I don't own SVM or the characters.

Chapter 5: The Patriot Act

EPOV

"Eric, it's me, Rasul. Listen, I found out some stuff on this Compton guy." Rasul said. I was groggy from the small nap I was finally able to take, so it took me a minute to realize who I was even talking to.

"Tell me." I demanded as I sat up in the bed.

"William Thomas Compton, age 29. Lives on Hummingbird lane in Bon Temps, Louisiana. He's originally from Clinton Mississippi. Mother's name is Lorena Ball- Brunswick and his father is Jesse Compton, but most all of the documents I've seen state that his father's name is Solomon Brunswick. " Rasul listed off the details.

"That tells me nothing." I miffed.

"There's more." Rasul said, and continued listing off the information he had. "This Solomon guy has been arrested for drug trafficking and spent time in Pollock. He's bad news Eric."

"Where is this guy now?" I demanded. If this Solomon guy was the one responsible for taking my daughter, there would be hell to pay, and Billy boy would be the payee.

"As far as I can tell, he's been laying low for the last three years. No arrests, no jail time and he's not on the DEA's radar. His last know residence was Jackson Mississippi and I believe he still lives there." He responded.

"OK. So where does that leave me?" I asked. It seemed like this was a dead end.

"Well." Rasul responded. "It seems that for the last three years, Mr. Compton has been working in New Orleans for Sophie Anne Leclerq." Rasul stated. I wasn't sure who that was, but it seemed significant to Rasul.

"Who the fuck is that?" I asked. The fucking cast of shady characters was just growing by the minute which only made me fear for my daughter that much more.

"She's a known drug dealer down in New Orleans. Nothing major, just pot, but she's a fairly big supplier in the city." He said.

"I don't see how any of this is connected." I stated impatiently. This was getting me nowhere.

"I'm not sure either to be honest. But Eric, these people are not exactly upstanding citizens. There has to be a connection, we just need to find all out what that is." He said sounding hopeful. That actually reassured me quite a bit. I trusted Rasul's word and his experience.

"And the Stackhouse woman?" I asked. I hadn't asked him specifically to dig into her past, but I was hoping that he had done so anyway.

"Clean as a whistle, shit she even volunteers at the local Senior Citizen Center. She's as wholesome as they come. Seems like the only thing she's done wrong in her life is associate with Mr. Compton." He said. If that were true, and I believed that it was, then I was willing to wager a bet that she had been deceived by good ole' Mr. Compton.

"Listen Eric, I know you and the first thing you are going to want to do is march right over to Compton's house and beat the answers out of him." He said and he was fucking right too. "But listen to me; he may be more dangerous than you think. I'm getting on the next flight to Shreveport, just give me 5 hours and we'll go over there together."

That was a fucking relief to hear that he was coming to help, but he was fucking mistaken if he thought I was going to waste precious time waiting for him. I wasn't completed worthless. I knew more than he gave me credit for.

"Thanks man." I replied, leaving out the part where I ignored his request.

"You're not going to listen are you?" he asked.

"Not a chance." I replied. I got up to put my shoes on. I looked ragged and my clothes were starting to feel sticky.

"Call me when you get in." I told him right after he gave me Bill's address. I hung up the phone, grabbed my wallet and keys and headed out the door.

Rasul told me Compton's house was on Hummingbird lane, but after I found the shithole, it looked more like a Mockingbird Lane, maybe 1313 Mockingbird Lane.

Hovel, shack, dump, whatever you wanted to call it, a home it was not. It was clear to me that this guy was definitely not in Bon Temps to live permanently. I was afraid to put my weight on the stairs in fear of falling through the fucking shit.

All the lights were out and Compton wasn't home, at least his car wasn't in the..dirt, I don't know what to call it since it was definitely not a driveway. I'm pretty sure my car needed an alignment after trekking through the dirt path to his…house.

It was a two story plantation hovel that had absolutely no paint left on the exterior and it had wood rot everyfuckingwhere. The windows looked like they hadn't been washed since the Confederates surrendered to the Union.

It really wasn't that difficult to break in. Truthfully, I wondered if I wasn't being set up by just being able to basically walk right in. Either that or this guy was so incredibly arrogant that he didn't think anyone would find him suspicious.

I winced as the door creaked loud enough to wake the dead who were buried at the cemetery located pretty much in the front yard. If Compton was home, then I had no doubts that he would've heard me enter the hovel.

So there I stood in the darkened entryway of the shifty fuck that held answers to my daughter's whereabouts.

I wasn't sure what I was looking for per se, but I had a feeling that I would find at least some missing puzzle pieces.

