Sookie 13.5 After Dead (6 page)

King
FELIPE DE CASTRO
reigned over Arkansas, Nevada, and Louisiana for thirty more years. By that time, his kingdom had gotten too complicated and cumbersome for one vampire to run, so he sold Arkansas to his regent, Red Rita, who set up her own kingdom. After an earthquake damaged two of his casinos in Las Vegas, Felipe rebuilt them with the money he got from selling Louisiana . . . to Bill Compton, who makes a great king, though he refuses to move to New Orleans.

MARK DUFFY
was struck on the head with a beer bottle in another barroom fight, and he died after two days of insisting he was fine.

Tara’s husband
JB DU RONE
kept his job at the health club in Clarice, rising to assistant manager since everyone helped him out. JB was beloved by his twins, who twisted him around their little fingers, and JB was also loved by strong-minded women, who were likewise able to talk JB into permitting liberties he ought not to have permitted. Tara put up with it as long as she could, but eventually she kicked him out. JB continued to have lady friends his whole life, and he married two or three of them (they insisted), but he never had any more children and he never thought of anyone but Tara as his true wife. Still handsome, he passed away in his nursing home while he was having sex with an aide.

ROBERT THORNTON DU RONE
and
SARA SOOKIE DU RONE
were read the riot act by their “aunt” Sookie after their second trip to the police station. She described their mother’s childhood in frank terms and told them how remarkably lucky they were to have a mom who had overcome such odds, because she would need all that toughness to survive her twins. It was a wake-up call. Rob graduated from Louisiana Tech and began working for a state senator. Eventually, he became a senator himself. Sara got a full scholarship to Tulane and became a speech therapist.

TARA THORNTON DU RONE
raised her twins to be good citizens. She had to pick them up at the police station twice. After that, they calmed down. Tara remarried once for about ten minutes. She built up Tara’s Togs and did a good amount of Internet business. She moved into the storefront next to hers, and that became Tara’s Bridal and Formal Boutique, which eventually became a destination shop for brides in Louisiana. She arranged JB’s funeral service and cried a lot.

Vampire
DUSTIN
finally learned the dos and don’ts of being a modern American vampire, and he writes a monthly column for AVO, the website devoted to American Vampires Online.

IMMANUEL EARNEST
became the favorite hairdresser of a well-known rock band and toured with them until he went back to L.A. to found his own salon, Night Cuts.

RUSSELL EDGINGTON
is still the King of Mississippi. He still likes to be surrounded by comely young men, but then so does his husband, Bartlett Crowe, King of Indiana.

FotS sympathizer
HELEN ELLIS
married another FotS member. Since they were bonded together by mutual hatred, they had a bumpy marriage, and they were terrible parents.

ERIN
married Remy Savoy after dating him for a year. She was a loving mother to Hunter and bore Remy a little girl who could never get away with anything, given her half brother’s gift of telepathy.