The other night, he whispered in my ear that she despised me because I had forever taken away her certainty that he would have chosen her over me. My brain hurt at the twistiness of the thought. Staring down at Freyda, however, I finally understood the messy thing.

I let her die. Eric is free. I am free. That is if I want him—even now it's a muddled mix. Or if he wants me. Nothing would be in our way, except all the other problems. But Freyda is the biggest roadblock of all. She's a deal-never-even-happened. Without that roadblock, we don't have to choose between anything or anyone. We just have to decide if we choose each other.

And despite all my fiddling, I know what choice I would make. I choose me now. Eric is mine. Because one plus one equals two.

But I let her live. I force Eric to make a different choice. A choice maybe I never gave him fair and square to make. No Sam in the wings. No best friend to take his place before my sheets are clean of his scent. I let her live and I make him choose. Maybe not entirely for the first time. But definitively for the last. For him to choose who he really wants to be. And who he wants to be with.

Algebra not simple addition.

What is life but the freedom to choose? My heart still rankled at the choice Eric had almost robbed me of when he attempted to turn me. I would not pay him in kind.

"Julianne," I said heavily. "The Queen needs your blood."

My daughter's eyes sparkled in the dimness. "You really want me to give a vampire my blood?"

"I really do."

"I haven't done that since I was in my early twenties." A stream of all her fanger lovers flitted through her mind. Too many for me to count. Too quickly for me to see—thankfully. Men and women vampires and both of either at the same time.

Contemplative and curious, she nevertheless complied with my request. I grabbed a jagged stick from the forest floor, told my daughter to steady, and sliced open the tender wrist. Bending down, her long, lush curls brushing over Freyda's charred and bloodied body, she placed her dripping vein on the vampires mouth. Soon the Queen dropped her fangs, a slight intake of breath from Julianne, and drank loudly and lustily from my daughter.

"That's enough," I said when half of the exposed flesh of a she-vampire I loathed shimmered at me in the dark. She stopped immediately. My words had carried that spark they sometimes did these days. A sort of friction of sound.

I helped my daughter to her feet. She swayed and placed her hand against a tree. "Remember, it's still unsafe," I reminded her, and she nodded.

Freyda merely blinked up at me, too weak to move still, no longer at death's doorstep. And not my concern.

I shifted my gaze to the wicked witch. Ding dong was she dead. But I'd never seen a corpse like this before—stuck in transition between her were-form and her human form. As it turned out, she had not been merely human. What that other thing was that lived within her remained a mystery.

My mind caught the approach of them long before my ears, and I hollered at them to speed their arrival. A breeze rustled and two pairs of wolf eyes looked at me from beneath some leaves. The familiar bubbling, popping sound of a shift stirred in the stillness of the woods. Alcide and Gile now stood behind the bushes which had masked their wolf bodies. They assessed the situation in a quick minute.

"Whoa. Who's the beauty next to Sookie?" Gile glanced at me, recalling my powers. His grandfather's thoughts were as different as can be. They bled red and shook with anger.

The wizened werewolf sniffed the air. "One of the pressure cookers—two of them by the thickness of the lemon. That's kinda poetic she went out like that."

"Why does she look like that?" Julianne asked, rubbing her wrist.

"She's a changeling," whispered the Queen, as she sprouted from the ground. "I have only read about them."

"A changeling?" How many years into this and I still didn't have a handle on the geography of the world's supernaturals.

The instant black to Gile's thoughts clued me into his distaste for the label. "She's a were genetic anomaly, like I am Sookie. It's derogatory terms like changeling that have kept my kind in hiding."

"How many of your kind are there?" Julianne asked, and I noticed her uptick in interest in the conversation correlated with her fresh appraisal of the doctor.

"It's tough to say. For most of the past, weres like me have been killed. Centuries of misunderstanding and demonizing. Even and especially amongst our fellow weres. Genetics has helped with our acceptance, to remove the stigma. One of the reasons I went into medicine. Still. It's a long road ahead. We estimate only ten percent of us transition in typical fashion. As with other things, we fall on a spectrum. I'm one of the rarer ten percent kinds."

"He most definitely is, ain't he mom?" She elbowed me. "Number please!" I guess she was in the off again period with her boyfriend. And I needed to set my mind straight about Gile. Digging into my heart, beyond the attraction. Nothing had happened with him. And as I was getting a handle on my powers—including that wack-a-nympho—I would let this go with my blessing. If not my warning. No broken Gile heart after a whirlwind week. Smiling was my condensed version of that long-thought process.

