Chapter 14
"Tell me your name," Bill said to the chauffeur, who was seated across from him in the car. After Jessica had managed to get out of her coffin, Bill ushered us all into the car out of public view and put the man under a spell- that glamouring thing that doesn't work on me.
"Leon," he answered in a monotone voice.
"Alright Leon," said Bill as he leaned in. "No one is going to hurt you." He turned to look at Jessica, who was watching with fascination. "Would you like to try?"
"Could I?" she said excitedly.
Bill smiled. "Here. Lean in close so you can catch his gaze." Jessica did just that, and Leon shifted his gaze to look at her. "And just let everything go," Bill continued. "Let yourself be dead."
I was strangely fascinated by watching them. This was the same technique Bill used when he "convinced" Jessica's parents that they never saw us. And this was what he tried to do to get me to go home when Sookie got scratched. This was what I felt when there was a pulling at my mind. But I could resist it. I thought about what it would be like if I could be glamoured. I would've never gone in with Bill to Fangtasia. Never would've met Eric. Never would've been here in Dallas. I couldn't decide if this was a good thing or a bad thing. But then I thought of how I would be at the complete mercy of any vampire I came across, and decided I enjoyed my freedom and independence.
"You feel it?" Bill asked Jessica, who nodded. "You are empty. A vacuum. Now you can pull his mind into yours."
She looked deeply into Leon's eyes and whispered, "Everything's gonna be okay. There's nothing to fear."
Bill moved back to sit beside Sookie and I, satisfied with Jessica's progress. He placed his hand on Sookie's lap, and she looked lovingly up at him.
"You were very sweet with her," she told him, but he seemed preoccupied with something else.
"Sookie, he was sent to abduct you two," he said, gesturing towards me. "Which means somebody knew you were coming."
"Who do you think's behind it?" I asked. "Vampires?"
"Too sloppy," said Bill. He looked to Sookie. "Maybe that church?"
Church. Clearly Bill had brought this up earlier with Sookie, but nobody ever told me anything about a church. Yet why did it ring a bell?
"Bill, they may be crazy, but they're still a church," Sookie said. "They're not gonna kidnap anybody."
"Sookie," he shook his head. "Churches have done much, much worse throughout history."
Church. Something clicked in my mind.
"Now, listen, we don't want this little incident to affect your views of our church. We are really a kind hearted, close knit family here that's sole objective is to walk in the footsteps of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ."
My vision.
"Wait!" I jumped as I said this much louder than I needed to. Everyone turned to look at me, including Jessica. She lost her focus and Leon snapped out of her influence. He gasped in fright.
"No, no! Don't hurt me!" he pleaded.
"Jessica, get him back under control," Bill told her.
"I'm trying!" she shot back at him. She quickly changed her tone back to the soft, sweet humming she was talking in before and said to Leon, "It's gonna be alright. It's just fine. Just trust me." After some convincing, he returned back to his hypnotic state.
"Wait, what?" Sookie asked me.
"When he grabbed me, I had a vision. I didn't think it was anything important, it just looked like what would happen if Bill hadn't stepped in…" I paused and shuddered at the thought of what could have easily happened. "But, there was something about a church. The church you were talking about, does it have the acronym 'L.O.D.I.'?"
Bill and Sookie exchanged a look. "No," he finally said. "I was referring to the Fellowship of the Sun. They are known for their hatred and protests of vampire kind."
"Oh," I murmured. I thought back to my vision, but I couldn't come up with anything that connected the Fellowship to Leon. The only straw I had to grasp at was "L.O.D.I", and that wasn't enough to give us any solid leads.
"We'll interrogate Leon when we get to the safety of the hotel," Bill announced. "We might find something in his thoughts. Jessica, have him drive us there."
When we arrived at the Hotel Carmilla, I was quick to realize this wasn't just any hotel. I had heard of vampire hotels before, but always assumed them to be very rare, only in lavish, eccentric places like Las Vegas or Japan. But that lady over the plane's loudspeaker wasn't exaggerating; apparently Dallas was very vampire friendly.
Jessica sat in the lobby's chairs with the still dazed Leon while Bill, Sookie, and I went to the front desk to get checked in.
"Welcome to the Hotel Carmilla! The only resort style hotel chain with full vampire accommodations!" the blonde receptionist exclaimed. She appeared to be human, with her sun kissed skin and warm handshake. "How may I help you?"
"Yes, we have reservations," Bill told her. "I believe they would be under Northman."
"Okay," the lady said, typing away on her computer. "I have you down for a room with no bed?" Sookie looked to Bill in confusion.
"Eric," he explained.
"No, we need a bed," she kindly asked of the receptionist, shaking her head at Eric's slyness.
"Of course. I do have a light-lockable room with a king-sized bed. It's a suite. Double-soundproofed."
"Oh," Bill spoke up, "with an adjoining room for my- what should I call her?" He wasn't sure what to refer to Jessica as and turned to Sookie and me for help.
"Isn't there a vampire word?" I asked.
"Progeny," he said.
"Call her your ward," Sookie joked. "You have a ward, like Bruce Wayne."
Bill smiled and went along with it. "And an adjoining room for my ward and her friend," he said, referring to me. I guess I had to share a room with a moody vampire who hasn't learned to control her impulses yet.
"Actually, I already have her down for her own double-soundproofed, light-lockable suite with a king-sized bed," the lady said, looking at me.
