As we filled up our cart, Quinn, a supernatural event planner, was telling me about a werewolf coming-of-age party that had turned into a free-for-all. I was laughing when we turned a corner and met Sam.
After his weirdness yesterday at the bar and on the phone today, I hardly knew what to say to Sam, but I was glad to see him. Sam looked pretty grim, and he looked even grimmer when I reintroduced him to Quinn.
“Yeah, man, I remember you,” Sam said, trying to smile. “You come to give Sookie moral support?”
“Any kind of support she needs,” Quinn said, not the happiest choice of words.
“Sam, I’ve talked about Mr. Cataliades, I know. He’s brought Diantha and Barry and Amelia and Bob,” I said hastily. “You remember Amelia and Bob, though maybe Bob was a cat last time you saw him. Come visit!”
“I remember them,” Sam said between clenched teeth. “But I can’t come by.”
“What’s stopping you? I guess Kennedy is working the bar.”
“Yeah, she’s got this afternoon.”
“Then come on out.”
He closed his eyes, and I could sense the words beating at his head, wanting to come out. “I can’t,” he repeated, and he rolled his cart away and left the store.
“What’s up with him?” Quinn asked. “I don’t know Sam well, but he’s always been standing right behind you, Sookie, always in your corner. There’s something compelling him to step aside.”
I was so confused I couldn’t speak. While we checked out and loaded the groceries into the back of the van, I chewed at the problem of Sam and what was happening with him. He wanted to come out to the house, but he wouldn’t come out to the house. Because? Well, why would you not do something you wanted to do? Because you were being prevented.
“He’s promised someone he won’t,” I muttered. “That’s gotta be it.” Could it be Bernie? I thought she liked me, but maybe I was reading her wrong. Maybe she thought all I was was trouble for her son. Well, if Sam had made her—or someone else—such a promise, there didn’t seem to be anything I could do about it, but I would put the situation on the back burner of things that worried me. When there was room on the front burner, I’d move it forward. Because it sure made me hurt inside.
When the groceries were put away, we assembled again in the living room. I wasn’t used to sitting around all day, and I felt a little restless as we all took the chairs we’d been in earlier. Quinn took the only one left, a kind of dumpy armchair I’d always planned on exchanging for something better . . . but I’d never gotten around to it. I tossed him a cushion, and he gamely tried stuffing it in the small of his back to make the chair a bit more comfortable.
“I have some things to tell all of you,” Mr. Cataliades said. “And later, some things to tell Sookie individually . . . but now I have to tell you what I’ve witnessed and suspected.”
This sounded so ominous that we all turned our attention to the part-demon.
“I’d heard that there was a devil in New Orleans,” he said.
“The Devil? Or a devil?” Amelia asked.
“What an excellent question,” Mr. Cataliades said. “In fact, a devil. The Devil himself seldom makes a personal appearance. You can imagine the crowds.”
None of us knew quite what to say, so perhaps we couldn’t.
Diantha laughed as if she were remembering something very funny. I, for one, didn’t want to know what it was.
“Here’s the most interesting fact,” he said precisely. “The devil was dining with your father, Miss Amelia.”
“Not dining on my dad, but dining with him?” She laughed for a second, but suddenly Mr. Cataliades’s meaning sank in. Amelia’s face drained of color. “Are you shitting me?” she asked quietly.
“I assure you I’d never do such a thing,” he replied, with some distaste. He gave her a moment to absorb the bad news before continuing, “Though I know you aren’t close to your father, I must tell you that he and his bodyguard have struck a deal with the devil.”
Again, I kept my mouth closed. This was Amelia’s thing to react to, I figured. Her dad.
“I wish I could say that I was sure he wouldn’t do anything so dumb,” she said. “But I don’t even feel the impulse to say, ‘He’d never do anything like that.’ He would if