"Well, then, shall we?"
"We shall." Eric's hand slid firmly around my waist, and his fingers slid right under my shirt. I slapped them away automatically and sighed.
It was going to be a long night.
We piled into Pam's minivan—one of us more reluctant than the others, of course. The vamps were certainly feeling their oats; Eric bounded right up into the backseat with me, causing Pam to snort as she hopped into the front seat and adjusted her designer (and perfectly unnecessary) sunglasses. She appeared to be humming something—from Grease, I realized, and groaned.
"You aren't sulking, are you, Sookie?"
"I still don't see why I have to dress like this!"
Next to me, Eric was practically humming with nervous energy. Or something else, given the way he was shoved right up against me, and not because the backseat lacked room. His arm was thrown around my shoulders, the better to try to touch me. Apparently, this outfit was the fashion equivalent of fairy scent for Eric.
"Remind me to take you into Fangtasia like this later," he said.
"Don't get any ideas," Pam said over her shoulder. "You'll start a fight in two minutes, and who will pay for the damage?"
Eric grunted sullenly in assent. Feeling his fingers stroke my upper arm, it occurred to me that I had a gateway here. I shifted to face him. I hadn't quite registered before his outfit—he had, in fact, brought out one of his suits. Knowing what generally happened whenever Eric wore one of his suits, I winced; this was not a good omen for our expedition. All the more reason to try to save (or at least redress) my butt, to stall this or get to a plan B in which I'd have some decent clothing on.
"Eric." I murmured, lowering my voice; Pam would certainly hear what I was doing, but I wanted to use what wiles I had. I reached over with one hand and ran my fingers down the curve of his jaw and to his throat; I drew my nails lightly there, as I knew he liked. He growled softly, his blue eyes burning down at me.
"Eric," I repeated. "We could go back to Fangtasia…" I put my other hand on his knee cap "accidentally," allowing my fingers to touch the inside of his leg there. Okay, and a little higher too, but then I wasn't looking downwards. His eyes became decidedly unfocused. "Now." I leaned in closer, whispering in his ear, "To your office." Figuring Pam couldn't hear everything, I allowed myself a little lick, too.
He hissed and suddenly, I felt a Viking at my own ear. "You are so…" Eric's hand was not stopping at the knee, I noticed. I also noticed I wasn't objecting. "Hot…" His tongue slid to that little place by my ear that he'd discovered that night at the cabin, when he'd held me under him on the hood of his car. You'd think that would make me cold, but suddenly, my skin was burning fire. And now he'd discovered the power of breathing on that spot, too, which seemed live-wired to certain southern parts of my anatomy. I squirmed and his hand squeezed me. "---when you bullshit me," he finished, pulling back with a mirthful expression.
I slapped at his chest and he drew back, laughing at my scowl. "Lover, you're spectacular." His face turned serious. "But what is your worry? No man shall offend you, if that is what worries you."
"She needs to worry. Some bastard was trying to take out my garden!" Pam added. She flipped the radio station with an annoyed sound.
Because Pam was driving, we got to the bar in record time. (She drove faster than her GPS could allow for; I asked her why she even bothered with a GPS, but she ignored me. Eric informed me that the device had been on Oprah's show, and for that reason it had become a necessity to Pam.)
"Do not speak ill of Her," Pam said darkly, pulling us into a lot. I was half-tempted to ask Pam if Oprah was a vamp, too, just to get a rise out of her, but our surroundings took the question from my lips.
Well, you could tell right away we were there. The "bar" was an oversized shack leaning slightly over, as if to buckle under years of cheap beer and fried food. The neon sign out front had lost its C, so the name flashed "TRAKS" at random intervals. The parking lot was a mix of mud and gravel, and the majority of the cars were trucks. More than the cars, though, were the presence of bikes—giant motorcycles, twice as big as me, for the most part.
"I need one of those," Pam said, pointing at a pink one.
"Later." Eric had lost his sense of playfulness. "You know what to do, Sookie?"
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, right." Actually, my walking orders to myself went like this: Go in, see if I could hear anything relevant, get the hell out of there before one of my boobs fell out.