"I'm not excusing her behavior—far from it—but a were whose transition is so atypical—hairless, human eyes—I imagine she was treated poorly her entire life. On top of being a magical brain." Gile shook his head. "Likely her own family tried to kill her as a teen."

There was a heavy silence as the victims of this former victim mulled over the doctor's words. I could hear the conflict and anger—anger at a world that mistreated the different and feared the unusual.

"I guess this explains her reasons for wanting what she wanted—who better to figure out her problems than Mother Nature? To tell her why she was so different."

Not much was said about the coven leader after my comment. Freyda vanished, without so much as a thanks. Alcide and Gile offered to bury the were witch. They had come out to the woods to track her and to track all of her traps and bombs. Julianne, after a flirty introduction, asked for a run-down of tonight's main events and I listened to the Herveaux men tell their side of the story. A great flood of relief swilled through me as I learned that they lacked any memory of what they had done during commands. No memory of shredding Alex or attacking the paralegal. My sympathy for Lune's tragic upbringing lessened as I recalled the brutality of Grace's co-worker's murder.

"What was happening when you left?" I asked.

"More fanger poltics. The fighting was all done."

Naked and all, Alcide buried me in a warm, wolffish embrace before we went our separate ways. "Stay safe, Sookie. Or at least, stay smart." His grandson gave me a long handshake, conflicted about my daughter's appeal and his connection with me.

"Friends can have strong feelings for each other, too," I said. "We are connected, after all." He kissed me on the forehead and transformed back into a wolf, where his thoughts were more his own. I considered the clarity of his were mind, realizing his unique voice was an outgrowth of his own "disability." Everyone has some disability or another.

The night was cooling, a northern fog settling. Julianne offered me her sweatshirt. The lemon juice had disappeared from the sleeve. The sigh that blew from me on wearing clothes other than the shift almost made me weep. Slowly, with the wolves as our guides, we wandered back out into the cemetery. When we departed from the trees, the animals ran one way and the humans walked another. The strings of fairy lights had been removed. The crowd of guests in gold chiffon had disappeared. Only the dead, the undead, my daughter and I remained.

The lampposts refracted clouds of yellow haze over the grassy knolls and tombstones. Battle wounds yet tarnished the peace of the resting place for generations of Bon Temps residents. Julianne and I passed the huddle of vampires without offering a greeting, our feet flowing in the same direction, pulled to the same destination.

I saw in her mind when her eyes perceived his corpse beneath the debris of the battle. Quietly she turned away from me and began to bury her father's body. In the mess and madness, and the scattered limbs, Sam had been partially hidden from view. A blessing that had not gone unthanked while his children had briefly been near. I joined my daughter in her labor. Using our hands, we managed to dig up the coffin and place him in it. The somber work moved at an angle to the fight that had marred the cemetery. We had just closed the lid and were climbing out of the grave when his hand shot out to help me up.

"Thanks Bill," I said as he gently lifted me up. More from habit than hope of effect, I dusted at the lower half of the shift while Bill assisted Julianne out of her father's grave. Without prompting, he informed us that a crew was coming to put the graveyard pieces back together. My daughter thanked the vampire, but after eyeing him, asked if we could go home.

"You can sweetie. I have some things to do."

Julianne glanced around at those who would be my only company should she leave, her mind heavy but determined. "I'll stay, mama."

"Actually, could you go to your brothers and sister? I don't have my phone and I'm beginning to worry." I hadn't seen Alex in the gathering of vampires, but surely the young newborn had been able to take out Vincent.

"If you're concerned for Neal's family—don't be," Bill said. "Eric's progeny returned to inform us of his success against Vincent."

"Oh," was all my reply. Why hadn't Alex come and informed me of that? But Bill had an answer for that, too. "Grace and he took their departure together shortly after."

"Oh," my reply again. Julianne smirked at me. "Good for Gracie that fanger was hotter than a James Dean." I didn't know how I really felt about a possible long-term relationship between those two—the two whose hook-up had led to so much strife. Not that it was either of their faults. But I couldn't control any of that at the moment or in the future. Grace was young and needed to break a few hearts and break some herself. I suppose so did Alex.

