I hadn't known the first man. This guy, I recognized. He was Cal Myers, a henchman of Furnan's and a police detective on the Shreveport force.
The blitz attack had taken only seconds. The moment Maria-Star was clearly mortally wounded, they were out the door, closing it behind them. I was shocked by the sudden and dreadful cruelty of the murder, and I felt my breath coming faster. Maria-Star, glistening and almost clear, lay there before us for a moment in the middle of the wreckage, gleaming blood splotches on her shirt and on the floor around her, and then she just winked out of existence, because she had died in that moment.
We all stood in appalled silence. The witches were silent, their arms dropping down by their sides as if they were puppets whose strings had been cut. Octavia was crying, tears running down her creased cheeks. Amelia looked as though she were thinking of throwing up. I was shivering in reaction, and even Dawson looked nauseated.
"I didn't know the first guy since he'd only half changed," Dawson said. "The second one looked familiar. He's a cop, right? In Shreveport?"
"Cal Myers. Better call Alcide," I said when I thought my voice would work. "And Alcide needs to send these ladies something for their trouble, when he gets his own sorted out." I figured Alcide might not think of that since he was mourning for Maria-Star, but the witches had done this work with no mention of recompense. They deserved to be rewarded for their effort. It had cost them dearly: both of them had folded onto the love seat.
"If you ladies can manage," Dawson said, "we better get our asses out of here. No telling when the police'll be back. The crime lab finished just five minutes before you got here."
While the witches gathered their energy and all their paraphernalia, I talked to Dawson. "You said Alcide's got a good alibi?"
Dawson nodded. "He got a phone call from Maria-Star's neighbor. She called Alcide right after she called the police, when she heard all the ruckus. Granted, the call was to his cell phone, but he answered right away and she could hear the sounds of the hotel bar behind the conversation. Plus, he was in the bar with people he'd just met who swore he was there when he found out she'd been killed. They aren't likely to forget."
"I guess the police are trying to find a motive." That was what they did on the TV shows.
"She didn't have enemies," Dawson said.
"Now what?" Amelia said. She and Octavia were on their feet, but they were clearly drained. Dawson shepherded us out of the apartment and relocked it.
"Thanks for coming, ladies," Dawson told Amelia and Octavia. He turned to me. "Sookie, could you come with me, explain to Alcide what we just saw? Can Amelia drive Miss Fant back?"
"Ah. Sure. If she's not too tired."
Amelia said she thought she could manage. We'd come in my car, so I tossed her the keys. "You okay driving?" I asked, just to reassure myself.
She nodded. "I'll take it slow."
I was scrambling into Dawson's truck when I realized that this step dragged me even further into the Were war. Then I figured, Patrick Furnan already tried to kill me. Can't get any worse.
Chapter 7
Dawson's pickup, a Dodge Ram, although battered on the outside, was orderly within. It wasn't a new vehicle by any means - probably five years old - but it was very well-maintained both under the hood and in the cab.
"You're not a member of the pack, Dawson, right?"
"It's Tray. Tray Dawson."
"Oh, I'm sorry."
Dawson shrugged, as if to say No big deal. "I never was a good pack animal," he said. "I couldn't keep in line. I couldn't follow the chain of command."
"So why are you joining in this fight?" I said.
"Patrick Furnan tried to put me out of business," Dawson said.
"Why'd he do that?"
"Aren't that many other motorcycle repair shops in the area, especially since Furnan bought the Harley-Davidson dealership in Shreveport," Tray explained. "That so-and-so's greedy. He wants it all for himself. He doesn't care who goes broke. When he realized I was sticking with my shop, he sent a couple of his guys down to see me. They beat me up, busted up the shop."
"They must have been really good," I said. It was hard to believe anyone could best Tray Dawson. "Did you call the police?"
"No. The cops in Bon Temps aren't that crazy about me anyway. But I threw in with Alcide."
Detective Cal Myers, obviously, was not above doing Furnan's dirty work. It was Myers who'd collaborated with Furnan in cheating in the packmaster contest. But I was truly shocked that he would go as far as murdering Maria-Star, whose only sin was being loved by Alcide. We'd seen it with our own eyes, though.
"What's the deal with you and the police in Bon Temps?" I asked, as long as we were talking about law enforcement.
He laughed. "I used to be a cop; did you know that?"
"No," I said, genuinely surprised. "No kidding?"
"For real," he said. "I was on the force in New Orleans. But I didn't like the politics, and my captain was a real bastard, pardon me."
I nodded gravely. It had been a long time since someone had apologized for using bad language within my hearing. "So, something happened?"
"Yeah, eventually things came to a head. The captain accused me of taking some money this scuzzbag had left lying on a table when we arrested him in his home." Tray shook his head in disgust. "I had to quit then. I liked the job."
"What did you like about it?"
"No two days were alike. Yeah, sure, we got in the cars and patrolled. That was the same. But every time we got out something different would happen."
I nodded. I could understand that. Every day at the bar was a little different, too, though probably not as different as Tray's days had been in the patrol car.
We drove in silence for a while. I could tell Tray was thinking about the odds of Alcide overcoming Furnan in the struggle for dominance. He was thinking Alcide was a lucky guy to have dated Maria-Star and me, and all the luckier since that bitch Debbie Pelt had vanished. Good riddance, Tray thought.
"Now I get to ask you a question," Tray said.
"Only fair."
"You have something to do with Debbie disappearing?"
I took a deep breath. "Yeah. Self-defense."
"Good for you. Someone needed to do it."
We were quiet again for at least ten minutes. Not to drag the past into the present too much, but Alcide had broken up with Debbie Pelt before I met him. Then he dated me a little. Debbie decided I was an enemy, and she tried to kill me. I got her first. I'd come to terms with it... as much as you ever do. However, it had been impossible for Alcide to ever look at me again in the same way, and who could blame him? He'd found Maria-Star, and that was a good thing.