"If you need me—"
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, blood bond, cell, whatever," I growled.
He caught me as I wiggled across him for the sliding door. His mouth was at my ear. "Be safe. I'll get out the pink lycra you liked later, if you wish." His hands on my hips helped me move to the door, but they also gave me a friendly squeeze.
I was momentarily distracted by Eric's reference to the night of the orgy, and his supremely distracting outfit that night, but I got myself back together in a hurry. No time to go mooning over memories, Stackhouse, I told myself, and at Pam's thumbs-up, I hopped from the van and scurried (well, as fast as possible, in that outfit), into the bar.
It was Sam's idea of hell—not just the volume, which was normal for any bar, or the language (also normal, particularly when poor Lafayette was working in our kitchen), or the smell (ditto), but the pack of bodies, the lack of decent seating, and the trash on the floor. We had our types who liked to shuck the bar nuts and toss 'em on the floor, but we actually swept up every night. This place, I figured, hadn't seen a broom since, well, the last time Eric wielded one regularly. Which would be never.
Because of the lack of room, I had no choice but to move to the bar, where the bartender (in a stained white t-shirt that would make Sam have a fit) gave me a huge smile and a free drink. "For the pretty little lady," he said, but his mind told me something else. As if the direction of his eyes weren't clear enough!
I scoped out the room as discreetly as possible. None of the guys here were standouts in my book—slightly more modern version of those Capitol One barbarians, come to think of it. The women (who universally thought of me as a slut) were dressed in a mix of leather, jeans, and tight t-shirts, all of which had seen better days. Their attitude was grim; they worked hard, wanted to play hard, and saw me as a threat to that.
Well, I couldn't blame them there, given I was dressed like a two-dollar floozy. Heck, I'd been mad when Claudine showed up and literally showed me up in front of all of the guys, and she didn't transmit "easy" the way my outfit clearly was.
"Why, hey, sweet thing," drawled one bear-like man, moving in next to me. I say "next" because really he forced a spot, almost pushing me into the lap of the guy on the other side. I cast down my shields and jerked them up again when I caught wind of oil, a water bed, and what the hell, a remote control?—yup, just your run-of-the-mill pervert.
"So nice to see ya," I beamed my enormous nervous smile. "But I've got to hit the ladies'. Be right back!"
I scrambled down the bar, to the darker area wherein all restrooms are located. I was really just avoiding Mr. Bear, but it wouldn't do to make it look realistic.
And that's when I noticed him—a guy sitting at the end of the bar by himself, stewing thoughtfully over a bottle of cheap beer. In any other setting, he'd be perfectly unremarkable, but for me, he was just the opposite—Langdon Bettany.
"This seat taken?" I patted the unbalanced stool next to him.
Jerked out of his thoughts, he mumbled, "Nah," and then looked at me. And blinked. And stared. And grinned.
Men are such pigs, I tell you.
Reluctantly, I fixed my mega-wattage nervous smile on and held out my hand. "Thanks, pal!"
"Welcome, Miss….?"
Although he was apparently talking to "the girls," I answered him anyway. "Martie." Pam had wanted my alias to be Martha Stewart, but we compromised on this point. "And you are…?"
"Name's Langdon but everybody 'round here calls me Larry." He apparently had yet to notice I had a neck or anything above it.
"Nice to meet ya, Larry!" I waved to the bartender for another drink and let my shields down.
Damn, that girl with the rack is so out of Larry's league. Wonder who paid her to talk to him? I wrestled my face into calm as the bartender, winking, served me my drink.
Why is he with that cheap bitch, I've been trying for years to get him, the woman at the table across from the bar was thinking.
I've never seen tits like those outside of a Hustler, my dear friend Larry was thinking. What did I say about men being pigs?
"I haven't been to this bar before, been over in Shreveport a lot," I told my new best friend, who was currently speculating on my cup size.
"Shreveport, huh?" I was impressed he managed words. I waited, sipping my beer, in hopes he'd get the connection. The most famous bar in Shreveport was Fangtasia, of course, although its fame was purely in terms of notoriety.
