A/N: Charlaine Harris owns all of her characters. Evil genius that she is, she has created the Sookieverse for our pleasure.

I'm enjoying the alternating POV for Eric and Sookie. So it continues in this chapter and the following one.

Consider this chapter a Girl's Guide to almost sex with a Werewolf. 'Almost?!' you intone, a deadly glint in your eyes. Sorry, Sookie must devote a small amount of time to unraveling the mysterious world into which she's been drop-kicked.

Chapter 8

I was at most minutes away from shifting to my Wolf form, possibly less. We'd have to stop, right now. I knew myself too well to risk any of her tender self

Regrettably, I was sure it was the unfamiliar, overwhelming wonder of kissing her that had sent me over the edge. But I couldn't ignore that my cock was definitely headed over into Wolf-man territory. Sookie didn't know about my third form yet. I wasn't sure I wanted her to find out.

SPOV

"Sookie, baby, gotta cool this off, now."

Trying to convince myself that it must be some rogue Vampire planting a distasteful suggestion in my brain, rather than Wolf-boy saying the unthinkable, I ignored his remark.

"Now. Off. Sorry, performance tonight." He was mumbling, but I could understand him perfectly.

If it was possible to say 'I froze' while melted into the heating blanket set at high that was Eric under the bed sheet, well, that's what I did. Here I was, ready to burn a couple of pleasurable hourswith a Werewolf, no questions asked, and he wants to call it off?! Is this payback time for last night in the hotel room, Wolf-style?

"Joking or not, I'm not stopping." I was going to insist. Why all the earlier drama if the Wolf wasn't certain of his intentions? If his desire barometer pressed into my crotch was any indicator, we had reached 212 degrees Fahrenheit many minutes earlier. I unselfishly prepared to choke off any protests he might make by swallowing his tongue and not letting go.

My actions prompted a short wrestling match. He was half-hearted about it, but definitely stronger. In fact, in spite of loudly-voiced multiple protests from me, he practically threw me back against the pillows finally, growling deep in his throat. It was a noise I couldn't place; definitely didn't sound like the masculine repertoire of any of the men I'd been around in the past.

"Sookie, off this bed, pronto." He sounded very sure about this momentary interruption. Could it be he wanted to try his luck in the shower?

Deluding myself. I knew that. I blushed, remembering that for a brief period before he pitched me off, I had clung insistently to him, shaking my head 'no', with my arms locked around his chest and my hands clasped tightly behind him. No way he wasn't aware of what I'd done, either.

"I don't understand you, Eric." My feelings were bruised. Rejection will do that to the average twenty-two year-old.

"Oh Jesus!" He yelled.

I was still processing his exclamation, Human speed, wondering what a Werewolf knew about the Christian savior, when Eric moved at inhuman speed off the bed and into the room's adjacent bath, slamming the door behind him. I'd heard the sound of cloth ripping and wondered if he'd torn the sheets, although it had a deeper, richer tone.

"Eric?" I called, careful not to sound too needy. I was concerned he might be ill; his skin had been so warm.

When he failed to answer, I swallowed my pride and walking carefully to the closed door, tried the handle. Locked? I knocked.

No response. I pressed my ear against the painted, hollow core door. Had I been a twelve-year old boy, I could have put a fist through it without thinking.

And then it happened.

An animal sound. So eerie, so primal, my mammalian brain stopped working, terror being the only emotion to register.

I could hear some clicking noises, followed by what could have been chuffing. Then Eric called to me, so softly I might have missed it if I hadn't now been glued in fear to the spindly door, unsure if the sounds were coming from behind the door or outside the bedroom walls. "Pam. Mobile." It was a request. Oddly guttural, muffled somehow, almost as if he was talking through a mouthful of hair, or teeth...

I didn't hesitate, flying down the stairs to the table where he'd dropped his wallet, keys, and phone when we first entered. I frantically searched the directory of names. No listing under 'P'. What else would he call her? Guardian? Another blank. I tried a different screen, looking for most recent phone calls, and found a number that appeared more often than the others. 'Demon' appeared to be a twice-daily phone call. Found it!

