A/N: Merry New Years Eve to all! Here's the next chapter to jump-start your festivities.

Thanks, as always, to my two C's: chiisai-kitty and Charlaine Harris.

...

Work at Merlotte's was as busy and chaotic as it ever was, especially when good old Mike Spencer walked in around ten o'clock, taking extra care to take a seat in my section. He was wearing his usual black cowboy boots, acid-washed jeans, and polo shirt, but his face lit up when he saw I was working.

"Hiya, Sookie," he said as soon as I came over, which was pretty soon because I made a beeline for him once he was seated. I had absolutely no idea why he'd need to talk to me so urgently, and so secretly, and it was bugging me.

"Hi, Mr. Spencer," I said politely. Even though I thought of him as 'Mike Spencer' in my head, he was the town coroner and owner of Bon Temp's only funeral home and on top of that was twenty years older than me, so I gave him the respect I'd give to any elder.

"I've been meanin' ter talk to ya," he replied as I sat down his table settings.

"Yeah, I heard. What for?"

He looked around suspiciously, to see who else was watching, and it didn't escape my notice. "Sookie, some of us, like your friend Tara and her beau Eggs, have been partying it up at Jan Fowler's lake house these past coupla weeks, and, well, we were wondering if we could get you to come with us this Friday night," he whispered, grinning crookedly up at me as I tried not to breathe in his bad breath.

Oh my God. He was talking about the sex club. I mean, this wasn't some regular poker night old Mike was inviting me to. No sirree, Mike was inviting me to some orgy—a regular occurrence with him and these friends of his and Tara (Tara!) and this Eggs, whoever he was—that looked like it could be called a sex club. As in, the sex club. Surely there weren't multiple sex clubs going on in this little backwards town, right? I wasn't that clueless about my hometown, was I?

While I was looking inside his head, he added, "And why don't you call me Mike, Sookie?" I nodded robotically, still peeking in his brain. I didn't see faces clearly, but I did see a lot of bodies. Oh, geez Louise. Ick.

Oblivious, Mike continued, "We wanted to invite you sooner, but then you went and took a week off from work after your vamp boyfriend caught Rene, and then Sam said you'd left town. We'd been meaning to ask you this for a while, actually, but the timing was never right. You understand, dontcha?"

Jesus Christ. With what he was thinking about what went on at these parties, I was surprised they were polite enough to think of the timing.

Before this had happened, I had been entertaining the idea of using Eric to get us in—when I thought this was a gay sex club thing. And even now, after I was approached, it seemed he was still our ticket in, albeit unknowingly. Thing was, would he go with me? Not just to a party of people he wouldn't even look at if they came, fully dressed too, to Fangtasia, but to a party of people suspected of killing a friend of mine. I had no idea how he'd react, mostly because I had no idea how I'd react if he was the one to come up to me and ask. But I knew I'd see his reaction later tonight, because I knew I'd have to tell him tonight.

I gulped. "So, what goes on at these parties? Is this just a drinking and dancing type thing?"

"Well, we get a little wild," he admitted, sounding extremely proud of the fact. His mind raced through a couple wild scenarios, and I saw Lafayette for a brief second lying face-down on a bed before Mike thought of two couples in a Jacuzzi. Holy shit. Holy motherfucking shit. I wished there was a way to rewind and spend more time looking at someone's thoughts, but it wasn't possible.

I forced myself to at least look somewhat composed as I listened to Mike finish, "We thought since you found yourself a hot piece of vampire ass, you might want to come let your hair down a little. You should bring him too. That'd be the bomb."

"I'll think about it," I said, without enthusiasm. It wouldn't do to look eager. That would probably make Mike say something even more incredibly out-dated.

"We'd like for both of you to come," he leered. "It'll be fun."

Shuddering, I composed myself enough to calmly ask, "When?"

"Say, ten o'clock on Friday."

"Okey-dokes. Thanks for the invite," I said, as if remembering my manners, and then asked him if he was ready to order.

When I brought Mike his burger and fries, he didn't say anything else about it. Same for when I brought him his bill, though he gave me a fat tip, winked at me, and said he hoped to see me soon.

