The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires - Grady Hendrix Page 0,130

curved toward the Old Village. The other two veered left and became Johnnie Dodds Boulevard, running out past strip malls, past Creekside, out into the country where there were no streetlights or neighbors, deep into Francis Marion National Forest where there were hidden clearings and logging roads, places where occasionally the police found abandoned cars with dead bodies in the trunk, or babies’ skeletons wrapped in plastic bags and buried under the trees.

Which road he took would tell her if he thought she posed a threat.

“Leland did this to her,” James Harris said. “Leland made her sick.”

Patricia’s thoughts fragmented. What was he saying? She tried to pay attention, but he was already talking.

“It all started with those damn trips,” he said. “If I’d known, I never would have suggested them. It was that one last February to Atlanta, do you remember? Carter had that Ritalin conference and Leland and I went on Sunday to take some of the doctors out golfing and talk to them about investing in Gracious Cay. At dinner, this psychiatrist from Reno asked if we wanted to see some girls. He told us there was a place called the Gold Club owned by a former New York Yankee, so it must be on the level. It wasn’t my kind of thing, but Leland spent almost a thousand dollars. That was the first time. After that, it seemed to get easier for him.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Patricia asked.

“Because you need to know the truth,” he said, and they were coming down the last rise of the bridge. Up ahead, the road branched: right or left. “I became aware of the girls last summer. Leland would be with a different one almost every trip. Sometimes, when it was places like Atlanta or Miami where we went a few times, he would see the same girl. Some of them were professionals, some weren’t. You know what I mean by that?”

He waited. She nodded stiffly in acknowledgment, eyes on the road. He drove in the middle lane, which could go either way. She wondered if this was a full and final confession because he knew she wouldn’t be able to tell anyone soon.

“He got a disease from one of them and gave it to Slick,” James Harris said. “There’s no way to know what it is. But I know that’s what happened. I asked him once if he used protection and he just laughed and said, ‘Where’s the fun in that?’ Someone needs to tell her doctor.

He didn’t put on his turn signal to change lanes; his car just came down off the bridge and then drifted, so slightly she almost didn’t notice, and they were on the road to the Old Village. The muscles in her back unclenched.

“What about Carter?” she asked, after a moment.

They rode Coleman Boulevard’s gentle curves toward the Old Village, passing houses, streetlights, then stores, restaurants, people.

“Him, too,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

She hadn’t expected it to hurt so much.

“What do you want from me?” she asked.

“He’s treated you like a fool,” James Harris said. “Carter doesn’t see what a wonderful family he has, but I do. I have all along. I was there when your mother-in-law passed, and she was a good woman. I’ve watched Blue grow up and he’s having a hard time but he’s got so much potential. You’re a good person. But your husband has thrown it all away.”

They passed the Oasis gas station in the middle of the road and entered the Old Village proper, the interior of the car getting darker as the streetlights became spaced farther apart.

“If Leland gave Slick something,” he said, “Carter could do the same to you. I’m sorry to be the one to tell you, but you need to know. I want you to be safe. I care about you. I care about Blue and Korey. Y’all are a big part of my life.”

He looked earnest as a suitor asking someone to be his bride as he turned from Pitt Street onto McCants.

“What are you saying?” she asked, lips numb.

“You deserve better,” he said. “You and the children deserve someone who knows your