Club Dead by Charlaine Harris Page B

glimpsed Alcide’s entrance.
    Phony bitch , I decided in the time it takes to snap your fingers, and I made up my mind to behave accordingly. The goblin Hob led the way to an empty table within view of the happy party, and held out a chair for me. I nodded to him politely, and unwound my wrap, folding it and tossing it onto an empty chair. Alcide sat in the chair to my right, so he could put his back to the corner where the shifters were having such a raucous good time.
    A bone-thin vampire came to take our order. Alcide asked my pleasure with an inclination of his head. “A champagne cocktail,” I said, having no idea what one tasted like. I’d never gone to the trouble to mix myself one at Merlotte’s, but now that I was in someone else’s bar, I thought I’d give it a shot. Alcide ordered a Heineken. Debbie was casting many glances our way, so I leaned forward and smoothed back a lock of Alcide’s curly black hair. He looked surprised, though of course Debbie couldn’t see that.
    “Sookie?” he said, rather doubtfully.
    I smiled at him, not my nervous smile—because I wasn’t, for once. Thanks to Bill, I now had a little confidence about my own physical attractiveness. “Hey, I’m your date, remember? I’m acting date-like,” I told him.
    The thin vampire brought our drinks just then, and I clinked my glass against his bottle. “To our joint venture,” I said, and his eyes lit up. We sipped.
    I loved champagne cocktails.
    “Tell me more about your family,” I said, because I enjoyed listening to his rumbly voice. I would have to wait until there were more humans in the bar before I began listening in to others’ thoughts.
    Alcide obligingly began telling me about how poor his dad had been when he started his surveying business, and how long it had taken for him to prosper. He was just beginning to tell me about his mother when Debbie sashayed up.
    It had only been a matter of time.
    “Hello, Alcide,” she purred. Since he hadn’t been able to see her coming, his strong face quivered. “Who’s your new friend? Did you borrow her for the evening?”
    “Oh, longer than that,” I said clearly, and smiled at Debbie, a smile that matched her own for sincerity.
    “Really?” If her eyebrows had crawled any higher, they’d have been in heaven.
    “Sookie is a good friend,” Alcide said impassively.
    “Oh?” Debbie doubted his word. “It wasn’t too long ago you told me you’d never have another ‘friend’ if you couldn’t have . . . Well.” She smirked.
    I covered Alcide’s huge hand with my own and gave her a look that implied much.
    “Tell me,” Debbie said, her lips curling in a skeptical way, “how do you like that birthmark of Alcide’s?”
    Who could have predicted she was willing to be a bitch so openly? Most women try to hide it, at least from strangers.
    It’s on my right butt cheek. It’s shaped like a rabbit . Well, how nice. Alcide had remembered what I’d said, and he’d thought directly at me.
    “I love bunnies,” I said, still smiling, my hand drifting down Alcide’s back to caress, very lightly, the top of his right buttock.
    For a second, I saw sheer rage on Debbie’s face. She was so focused, so controlled, that her mind was a lot less opaque than most shifters’. She was thinking about her owl fiancé, about how he wasn’t as good in the sack as Alcide, but he had a lot of ready cash and he was willing to have children, which Alcide wasn’t. And she was stronger than the owl, able to dominate him.
    She was no demon (of course, her fiancé would have a really short shelf life if she were ) but she was no sweetie, either.
    Debbie still could have recovered the situation, but her discovery that I knew Alcide’s little secret made her nuts. She made a big mistake.
    She raked me over with a glare that would have paralyzed a lion. “Looks like you went to Janice’s salon today,” she said, taking in the casually tumbled curls, the fingernails. Her own