As it happened, Bernard's coffin was much too small to accommodate Eric's height, so he found a place to sleep in the basement of the mansion. This made his escape much easier, especially since most of Edgington's people did not wake right at sundown. After visiting Sookie's room to make sure she was gone, he left the mansion without a hint of trouble. The Lincoln was gone. Since no one was about the grounds, he took a glance into the building where Bill had been imprisoned, and he was satisfied again. Nothing left to do but fly to the parking garage at Alcide's place to meet Sookie.
The Lincoln was easy enough to spot, especially considering that jagged metal was sticking up from the trunk. He raced to the car and ripped up what was left of the trunk. Inside lay Bill and Sookie, the latter as pale as a living human could possibly look. She was covered with her own blood.
"What are you two doing in here?" he asked Bill. Bill opened his mouth to answer, but Eric saw immediately what had happened. Sookie's paleness and Bill's healthy color were all the answer he needed. "You son of a bitch."
"It wasn't my fault, Eric."
Eric reached into the trunk and lifted Sookie, holding her close to his chest. Her heart was still beating, but she needed blood immediately. She would be dead already if she didn't have his own blood giving her strength. Without another look at Bill, he hurried to Alcide's door and banged until the Were flung it open.
"Oh, Christ," Alcide said, moving aside. "Come in, Eric. Is she…?"
"Not yet." Eric took her to the room she'd been using. "Alcide," he ordered, "grab that blanket and spread it on the bed. She's covered with blood." The Were did as he said, and Eric laid Sookie down gently. Then he bit his wrist.
"No," said Bill's voice behind him. Bill appeared at his side with bottles of TrueBlood that had been with him in the trunk. "This is better. She's had enough of your blood already."
Eric bared his fangs. "The synthetic shit isn't any good for her. She needs real blood, and she needs it now."
"But if she gets too much of ours…"
"Fine."
He licked his wrist to clean and close the wound, then stood aside as Bill sat on the bed beside Sookie and carefully poured TrueBlood down her throat. Emergency rooms and ambulances had begun keeping synthetic blood in stock, but only for… well, emergencies. Transfusions of real blood were always preferable because they went straight to the blood stream and had the advantage of being real blood. But TrueBlood had saved many lives. Hemophiliacs, in particular, liked to keep a stock at their homes.
"What the fuck were you thinking?" Eric asked as Sookie drank.
"Someone locked her in the trunk with me. It was pitch-black, I was starved out of my mind. It wasn't my fault."
"You almost—"
"I know, Eric."
When the bottle was drained, they waited a few moments. Sookie moaned and stirred, and Eric smiled with relief. "She's coming around. Maybe that was enough blood."
"She's looking much better," Alcide said, taking the empty bottle that Bill handed up to him.
Eric nodded. "She really is."
Her eyes opened slowly and then found each of them. She gave a small laugh, more of a schoolgirl's giggle, and murmured, "The Three Musketeers."
Eric frowned and looked down at Bill. "Is she hallucinating?"
"I think she's laughing at us," said the Were with a smile.
Bill took Sookie's hand and said her name quietly. She rested her eyes on him and told him in a weak voice, "They said, was I coming back for the crucifixion?"
"Who said that to you?" Bill asked.
"Guards at the gate."
"The guards at the gates of the mansion asked you if you were coming back for a crucifixion tonight? This night?"
"Yes." She was taking long, slow blinks, and each time it seemed that her heavy eyelids would stay closed.
"Whose?" Eric asked, stepping closer to her.
"Don't know."
He studied her face, which was still a little pale, and looked at the ugly wound Bill had left on her neck. It wasn't a vampire's usual clean bite; it looked rather like a dog had grabbed her by the neck and shaken her around. It suddenly struck him that Bill had probably tried to rape her. He would find out later. "I would have expected you to say, 'Where am I? What happened to me?' Not ask whose crucifixion would be taking place." He paused and noted the time. "Perhaps is taking place."
"Maybe they meant mine? Maybe they decided to kill me tonight," Bill said.
