At 9 am, Sam and I whipped past the 'Welcome to Texas' sign. I rolled down my window and whooped. I was officially out of Area 5.

Sam glanced over from the driver's seat. "Going wild on me, Sookie?"

"Just haven't been out of Louisiana for a while." I leaned out the window, closed my eyes, and tried to forget the world was bigger than the breeze on my face. "Gosh, this air is nice."

Sam cracked his own window. "Sure is." He seemed to get where I was coming from, but it could have just been the dog thing.

"If you want to go collie later, I can take the wheel."

He smiled. "I'll take you up on that."

Sam's family lived in Wright, Texas, ten hours west of Bon Temps, getting up near the panhandle. We planned to drive straight until we passed Dallas, reward ourselves with lunch, and then plow north. Sam's mom expected us for dinner.

"Don't be surprised if she feeds you the whole fridge," Sam told me. "Mom's dying for company. She hasn't been out much since the divorce."

"I can't wait to meet her." I hoped it went better than my recent meet-the-folks experience. Since Sam wasn't related to psychotic Russian royalty, the odds were ahead. Thinking of Alexi brought me back to Eric. "Sam, what did you tell your Mom about me?" Sam and I weren't dating, but with family gatherings—weddings in particular—people made assumptions. My fight with Eric last night showed that too well.

My phone rang before he could answer. It was an unfamiliar number with a Shreveport area code. I've started screening my calls—since my kidnapping, I can't be too careful—but I decided to answer in case it was Eric's new day man. Before I picked up, I said a mini-prayer for Bobby. We'd never been each other's biggest fans, but he hadn't deserve to die. I hoped someone would think of me when I was gone. "Hello?"

"Sookie Stackhouse? This is Jannalynn."

"Are you calling for Sam?" He looked up at the sound of his name. Jannalynn, I mouthed. He blanched. "How did you get my number?"

"Alcide. Why are you going to a wedding with my boyfriend?"

What was it with Jannalynn and Eric? "It's not like that, we're friends," I said, which, while true, sounded like the worst kind of excuse.

I sort of admired Jannalynn's gumption to call me and talk things out direct—'sort of' being the operative phrase because her gumption was by another standard rudeness. By any standard, Jannalynn was not the kind of girl you rushed home to meet the folks. In my experience—which consisted of a little common sense and a lot of eavesdropping on private thoughts—parents meeting their grown kid's boyfriend or girlfriend judge them based on their ability to hold a polite conversation. I'd call Jannalynn a lot of things before I called her Miss Manners. I'm not saying she can't be polite. I'm not even saying it would necessarily be good for her to tone down her attitude. What I am saying is I wouldn't introduce her to my parents until I was sure that I loved her and that I'd fight for her no matter what. Because she was the kind of girl who started fights. Sam and Jannalynn had been dating for what, a month tops? In my opinion, it was too soon.

I didn't know if that's what Sam was thinking because I try to stay out of his head, but I did know Sam would bring Jannalynn home when—and if—they got serious. He wasn't the kind of guy to hide someone he cared about.

If I had to talk to Jannalynn, but I wasn't going to do it by myself. This wasn't just between the two of us. It wasn't even mostly between the two of us. Sam was doing his best to watch the road and me at the same time. I'd save him the trouble. "I'm putting you on speaker phone," I told her.

"Whatever," Jannalynn said, and then as I hit the speaker button, "tell Sam he has a week to get you out of his system, or I'm done." She hung up.

"Charming." I'd never been a huge fan of Jannalynn but I'd always tried to watch my words out of respect for Sam. "You told her we were going to this wedding, right? She didn't find out from someone else."

"I told her," Sam said. "She wasn't happy. You probably figured that out."

"No, she was all peaches and cream." I sighed, regretting the sarcasm. I could relate. "Eric's been laying into me too. Well, you saw last night."

"I got the impression." Sam scowled. "Sookie, I invited you. You accepted. Eric can deal with it. You shouldn't apologize for being friends with me and I won't apologize for spending time with you."

I was touched. "I'm not sorry I came. Look, I think she's being, you know, how she is—" I wouldn't say 'bitchy' out loud "but I understand why she's mad. Why they both are. I think its dumb, but people assume, with weddings." Sam looked uncomfortable. He knew it was true. So did I, but that didn't mean I had to cave. In fact, I was more determined not to. Smallmindedness was still smallmindedness, even if you could see where it came from.

"Sookie, you know I like you, but I would never—we're both with other people—"

I was embarrassed he'd felt the need. "Sam. Of course."

Thankfully, that was it. We both looked out the windows and after a minute or two Sam had cooled down enough to feel charmed by his girlfriend getting all territorial. "She's pretty brave, calling you up." He was trying not to smile.

I'd never seen him get misty over Jannalynn. "She could have given me a heart attack." She wouldn't have minded.

"She's a firecracker. I like that. Keeps me on my toes."

"Make sure she doesn't burn them," I said, but I knew I shouldn't really talk, dating a vampire. Sam didn't call me on it. Instead, he laughed. All of a sudden, I wanted to tell him about the bloodbath on my front lawn, but didn't know how to bring it up and, honestly, I was afraid of how he would react.

A loud honk saved me from initiating a conversation I was sure to regret. I wheeled around to see a biker riding Sam's bumper. He was the kind of guy who thought he was too tough to wear a helmet: mutton chops, leather, hasn't had a hair cut since the seventies, you know the type. The biker leaned on his horn, trying to get us to speed up. I glanced at the odometer. We were already fifteen over.

