A/N: I apologize for the long pause here—lame, busy real life. For those who have been missing the quieter moments, this more static, interior chapter from Eric's perspective should be right up your alley… For those more interested in action, we'll be back at it next installment! Thank you, as always, for reading—you're the best. xo

Also, lemons…

Chapter 15

Eric's POV

It was daytime. In an unusual reversal, Sookie was asleep in bed, and I was at work in my small office. I hated bringing business home, but sometimes it was unavoidable.

It had been a heavy, watchful, angry morning. I was livid that someone had gotten to Sookie inside her house, not just to lie in wait to cause her harm, but to plant the camera as well. The latter did not seem like the work of a grunt muscle were, which implied two separate breaches. Though I had little to go on, I was more determined than ever to find the perpetrators and crush them.

I read the digital report from my security team who swept Fangtasia in the morning. There were no cameras besides the ones installed for our security. They had found no evidence of breaking and entering. The file Pam compiled on local weres had nothing to do with the man found at Sookie's house. While thumbing through the research we had recently put together on possible face-changers in the area, I was concurrently watching the video feed from the last several days at Fangtasia, trying to discover anything out of the ordinary, anything to predict or anticipate what was next. Although I could usually focus my mind wholly on the task (or even multiple tasks) at hand, something else was constantly overriding my thoughts—something delicious and warm and sexy lying in the next room.

I assumed Sookie (and most others as well) thought I was just one gigantic, raging hard-on all the time. While that image did not exactly displease me, it was not strictly true. I could generally control my sexual impulses quite well, will down my desires, especially when there was work to be done. Every now and then I liked to prove that. My choice not to fuck Sookie's brains out the night before had been as much a demonstration of willpower as it had been concern for her well-being or desire to stay vigilant. Not today, though. In my weakened, daytime state with Sookie's pulsing body in my bedroom, my concentration was fragmented at best.

One minute I was reading security details, and then flash: I saw Sookie in a wide, sunlit grass field, naked, sweat trickling between her breasts, her eyes locked onto my face. I had just focused back down on the surveillance tapes when flash: I was overwhelmed by the fleshy tang of peaches in summer, watching as I massaged them between my fingers, running the juice over Sookie's body glistening in the moonlight… I returned to the paperwork for a moment before flash: a sense fantasy so real I felt it at the root of my being—the two of us submerged in the river, eye level with the base of the reeds, noses barely breaking the skin of the water. I could not see her lips but I could tell she was smiling by the crinkles around her eyes. I grasped her to me and laughed.

With difficulty, I shook myself back to the present.

The delicious disconnected thoughts were one thing. More difficult to block out, though, was the call of my own blood. Although she had drunk me hours before, I still felt it running a tortuous path through her, threading around her thin wrists, her curved calves, her delicate rib cage… Though I was physically outside, buried in laborious, high-stakes work, the part of me circulating in Sookie felt far more real and compelling. A focused attention on my blood inside her calmed me, blinded me to everything else—including my own impatience with my distraction.

Surely I was losing my mind. I no longer cared who was after us. All I wanted was to bury myself as far in Sookie as I could in as many ways as possible—my blood, fingers, tongue, cock… I felt restless and impatient and consumed with stupid, futile, striking love.

My body screamed for action as I sat motionless at the desk, blood trickling out of my ear and down my cheek. Ignoring the papers clutched in my hand, the security tapes running before me, I gave up. I consciously willed myself out of my body and into hers.

This was different than a blood bond—that was about knowing another's intimate feelings. This was different from drinking Sookie—that was a sensual, plunging free-for-all. This was about actually being inside, almost like witchcraft. I had never felt anything like it.

I suppose the lacking awareness of my physical self could have been eerie, but I did not have the wherewithal to notice. I was completely absorbed in the continuous rush surging through her. Focused on the path of the blood, I stroked and caressed her for my own pleasure. I had no idea if it was all in my head or if it would actually affect Sookie, and on some level I did not care. I willed myself as deep as the blood would let me go.

My actual surroundings faded away: I heard a lone note plucked on a mountain-range mandolin, felt a cold breeze on my cheek, tasted hot, rich blood in my mouth. I tried to push away the sudden sickness that came with the overwhelming beauty, the feeling that I did not belong in or deserve such perfection. The blood pulled me down into her until I almost lost the way out.

A noise in the hall brought me up short. With a gasp I wrenched myself away and snapped back to consciousness. I shuffled the papers I had been holding motionless for minutes in my hand, composed myself, and returned to some semblance of work. Sookie entered the room clad in nothing but one of my t-shirts. She took me in. Although I knew I was disheveled and bloody, I felt her desire.

"God, you look sexy," she breathed. I did not need further encouragement. All concerns forgotten, I walked to her, grabbed her, and laid her out over my desk with the rest of my paperwork.

