(1) Someone to Watch over Sookie

Tony never had any problems finding a woman. He was hard working, successful, owned his own home, was tall with a thick head of dark brown hair, muscular and he had animal magnetism, seriously. A few times a month he went running with his Shreveport pack. They had a new leader thanks in part to vampire lover Sookie Stackhouse. Sookie had been a good ally and despite her fondness of vampires, she was welcomed as a Friend of the Pack.

The wolf had never spoken with Sookie. She was in love with a vampire and his pack master had designs on her too. He was not going to get too friendly with a girl that the pack master pined for. Not that Tony ever thought of her that way. Tony was just making sure to keep his distance so that there never would be something he would have to deal with. He did watch her though. When the pack master thought she might be getting into some trouble, he would send Tony down to Bon Temps.

Sookie would have been pissed to know that the Shreveport pack was watching her. She was not in Shreveport, but the pack master wanted her safe. The telepathic barmaid frequently found herself in trouble and it frustrated Pack Master Alcide to no end that she did not call him for help the second trouble started up. That is how Tony came into the picture. Sookie had only seen Tony as a wolf. She never saw his face so the most that Sookie would ever know about Tony was that he was a Were. Sookie did not know that he was a Shreveport Were.

Tony's boss and pack master Alcide Herveaux had heard through the supernatural community that someone was stalking Sookie. He sent Tony to Bon Temps to check it out.

Tony went to Merlotte's for lunch. He could smell her scent and decided to sit in another waitresses section instead of Sookies. His waitress was a pretty petite red head named Claire. Lunch was good. The Burgers Lafayette were the best he'd ever had and the beer was cold. Sookie was good at her job, even as a few young men ogled her her perky breasts. Those same people also talked to her as if she were and idiot. Likely they noticed that she had long blond hair and decided that hair color was an indicator of intelligence. Assholes. Sookie had many different kinds of attention, a few patrons looked at Sookie with an air of disapproval. What was she thinking, to be dating a vampire? A person didn't have to be telepathic to figure out what they were thinking, their expressions said enough. Sookie looked a bit distracted. And nervous. Alcide had told him that she had a wide grin whenever she was anxious. There it was; a sign that she was not as happy as most people believed.

After lunch, Tony drove his beat up red Chevy truck to the Bon Temps Construction building parking lot. The construction business was doing well and the boss decided to expand. Now there was an office located in Bon Temps. The building was actually a home. The home served both as a model for a popular style home as well as an office for the construction business. The parking lot was actually a long driveway, with a small parking area near the house.

Before getting out of the truck, Tony called Alcide to report what he saw and heard. Alcide spoke calmly on the phone, "Scout the area near the woods. Let me know what you find and do it before she gets off work so we know the area is safe."

Tony thought for a moment and then said, "Sure thing. I'll be sure to scout around again after I follow her home."

"No. Her vampire will escort her home." Alcide sounded certain, but then added, "If she leaves work without an escort the Shifter will call, but I doubt that will happen. That damn vampire is very possessive of her. She gets off in two hours. Get to work."

The men hung up without any farewells. Tony got out of his truck and then turned to reach behind the seat to pull out a duffel bag. He then walked into the model home. The home had everything needed to live there. It was sparse. There was no clutter, but there were clean white sheets on the bed, deep blue extra long Egyptian cotton towels in the bathroom, as well as soap and shampoo, food and drinks were in the refrigerator, there was even a suede couch set opposite a large plasma screen television. Tony quickly took a handful of clothes out of the duffel and then walked back outside with the empty bag.

He locked the door to the home/construction office building, stepped away from the door and walked towards the trees. It was a couple hundred yards before there was a real tree line. Once he was beyond the line by several feet, he took his clothes off and put them into the duffel bag. His body then began to shimmer and shake and hum. He had transformed himself to a wolf. A big, dark brown, harry, toothy wolf. Tony took off.

He scoured the woods near the Stackhouse home. The home was an old white farmhouse, with screened in porches front and back. There was a long driveway leading to the house which was back a good distance from the road. Ms. Stackhouse lived in a home surrounded by thick woods. Many smells were out there. Panthers had come through not long ago. Alcide had mentioned that Sookies' brother had recently become a werepanther. Maybe her brother and some of his buddies hunted or patrolled her woods. The wolf also smelled many different vampires. He recognized some of the vampires scents; Bill Compton and Eric Northman among them. Tony had expected as much. He found a patch of earth that once was an underground space for a vampire. This vampire had a scent that was not familiar with. Had the vamp been lying in wait? Not too far off, Tony found a number of small animals heaped together. All were drained of blood and had the same vampire scent as the patch of earth. No one was in the woods at the moment. It was time to go back and report to Alcide.

Tony was back to his human looking self, wearing clothes and carrying his bag back toward the house. As he approached, a beautiful black pick up pulled into the driveway. By the time Tony got up to the house, the driver was out and walking toward him. The driver was much shorter than Tony, had short blond hair and a muscular body. He smelled like panther. The panther held out his hand, "Hi. I'm Jason Stackhouse. We were wondering when Herveaux was gonna get this place started up. Were you just out for a run? I wish I could do that whenever I wanted."

Tony headed for his truck. "We're not using the building as a Herveaux Construction office just yet. I'm here setting up. If you need something..." Tony reached into his truck though an open window and pulled out a stack of business cards. He handed Jason a card. It had a Shreveport address, website and phone number. "We will do what we can to help."

Jason looked at the Were and thanked him for the card. "Sure. Yeah. I'll just give this to Calvin. He sent me here to talk to you… whoever was gonna be here that is."

"Calvin Norris?" This spiked his interest a bit.

"Um yeah. Calvin is real good with construction and all, but you know that uh… that it's real easy to… um damage, stuff, like walls and shit…"

Tony burst out laughing. "I'll tell Alcide to expect a call. Sounds like you panthers might be some fun after all." Jason thanked Tony and left.

Tony went inside and called his boss. Alcide picked up on the second ring. Tony explained that it took him longer than it should have to return the call, because Jason Stackhouse was in the driveway when he got back. Then he explained to Alcide that the Hotshot community had some sort of problem with damaging their own homes. Alcide figured that there was perhaps a lot more to the story, and he would be waiting to hear from Calvin Norris. Next, Tony shared what he found on the Stackhouse property. He had smelled werepanthers in the trees. Now that Tony had met her brother, he was able to identify Jason as being among the werepanthers that had been near her home. Then he mentioned the hiding place (or resting place?) of a vampire and finding a heap of dead rodents nearby. It had been at least a week since the last little corpse was added to the heap. Both agreed that vampires preferred bigger game. If there was a vampire in the Stackhouse woods eating vermin, then it was afraid to leave her out of sight. As said vampire was no longer around, it could be assumed that he was staked or made to have met the sun. Before his pack master told him to, Tony said he would go back to the Stackhouse property that night. He didn't know what was in store for him.