I glanced up at the vampire in front of me. "Julianne, go on home. I'll be fine." When she hesitated still, I took her by the shoulders and pointed her in the direction of home. "Fine," she sighed. Following a break-neck drive to get to Louisiana, she was running on fumes—more so since feeding the Queen. A mind-reading mama doesn't need to pry to know those sorts of things. After a hug and a kiss, while I could still see her but she could not hear me, I was about to ask Bill to send one of his guards to watch over her—when he kindly offered the protection without my asking. One nod from me, one motion from him and for the first time tonight, I could lean into the confidence that my children were safe. I couldn't say that my worry had all evaporated. A mother's worry is never done.

My gaze on my daughter, I knew the vampire's gaze was on me, his influence bumping into me, nudging at me as a dog who wants attention—only this nudge was to try and get more than my attention. After all these years, Bill still wanted my mind and blood and body—and my heart, because want it or not, I still had his. I'd cut my teeth on it and the damn vampire had never healed.

"Sookie, I must ask for your forgiveness for my proposal the other evening. Not only was I mistaken about the nature of the ceremony—I had no idea you were meant to be sacrificed—but I had been misinformed about the temporary revival of your—"

"I did see Sam tonight, Bill," I said, looking at him. His dark gaze swam in the foggy moonlight. Maybe because I knew he loved me, not in the same way as Sam, but in his own way, I could tell him this. Or maybe I wanted to tell somebody, anybody who was connected to me but not to Sam.

"How?"

"Sam's spirit took me to his current home, for a little while." I caressed my husband's headstone—intact despite the destruction around it—and then spun away from the grave. He deserved peace tonight. No more feet on his grave, not even mine. Bill walked beside me to a circle under the lamppost. I craved to be in the warmth of light right now.

"Sookie, you must know I would never do anything to harm you. I—"

"How'd you know to come Bill?" I cut off his unnecessary declaration.

"A few reasons. Jennings called me around the same time that Freyda texted that she had "escaped" from her prison spa—which I did not realize was a thing until she corrected me tonight about low-grade mud facials being a form of torture. Both your son and the Queen could provide some more context, however, I was already in preparations and had determined to come back. I knew once the King of Mississippi was involved that it had to do with cartel business."

"That's all interesting but how'd you know? You were spelled to forget."

If vampires could blush, the King may have done so now. "Miss Gale had not done as she had been bidden to do—she told me after the battle that she could not, these are her words mind, bare the thought of me forgetting the taste of her. I awoke in my car en route to New Orleans with my memory whole."

The King wanted some more of a reaction from me than a shrug, I was sure of it. "Where is she now? Or the other witches?"

"We released those who had surrendered, many had been misinformed, glamoured some, and those who refused to denounce their priestess are in transport to a secure facility for further interrogation. My cleaning crew should be here momentarily to dispose of the bodies and evidence of any skirmish, as I told you."

There had been a time in my life when I would have balked at the idea of so much cover-up and conspiracy, of hearing about some vampire off-site torture camp. Now I merely hoped for ignorance and prayed for mercy. I studied Bill for a moment longer, and was reassured that fairness would win out in the end. He was studying me too.

"You didn't tell me where Stephanie Gale ended up Bill."

"Do you care where she ends up Sookie?"

"No, but I wish you did." I decided to give Bill something, something he had earned returning here and acting kingly. Free advice. "Take her up on it. She may just be the thing you never knew you needed."

"I've always known what I needed." He leaned over and inhaled, his nose tickling my ear. A quiver of desire came and went, in a ghostly way, much as what had happened to my love for him.

"Bill, you've always known what you wanted. You've never known what you needed." The King also knew that he didn't have any real time alone with me left. Eric and all the other vampires were strolling right towards us. And I didn't like it. I didn't like what I was feeling—a strange soup of my own uncertainty and fears and longings flavored by the vampire's heady sense of victory and yep, right there, total possession. From what I could feel of him the Viking believed I was his again—blood and body.

"Your Majesty, I hope you haven't been whispering sweet offers into Sookie's ear like raising her dead grandmother in exchange for a kiss."

The King's fangs shot down. I rolled my eyes, fifty years over this cockfight. There remained imminently more pressing matters—any matter, really—but one matter of grave importance. Stepping between the two vampires, I asked: "Eric, why the hell is he still alive?" And smiling, I could have added, as the grin on Russel Edgington's face widened at me.

