rod, or my house would burn down . . . wait, that had already happened . . . well, that some disaster would happen, like a high wind would blow off the stupid tin roof my grandmother had insisted on, or something.
“Did you want something of Hadley’s?” I asked her, my train of thought having veered away from money. “You know, a remembrance?”
Something flashed in her eyes, something that surprised me.
“You took the words right out of my mouth,” said the queen, with an adorable hint of a French accent.
Uh-oh. It couldn’t be good that she’d switched on the charm.
“I did ask Hadley to hide something for me,” she said. My bullshit meter was beeping like an alarm clock. “And if you come across it in your packing, I’d like to have it back.”
“What does it look like?”
“It’s a jewel,” she said. “My husband gave it to me as an engagement gift. I happened to leave it here before I got married.”
“You’re welcome to look in Hadley’s jewelry box,” I said immediately. “If it belongs to you, of course you have to have it back.”
“That’s very kind of you,” she said, her face back to its regular glassy smoothness. “It’s a diamond, a large diamond, and it’s fixed on a platinum bracelet.”
I didn’t remember anything like that in Hadley’s stuff, but I hadn’t looked carefully. I’d planned to pack Hadley’s jewelry box intact so I could pick through it at my leisure in Bon Temps.
“Please, look now,” I suggested. “I know that it would be like a faux pas to lose a present from your husband.”
“Oh,” she said gently, “you have no idea.” Sophie-Anne closed her eyes for just a second, as if she were too anxious for words. “Andre,” she said, and with that word he took off for the bedroom—didn’t need any directions, I noticed—and while he was gone, the queen looked oddly incomplete. I wondered why he hadn’t accompanied her to Bon Temps, and on an impulse, I asked her.
She looked at me, her crystalline eyes wide and blank. “I was not supposed to be gone,” she said. “I knew if Andre showed himself in New Orleans, everyone would assume I was here, too.” I wondered if the reverse would be true. If the queen was here, would everyone assume Andre was, also? And that sparked a thought in me, a thought that had gone before I could quite grasp hold of it.
Andre came back at that moment, the tiniest shake of his head telling the queen he hadn’t found what she wanted to reclaim. For a moment, Sophie-Anne looked quite unhappy. “Hadley did this in a minute of anger,” the queen said, and I thought she was talking to herself. “But she may bring me down from beyond the veil.” Then her face relaxed into its usual emotionless state.
“I’ll keep an eye open for the bracelet,” I said. I suspected that the value of the jewelry did not lie in its appraisal. “Would that bracelet have been left here the last night before the wedding?” I asked cautiously.
I suspected my cousin Hadley had stolen the bracelet from the queen out of sheer pique that the queen was getting married. That seemed like a Hadley thing to do. If I’d known about Hadley’s concealment of the bracelet, I would have asked the witches to roll the clock back on the ectoplasmic reconstruction. We could have watched Hadley hide the thing.
The queen gave one short nod. “I must have it back,” the queen said. “You understand, it’s not the value of the diamond that concerns me? You understand, a wedding between vampire rulers is not a love match, where much can be forgiven? To lose a gift from your spouse, that’s a very grave offense. And our spring ball is scheduled for two nights from now. The king expects to see me wearing his gifts. If I’m not . . .” Her voice trailed away, and even Andre looked almost worried.
“I’m getting your point,” I said. I’d noticed the tension already rolling through the halls at Sophie’s headquarters. There’d be hell to pay, and Sophie-Anne would be the one to pay it. “If it’s here, you’ll get it back. Okay?” I spread my hands, asking her if she believed me.
“All right,” she said. “Andre, I can’t spend any more time here. Jade Flower will report the fact that I came up here with Sookie. Sookie, we must pretend to have had sex.”