She picked up on the first ring. "Problem?" The note of concern was unmistakable in her question.

"It's me, Sookie. Eric seems to be the one having the problem. His skin was overheating, and now he's…" She cut me off with a string of inventive curses that sounded as if she'd had more than a quarter-century of history from which to draw and had stored them up for future use.

"Quickly, where is he?" she breathed.

"Locked in his upstairs bathroom. I can't make him come out."

"By the blood of Aranadar, don't open that door, Sookie. There's a secure room where you can wait for me. Hurry, go to the kitchen and open the pantry door. Now." Her urgency was frightening me. I'd graduated from community college. It was no great leap to guess why she was worried.

I located the pantry door, stepped inside still holding Eric's mobile and found a heavy gauge, shiny steel swing door. I shoved it in place, swung the latch, and catching my breath, told her I was in the room. A light had activated when I entered. I turned around to survey the set-up. Cozy; I had everything I might need for a siege of several days, including food, water, a computer, and an efficiency bathroom. No Eukanuba or newspapers on the floor for Wolf-boy.

"He's shifted to his Wolf form, right?" I really didn't need to ask the Elf for confirmation; I was merely observing the formalities.

"Sookie, I'll be there as soon as I…ah, can. Minutes only. Eric won't hurt me. I doubt he'd hurt you, either, as he's likely just shifted to his Wolf form, not the Other. I'm convinced you are fine if you stay in the room. When I arrive, we'll lock down the house. He'll return to his Human self within the hour. It's too early for him to shift by a full day. What were you two doing?"

I didn't know if she was fishing, or possibly compiling data for a professional report. Pam? Fishing.

"Kissing, that's all."

"Ah, then, it's serious." She hung up.

As the click tingled in my ear, I heard what sounded like snuffling along the floor from the other side of the door. She'd said I was 'safe', okay? No reason to panic. I exhaled slowly and as quietly as possible. Scarcely daring to breathe was no way to spend a Saturday night. I backed away from the steel door and sat down on the chair in front of the computer.

All I could do now was wait. What to do to kill time?

EPOV

I hadn't had my emotions trigger a form shift since I'd first matured and learned to control my second nature. Pam would know something was wrong and what to do. The Demon-Elf had been my Guardian from my earliest years. My Dame and the rest of her Pack had been slaughtered on the Russian Steppes by hunters seeking out marauding wolves in the winter of 1897. I'd been hidden while she and her sisters left our home with the other village males to bring down some deer; we were starving, as were our neighbors in the villages around us. The winter had been bitter and wildlife was scarce. As a prelude to the tragedy, the native wolves had taken to waiting for their food source outside the pens of the villagers' domesticated livestock. In retaliation and fear for their own safety, the village hunters were systematically stripping out the wolves from the area around their cultivated lands, trying to retain their livelihood.

When my Dame Nemia had died, she had made a Wolf call to my Sire to find and save me. Instead, he had sent Pam, who was in his debt for a major favor Niall had done for her Demon Sire in an earlier century. Pam had found me, cold and frightened, hidden beneath the floorboards of my Dame's steep-roofed square log house. She'd had to pry off the ornate scrolled wood shutters, calling my name, and then tear off the floor boards with her claws when she caught my scent. Nemia had shielded her own death from me, so I was unsure about leaving with someone I didn't know. But with the fire in the hearth long dead, I'd had no choice but to let Pam remove me.

Of course, she hadn't been my Pam at the time. She'd formally introduced herself as 'Meliel', which I later learned translated as 'daughter of love', a rather cruel joke settled on her by her Elf mother. But Pam had known the safe words and the secret name of my Sire, a name guarded from every other peasant Were in our village by my True Were mother and her barren sisters. And what choice did I have? I'd been alone under the floorboards for three days. I was seven years old, and it was time to go.

The experience had convinced me that in every dwelling, I would make a secure room for myself. In the event of another catastrophe such as had befallen me as a pup, I'd be ready. Now the precautionary measure would serve to protect Sookie. I never believed this Wolf would hurt her. But a shift to my third form could be catastrophic. I couldn't risk it.