Though the fucker didn't spend a dime fixing up the shithole, he did spend a lot of money on computer equipment. In what would normally be the dining room, sat thousands of dollars' worth of computer hardware - a large server, three laptops that each had a separate monitor extensions. It all had to cost thousands.

Using the flashlight on my phone, I made my way into his sitting room. There was nothing noteworthy or interesting about it, save for the coffee table which had a bunch of papers strewn haphazardly. I looked through the papers and what caught my eye was a life insurance policy for one Ms. Sookie Stackhouse and guess who the sole beneficiary was? Fucking bastard.

If I were a criminal prosecutor, I would say that I just found the motive. A million dollars was a pretty big incentive to have someone kidnapped. The phone conversation that I had eavesdropped on earlier in the day started to make sense. He wanted the fucking money already? She hadn't even been gone for more than 48 hours.

He was desperate. That was the only explanation.

I rummaged through his house a bit more but I didn't find anything that would give me any more answers; though I did find a cache of semi-automatic weapons in his closet. I recalled Jason's story of asking Bill to go hunting. I guess that second amendment wasn't so archaic after all. Although it did prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that he was a bona fide liar. Not that I didn't already know that.

I took all the bullets with me though, just to be on the safe side. In retrospect, I should've burned the house to the ground. I'm sure the electrical wasn't up to code so it could've easily been explained.

Bill never did show up, and I couldn't decide if I was relieved or pissed that I didn't get to confront him. So I left having no more answers than when I got there, but I felt that I was at least moving in the right direction.

Besides all of that, thinking about the Compton and the fucking puzzle of it all offered some respite from the gut wrenching pain that I felt when I thought about my baby girl. I had no idea if she was even alive, but my heart was telling me that she was.

I once again made my way back to the dingy old hotel, and fell asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow, wearing the same sticky clothes that I'd had on for nearly two days.

I was woken from a nightmare by the shrill ringing of my cellphone. I felt like I had only been asleep for a few minutes, but as I looked at the clock, I realized that I had managed about three hours.

I felt like shit, but it was Rasul calling, most likely to tell me that he had arrived in Shreveport.

"Hey." I said groggily.

"I'm here. Terminal B, come get me." He said sounding equally groggy and then hung up.

The first word that hastened through my mind when I saw Rasul standing curbside was 'BAMF'. He had gotten even more muscular since I had last seen him. He was the same height as me, 6'4", but he was way more muscular. Rasul was originally from Egypt, but came to live in the U.S when he was a child. He was one of the smartest motherfuckers I knew and could speak 4 languages. It was easy to see how he had made his way through the ranks so quickly.

"How'd it go?" Was the first thing he said to me as I got out of the car to help him put his bags in the trunk.

"The fucker wasn't there. I searched his house and found an insurance policy of the Stackhouse woman." I said succinctly. I put his suitcase in the trunk and we both made our way around the car and got in.

"He's behind this, I can feel it." I said huffing angrily. Thinking about Compton made my fucking blood pressure soar.

"Maybe, but we have to look at this from all sides Eric. We can't put all of our eggs in one basket." He said. He was right. Logically, I knew that, but it was hard to tear myself away from the feeling that Compton was knee deep in shit.

"So what do we do?" I said feeling slightly defeated.

"I love that little girl Eric and you're my brother. We'll do whatever it takes to get her back and the first place we start is questioning Compton." He agonized in an oddly reassuring manner.

I nodded at him in agreement. He had a badge, we could make the questioning legit and I wouldn't even have to hide his body.

We stopped at a 24 hour McDonald's and picked up some tasteless burgers that we both ate while I drove us back to the hovel in Bon Temps. I had to swallow a lump in my throat when I saw that McDonald's was advertising Disney Princess toys in their happy meals. She would've begged me endlessly for the Cinderella toy.

For the second time that day I found myself on the front porch of the Compton shack. This time, however, the fucker was home and the lights were on.

Rasul pounded on the door. I heard a string of expletives from Compton before he opened the door.

Given the fact that it was after midnight, I found it very odd that he was fully clothed. He had on Khaki pants, a green polo shirt, and loafers. It was the shoes that bothered me.

The fucker opened the door just enough for us to see him, but no more than that.

"What do you want Northman?" He asked focusing his beady eyes on me.

"Actually Mr. Compton, I'm Rasul Hamadi with the FBI, do you mind if we come inside?" Rasul said in an authoritative tone while flashing his badge.

"Do you have a warrant?" the fucker replied without flinching.

"Do I need a warrant?" Rasul retorted, then added "We just have a few questions Mr. Compton."

"Then I will remind you officer, that evidence obtained illegally is inadmissible in a court of law." Compton replied. Why not just wear a neon colored sign announcing your guilt? I thought bitterly. His odd clothing choice and his responses to seemingly harmless questions made it obvious to anyone that he was guilty of something.