For the next half hour, I had to listen to two kings, a queen, a Hollywood legend and a Viking explain to me the fragility of geo-political vampire relationships in the age of the cartel and since the "Great Revelation," of the balance between survival against humans and other supernaturals and survival in contest of territories and wills amongst themselves, that an amicable rapprochement was desirable for all, how the King of Mississippi had forswore any further plots on encroaching on Eric's territory again, vowing to return all blood drained, that as Eric's progeny had only been temporarily incapacitated, while one of the king's own sons had been annihilated with my fire, and Joe's progeny Vincent murdered at Alex's hand, blood debts had already been paid, and above all, as the coven witch who had first contacted Edgington to see if he was interested in expanding his empire and expanding their relationship (she had been a drainer and distributor for the king's cartel for years prior) had not accomplished her designs, why then, darling, no harm, no foul. That I should be thankful that they were explaining anything to me was more than implied. It was outright stated by the Queen—who still hadn't given me even a damn thumb's up for saving her pasty princess ass. That's right. I had demoted her, in my mind.

But there had been harm. And there had been fouls—plural. "My husband is dead. I don't give a damn about all you-all's warped idea of justice." I crossed my arms. "With all due respect, conspiracy to kidnap and murder are punishable offenses and there should be some lasting consequences for those at fault."

"I'd say death is fairly lasting, Sookie," Eric replied.

"Besides, Harriet."

"There were others who died."

"Your Majesty," I spoke to Bill. His obsession with me had to be good for something. "As King of Louisiana, you have final say on what happens in your own state. How can you allow the interests of drug dealers—"

"We do not sully ourselves with drugs, my dear—we view ourselves as the guardians of our sacred blood. If we cannot end the human use of our blood for sport and recreation, then we are not above profiting from their predilections." The King of Mississippi motioned at the others for agreement. Which by the silence of even Bill, I had to take as a yes. "At the end of this, Mrs. Merlotte, I am very relieved that you were not killed and reborn." Edgington breathed in as if I was the first rose of springtime. "Despite Madame Lune's extraordinary gifts, she might have been wrong and then what—no one be able to taste you, to drink from you," he licked his lips, "to partake of you? Quelle tragèdie! As the late coven witch might say."

My blood simmered. I realized I could take them all out—well, apart from Eric—and maybe I would. Maybe I'd just let it all out now. But a blood bond works two ways. And the damn Viking poured an icy bucket of fact over me before I had the chance.

"This has to end somewhere, Sookie, and the longer we talk, the longer Pam and Karin and even Heidi," Eric glanced at Bill, and I caught something in the vampire's feelings, a specific kind of disgust and rage, like a grudge almost, "are suffering in silver and blood loss."

Unsatisfied. Unhappy. I understood. "Fine. For now."

Vampires don't really say goodbye. They aren't human and don't share in all of our customs and manners. But Joe did. He made certain to bow to me and apologize , claiming he had no choice as all things were done at the behest of his Maker, and as a token of his sincerity, told me to allow my granddaughter to keep his car, and offered to buy me one as well, as by his calculations, I no longer owned one myself. When I thanked him for the gestures, I said that I would not speak to what Grace wanted, but I assured him that I did have a car—it was parked at Gile's clinic.

"No, Mrs. Merlotte. It is not. We had a tiny accident when stalking you, which involved a now departed son of mine, getting a little too frisky with your car. Although, considering how potent your scent was in the vehicle, one can understand."

No one could not understand. But I did accept his apologist gift after that, especially on learning that he would also be banned from Louisiana, including his compound as a home, for the next fifty years.

It happened then, right after Mr. Hollywood walked away from me. The Queen had been watching our interaction with unusual suspicion, and when I chanced to meet her glare—that dank, serpentine mind grabbed onto mine, sucking me into her thoughts. There were images and a telephone conversation and my face from five years ago in a news story and all that she wanted from Eric, and for Eric. And then the snake-like constriction unraveled from my mind and my thoughts were my own again.

The Mississippi group—or should I say cartel—vanished away. Eric came to my side. He knew I was upset, but there wasn't time to talk. And we had so much to talk about. It was the longest night of the year. It had been one of the longest nights of my life, but we didn't have time. There was never any time. He needed me to come with him, to hurry on the wind, to feed Pam and to feed Karin before dawn in a few hours. The Queen had given permission, again, to breach the contract so that I might save his progeny from pain. How gracious of her majesty. She had also relented for me to be alone with Eric as I rushed to save his daughters. Freyda would remain with Bill to work out some details about the prisoners.