Ahhh, there it came. A ripple of anxiety slid over his face. "You go to that vamp bar?"
"Nah, not a lot. I like my men warm." I simpered, but it made no difference, unless my boobs somehow reflected my facial expression.
Not one of them fangers, then…Should show her to Jerry, show him there's better stuff out there---not that creepy shit he's with now—although Jesus knows they can pay…
I stiffed as if an ice cube ran down my spine, as an image of Eric's Corvette flashed through Langdon's mind. The thoughts came rapidly, and I tried desperately to piece them together—the Corvette, a friend, a check, and the new HD TV on his wall of his house, and how he'd spent that first night consoling himself with porn.
Even criminal men are pigs, I guess.
"So, a lot of them hang out here?" I asked, trying to redirect his thoughts back to the vamps.
He glanced longingly at my chest before (finally) bothering to look at my face. "Them? Oh, you mean the vampires. Nah, this ain't their place." Good thing, too, he was thinking, with Bela Lugosi-type images in his head. I nearly choked on my beer. This guy definitely hadn't had much contact with vampires, that's for sure. "This is just a neighborhood hang-out, locals, y'know. And pretty little guests like yourself." His eyes were down south again.
I decided to take a pause and get my breath back together. "Why, thanks, Larry. I'm going to scoot to the ladies'—be right back!"
I "scooted" as delicately as I could back to the restrooms and ran into a brunette emerging from the hallway. Even in the half light, we recognized each other; my hand shot out to clamp over her mouth, and I dragged her into the women's room.
It was (thank God) empty. "Amelia! What the HELL are you doing here?" I whispered furiously.
"Same thing as you!" Her eyebrows went up to her forehead. "And what the hell are you wearing, by the way?"
I waved my hand impatiently. "You could get yourself killed!"
"And you couldn't? Besides, it's better than Jason."
I stared at her. "Jason?"
"Yeah, he wanted to come—he stopped by the house and asked if you'd left, said he was going to follow along. It was only after I promised him I'd go and do my 'witch voodoo shit' that he agreed not to come. And good thing he did," she said pointedly. "One look at you and he'd lose it."
I rubbed my face. "Okay, thanks for heading off Jason. That…would not have gone well." A disaster in the making, more like it. Jason was about as subtle as a rock. "So what have you got?"
"Not much, but I know there's a bunch of E(E)E people who live near here. That could be the source of your mystery button."
I nodded thoughtfully. "Let me head back out there and ask the guy I had at the bar. And no, I'm not saying anything else—now's not the time."
I slid back out into the dingy bar area. My stool had been held open by Langdon/Larry; he'd tossed his jacket on it and seemed to be scanning the area. When he saw me, he snatched his coat back and grinned. "It can get kind of full here." The woman at the table across from us glared at me again for this show of preference.
"Oh, sure, thanks." My smile could've knocked him over. Fortunately, he wasn't looking in the direction to get the full power. "Hey, I thought I saw some people up front who all had some weird emblem, all Es. Is that some kind of bike gang for here? I haven't heard of it in Shreveport."
"Weird emblem?" I patiently drew him a copy of the E(E)E logo, doing my best to fudge it as if I weren't entirely certain of its design. "Oh, yeah, those types. No, the vamps aren't coming here—they just work for them, setting up their parties and shit like that."
"Vampires have parties? What, like Mary Kay?" I pretended to giggle. Since I was on edge, my laugh came out as slightly crazed.
Langdon didn't seem to care. "Yeah, parties. I ain't ever been to one of them, don't worry." He winked. "Don't want to end up like them cold men!" He must've had a bit more to drink, as he patted the area near his belt buckle. "I want to be warm, y'know." He winked.
I kept my vacant smile fixed. "Oh, sure, sugar. I wouldn't want to work for those types, either. Give me the heebie-jeebies. What do you do, anyway?"
"Oh, lots here and there…economy's down, y'know." I nodded sympathetically and he leaned in. "I do have a lead at that E place, but it's my friend's brother, and I ain't so sure I want to get mixed up any more with them."
