Midnight Crossroad (Midnight, Texas #1) by Charlaine Harris Read Free Book Online Page B

crossing the Davy highway, Olivia returned to the table.
    The two men by the door had eaten all their pie and drunk all their coffee. Creek had come by the table twice to see if they needed anything else, and she’d left the bill between them on her second pass. Still the two were exchanging idle comments, as if they’d realized they had to justify their presence at the table.
    Finally, Madonna came out of the kitchen and rang the bell on the counter. “Guys and gals, I love being a social center for this little town, but I need to get Grady and Teacher home, and I need to watch me some television. So you all clear out and let us close up.”
    You can’t get any more straightforward than that,
Manfred thought.
    Those who hadn’t paid got out their wallets. Manfred noticed that the two strangers paid Creek in cash before they slipped out the door, watched closely by Olivia, Lemuel, and Manfred.
    “They’re all wrong,” Manfred said to Lemuel. He watched as Olivia left the diner by herself, moving quickly and neatly.
    Lemuel’s snow-slush eyes regarded him briefly. “Yes, young man, they are.” Madonna was standing by Teacher, holding Grady, who was heavy-eyed. Lemuel rose and stepped away to pat the baby on the head. Grady didn’t seem to mind Lemuel’s chilly touch; a pat on the head and a smile was all it took to make the baby gleeful. He stretched out a little hand to Lemuel, who bent to give it a quick kiss. Grady waved his arms enthusiastically. Lemuel drifted closer to the door. Though Manfred hadn’t noticed Madonna and Grady tense at Lemuel’s attentions, he did notice when they relaxed.
    Abruptly, Manfred felt foolish. Why had he been so concerned? Two men he’d never seen had eaten in a restaurant and lingered in a somewhat odd way. Lemuel had held his hand. Why should he worry about either of those things?
    As Manfred rose to take his own departure, a bit shakily, he thought about his sudden change in attitude. Had his physical proximity to Lemuel affected his judgment? Was his reversion to “everything is probably okay” a valid viewpoint or some kind of mild euphoria induced by Lemuel’s leeching?
    Lemuel turned to give Manfred one last enigmatic look before he left the Home Cookin Restaurant.
    Bobo, exchanging good nights with Joe and Chuy, seemed oblivious to any undercurrent in the evening . . . and so did the rest of the Midnight people. The strangers had (Manfred assumed) piled into their pickup and driven off, never to be seen again. But as Manfred walked past the area between his house and the pawnshop, he saw that the anonymous silver car was gone.
    He suspected strongly that Olivia Charity was following the strangers.
    And he thought,
It would be interesting to know why they were here. And why Lemuel is different from other bloodsuckers. And—who’s Aubrey?
    Then Manfred reminded himself that he was here to work, and to work hard. He was planning for his future. The problems of these people were not his problems.
    But he thought about those people until he went to sleep that night, all the same.

4
    T wo mornings after that, Fiji sat on her small back porch, looking at the herb garden with some satisfaction. She’d put in an hour’s work this morning before breakfast, and she felt satisfyingly relaxed and pleased with her labors. She was wearing her oldest jeans and a torn sweatshirt stained with the results of a long-ago painting project, its sleeves hacked off to elbow length. In her stadium chair, her feet propped up on her weeding stool, Fiji was utterly comfortable. She had a big mug of tea and a blueberry scone on the little table beside her.
    This was as good as it got, and she had a whole hour and a half before the shop opened to enjoy it.
    If she hadn’t felt so content and comfortable, she’d have gone in to get her camera to take a picture of the cat. Mr. Snuggly was curled picturesquely on a flat paving stone. The slanted morning sun warmed his striped orange fur to