From Dead to Worse (Sookie Stackhouse #8)(21)
Author: Charlaine Harris

"Oh, that’s the one. Well, she won’t spy on you again. I’ll take steps."

That was a scarier thought than working with Tanya. Amelia was a strong and skillful witch, don’t get me wrong, but she was also prone to attempt things beyond her experience level. Hence Bob.

"Check with me first, please," I said, and Amelia looked surprised.

"Well, sure," she said. "Now, I’m off to bed."

She made her way up the steps with Bob in her arms, and I went to my small bathroom to remove my makeup and put on my own nightgown. Amelia hadn’t noticed the speckles of blood on the shirt, and I put it in the sink to soak.

What a day it had been. I’d spent time with Eric, who always rattled my chain, and I’d found a living relative, though not a human one. I’d learned a lot of stuff about my family, most of it unpleasant. I’d eaten in a fancy restaurant, though I could hardly recall the food. And finally, I’d been shot at.

When I crawled into bed, I said my prayers, trying to put Quinn at the top of the list. I thought the excitement of discovering a great-grandfather would keep me awake that night, but sleep claimed me right when I was in the middle of asking God to help me find my way through the moral morass of being party to a killing.

Chapter 6

There was a knock on the front door the next morning about an hour before I wanted to wake up. I heard it only because Bob had come into my room and jumped on my bed, where he wasn’t supposed to be, settling into the space behind my knees while I lay on my side. He purred loudly, and I reached down to scratch behind his ears. I loved cats. That didn’t stop me from liking dogs, too, and only the fact that I was gone so much kept me from getting a puppy. Terry Bellefleur had offered me one, but I’d wavered until his pups were gone. I wondered if Bob would mind a kitten companion. Would Amelia get jealous if I bought a female cat? I had to smile even as I snuggled deeper into the bed.

But I wasn’t truly asleep, and I did hear the knock.

I muttered a few words about the person at the door, and I slid on my slippers and threw on my thin blue cotton bathrobe. The morning had a hint of chill, reminding me that despite the mild and sunny days, this was October. There were Halloweens when even a sweater was too warm, and there were Halloweens when you had to wear a light coat when you did your trick-or-treating.

I looked through the peephole and saw an elderly black woman with a halo of white hair. She was light-skinned and her features were narrow and sharp: nose, lips, eyes. She was wearing magenta lipstick and a yellow pantsuit. But she didn’t seem armed or dangerous. This just goes to show how misleading first appearances can be. I opened the door.

"Young lady, I’m here to see Amelia Broadway," the woman informed me in very precisely pronounced English.

"Please come in," I said, because this was an older woman and I’d been brought up to revere old people. "Have a seat." I indicated the couch. "I’ll go up and get Amelia."

I noticed she didn’t apologize for getting me out of bed or for showing up unannounced. I climbed the stairs with a grim feeling that Amelia wasn’t going to enjoy this message.

I so seldom went up to the second floor that it surprised me to see how nice Amelia had made it look. Since the upper bedrooms had only had basic furniture in them, she’d turned the one to the right, the larger one, into her bedroom. The one to the left was her sitting room. It held her television, an easy chair and ottoman, a small computer desk and her computer, and a plant or two. The bedroom, which I believed had been built for a generation of Stackhouses that had sired three boys in quick succession, had only a small closet, but Amelia had bought rolling clothes racks from somewhere on the Internet and assembled them handily. Then she’d bought a tri-fold screen at an auction and repainted it and arranged it in front of the racks to camouflage them. Her bright bedspread and the old table she’d repainted to serve as her makeup table added to the color that jumped out from the white-painted walls. Amid all this cheer was one dismal witch.

Amelia was sitting up in bed, her short hair mashed into strange shapes. "Who is that I hear downstairs?" she asked in a very hushed voice.

"Older black lady, light-skinned? Sharp way about her?"

"Omigod," Amelia breathed, and slumped back against her dozen or so pillows. "It’s Octavia."

"Well, you come down and have a word with her. I can’t entertain her."

Amelia snarled at me, but she accepted the inevitable. She got out of bed and pulled off her nightgown. She pulled on a bra and panties and some jeans, and she extracted a sweater from a drawer.

I went down to tell Octavia Fant that Amelia was coming. Amelia would have to walk right past her to get to the bathroom, since there was only the one staircase, but at least I could smooth the way.

"Can I get you some coffee?" I asked. The older woman was busy looking around the room with her bright brown eyes.

"If you have some tea, I’d like a cup," Octavia Fant said.

"Yes, ma’am, we have some," I said, relieved that Amelia had insisted on buying it. I had no idea what kind it was, and I hoped it was in a bag, because I’d never made hot tea in my life.

"Good," she said, and that was that.

"Amelia’s on her way down," I said, trying to think of some graceful way to add, "And she’s going to have to hurry through the room to pee and brush her teeth, so pretend you don’t see her." I abandoned that lost cause and fled to the kitchen.

I retrieved Amelia’s tea from one of her designated shelves, and while the water was getting hot, I got down two cups and saucers and put them on a tray. I added the sugar bowl and a tiny pitcher with milk and two spoons. Napkins! I thought, and wished I had some cloth ones instead of regular paper. (This was how Octavia Fant made me feel, without her using a bit of magic on me.) I heard the water running in the hall bathroom just as I put a handful of cookies on a plate and added that to the assemblage. I didn’t have any flowers or a little vase, which was the only other thing I thought of that I could’ve added. I picked up the tray and made my way slowly down the hall to the living room.

I set the tray down on the coffee table in front of Ms. Fant. She looked up at me with her piercing eyes and gave me a curt nod of thanks. I realized that I could not read her mind. I’d been holding off, waiting for a moment when I could really give her her proper due, but she knew how to block me out. I’d never met a human who could do that. For a second I felt almost irritated. Then I remembered who and what she was, and I scooted off to my room to make my bed and visit my own little bathroom. I passed Amelia in the hall, and she gave me a scared look.