Any more. I saw more images moving through his head—a guy, a friend he met just today for lunch; buffalo wings that didn't sit right with his digestion; I pushed all of my energy towards the friend's face, not the food—bingo! It was the same guy who had tried to burn down Pam's house. He wasn't wearing anything that linked him to Quinn's business, though, and I knew he wasn't one of their workers.
"Maybe your friend could help you out, get you a spot whatever he's doing," I suggested, trying to maintain my stillness.
"Jerry? Nah, he's…got a lot on his plate." I saw the arsonist again, this time gesticulating wildly as he sat at the bar with Langdon; Langdon wasn't thinking of the conversation, but the tone came through clearly---there was a lot of drama in Jerry's life. "He's done temp stuff with that place, too, but nothing permanent." Apparently not liking this gloomy turn of the conversation, he mentioned, "But hey! What's your talent, Martie?"
Not the ones you're thinking of, I wanted to respond, but I bit my lip. "Oh, I was clerking—lots of temp work, you know how it is. Not too many places nowadays that are good for a woman to work at."
My new buddy nodded affirmatively. "Terrible out there for a woman these days."
As he started to regale me with stories about his sister's job, I let my mind wander again. He was actually thinking about what he was saying, bless him, so I didn't have to follow his thoughts too deeply. I glanced out towards the other side of the bar, nearer the door. Amelia had stationed herself there, and she was chatting fairly easily with a couple of guys and a girl. Beyond them, the door opened and shut with a decisive thump, as a new group of leather-clad types wandered in.
"Oh, great," Langdon was saying next to me. "Jer's here, you should meet him."
He sure likes the blondes, but his ain't half as hot as you…
"Jer?" I replied automatically, sweeping my eyes across the crowd.
"He just came in with that E(E)E group—one I mentioned before. The vamp people, remember."
"Oh, yeah, right." I saw, to my distress, that dear Jerry had indeed arrived. He was working his way through the bar, with a bunch of guys in leather E(E)E jackets. I guess Quinn was paying better these days.
Told him he ought to get away from those types—I don't care about the money, they're all freaks…
Amelia must've seen the group, too, because she spun on her stool to look at me. For once, I let down my shields and tried to listen to a friend's mind.
Is that an 'oh, shit' or an OH, SHIT, roomie?
I was suddenly aware of the predicament we were in. Even if I hadn't been a target of the fire, Jerry might remember our up-close-and-personal encounter in Pam's yard—unless he was attacked by blonds wielding garden gnomes on a regular basis, which I doubted. Which would expose me right in front of Langdon, and make getting out of this place in one piece unlikely.
Oh, hell. Here we go again.
I shot Amelia a look—no secret codes, unfortunately, nothing more than a frantic shake of my chin. Fortunately, Amelia was well versed in the art of the Female Look, and interpreted my expression correctly. She suddenly staggered backward and managed to land on a large man's lap, dumping her beer all over his lady friend.
"Bitch! Watch where you're going!" the woman howled.
"Woah, there, little momma!" exclaimed the man.
"Did you just pinch my ass?" Amelia yelled, slapping in the direction of the large man, who grabbed her wrists, confused. The poor man's wife/girlfriend immediately took the side of the supposed competition, smacking him with her purse, until he tried to shove her away.
"Don't grab hold of women here!" two bikers down the bar yelled.
"What did you say? He called you all DAMNED DEMOCRATS!" howled Amelia.
"Woman's crazy!" the poor biker protested, but that was it. The bar started to light up, an audio loop of (mostly profane) exclamations: "Bitch!" "What the fuck!" "Son of a bitch!" "Who isn't?" "But we need a stimulus plan!"
As any bar worker knows, this pandemonium is the mating call for the next step, violence. It would only take one more tinder on the fire…
"WHAT, YOU DON'T SUPPORT THE TROOPS?" yelled Amelia.
"What the FUCK!" roared a random biker, and it was on. I saw a table turn over as men and women alike jumped to their feet and threw themselves at each other like angry zoo animals.