From what he was thinking, he hoped to see my naked breasts soon.

I just nodded and plastered my old Crazy Sookie smile on my face. I'd seen enough about the party that Mike hoped to see me at to know there wasn't anything to smile genuinely about.

Especially not when Andy Bellefleur came in and sat at the bar. We weren't the best of friends, so I didn't take it personally when he didn't smile or say hi or even acknowledge that I did both of those to him while passing by to grab a bottle of ketchup. But I could tell something was up. Anyone could just by looking at his slumped shoulders, his furrowed brow, and his down-cast eyes. No one else approached Andy, not even his cousin Terry.

When I asked Sam about it during my break, as we were going over my schedule, he said that Andy had been surly every time he's come in, and people just knew now to let him alone. Course, he added, that might have something to do with the fact that a dead body showed up in his car and no one knew why. Sam then changed the topic and asked me what days I could do, and I didn't bring it up again.

I made sure to take tomorrow night off … and Friday night as well. But I made up for it by doing a lot of day shifts, which no one ever volunteered for since it didn't have as many good tips.

The rest of the night went by in a blur. Customers came and went, food was hot and then cold, and the only constant seemed to be the nagging thoughts I had about this sex party the town coroner gave me an exclusive invite to.

What good could my going serve? Could I really learn anything that would solve the mystery of Lafayette's death? I didn't like Andy Bellefleur much, but it wasn't fair that Andy might be prosecuted, his reputation ruined, for something that wasn't his fault. Something that I knew wasn't his fault, no matter what anyone else believed.

I had a nagging suspicion that no one present at a party at the lake house would trust me with any deep dark secrets until I'd become a regular, and I just couldn't stomach that. I wasn't even sure I could get through one gathering, even with Eric at my side. The last thing in the world I wanted to see was my friends and my neighbors "letting their hair down." I didn't want to see them let down their hair, or anything else.

As soon as my shift was over—and Andy's sister Portia came to take him home—I went right to Fangtasia. I hadn't been planning to, but now I knew I had to. Luckily I always kept a spare sweatshirt in the car, which I threw over my Merlotte's shirt now. Sure, I wasn't looking—or, to be honest—smelling my Fangtasia best, but Eric wouldn't mind. Especially when I told him what made me drive over to see him unannounced at two in the morning.

When I got to Fangtasia, there wasn't that long of a line of fangbangers outside, and Pam wasn't even at the door. I had a split-second of panic when I wondered if Eric was even here, and if I should have called first, but that went away once I felt his presence and then walked inside and saw Eric at his throne. The club wasn't as crowded as it usually was, probably due to the lateness of the hour, which made it easier for Eric to see me before I saw him.

"Sookie, what a nice surprise," Eric said warmly, getting up from his spot and bending down to kiss me as if I hadn't seen him hours before.

After a fair amount of kisses later Eric pulled away. He was wearing a black tank top and jeans, and we kind of matched with our dark clothing and blond hair.

"To what do I owe this visit?" he asked.

I placed my hand on his cheek and gently brought his face down so I could kiss him again. "I have to tell you a secret," I whispered in his ear.

Amusedly tilting his head at me, Eric led us over to our booth. We slid into our seats then, and before I could even place my clutch on the table a waitress was over with our drinks, my customary gin and tonic and Eric's True Blood.

I was nervous, playing with my hands and looking around at the interior that I'd already memorized. I wasn't sure of the right way to bring up what I was about to bring up. But as I watched Eric bring the bottle to his lips, I thought, 'Fuck it. Just ask him already.' And just like that, any prewritten speech I had introducing the sex party and my—our—future involvement went out the window. Fuck it, indeed.

"Eric, I need you to escort me to an orgy," I said, as calmly and casually as if I was discussing the weather.

Sputtering, he spit out the blood he had been sipping. It was the most human gesture I'd ever seen him do.

Looking around to see who noticed (which I didn't think was anyone, since we were in a pretty secluded area and Eric wasn't even facing the crowd), he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "Did you just ask me to take you to an orgy?" he asked, clearly dumbfounded.

