seemed upset; the rest regarded the demonstration as good entertainment. Catfish Hennessy clapped Sam on the shoulder as he went by, and he wasn’t the only one who made an extra effort to show support. I wondered how long the tolerant attitude would last. If the picketers kept it up, a lot of people might decide that coming here simply wasn’t worth the trouble.

I didn’t need to say any of this out loud. It was written on Sam’s face. "Hey," I said, slinging an arm around his shoulders. "They’ll go away. You know what you should do? You should call the pastor of that church. They’re all from Holy Word Tabernacle in Clarice. You should tell him that you want to come talk to the church. Show them you’re a person just like everyone else. I bet that would work."

Then I realized how stiff his shoulders were. Sam was rigid with anger. "I should not have to tell anyone anything," he said. "I’m a citizen of this country. My father was in the army. I was in the army. I pay my share of taxes. And I’m not a person like everyone else. I’m a shifter. And they need to just put that on their plates and eat it." He whirled to go back into his bar.

I flinched, though I knew his anger wasn’t directed at me. As I watched Sam stalk away, I reminded myself that none of this was about me. But I couldn’t help but feel I had a stake in the outcome of this new development. Not only did I work at Merlotte’s, but the woman who’d come in initially had named me as part of the problem.