A/N Just a short little chapter, as I thought I'd get this out while I can. Thanks for all the reviews!

Disclaimer: Characters are not mine.

EPOV

I took it as a pretty good sign that Sookie had barely protested when I threw her over my shoulder and carried her off to bed. I think the more sex with Eric plan was definitely working because she started removing her clothes pretty quickly after I set her down. That was fun to watch. It was even more fun to watch her undress me. But the viewing highlight had to be watching her mouth working up and down my cock. Fuck she was good at that.

So we were having a pretty good night all told. I really needed to do something about replacing those ugly black condoms, but they were doing a job so I was making do.

I'd been asleep for a couple of hours, pressed up against Sookie, when I heard the handle on the bedroom door rattle. Shit, had we locked it? Apparently we had, but then Amelia wailed "Mummy!" from the other side.

Sookie sat up immediately "Put some clothes on" she whispered to me, and I started hunting around for my boxers and t-shirt. Sookie threw her pyjamas on and raced out the door.

I could hear murmured sounds coming from the hall, and the sound of the toilet flushing. I hoped that it was just a trip to the bathroom and Sookie would be back soon, because now I was awake again I had some ideas about what might help me get back to sleep.

However, before I could get too far down that line of thinking, Sookie appeared back in the bedroom, accompanied by Amelia who was clutching some kind of soft toy. "Sorry" Sookie whispered to me "she heard a noise outside." Sookie climbed into bed and Amelia climbed in next to her.

"Oh, do you want me to go?"

"Ummm" Sookie seemed to be considering it. Fuck.

Just then Amelia obviously realised I was there, she lent over Sookie and looked at me, then looked up at Sookie and asked "What's Eric scared of?"

"There's, um, lumps in his bed" Sookie replied. I guess that was true.

"Yeah" I said "big ones."

"Oh, OK" said Amelia, and she lay down.

Sookie shrugged and whispered "I think you're good if you don't want to go back to the lumps."

I figured I could still enjoy holding Sookie, so I said "OK, I'll stay then." So we both lay back down and I put an arm round Sookie and eventually we all drifted off.

When I woke up the next morning I was almost lying over the edge of the bed and Amelia was looking down at me. "You snore" she announced and then she took off. Huh. Right. And to top it all off, I'd missed catching Sookie in the shower again.

After I'd showered I headed out to find her in the kitchen. She had her back to me and I thought I might sneak up on her, but I hadn't factored in fat Bob just lying there on the middle of the floor and I tripped over him. "Fu…" I yelled, Sookie turning round and catching my eye just as the word left my mouth. "Yeah", she said. "Fudge. Right, Eric?"

"Uh, yeah, right". Bob just blinked at me. How did I not notice something that fat?

I was still staring Bob down when Sookie hugged me and kissed my chest. "Sorry about last night" she murmured.

"Oh, that's OK"

"Did you sleep OK? When I got up you were pretty far over to the edge of the bed. Amelia's little, but she spreads out in her sleep. She's worse than you!" Sookie laughed, and turned back to what she was doing. Worse than me? What was wrong with the way I slept?

I'd been thinking that I really needed something to show Sookie just how useful I was. Well, other than the sex. So after breakfast I said "Uh, now that the spare room isn't being used, I was thinking maybe I could paint it for you?

Sookie turned to look at me "You really want to paint the study?"

"Yeah, I said I would when I first arrived."

"I didn't think you were serious. You've really painted before?"

"Yeah, no problem. Piece of cake." I was pretty sure Amelia could have painted a small square room given half the chance. It was going to be a breeze for me.

Sookie just shrugged and said "OK, well we can start moving stuff out this morning then."

While she was busy with something else I got out my laptop and surreptitiously Googled painting. Didn't seem that hard. I also noticed there was an email from Victor asking about my return date. Fuck. I looked over at Sookie sitting on the floor with Amelia and Felicia. On a whim I sent a reply telling him I wasn't coming back and where to stick his job, although I may have used more of my 'American politeness' in the actual phrasing. I wondered whether to tell Sookie, but I didn't want to scare her. We hadn't discussed when I'd be leaving, so I figured I'd just see what happened next.

We spent part of the morning moving all the junk that was crammed in the spare room into the hallway and family room, leaving just the bigger pieces of furniture. Sookie had a lot of shoes stashed in that closet. Amelia spent a while opening all the boxes they were in and trying them on before leaving them in a heap. At least Felicia couldn't eat these ones I guess.