I expected that by telling Sookie to call Pam, my Guardian would remember my reinforced secure room and tell Sookie how to find it. If Sookie would cease being so stubborn and inquisitive and simply follow Pam's orders, she would be safe until I regained my Human form. It would take a few minutes; I'd wait because to shift back to Human too soon would take extra energy I'd need later tonight. I didn't want to be unable to defend my mate when the rogue Vampires showed at Clancy's.

My mate?

As the shock washed over me at the term I'd just voiced for Sookie, I immediately realized the truth in the statement. I wasn't going back to being a lone Wolf again. Yet, I couldn't explain why I'd reacted strongly enough to Sookie to be thinking of bonding with her. Admittedly, she was a very desirable True Human female offering sex. So what? I rejected many similar offers of casual sex from Human females every day; they didn't interest me. Why was she different? I had no ready answer.

Of course, bonding was Wolf-speak for a lifelong commitment. Humans had different words, different ceremonies, and different ideas of how long a bond might endure. It seemed Humans treated bonds as a convenience, not always a permanent commitment of two lives.

I hoped Sookie would not treat me as a casual fuck. For whatever reason it had happened, I now had no choice but to acknowledge my desire to bond with her. I was her Protector, if not a qualified Guardian. I had no doubts that she would eventually accept my offer. First, though, I wanted to gauge the depth of her feelings for me. In the interim, I would tear apart any Vampire that tried to touch her tonight.

I heard Pam at the door and loped in to greet her.

SPOV

If Eric was going to be so secretive about everything, I reasoned, I would have to take extreme action to get answers. His computer was such a temptation. Why should I resist?

Flipping on the Dell machine, I went to the Internet browser to check his History and Favorites lists. I didn't want to go into Word or Excel; no point in risking learning something about his businesses I didn't wish to know. That late night cash deposit had been too weird.

I started with the history of recent Web sites visited, and found the first item was from YouTube. It appeared to be vid of some nineties band named Temple of the Dog. I couldn't watch it, fearful that Eric might be able to hear it in the kitchen area and know what I was doing. The next web site was Tube8. Wolf-boy was wasting no time getting current with contemporary male interests. No need to open it. The third item was the Atlanta Journal-Constitution online site. I was curious what news items interested Eric. The first item was from Friday's paper. It was a front page story about the inexplicable disappearance of average citizen William Compton, a law-abiding Ford dealership owner from Smyrna. I quickly scanned the copy. It appeared they had no leads, but were working every angle, blah, blah, blah. It also appeared his sister had disappeared from her management job at a local department store. The story's writer broadly hinted that she was a person of interest. In no way could Halli ever have had anything to do with her brother's disappearance, I thought.

However, I was very curious why Eric was searching out stories on Will. Perhaps it had to do with my talk with Pam about Will? Well, that made some sense. It was still odd. My boyfriend dumps me and Eric wants to check into it? I didn't recall telling Pam Will's full name, but how else could they have known it?

Of course, I'd forgotten the most important point. Maybe Will hadn't dumped me. The police thought he was MIA. I recalled that Halli was rumored to be on vacation. The new information about Will didn't upset me as much as it might have before last night and today. After all, I'd been ready to obtain revenge by immediately dumping Will if I could renew his interest in me. I knew it was immature and cranky. But wasn't it also the impetus that led to me meeting Pam and Eric?

My head seriously hurt as I tried to reason out the coincidence of going to Eric's shop and him morphing into my Guardian. Was it more than random? Since no explanation worked, I forgot about it and checked the rest of his history list. That was the only entry on the subject of Mr. MIA, aka Former Boyfriend.

Clicking on Eric's Favorites, I was astonished to see that he had amassed a huge list for someone so recently returned from another part of the World. He also seemed to have mastered the computer and Internet without any trouble.

Judging by his interests, Eric had a serious sports hard-on. All types of sports. Every sport I knew and many I didn't recognize. The subject was a good fifty percent of his saved sites. I immediately flashed on my future with Eric as a part-time sports widow. I already liked football and baseball; you couldn't grow up in a small Southern town and ignore one of the few diversions readily available. So, I could live with his addiction. Not that he'd asked me to spend my future with him, I cautiously reminded myself.