"Or perhaps they caught the fanatic who tried to stake Betty Joe. He would be a prime candidate for crucifixion." If Eric had access to him, he would be a prime candidate to have his limbs ripped off, one by one, for contributing to what happened to Sookie.
"Not the picture I got," came Sookie's voice, barely audible.
"You were able to read something from the Weres?"
She moved her head in a sort of nod. "I think they meant Bubba."
Fuck. "That cretin. They caught him?" Bubba was useful enough, but he had certainly caused his share of trouble lately.
"Think so."
Bill sighed and ran a hand through his already messy hair. "We'll have to retrieve him if he's still alive."
Going back to Edgington's mansion was not something he had planned to do – not just tonight, but for many years at least. Now Bubba's stupidity could get them killed or even start the war he had warned Sookie about.
"Eric?" Bill said, waiting for a response.
"I guess you are right," he conceded. He didn't bother masking his fury. "We have the responsibility of him. I can't believe his home state is willing to execute him! Where is their loyalty?"
"And you?" Bill asked the Were.
Eric could have told Bill Alcide's answer before he gave it. It was reasonable and pragmatic; besides, why should Alcide risk his life to save a vampire he didn't even know?
"I don't see how I can," Alcide said. "My business, my father's, depends on my being able to come here often. And if I'm on the outs with Russell and his crew, that would be almost impossible. It's going to be difficult enough when they realize Sookie must be the one who stole their prisoner."
"And killed Lorena."
Eric's eyes widened and he turned his gaze back to Sookie slowly, as if any second he would realize that he'd imagined what she said. "You offed Lorena?" He was so proud and amused he could have kissed her.
"Sookie staked her. It was a fair kill." Bill's voice was dispassionate.
He knew he was grinning in a very undignified way, but fuck that. "She killed Lorena in a fight?"
"Very short fight," Sookie said.
He could have told her that any fight between a vampire and a human was a very short fight, and that nine times out of ten, it was the vampire telling the story later.
The Were seemed overly delighted. "Sookie killed a vampire." The warning looks on the vampires' faces must have made him realize that he shouldn't sound too happy about killing their kind, so he cleared his throat and poured Sookie a glass of water.
Eric gave her a few moments to drink, then said briskly, "Back to the original subject. If Sookie has not been pegged as having helped Bill escape, she is the best choice to get us back on the grounds without setting off alarms. They might not be expecting her, but they won't turn her away, either, I'm sure. Especially if she says she has a message for Russell from the queen of Louisiana, or if she says she has something she wants to return to Russell..." He trailed off and shrugged. They got the idea.
"Flag of truce?" He looked at Sookie, who cleared her throat and went on, "Do the vampires have such a thing?"
They did, in a way, but it would require that he go to Edgington's mansion as himself and speak to the king in private. It would also mean that Sophie-Anne must be told of the situation. Both requirements meant that his ass would be on the line.
"Of course, then I'd have to explain who I am," he mused aloud. He kept the rest to himself. In his mind, this wasn't even an option.
But Sookie seemed to have moved on already. She was watching Alcide with a guarded expression, and Eric assumed she was reading the Were's mind. "Know who pushed me in the trunk and slammed it shut?" she said suddenly.
Alcide said nothing, but he left the room and shut the door. Well, he may not want to know who had tried to murder Sookie, but Eric was very interested. "So, who did the deed, Sookie?" he asked her.
"His ex-girlfriend," she replied. Ah. That explained it. "Not so ex, after last night," she continued grimly.
Bill looked pained at the reminder of what he'd done to her. He should be pained. "Why would she do that?"
There was no reply from Sookie, so Eric explained for her. "Sookie was represented as Alcide's new girlfriend to gain entrée to the club."
"Oh. Why did you need to go to the club?"
Again Sookie was silent, though her expression betrayed a bit of impatience. How could Bill not know why she had been there?
"She must have gotten hit on the head a few times Bill. She was trying to 'hear' where they had taken you." And, he reminded himself, a certain vampire Sheriff had pleaded with her to help save his ass.
Before Bill could reply, Sookie changed the subject cleanly and abruptly. "It's dumb to go back in there. What about a phone call?"