"I'll help you, honey," Langdon said, his hand "helpfully" grabbing me by one of my boobs.
Oh, hell. With the talent of many a Merlotte's fight under my belt, I snatched up the wait tray on the bar and smashed it over Langdon's head.
"What the FU—" he started, before I gave him a good knee where it counts, spinning away to face another crazed patron—in this case, the woman across the way, who was apparently waiting for this opportunity to take out her hostility on me.
"Whore!"
I sighed, evaded the hands going for my hair, and shoved her downwards.
"Bitch!" Langdon's punch caught me from behind, right in the kidneys, and I cried out. I felt someone punch my face—the woman, I thought distantly, as Langdon would've had more power. My knees were giving way, I suddenly knew.
Across the room, I could hear a familiar voice screaming, but not in fear: "VIKING!"
Time splintered into fragments of seconds as I slammed downwards on my hands, Langdon going down with me.
Well, for a second, anyway. We slammed down on the ground, and then Langdon was gone, with a great crash in the background. A shiny briefcase landed next to me. I guess he was telling the truth about that briefcase, I thought dimly.
"Trouble, as always." A voice floated down to me, as I rolled over. I stared at Eric's well-polished shoe, listening to pandemonium break out around us; he was apparently hurling a combination of people and things as I scrambled to my feet, using his leg as my anchor. He lifted me the rest of the way, tucking me behind him. I clutched his briefcase, using it as my own personal shield.
"Side door's open—leave," he said between joyous whoops, throwing beer glasses around. I swear, he was having fun.
"Ame—my roomate's here!" Okay, I didn't think anybody was exactly in condition to see if I dropped my charade or not, but I didn't want to expose Amelia anymore than necessary.
Eric just nodded. "Very well." He ripped off the top of a circular table, making an impromptu shield, and snatched a club out of a bartender's hand. "On our way, then."
Eric started to plow through the masses, sending human beings flying all around us, as I staggered after him, ducking flying objects and looking for insane roommates.
"Move it, bitch!" yelled one guy behind me, and I spun to see Mr. Bear, holding a considerably large knife. He froze, too, and I realized, with annoyance, why—my top had come undone entirely.
"Pig!" I screamed, using the briefcase to block him, while delivering a good sharp kick straight to the crotch.
He doubled over just as Eric, tossing another biker aside, was yanking me back closer to him. "Your talents never cease to amaze, " he said over the din, and I felt a sharp tug at my neck—a hasty knot restoring my top, courtesy of one vampire defender.
"NO!" I looked across Eric and saw Amelia pointing wildly. I followed her gaze—a red-headed nut with a chair was running towards us, a wooden chair, a chair that could make a—
"ERIC, NO!" I screamed and pushed myself forward as fast I could—oh, Jesus, please--
"SOOKIE!" I heard him bellow, just as I felt a heck of a lot more pain, something that felt like sharp claws dragging over my face, chest, and arms.
I staggered back, with a chair partly wrapped around me, in me. I couldn't move, couldn't breathe, but I didn't have to—I felt a frenzy, clearing the way around me, and suddenly Amelia was there, ripping the wood away—"Sorry, roomie, got to do it the fast way, before boyfriend loses it completely"—as I distantly saw Jerry fall down in the body mass ahead of us, a body mass that now included a very white-faced red-headed man--
I saw the front door ripped off of its hinges and a figure silhouetted in the midnight moon. A female figure—wearing sunglasses at night. A man tried to rush her and she thrust a swift heel of her hand into his throat. Her teeth glinted white. "Don't fuck with a lady."
I saw a beer bottle looming over Amelia's head, waved weakly, and suddenly it was gone. I was floating, I was—I was safe, I was in heaven, I was with Eric, I was in his arms… His blue eyes were the only anchor I had as the world swirled around me, as I heard Amelia ("out, out, let's go") and Pam ("I cannot kill anyone?"), and finally, him, leaning over me: "Hold on, hold on to me, Sookie."
And, so help me, I did.
AN: All political humor is in good fun only. As always, thanks for all reviews! I appreciate the comments.