"I am aware of the constitution, Mr. Compton. I'm neither here to collect evidence, nor am I here to question you as a suspect. I am here to ask you questions regarding Ms. Stackhouse." Rasul said.

"Look, I barely knew her. We only dated for five months. It's awful that she was abducted, but I honestly didn't know much about her. I was going to break up with her a week ago, but I felt sorry for her. I have nothing else to say." He said and made an attempt to shut the door on us.

I had it at that point. He was a lying motherfucker and I was not about to let him get away with it anymore. I shoved the door wide open and grabbed Compton by the collar of his polo shirt.

"I beg to differ motherfucker. " I spat with clenched teeth.

"Why do you have a life insurance policy on her then huh? Normal people don't purchase those on someone they're casually dating." I said shoving him harder against the wall causing some plaster fall.

"I don't have an insurance policy." He said with a strained voice.

"Then what's this?" Rasul said, holding the documents in his face. Bill's eyes shifted from mine to Rasul's. He had a wild look in his eyes that spoke of his anger. But above all else, he just looked caught. Like a child looks when the parent discovers that they've been doing something they weren't supposed to. I could see phases of emotions cross his face, until he finally resigned himself to the truth.

"It was just that…an insurance policy." He said in resignation while looking at the floor. "I wasn't really dating her. Can you let go of me?" He said. My grip loosened slightly, but I still kept ahold of him out of fear that he would bolt if I let go completely.

"Keep talking motherfucker." I said as I loosened my death grip.

"Look, I'm sorry your daughter got caught in the middle of it. That wasn't supposed to happen." He said. Jus the mention of my daughter from his lips infuriated me. I reared back and punched him in the nose as hard as I could muster. Blood poured from both nostrils and he cried out like a girl.

"What the fuck?" He said in a half cry half angry tone. He pinched the bridge of his nose and held his head up as he continued to cry about why I hit him when he was trying to apologize. Fuck him.

"Who has my daughter?" I yelled at him, interrupting his bitch fest.

"Some hired hand. I don't know his name. All I know was that I was supposed to set Sookie up and he was supposed to take her." He said, his voice muffled by the blood.

"Why?" Rasul asked.

"Sookie. Sophie Anne wanted Sookie." He said.

"For what reason fucktard and quit giving me half answers." Rasul said shoving him against the wall again. More plaster fell.

"Alright Alright, Fuck jeez. Sookie is a deadringer for her cousin Hadley. Hadley was a drug addict and a prostitute who worked for a guy named Victor Madden. Sophie Ann found Hadley about seven months ago and they fell in love. Victor demanded that Sophie Ann give him Hadley back because she was his best girl, but Sophie Anne didn't want to give her up. She made a deal with Madden to give him Sookie instead. Madden agreed to it and gave Sophie Anne six months to turn Sookie plus $100,000 over to him. I was sent here to…procure her if you will." He stated.

That was a lot of information to process, and a fucked up web of bullshit to weave through, but it eased my mind in knowing that the end goal was not to kill them, though I didn't want to think about what else could happen.

"What of the insurance policy." I asked after thinking over the information.

"Sookie was never to return to her life ever again. She's going to be turned out and most likely given a new identity. Sookie Stackhouse, for all intents and purposes, is dead. I just wanted to profit from that." He answered without a hint of guilt or remorse.

I beat the living shit out of him for that. Granted, I didn't know Sookie, but she didn't deserve any of this. She was duped by Compton. How fucking dare this low life profit off of some fucked up debt repayment agreement. The thought of turning Sookie into a prostitute slayed me. And would they try to do the same to Pam? The thought made my stomach turn.

Rasul had to literally pull me off of him out of fear that I would kill him.

"You will leave this country tonight, do you understand me. If I ever see your face even if it's only for stealing a loaf of bread, I will ensure that you never see the outside world ever again. All it takes is one flag in the FBI's system and Bill Compton becomes Osama Bin Compton, Al Qaeda operative. You can say goodbye to the U.S and hello to Guantanamo. Do you understand me?" Rasul fumed.

"But my family…" He sputtered.

"Fuck. Your. Family. See Compton, the Patriot Act is a wonderful tool. I can have your ass shipped to Cuba in about 30 minutes no questions asked. And let me tell you there is no kicking someone's ass in Guantanamo. No, you are just somebody's bitch and there's an all you can eat cockmeat sandwich buffet twenty four seven. So you will get on a flight and go to I don't fucking care where, and you will never step foot on U.S soil again. Ever." Rasul thundered and kicked Compton for good measure.

I fucking loved Rasul.

"Now what Raz?" I asked after we left Compton's house.

"We go to fucking New Orleans." He wearied.