He backtracked his mind to Bubba's predicament and considered this easy solution. Just like a human to suggest it. No bloodshed, no kings and queens haggling over a truce. "Well," he said simply, "what a good idea."
"I'll get a phone book from Alcide," said Bill. He laid the backs of his fingers against Sookie's cheek. "And some more blood for you."
"Oh, no, please," Sookie begged. "Not anymore of that stuff. It's so gross."
"You need more. I'll see if Alcide has something I can mix it with so it won't taste as bad."
She seemed too tired to fight and said nothing as Bill left them alone. Eric stood looking at her in silence while she closed her eyes and rested. Bill returned a few minutes later with the phone, a Jackson phone book, and a mug, which he offered to Sookie. Alcide came back into the room as well, much to Eric's annoyance.
"It has apple juice in it," Bill told Sookie as he handed over the mug. "I hope it helps." While she drank, he began flipping through the phone book. "I'll just… explain the situation," he mused aloud. "Tell them who Bubba is, and…"
"No," Eric broke in sharply. "The last person who should be calling on Bubba's behalf is you. And I… They don't know who I am, really."
"Surely you don't expect Sookie to deal with them."
"As a matter of fact, yes. She saved Betty Jo's life, and now Betty Jo can return the favor. She can say…" He thought for a moment, then talked to Sookie instead of Bill. "Sookie, you can tell her that you've been kidnapped, and that your abductors want Bubba back. Explain who he really is, and I'm sure they'll release him. Can you do that for us?"
She drained the last bit of blood and apple juice – surely a hideous combination – from the mug and nodded. Evidently bored with vampire machinations, Alcide took the empty mug and returned to the kitchen. Bill gave Sookie the phone and showed her Edgington's number in the phone book. Then it was a matter of listening to her conversation and waiting to learn Bubba's fate. She handled the vampires well, he thought. A good balance of confidence and humility. They should be eating out of her hand. After a while, she tried to sit up, with Eric and Bill assisting her. She seemed to be waiting for Betty Jo to come back on the line with news. And the news was good.
"We got him down in time," he heard Betty Jo say, and Sookie confirmed with a happy, "The call came in time!"
He silently thanked whatever gods there were. "Tell them to just let him go, and he will take himself home. Tell them that we apologize for letting him stray."
He knew that Betty Jo could hear him, but Sookie repeated the instructions.
"Would you ask if he could stay and sing to us a little?" Betty Jo asked. "He's in pretty good shape."
"She wants to know if he can stay and sing for them," Sookie repeated.
Oh, for fuck's sake. "She can ask him, but if he says no, she must take it to heart and not ask him anymore. It just upsets him if he's not in the mood. And sometimes when he does sing, it brings back memories, and he gets, uh…. obstreperous." Being around Bubba during one of his howling, violent fits was not a pleasant experience.
Betty Jo agreed to this, then seemed determined to try Eric's rapidly waning patience by wanting to keep Bubba for a while. He reached for the phone, and Sookie gave it to him.
"Yes?" he said, adopting the flawless accent he had learned during his years in London.
"Would it be possible for us to keep El… er, Bubba? We'd love to have him here."
"We really don't like to do that. He's a sacred trust, and he is our responsibility."
"Oh, but we would take such good care of him!" Betty Jo pleaded.
"If he gets upset, he has to be managed firmly but gently. You don't know what you're biting off. If something were to happen to him…"
"We'll pay you. A hundred grand sound fair?"
Eric smiled. Money, not begging, was the language he understood. "Perfectly. Very well, then."
Moments after he had finished negotiating and hung up the phone, it chirped and silenced in the middle of the first ring. The Were must have been expecting a call of his own. Only a minute later, he was back in the bedroom and ordering them out and into the empty apartment next door.
As Bill lifted Sookie carefully from the bed, Eric followed Alcide from the bedroom. "Key?" he asked shortly.
"Don't have one," Alcide replied.