We drove because I refused to fly, but I couldn't speak. I was too afraid that if I opened my mouth, my supper of wine, sausage, and cheese would come out instead of words. This was the Indy 500 and Eric car numero uno. Eric had zero compunction about upsetting my stomach and seemed hellbent on upsetting my mood by only opening his mouth to tell me that "I'd get over it." I wasn't sure what he meant. My vertigo? My need for Dramamine? The fact that he was a criminal now? That he could have clarified his role in why he was such a desirable prisoner? Who his enemies were and in turn who mine were? But I couldn't bring up his cartel connection without first figuring out how to tell him what I'd unexpectedly learned about his wife and how I had learned it. Regardless, I couldn't open my mouth without losing my supper.

Winded and queasy, we ran into Joe's mansion and through a series of doors that made me think we had in fact gone down the rabbit hole and entered Wonderland—a jungle room, a card room, the whore house room of the party from the first visit, finally a dungeon room that I'm certain had been used before—but not as a prison.

The sight of Pam, Karin and Heidi's emaciated bodies and sunken eyes punched me in the gut and heart. Eric said he thought the combo of his blood and my blood might help them avoid Gile's clinic entirely. I fed Pam while Eric fed Karin, and then we swapped. By the time we had finished—the two blondes looked sexy as new.

Pam kissed me full on the lips, a little more than friendly, but a little less than flirty. "Don't forget to get your million, Sookie," she reminded. That's right. I'd forgotten to bargain this time. Although, I wouldn't have asked even if I had remembered. Pam was my friend, and as frightening as Karin was, I had known her for years, and would never forget how she had watched over me for a year. Pam also made sure to comment on the state of Eric's and my dirty dishabille. I'd grown desensitized to the chiffon, less transparent now that both of our outfits were caked in blood and mud. Karin hugged me, told me she had never tasted better, and thought her Maker and I looked "rad." Drained but not really that tired—Eric's blood had a stamina that brought other uses for his staying power to mind—I moved on to Heidi. Eric's hand grabbed my wrist.

"Pam, take your wife to the clinic. Karin go with them. Better check up with the wolf doctor just in case." No one argued. Not even I would sass him when I felt the fury in him. It didn't tally. I said goodbye to the she-vamps as Eric led me by the elbow and down the hall. We took a turn and the new corridor looked familiar to me. The door on the end I had walked out of a night ago.

"Eric, I'm going home tonight."

"Yes but you can at least shower and put on some clean clothes before you do. You'll fit into Pam's fine." He stopped and pointed to the door midway down the hall. "I won't even escort you to the room."

Stunned by his lack of suggestive remarks or bald-faced intentions, I sort of wove my way to what turned out to be the most normally-decorated room in the house. The bedroom could have been in any Better Homes and Gardens water-magazine. Feeling a little uncomfortable for snooping around in someone else's stuff, even a friend's current room, I hurried myself more than I would have at home. But it was worth it not to wait, to discard that disgusting shift, to chuck it into the gas fireplace, and watch it burn into ash. This was the reason I hadn't argued with Eric. It was cathartic to rinse the filth from me and to slip clean clothes—knit pants and a tight green sweater— onto my fresh skin. (I eschewed borrowing underwear and decided commando and braless would have to do—Hey, twenty-five year old breasts had their perks...) It was pure heaven, every part of it, to brush my tangled hair and pat some of Pam's makeup onto my face. And if Heaven doesn't have to wait, why make it?

Unsurprisingly, Eric was waiting for me when I tentatively opened the door. He was showered and changed, too. His wet hair was pulled back into a quick knot and he wore jeans and a blue v-neck long sleeved tee the exact color of his eyes. The mixture of my jolt of attraction with his steady gaze and unfiltered lust made me want to run back and slam the door, and run straight at him and rip those pretty, laundered clothes right of his body. I settled for cinching Julianne's sweatshirt against my arm and asking him about borrowing one of Joe's cars—possibly forever.

"Whatever you wish, Sookie," Eric said, waving his hand for me to lead the way. Feeling his mood, happy and hungry and horny, I still had no clue what he was thinking and doubted we would get another chance to be so very alone. Once we were in the garage and I had picked out an old-fashioned electric Dodge Ram—my selection confounding Eric, but as I explained to him, a pick-up with a decent bed comes in handy and hovercars sometimes still gave me the creeps—I knew my time was up. Taking a deep breath, gritting my nerve—he cut me off.