"I get my own room?" I asked, overjoyed. I didn't want to be rude about sharing a room with Jessica, but it sure would be nice to not have to sleep with one eye open.
She nodded as she handed Bill some papers. "Can I just have you sign here, please?"
"These accommodations are being covered by a third party, right?" he asked.
"Yes, sir," she assured him, "it's all been taken care of by a Mr. Northman."
"Becky Eubanks is a stuck-up whore who let Chase finger her in the church!" Leon suddenly screamed from behind us and we all turned to see Jessica laughing hysterically.
"Jessica!" Bill scolded. He turned back to the receptionist. "She's new."
We got our room keys and headed upstairs. I decided to stay with Bill and Sookie in their room while they interrogated Leon to see if I could be of any help. When we got inside their suite, Jessica ran straight to her room, slamming the door and yelling for nobody to bother her. Bill sat Leon down and I joined Sookie on the opposite couch.
"Leon, look at me," said Bill, exerting his influence over him. "Look at me, Leon." The man looked up at him with fear in his eyes. "Everything is going to be okay."
"No, it's not," Leon whimpered. "My worst nightmares."
"Jessica, what on earth did you do to this man?" Bill shouted at his progeny's closed door.
"I'm on the phone!" she yelled back, annoyed. Bill scoffed.
"Maybe if you put your hand on his shoulder," said Sookie quietly. "Sometimes touching helps me to hear their thoughts better."
Bill followed her suggestion. "Who sent you?"
"Fellowship of the Sun," Leon confessed. So I was wrong about whatever the "L.O.D.I." was being behind this. I knew my visions could sometimes be inaccurate, but I felt so surely about that one.
Sookie asked, "Are you a member?"
"No, they hired me."
"Who specifically?" Bill pressed.
"I'm not sure. It was over the phone. Money was put in a locker for me at a Greyhouse station."
"And they hired you to do what exactly?"
"Abduct the humans with the Compton party and bring them to the church."
I shuddered. "Do you know my name?"
"No, ma'am, I didn't even know y'all were going to be women. All I know is a vampire's using humans to find a vampire Godric." Godric, he's the one Eric sent us to look for.
"Do you know where he is?" I wondered.
"No, ma'am, I do not."
We all sat in silence for a minute, digesting this new information. Eventually, Bill turned to Leon. "You did very well. I'm sure your employers will be pleased."
"Think so?" the chauffeur asked nervously.
"Of course. What could you? We never arrived. It's not your fault," Bill persuaded him.
"Yeah," Leon smiled. "Flight never arrived."
"No. We just weren't on it," the vampire corrected. It was definitely easier to say a couple people were missing rather than an entire plane.
"I got so nervous for nothing," chuckled Leon, and we all joined in convincingly.
"Go on now," Bill told him. "You never saw us."
"Never!" he laughed as he walked out the door. The second the door shut behind him, everyone took on a more serious tone.
"I have a phone call to make," Bill stated.
I didn't feel like being alone after learning a church was after me, so I stayed and helped Sookie unpack her and Bill's stuff. I overheard bits and pieces of Bill's heated phone conversation.
"We were ambushed at the airport… You know exactly by whom, Eric. The Fellowship of the Sun. Why didn't you tell me they were involved?... You could have shared your suspicions with me." He angrily listened to whatever Eric was saying on the other side and hung up abruptly.
So Bill called Eric to yell at him. Good. That asshole vampire deserved a good yelling for sending us into unknown territory without a fair warning about the wacko church congregation waiting to snatch us up.
"Why does he have to be such a dick?" I asked to no one in particular.
"I ask myself that question every day," Bill replied.
"He's nothing but a selfish, a-hole Viking with an empty cavern where his heart should be," Sookie ranted. "He thinks he has all this power just because he's sheriff-"
"He does have all the power," Bill told her.
"That doesn't give him the right to be reckless and regardless of everyone else's wellbeing!" She turned to me. "Stay away from him. He may have saved your life and mine but we don't owe him anything."
"Trust me, I want nothing to do with him," I tried to convince her, and myself, of this.
Bill opened his mouth like he was going to say something, but shut it and shook his head.
"Just be careful," Sookie warned me.
I nodded and decided to head out because Bill was eyeing up Sookie hungrily and when she saw this, she smiled back at his. They obviously needed some alone time and I needed to unpack anyways.
My suite was just down the hall from theirs, and when I unlocked the door and went in, I found it to be just as extravagant and lavishing as theirs was. I almost felt bad staying in this room that probably cost a fortune, but then I remembered who was paying and popped open an expensive looking bottle of champagne from the fridge.
I plugged in my iPod to the speaker the room provided and jammed out to some music while I put my stuff away. I was really going to town with the booze, and knew I was a little tipsy when I started jumping on the humongous bed, dancing and singing to Kelly Clarkson's "Since U Been Gone". I was singing so loudly that I didn't even hear him come in.
He shut off the music, but I didn't notice as I continued screaming the lyrics and jumping around in circles. When I spun in his direction, we locked eyes and I gasped, startled. I froze mid jump and fell on my butt, bouncing softly on the comfy mattress.
"That was a lovely performance, you'd make a great dancer at Fangtasia," Eric smirked.
My cheeks flushed in embarrassment. "What are you doing in my room?"