Also stashed in there were some larger framed wedding photos. Sookie tried to move those out of the way pretty quickly, but Amelia caught sight of them and announced "That's my mummy when she was a princess." Sookie laughed.

"Yeah" I said "You looked beautiful." Sookie blushed and mumbled something and we carried on.

There were some other photo albums which Amelia decided to sit and look through. I glanced at them a few times. The photos of Sookie pregnant were a bit of a revelation. Her boobs were enormous. Fuck. I briefly wondered if it was worth accidentally destroying the ugly black condoms to see that effect in real life, but I didn't want to risk getting no sex at all.

There were the odd photos of Bill in there, and the weird thing was, it didn't really bother me that much. He wasn't here, I was. I'd won. Sure, Sookie might have the odd good memory of him, but they'd fade over time and he'd become insignificant. He wasn't going to be showing up on the doorstep every Saturday looking for his kids. Hell, Felicia wouldn't remember him and Amelia probably wouldn't either. Bill certainly wasn't going to be an obstacle to all three of them being mine, I was pretty sure of that. I just had to figure out how to get Sookie to see it that way. The painting would help.

When everything was moved Sookie helped spread some coversheets over everything and left me to it. She had been muttering about whether some of the surfaces needed sanding back, but that sounded like pure drudgery, so I assured her it wasn't required.

I opened up the paint can, poured some into a tray and set to work with the roller. After about half an hour I was really bored. After an hour I was completely over it. I was right, it wasn't that hard. But soooo boring. I was starting to be glad I had that MBA after all.

I finished one wall and went in search of Sookie to get her thoughts. She'd said she was going out in the back garden to do some weeding. Only when I got out to the deck she and Amelia were next door at that kid Riley's place. On his trampoline. Bouncing. Fuck me. That was better than the horse race. I wondered if I could persuade Sookie to get one of those for Amelia.

I was about to head back into the house, realising that if I watched for too long my shorts were going to be uncomfortably tight, but Sookie spied me and got down and came back over the fence. Actually, her jumping over the fence was a pretty good look too. I wondered how long Amelia would be occupied next door, but Sookie said "So how's the painting going?" and I remembered I was supposed to be working today.

Sookie seemed pleased with what I'd done so far, so after lunch I carried on. It was still fucking boring. And the smell was pretty horrific. I didn't know how people did this all day every day. I was glad it was a really small room.

Amelia would pop in and out to keep an eye on me, and she sat in the doorway and read to me from one of her books for a while. The story rambled a lot and got abandoned half way through, but the company was nice.

I had just about finished the third wall when I stepped back to see what I'd done, and tripped over Bob who was also checking out the progress. Fucking cat. I stumbled and knocked over the paint can. "Fuck" I yelled, as the paint poured onto my foot.

"That's not a nice word" said Amelia's voice from the doorway, and she left, leaving me to deal with the mess. Then I heard her yell to Sookie "Mummy, Eric had an assident."

Sookie appeared "What accident?" she asked, and then she noticed the fact I was hopping next to a pool of paint. She laughed. "Well, at least you mainly got the coversheet" she said.

"Yeah, and my foot!"

"Hang on there; I'll get you something to clean up."

In a few minutes she came back with a bowl of water and helped me get the paint off my foot, and then we picked up the coversheet and moved it outside.

"That's the last of the paint" I said "I'll have to get some more tomorrow".

"Yeah, but it's looking good so far, thanks for this Eric." Sookie pulled me down to kiss me. It was nice but I hoped she'd be really grateful later on.

SPOV

Eric was trying really hard with the painting, but I could tell it wasn't his thing. He looked hot and bored and like he was trying to race through it as quickly as possible. I couldn't blame him; I hated painting a lot too. He was trying though.

He finished up for the day when he ran out of paint, due to a small accident with the paint can. Eric managed to look relieved and annoyed all at once.

Amelia had enjoyed keeping him company though. She sat there and talked his ear off while he worked. She really seemed to be keen on him. Well, I couldn't blame her.

At bedtime she insisted that Eric read her story tonight which was a first. I wasn't sure how he'd go with that, but he seemed happy to do it. And didn't flinch when she insisted that he kiss her goodnight as well. Oh, we were going to miss him so very much.

Thanks for reading!