"Heidi was the one who spied on me for Bill. She's been trying to procure blood that smelled like yours for the past couple decades. The King didn't know about the loophole in my contract until Heidi overheard our conversation on the balcony here while inspecting your granddaughter's car. She thought she would finally be able to get the payday Bill had promised her if she ever found blood like yours, by procuring the original source. When she approached me again about the sale of your blood, I gathered there was more to the story and she came clean. And then she came clean of her hands. The punishment fit the crime."

My eyes blinked in rapid fire at him.

"You're surprised," he observed. "More surprised than I had expected. Isn't that why you were so upset right before we left the graveyard? I knew you had sensed my anger as I spoke about Heidi in the King's presence. I figured I would save us both time if I simply told you the truth."

The truth. That word barreled through everything else. "I didn't realize you could do that Eric, tell the truth, that is."

Not so happy a mood, but still as hungry. Not that his face showed anything.

"Get in, Sookie," he said, plucking the keys from my grasp. "I'm driving."

Frazzled by his caustic behavior and his recent contentment, I still pitched a fit. He would be cutting it close to find a place to hunker down in for day. I was actually perfectly awake. My children had probably ended up at my house and might be waiting up for me. As I pushed through with reason after reason why I was driving home alone, Eric not interrupting me once, texting someone on his phone during my very persuasive closing argument, his silence bothering me more and more, I finally gave up.

"Fine. You can drive. My truck. No speeding though."

"Excellent. I texted your telepath son you were safe and would be home by dawn. Get in the truck."

Fifteen over the speed limit, according to Eric, was not speeding. We had been on the road about ten minutes, listening to a classic pop station that evidently had the rights to only play Ariana Grande and Lizzo classics, when the vampire flicked off Lizzo mid "truth hurts." Personally I had been hoping he was taking the lyrics to heart. I know it was boosting my nerve again.

"Freyda wants me to thank you for saving her," he said, eyes on the road.

That wasn't where I'd thought he had been going.

"Funny. She failed to mention her gratitude to me."

"She didn't think it was her place.

"I think it's only her place."

"It was her mistake that set off the bombs. She was attempting to capture the witch."

That, I actually believed. If the Queen had sensed that things were going sideways with the witch, she'd want to be there. Probably had been tipped off by her royal partner in crime. I leaned against the passenger window. The cool on my forehead calmed my temper. "I guess she "let" you be alone with me to say thanks for not letting her die."

"After all you've done, she will come around. As I've said, our marriage is complicated, but it is rewarding. I know she wants what's best for us all."

"You shouldn't trust her." Word vomit. I'd done a better job of keeping my trap shut from puking up my actual food.

"Don't be jealous Sookie. It will work out. You and I will figure out a way."

Whoa. That took a turn. Another turn. "This isn't about us. Not that there is an us. This is about you and your wife. Don't trust her."

"Why?"

Because she's a horrible bitch and I hate her. That was equally true—but he already knew that and seemed honky-dorey wedded to a knock-off, nastier Regina George.

"I think you need to check her phone records." I muttered. Damn that word vomit.

"What?"

"Nothing."

He swerved over to the side of the road. A deserted patch of highway next to some farmland, free of even any trees.

"Speak."

"I'm not a dog. I don't speak on command."

"I can feel your tension and your hesitation."

And I could feel his returning good mood, all the drive, that mood rising and rising, as if he was about to get a big payday. I had my suspicions about that payday. His hunger hadn't faded one bit. I looked at him, his skin aglow as if dusted in sunlit snow. He had to know. I couldn't let him go on like this and not know. It wouldn't be fair of me. I wasn't doing this so I could have him—I didn't even know if I should have him. (With the way he was beginning to stare at me, my wanting him was a done deal—that ship sailing away on a river as blue as those eyes.) Hadn't I gone against Sam's advice already? Yet here was another chance.

"Freyda was the one to suggest Alex visit Louisiana."

Now he was surprised. The volume turned up on our bond had some benefits. "We discussed many places for him to travel," he said carefully. "A visit to nearby family made the most sense. Did Alex tell you it was Freyda's idea? Does he blame her for that? They're relationship is complicated."

"If a person's relationship is complicated with everyone they know, you can't call it complicated anymore; it just means the complication is the person." I was losing the mark. "This isn't about Freyda and Alex. This is about whether you can trust your wife. The answer is no."

"I'm going to need more to go on."