I blushed and looked down at the tabletop. "Uh … yeah. I did."

He blinked. Once. Twice. Three times. And then he cleared his throat before asking, in a curiously wounded voice, "How did you come to hear of an orgy that I didn't even know about?"

Now it was my turn to spit my drink across the table, though it was done because of laughter, not shock.

Once I stopped, he said, "But, I mean it."

I was about to respond when Pam sauntered up to our table, carrying a handful of red napkins. "You two are truly meant for each other," she said dryly, obviously staring down at Eric's True Blood drops and my gin and tonic drops on the table.

Ignoring her jab, Eric turned to her and conversationally said, "Pam, Sookie here just asked me to take her to an orgy."

Pam laughed for a couple seconds, and then her jaw dropped when neither Eric nor I joined in. Astonished, she turned to look at me for confirmation. "Sookie?"

Embarassed by her close scruitny, I mumbled, "Yeah."

She exchanged a look with Eric, who was already shaking his head when she excitedly asked, "Can I come?"

"Absolutely not," Eric said immediately, before I even had the chance to look at him.

"Why not?" she pouted. "I deserve a reward, after all the work I've had to do for you while you went to New York City and were on TV and then went to Dallas to have hotel sex with Sookie."

"Doing the employee schedule and picking out merchandise for the store for two weeks deserves a drop of fairy blood at best, and certainly not an orgy with Sookie," Eric argued.

"It could be both," Pam said, smiling wolfishly. "Besides, you know I did much more than that. The bull? Niall? The Loboutins? Eric, please, the Loboutins?" She jutted her chin up at Eric and looked down at him as she waited for his response.

Eric exasperatedly ran his fingers through his hair and sighed. Pam looked to me instead. "Sookie? It is your orgy, after all," she pleaded. Pleaded. Pam. Pam pleaded.

I shrugged. "Um, not exactly. It's some local orgy that the town coroner invited me to, and that I guess some of the people in my town go to. Some of them are customers at Merlotte's, actually, so you might have seen them when you were there."

"Oh," she sneered, her excitement visibly leaving her face as disgust took over. "It's a human orgy? In Bon Temps? In that case, never mind." And with that, she left just as quickly and unexpectedly as she came. I was half surprised she remembered to leave the napkins on the table.

I grabbed one and started sopping up the mess when Eric remarked, "You handled that much better than I did." I shrugged noncommittally and continued mopping. He put his hand down on the spot right next to the napkin I was holding, forcing me to pay attention to him and what he was saying. "I mean it, Sookie."

"Yeah, I guess," I said, not knowing why he was making such a big deal of it. I crumpled up the soggy mess and asked, "So, what was that all about? The Loboutins and, and Niall and the bull and stuff?"

He waved his hand. "Later. Afterwards. So, why do you want to go to this orgy, and now? You never talk about the town coroner, and if he's the dirty old man I'm thinking about, I don't know why you'd want to go to an orgy to see him. Or why he'd invite you to one."

"I know," I muttered before telling Eric everything I had been waiting to tell him before: the sex club and its possible link to Lafayette's murder, how Andy was getting treated in all of this, and how much I wanted to clear his name and find Lafayette's killer. Like someone who's seen a lot in his lifetime, Eric had taken it all in stride, his poker face never wavering … until I told him I had originally thought it was a gay sex club and had been trying to figure out a way to use Eric to score an invitation. Then his eyebrows shot into his hairline.

"Sorry! I know I didn't ask you about it," I hastily admitted, "but I was going to, I promise!"

Eric shrugged. "That's not what concerns me, although I would have done it for you. No, what concerns me is that a group of people you think murdered your coworker invited you to go to a secluded lake house with them. Even if you hadn't asked me, I would have gone, to protect you."

"Well, I don't think they'll try anything if you're there." Then I thought about what I just said. "Deadly, I mean," I corrected.

"I'll kill them if they do," Eric said, and I knew he wasn't kidding. "And it will be very, very hard not to kill them if they try anything of a different nature with you."

I opted to take a sip of my drink rather than reply to that. Eric barely noticed, he was so lost in his thoughts, staring down at the tabletop.

