Deadlocked (Sookie Stackhouse #12)(64)
Author: Charlaine Harris

Mustapha howled again, and I feared that Warren was dead.

I just couldn’t stand it; the death of the little blond sharpshooter with his pale freckled skin and his missing teeth was somehow more than I could bear tonight. I sank to my knees.

"Sookie," Alcide said urgently.

I looked up. Mustapha was coming down the stairs, a body in his arms. Alcide was right in front of me.

"He’s alive," Alcide said. "But he’s been up there without air-conditioning or ventilation or food or water for God knows how long. I guess the bitch couldn’t be bothered. We got to get him some help."

"Vampire blood?" I suggested, but very quietly.

"I think Mustapha might consider that now," Alcide said, and I knew that Warren must be very bad.

I called Bill. "Sookie, where are you?" he yelled. "I’ve been calling! What happened?"

I glanced at the screen. I did have a lot of missed calls. "I had the phone on vibrate," I said. "I’ll tell you everything, but I want to ask you a favor first. Are you still in Shreveport?"

"Yes, I’m back outside the Trifecta, trying to pick up the trail of those dogs!"

"Hey, listen, chill. It’s been a real bad night. I need you now, my friend."

"Anything."

"Meet me at Alcide’s. You can save a life."

"I’m on my way."

On our way back into Shreveport, Mustapha took my place in the backseat with Warren’s head on his lap. When I proposed that Bill give Warren a drink to help him live, Mustapha said, "If it can bring him back, I’ll do it. He may hate me later. Hell, I may hate myself. But we got to save him."

Our drive back into Alcide’s neighborhood was shorter than our drive out because we knew our way now, but we grudged every stoplight or slow driver ahead of us, and Mustapha’s urgency pounded at me. Warren’s brain signature became weaker, flickered, resumed.

Sure enough, Bill was standing waiting at Alcide’s, and I leaped out of the car and pulled Bill around to the backseat. When the door opened and he saw Warren, recognition flared in his eyes. Of course, Bill knew Mustapha, and he remembered Warren the shooter. I hoped it hadn’t occurred to Bill that it might be a good thing if he died, since he was yet another witness who could testify-at least in a limited way-to what had happened the night we’d killed Victor.

"He wasn’t in the club," I said, grabbing Bill’s wrist, as Mustapha gently lifted Warren’s head so he could vacate the car to leave room for Bill.

And Bill looked at me, a huge question on his face.

"Feed him," I said. Without another word, Bill knelt by the car, bit his own wrist, and held the bleeding wrist over Warren’s parched mouth.

I don’t know if Warren would have done it if he hadn’t been so thirsty. At first, Bill’s blood trickling into the slack mouth seemed to raise no reaction. But then something sparked in Warren, and he began to consciously drink. I could see his throat moving.

"Enough," I said, after a minute. I could sense Warren’s brain firing back up. "Now, take him to the hospital, and they’ll do all the right stuff for him."

"But they’ll know." Alcide was scowling at me, and so was Mustapha. "They’ll question him about who took him." Bill, standing and holding his wrist, looked only mildly interested.

"You don’t want the police to arrest Jannalynn?" That seemed like the best of all possible worlds to me.

"She’d kill them if they tried," Alcide said, but I knew from the conflict flowing from his head that he wasn’t voicing his real concern.

"You want to punish her," I said, in as neutral a voice as I could manage.

"Course he does," Mustapha said. "She’s pack. She’s his to punish."

"I do want to ask her some questions," I said. It seemed like the right time to get that out in the open. Otherwise, Jannalynn might end up dead before I’d had a chance to extract information.

"What about Sam?" Bill said, out of the blue.

"What about him?" Alcide asked after a moment.

"He’s not gonna be happy," I muttered. "They weren’t ever as close as she told you they were, but after all …"

"She’s his woman," Mustapha said, shrugging. He looked down at Warren. Just then Warren’s eyes fluttered open. He saw Mustapha and smiled. "I knew you’d find me," he said. "I knew you’d come."

It was touching, it was awkward, and I was totally confused.

"So it was Claude," I said out loud. "I just can’t believe it. Why would he want Eric to drink from a borderline whore like Kym? Why would he give her his own blood to drink?" I was beyond mincing words, or being charitable.

"Claude could tell you why," Bill said grimly. "Where is he now?"

"Niall came to get him. I haven’t seen Claude in days."

"And he left Dermot here?"

"Yeah, he left Dermot in charge of all the stray supes at Hooligans," I said.

"I’d heard everyone there was some form of fae," Bill said, confirming my belief that supes gossiped just like humans did. "Did Claude give you a time for his return?"

"No. Niall took him to Faery to investigate who actually put a curse on Dermot. Claude said it was Murry, but Murry’s dead. I killed him, in my backyard." I sure had everyone’s attention now. It seemed that all the separate parts of my life were finally colliding. My personal highway was jammed with fairies, werewolves, vampires, and humans.

"So it was pretty convenient for Claude to name Murry as the bad guy," Bill said, and that kind of hung in the air for a minute before everything came crashing down.

"Claude," I said. "It was Claude all along." I felt numb.

After a little while, we were all sorted out. Since no one knew where Jannalynn was, Mustapha and Warren were invited to spend the night at Alcide’s, and Mustapha accepted for them both since Warren was still not talking much. Apparently, he wasn’t going to go to the hospital, which I had to accept. At least he was getting a bottle of Gatorade. Mustapha let him have it in little sips.

Bill and I got in his car, and Mustapha thanked Bill for coming to Warren’s aid. He didn’t like telling Bill he owed him a favor, but he did it.

Alcide was already on the phone as we pulled out of the driveway, and I was sure he was checking on his pack members who’d locked up the rogues. I would put money on his main interest being Kandace. I didn’t know if she’d go into lockup with the rogues or if she’d abandon the pretense of being a rebel. At the moment, I could only be glad that wasn’t my problem.

I was glad Bill was driving. I had too many thoughts crowding my head. I wished there were a way to warn Niall what a snake he was nurturing in his bosom. And as long as I was getting biblical, I’d never in my life been so glad I’d said no to someone when they’d wanted to have sex with me.