His remaining Favorites emphasized he was both a musician and a businessman searching for new marketing schemes, evaluating Internet opportunities and utilizing Craig's List. It also appeared he regularly scanned all sorts of popular culture sites, including 'E', MTV, Perez Hilton, and Just Jared. Catching-up, I guessed. I wondered if he'd be interested in seeing New Moon with me later in the week. I also wasn't surprised to see that he had lots of World of Warcraft lore. It was another interest I shared with him.

Absorbed in downloading the information about my protector for later girlfriend analysis, I barely heard Pam's call outside the door. When I did, it was almost too late. I quickly exited the Internet and hit 'shut down.'

"Sookie, you in there? Open up, please." An irritated Demon didn't sound promising for a swift night in downtown Atlanta. I'd have to be careful.

After we'd both argued about the mechanism for the heavy steel door for several minutes, I gave in and we succeeded in opening it. I met Pam's appraising stare with a blush.

She was dressed for trouble tonight. What sort of trouble, I couldn't guess. I, on the other hand, hadn't taken time to find my clothes in my scramble to head downstairs for Eric's mobile and wasn't dressed at all. Luckily, I'd picked up a loose jacket of Eric's hanging off the bottom post of the stairs, zipping it up as I'd run to the kitchen. It was about all I had on.

"Just kissing?" She didn't bother to hide her smirk.

"Where's Eric? Is he alright?" I wasn't going to ask if he was still a Wolf, nor was I eager to see him in animal form.

"Getting dressed." No more Wolf, then. "I found and moved your shucked clothes from the bedroom to the powder room by the stairs." She smiled sweetly, having already guessed what we'd been doing when Eric started to shift. "So take your time, sweet cheeks. He'll need at least a half hour before he's ready to go. His hair alone is a major operation."

With all the dignity I could muster, I left Pam to follow her suggestion.

What I'd learned from Eric's computer was a lot to process. I wasn't averse to spending the next half hour sorting through it all in private as I dressed. It seemed very significant that he'd been researching the disappearance of my former boyfriend. If I was back in Bon Temps, I'd call Amelia and we'd tease out every possible explanation. It could take hours and a couple of pints of Ben & Jerry's. But my phone was dead, and I hadn't spoken to her in more than a few weeks, anyway. I needed new friends! I wailed, silently.

EPOV

I shifted back to Human form without any significant effort once Pam arrived, calling me to her by her pet name for me, 'Little Wolf'. I'd welcomed her by placing my nose in her outstretched hand. She'd responded by performing a healing spell over me that served to calm and stabilize my excited self.

In less than a minute, I was Human again and headed back upstairs to dress and prep.

Dammit! The mirror reflected the thin mustache and chin scruff that re-emerged every time I shifted. I'd shaved it off once this morning, and cleaned up my beard again this evening after my shower. Screw it. It was staying on for tonight.

My hair was a curly mass of ringlets, its natural form. Would I have time to work in product and blow it out? Product yes, but I didn't want to waste time working on my hair when I could be with Sookie.

My jeans had been destroyed in the shift, the ripping cloth my first clue that the change was happening. I'd been so besotted with the sensations of kissing Sookie that I ignored the swirl of emotions churning my stomach. Since I was never sick, any nausea was a sure sign of an impending shift to Wolf. Shifting to Human was nausea-free. And my Other form? Forget nausea; it was an entirely different set of issues and potentially unpleasant outcomes.

I swiftly chose new clothes, pulled on my leather wristbands, ran a hand through my unruly hair, and checked out my guyliner. Applying some more, I was reassured my eyes would disappear into my face now, lost in the shadows. I could search the audience for threats to my mate, my actions carefully masked from the rogue Vampires we were seeking. Glancing down, I saw that when I'd shifted, I'd also absorbed the green nail polish. No big deal. If everything worked out tonight as planned, I'd still have time for a manicure tomorrow. After grabbing some powder for my face to control the sweating caused by the stage lights, I quickly found and slipped into a pair of loafers. When necessary, I could stand in these shoes for hours while performing, or fighting.