"Fuck yes," she cried as I whipped my t-shirt over my head while she worked on my belt. The earlier experience had me so aroused I had no patience for foreplay. Sookie was ready, though. I wondered if my internal exploration had a similar affect on her… The instant my cock was free, she wrapped her legs around my waist and I entered her hard and fast.

"I love it when you're rough," she bit out. There were no sexier words she could have said to me in the moment.

"You got it," I grunted back, digging my fingers into her hips and increasing my pace.

I wanted to do something new for her, to roughen things, as she put it. Though I did not stop fucking her into the desk—could not stop, really—I caught both her hands in one of mine and held them above her, limiting her movement and increasing the intensity. She moaned and arched up into me. In answer, I ran a finger around to her ass and touched her, raw and firm and intimate. She might have gasped or shrunk away from me, but she did not. Her eyes widened at the sensation, as though I had turned up the amp on her pleasure. She came a moment later, a feral wildness etched on her face. I was unsurprised, though my lust increased tenfold. Sookie was like me—unashamed, willing to give and take without fear. I slammed into her repeatedly until I exploded.

I collapsed over her on the desk, feeling both possessive and possessed. Yes, I loved being inside her because I wanted to claim and mark her as mine, but also because I liked feeling contained by her. It was a new sensation for me; it spoke of true partnership.

After a few moments, we both became aware of our awkward positions. My elbows were buried amidst piles of reports, and Sookie's head drooped over the side of the desk, the veins in her neck straining. I admired her hair as it cascaded down to the floor. She looked up at me mischievously and winked. The shirt she was wearing had ridden up over her breasts and I playfully tugged at one of her nipples. She gasped and slapped at me before stretching back down over the edge.

What had begun as amusing quickly became hot: her back arcing over the desk inflamed me, and her breasts looked so tantalizing I bent to focus my attention on them. She sighed softly, his fingers twisting in my hair, and I watched, fascinated, as tiny goose bumps formed on her golden skin. My desire swelled instantly. I intended to take her slowly this time, and began to trace her form leisurely with my tongue.

A moment later I realized Sookie was elsewise occupied. Though upside and backwards, her eyes were fixed on the screen behind her. I knew all I had to do was lightly increase the pressure and she would forget everything but the feel of me, but something told me to pay attention.

"Eric, what time does Ginger normally get into work?" Her tone was concerned. I stilled my exploration.

"Her shift starts at 4pm—she tidies up and readies the club for opening. I don't think she's even awake before noon." Sookie sat up and lightly shifted me off as I spoke, turning to focus on the video feed.

"Do you think this is a big deal?" She pointed to the screen. I snapped into investigative mode. Yesterday's date was clearly displayed on the security footage. There was Ginger, vapid and shaky as ever, opening the backdoor. The time read 2:01pm.

I reached for the remote and advanced the footage. She reemerged at 2:27pm and drove off, then returned again at 3:52pm. She was wearing the same outfit; her behavior was ordinary. There was nothing wholly alarming about the set of events, and if I had seen it any other week, I would have thought nothing of it. Today, though, it rubbed me the wrong way.

Neither of us wanted to jump to conclusions, though it was clear we were both thinking the same thing. Ever since Sookie had suggested our adversaries might include a face-changer, everyone was a potential suspect.

"Maybe she left something behind?" Sookie suggested.

"It's possible… But why would it take 26 minutes for her to find it?"

I reached for my cellphone and dialed Pam who, of course, did not pick up. "Pam. The minute you wake, get a hold of Ginger and find out where she was yesterday at 2pm." I hung up and looked at the clock—it was still seven hours until nightfall. Sookie anticipated my thought process.

"Can someone from your security team check her out now?"

"Ginger's hard to follow even when she's been glamored. They wouldn't find out anything that I would trust. It needs to be a vamp, and it needs to be Pam or me." I sighed. "It's a long shot anyway. Even if we found out that she hadn't been at Fangtasia earlier, we would hardly be closer to finding out who was."

"Do you think she could have installed cameras or something?"

"She didn't. The security team swept this morning." I felt a fresh stream of blood run down my cheek, thicker than the last one. I wiped it away in annoyance.

"So," Sookie frowned, "is there anything we can do now?"

I wagged my eyebrows at her suggestively. She exhaled, exasperated, but then reached up to my face and gently drew her thumb along the streak of blood. She was concerned for me, and for some reason it turned me on.

"Fuck all of this," I mumbled, wrapping her in my arms and kissing her deeply. I could feel her begin to melt against me, although she pulled back at the last second.

"And afterward you'll sleep for a few hours?" I gave her a noncommittal shrug, running a hand up her back and into her hair, dragging her body against mine. She pushed at my chest and stepped away, eyes sharp.

"Eric Northman, if anything happens tonight, I do not want to have to save your ass all by myself!"

"My hero," I muttered only partly in jest, as I nudged us back into the bedroom, pulling her down into sheets that still smelled of her.