He picked himself up a couple moments later, drinking some True Blood and asking, "Do you want to know what Pam was talking about earlier?"

I nodded.

"Then we'll have to go to my office," he murmured, "for security purposes, you understand."

We both got up and walked to his office, and once we were inside it I was certain Eric would sit behind his desk, like he often does, and I would sit in the chair across from him; he surprised me by guiding me over to the couch, his hand resting above my ass as it had since the moment we were alone in the employee-only section.

Once we were situated on the couch—my now-bare feet on Eric's lap because he wanted to massage them, which felt heavenly since it'd been a while before I worked a shift as tiresome as tonight's—he cleared his throat and began talking. "As you know, I haven't been at Fangtasia for an unusually long time—the longest since it's opening, actually—and Pam's been taking care of things in my absence. Everything related to you was included in that."

"Like what? She said something about Niall, that fairy prince. What did she mean by that?"

"Niall finally got word of you and the situation you're in, and when he tried to contact me all he got was Pam. But as soon as she told me yesterday I spoke with him over the phone, and we're to meet with him soon. He's going to be on Earth next week to oversee how his earthly affairs are doing, so I told him I'd carry on his request for you two would have dinner together and talk. I imagine you have a lot of questions for him."

Yeah, like where he normally is if he's not on Earth. I nodded. "Yes, that sounds good. But why wouldn't you come?"

"To dinner, you mean?" Eric asked.

"Well, yeah," I said, "I know you wouldn't eat, but I'd feel better if you were there."

Eric stopped rubbing my feet for a moment. "Of course. Then I will join you." We shared a smile before Eric continued, "I thought it'd be to our advantage to have this meeting occur before your meeting with the queen."

"My meeting with the queen?" I asked dizzily.

He nodded, reluctantly. "The last time I spoke to her, she wanted to meet with you after I passed in my report detailing our time in Dallas. I haven't had time to do that yet, but she usually likes the reports due a few days afterwards. I imagine you'll be summoned to meet with Sophie-Anne sometime next week as well, hopefully after the meeting with Niall. I don't want you walking in there blind, you see."

"What do you mean?"

"In her infinite wisdom, Sophie-Anne hasn't even attempted to contact Niall, as I just found out. I don't know why, but she should have, especially if she knew you were related to him. Because of her error, we stand at a position to know more than she does, which is always a great position to be in. We might be able to use that to our advantage, though I won't know how until after the dinner with Niall, of course."

"Okay. That makes sense," I agreed. Sherriff Eric had obviously come out to play.

"Does Saturday night work for you?" he asked.

"Yeah, sure."

"Is there anywhere in particular you'd like to have dinner with him?"

Certainly not Merlotte's. "No. I don't care."

"Do you care if I make the arrangements?"

"Go for it."

"Good. Now, about the bull and the Loboutins. They're actually related," he said, and I furrowed my brows quizzically at him. He explained, "I asked Pam to make an offering to the maenad, and she and a couple other vampires brought a young bull and vintage wines to the area of the forest where she attacked you. But by doing so, Pam ruined her favorite pair of shoes. Suffice to say, she was not pleased, especially when the maenad made it clear she found our offerings inadequate."

"I bet," I said sympathetically. "So now what are you going to offer her?"

"I'm not sure," he admitted dejectedly. "I'm working on a few things, but I really thought she'd accept the first gifts." He shrugged his shoulders. "I still want to discuss this orgy of yours some more."

Judging from the look on his face, I knew there was a lot he wanted to talk about. "Discuss away," I said, carelessly waving my hand in the air.

"Right. How sure are you that these are the killers? The coroner didn't think anything specifically, did he?"

"Well, not really," I admitted, "but I did see Lafayette's body face-down on a bed. Of course, that could be because of something completely different, but you never know. It's got to be them. It just has to be."

"Perhaps you'll pick up on something when we go to the orgy."

"Just as long as it's not an STD," I muttered.

"You know, if you did get an STD, my blood would probably cure you," Eric said thoughtfully.

I shook my head and tried my best not to grin. "So not helping."