I realized I was rushing, eager to get back downstairs and discover if I'd scared Sookie shitless or if she'd still accept me. I had a whole raft of problems to sort through, but didn't care. At the moment, what was of paramount importance to me was learning my mate's reaction to my unexpected shift into Wolf form.

I was so hosed.

SPOV

"Captain Jack Sparrow!"

Eric was sporting several inches of height Johnny Depp probably wished he had. Seeing him with his trim mustache, chin scruff, long and curly, light-swallowing hair, and mile-wide grin, he looked so familiar I'd blurted out the pirate's name without thinking. I quickly checked his smile to find it still fixed in place. Thank god his canines had retracted to normal. He did not have a frightening mouthful of teeth, a big fear of mine. I knew it was a hold-over from a children's book Granmere had read to me at night before turning out the light, the illustrations more terrifying than charming to a six year-old. I'd never told her about the nightmares.

"Eric, are you okay? You look amazin' for what you've…just done, I guess." I didn't know if he was sensitive about the too-early form shifting. Maybe it was an embarrassment to him? What had caused it? I wanted to ask, but I knew he wouldn't tell me.

He crossed the room swiftly and dropping his face into my hair, I had time to see his guyliner close-up before he whispered in my ear that he was happy I was safe. I moved closer against his chest as he assured me I never had anything to fear from him.

Pam loudly cleared her throat, reminding us she was still in the room. "Little Wolf, my calming spell can only overcome so much provocation. Step away from the True Human."

Well, was his Elf-Demon Guardian implying I had caused the near mishap? Before I had a chance to ask yet another question, she corrected me.

"Chris Cornell, Sookie. Dead ringer. I told him so yesterday."

I had no idea who Cornell might be, but Eric evidently made the connection. He followed Pam's order for distance and bowed deeply in her direction, obviously preening from all the attention. I felt colder as Eric moved away from the two of us to settle on a metal stool propped against the wall. He leaned behind a cabinet I hadn't registered and produced an instrument case. Unbuckling the top, he set the lid back on its hinges. When he reverently lifted out the blazing brass heavy wind instrument, there was no doubt he was a serious musician.

EPOV

Music to charm the savage beast. That had been part of the spell Pam had woven that helped me to relax. I fished out my sax and left the females to chat among themselves. Tonight was my debut at Clancy's. It would be my first time back on stage since I'd returned from my decades-long Niall-enforced exile. I had been practicing to regain my finger dexterity and breath control. I felt confident I would not make a fool of myself with Sookie in the audience. I only had four pieces I'd need to prep; I'd leave the stage while the other musicians finished the first set. Then I was free for the remainder of the evening, if I'd had enough, as the second set was more rock-oriented.

Suddenly, I was eager to take the mouthpiece for some impromptu scales.

Both Sookie and Pam stopped abruptly and circled around me when I began in earnest on Desafinado. Stan Getz did it best, but it was still one of my favorites in performance. The lyrics to the preferred version began 'Love is like a never-ending melody'. I didn't wish to waste all my juice in warm-up, but I still wanted to watch Sookie's eyes as I played for her. Music was a classic form of wooing your Lover. I certainly didn't intend to buy her any gravel driveways. Nor would I fall prey to the common male misstep of overly practical gifts of functional clothing or checks. Instead, I'd find her heart's desire and give it to her.

A/N: What would be Sookie's heart's desire? Eric naked, hard, handcuffs locked in place, the cloth gag pulled tight around his head, some of his shiny ebony hair caught in the knot? With a full moon set to appear in an hour or so, she'd strip... No, wait, that couldn't be Sookie having those thoughts?! Although it could be a fantasy she might share with him at some point. Next chapter, maybe.

Don't forget to fire up your virgin self for the Poppin' Eric's Cherry contest sponsored by S. Meadows and VampLover1 going on this month. What could be more sinfully delicious? Do remember to ladle on the white fudge syrup for that extra kick, of course.

Did I forget to mention this is a contest for virgin 'writers'? Sorry.

I gratefully acknowledge beta reader VampLover1's thoughtful advice and assistance re: all things FF. If you find errors, I must claim them.

I'm posting Chapter 9 tomorrow. I'm hoping you are ready for it?