"What's this fool doing?" Sam's brows knit together as he eyed the rearview mirror. "If you wanna pass me, pass me." Sam addressed Mad Max directly, even though there was no way he could have heard. He turned to me. "What's his problem? This isn't a one-lane highway."

That's what got me suspicious. It was an early morning. The road wasn't busy and Evel Knievel could have easily changed lanes and left us in the dust, if he wanted to. He went from jerk to threat in less than a second. I unhooked my seatbelt and spun around to look at him straight-on. I tried to get a purchase on his thoughts, but he was too far away. He must have seen me eyeing him, because bared his teeth. He looked like a wolf.

Then he accelerated.

I tried to keep a lock on his thoughts. It was harder than I thought. I'd never tried to read a moving target before. I got a taste of his thoughts as he eased parallel with us. They were jumbled, snarly. I recognized the pattern immediately.

As Road Rage barreled by on Sam's side, he saluted us with the ever appropriate, "Bitches."

Sam sniffed. I thought, like me, he had figured out something wasn't right and was trying to catch our new friend's scent. "Were?" I asked.

Sam nodded. "You can tell from thoughts?"

I nodded as the biker cut in front of us. Sam slammed on the brakes, which screeched their protest. We went from 90 to 75 in a flat second. My teeth rattled around in my head.

The biker laughed and waved. Goodbye to you too, asshole. The rebel flag fluttered from a stick poking off the back of his bike. There was a sticker below it. I squinted: a fleur-de-lis. I looked lower. "He has Louisiana plates." Damn. He probably followed us.

Keeping one hand on the wheel, Sam started scrabbling around the floor like he was trying to claw his way to the undercarriage. "Pen," he said, when I asked what he was searching for. I fished one out of my purse and he copied down the biker's license number on the back of an old receipt. "He looks mean."

Mean didn't cover half of it. "He looks hired."

"Open the glove compartment."

I did as I was told. A silver handgun sat on top of Sam's owners' manual and registration. I shut the door. "Good to know."

Sam looked at me. "What do you mean hired?"

I wouldn't drag Sam into vamp shit. He deserved better. I hated it when Eric was right. I shouldn't have come. "Look, why don't you just drop me off at the Dallas Greyhound station? I'm sorry about the wedding. When I'm gone you'll be fine." If this biker was from Victor Madden, and my gut screamed that he was, I probably had to call Eric at first dark. He would just love it.

Sam pulled onto the shoulder and shut off the pickup. "Sookie, you know I won't do that."

"Should we be stopping?"

"Sun's high in the sky and it's a weekday morning. If it makes you feel better, roll up the window." As I did, Sam pressed the automatic lock button. "Sookie, that guy would have run us off the road. If you know what's going on, tell me. I want to help."

"I don't want you getting hurt."

He looked right back at me. "And I don't want you getting hurt."

The less a normal person knew about vamps, the better. Period. But Sam's safety was at risk. I couldn't, in good faith, keep him in the dark. Besides, from a selfish angle, I wanted to make a plan and needed his help to do it. Eric was always good to bounce ideas off of. I missed him, and then caught myself. It spoke volumes about Eric and my relationship that having my life in danger reminded me of spending time with him.

I manned up and spat it out. "I think the biker came after us because we passed out of Area 5 with the state line."

Sam raised his eyebrows. "Area 5?"

"Eric's territory."

Sam's eyebrows went higher. "Eric has territory?"

"You know Eric's big dog in Shreveport. Well, it's more than just Shreveport." Sam still looked confused so I backtracked. "The vamps have set themselves up by state, you know that right? I guess they've got clans too." I couldn't remember the details. Appius and Alexi's arrival upstaged Eric's lecture, and I hadn't been that into it to begin with. Even so, I was almost sure Texas was in a different clan than Louisiana. I knew Eric and I had talked about Stan, which meant we'd talked about Texas.

"Clan?"

"Don't ask me to tell you the names. They're sort of earth-mother sounding, it's weird. What's important I think, and I could be remembering wrong, is different people run Texas than the people Eric work for. Not on the King and Queen level, well that too, but also on some bigger vampire clan level."

Sam looked like he was going to be sick. I was surprised he seemed so upset. "Eric told you this?"

"He thought it might keep me from getting killed." This was probably the moment Eric had been anticipating, although I still didn't see how knowing vampires created a bunch of fruity-sounding clans would help me survive. "Are you okay?"

"No one knows this," Sam said. "If Eric's telling you, he must mean to turn you."

Turning hadn't crossed my mind, but why would Eric—who was usually so secretive—share part of his world, if he didn't intend on having me share all of it? "He promised not to," I reminded myself. "We talked about it."

But Eric always found a way to do exactly what he wanted.

My phone saved me from Sam's reply. It was an unfamiliar number with a Shreveport area code. Again. "Jannalynn, one second," I said to Sam and answered. "What?" I knew shouldn't have picked up, but after Sam's turning comment, I was hoping for an excuse to yell.

"Sookie Stackhouse?" It was a man.

I went from mad to worried fast. "Yes."

"This is the Shreveport Police Department. Do you know Eric Northman?"

Belongs to Charlaine Harris and HBO. Thanks for reading and reviewing! I really appreciate your feedback.