I closed my eyes and pressed my lips together. This seal wouldn't set. It all tumbled out, in a torrent of tied-together words. "Russell Edgington called Freyda to see how much you'd really mind at this point if someone bled me. Before venturing into the cluster-mess that was Lune's idea, he wanted to see about a liaison with you-all first. He never wanted a war. Freyda told him about the loophole in your contract. She didn't know when she mentioned it that the King had tasted me—but he told her right there on the phone. They both saw an opportunity and took it. Russell said the witch wanted you and Alex, too. He told her they'd drain you, but not kill you. He told her they would kill me but rebirth me. The witch knew her role, because Freyda was the one to tip off the vampires where Alex was the night they met him. She wanted a more aggressive sale of V; she wanted you to be all the Kingpin you were meant to be. Russel wanted half of Louisiana. More pie for both of them. And Freyda felt like she hadn't really betrayed the edict, or even you, since she believed that in the end, all would be well. Richer. Happier. Freer." I couldn't look at him, so I looked to the dusky sky. Eric didn't have much time. Dawn was coming. It didn't stop for anyone. "Bet she was the one who suggested you save some blood on the side."

I managed to glance at him. My bet had been right. I could see it on his still face, sense it in that well of doubt and fury and confusion and accusation deep within him, the well threatening to explode like boiling geyser.

"How do you know this, Sookie?"

"Doesn't matter."

"It does matter. You are accusing my wife of conspiring against me. Not only breaking our contract where you are concerned, but in a much graver and universal way, plotting to drain me or my progeny—which is explicitly prohibited and not only cause for divorce but for execution."

Snap. That's how I felt then. Like a twig that had just been snapped in half. Freyda's betrayal was worse than I imagined. And I understood something else. I had been a motivating factor in her deciding to betray Eric. Only personal reasons would compel an individual to break bad that terribly. To risk execution. That month of Eric bedding white-wigged women may have tipped her over the precipice. That's why I had seen that news clip. Sure, at around eighty, I'd kick the bucket soon—but maybe not soon enough. Maybe Eric would want to see the geriatric me en flagrante. So Freyda had decided to kick my old bucket for me.

This last part was simple sleuthing. The actual treason bonafide fact—or thought. And Eric was staring pointy, little blue knives at me to fess up on how I knew these facts.

"You just need to trust me."

"That's not a good enough answer right here."

"It needs to be." I looked to the horizon, the navy was lightening to teal. "How are you getting home?" I turned to ask just as the driver's door slammed shut, and turned back to the passenger side just as its door was flung open and I was ripped from my seat.

He dragged me to the ditch where the field ran into the tall, dried grass. The barbed wire fence whistled in the rising breeze of a dawn about to wake and the idle engine hummed with the stirring insects, the left-open passenger door creaking as it swayed on its hinges. The pleasant sounds around me clashed with the panic in me and the rage in him.

Eric curved imposingly above me, bending his face inches from mine. "Did Russell put you up to this? Did he try and trick you? Did Bill?"

"Neither Russell nor Bill said anything, and I wouldn't believe a word Edgington would say anyway."

" I assumed the witch knew Alex's location because she had used a tracking spell. That seems likely."

"Likely but not the truth."

"Then tell me the truth, Sookie."

"I am!"

"Tell me how you know."

But I couldn't do that. I couldn't. My life. The one I had fought tooth and talon to preserve an hour ago would be over. Ended. If ever I revealed to a soul that on occasion, on very rare occasion, I could read vampiric minds. That I'd just read a whopper of one.

"You're afraid." His voice softened. "Tell me who has threatened you, and I will remove them as a threat."

I laughed without humor and folded my arms. "You told me you would not doubt me. So don't doubt."

"I don't doubt that you believe what you say is true, I doubt whether what you say is true."

"That's the same thing."

"It isn't. Tell me. Why can't you tell me?"

"I just can't."

His voice softened even more, tenderizing into pure liquid heat. I could feel it, his heat, inside my body, inside my bones. I could feel how much he wanted me—not just my body and blood but me. Every inch of me, inside and out and physical and ethereal. He placed his hand on my cheek. "Sookie." And I caved. I saw no way around it.

"I read Freyda's mind."

Note-So I have been wanting to get here for basically the entire story! I know Eric's version of events is coming next but I always wondered what would have happened should Eric know about Sookie's occasional mind reading. What do you think? Thanks for the reviews.