Eric ran ahead to fiddle with the lock. He inserted one of his credit cards into the crack between the door and frame, and carefully pushed the lock aside. Security here was a joke, then. Bill shut the door and lowered Sookie to her feet, though he kept his arms around her. The three of them stood in silence for a little while, but Eric could hear nothing yet. Alcide and his guest must be speaking in whispers.
Eric could see the small puffs of Sookie's breath in the cold air of the apartment. Bill noticed, too, because he guided her into one of the empty bedrooms and laid her on the floor, wrapping the blanket more snugly around her. He rejoined Eric, and the two of them stepped close to the wall adjoining Alcide's apartment, each pressing an ear to the cool surface.
"—with some blond slut from Louisiana, how do you expect me to react?" a woman's voice asked angrily.
Eric rolled his eyes. "What a bitch."
"And even introducing her to your sister?" the woman continued. "What the fuck was I supposed to think?"
"When did you talk to Janice, Debbie?" Alcide demanded.
"I went and saw her last night to see what's been up with you lately. And all she could talk about was Sookie this and Sookie that, how she looooves Sookie, and I bet Sookie's shit must smell like roses to your batshit sister."
Eric grinned and glanced at Sookie. She looked bemused, and he remembered that she had no idea what was being said, so he whispered a quick summary. When he returned to the argument in the next apartment, the woman was speaking again.
"—frankly don't know what you see in her."
"If you must know, Debbie," Alcide said slowly, in a low voice, "she was the best sex I've ever had."
The rest of their petty argument meant nothing after that. Eric knew he was gaping, but there was no help for it. Surely Sookie – his Sookie – hadn't fucked the Were? Not when she was here looking for Bill, not when she had refused even his own advances? He looked at her, trying to see the truth in her face, and he found it. He was satisfied.
He couldn't say the same for the pair next door, judging by the sound of a hard slap.
"Leave us for a moment," Bill said.
Eric saw the conflicting emotions on the younger vampire's face and could have told him that there was no way in hell Sookie had slept with Alcide, but he said nothing. Better to let them sort it out, along with all the other things they had to discuss. Now was as good a time as any. Besides, Bill no longer had any claim on Sookie… unless she chose to forgive him. Without a trace of remorse, he found himself wishing that she wouldn't. Bill was waiting, so Eric nodded with feigned disinterest and left them alone.
A nagging part of his brain told him that Sookie should, and probably would, forgive Bill. The incident hadn't been Bill's fault, though he should have explained it to her instead of lying and running away. And if she cared about him…
He stood close to the wall that separated him from Alcide and his woman. He had no desire to listen to a reconciliation between Bill and Sookie. A fight between a Were and his bitch would serve his mood much better. The pair did not disappoint; they argued as if they knew they had an audience, and before long Eric found himself grinning from ear to ear.
When Sookie burst out from the bedroom some time later, it took him a moment to reorient himself from smirks and laughter to the response her stricken face called for. Before he could speak, she said quietly, "Take me home."
"Of course," he replied without hesitation. He paused for a moment, realized what she was asking, and added, "Now?"
She nodded and folded her arms across her chest as if she were trying to hold herself together inside the jacket she wore. "Yes. Alcide can drop my things by when he goes back to Baton Rouge."
He looked past her to see Bill in the other room. From the expression on his face, forgiveness and reconciliation had not been on their agenda. He returned his attention to Sookie and remembered the ripped-up trunk of the car. "Is the Lincoln drivable?" he asked.
"Oh, yes," she said, fumbling in her pocket and tossing the keys to him. "Here."
She stepped into the apartment's bare white bathroom and shut the door, while Eric went to Bill.
"Don't ask," Bill muttered just as Eric opened his mouth.
"I wasn't going to."
Bill shoved his fists into his pockets and turned away. "Is there anything I need to take care of here before I leave?"
"Speak to the Were and make absolutely certain that he and Sookie hid the dead body well. Call Sophie-Anne, just in case she has tried to contact you while you were gone. Tell her you were visiting friends in Jackson. Lorena's maker—"
"Already dead."
"Good. Tell Alcide to mention his friend Leif a few times before he leaves the city. I think that's all for now."
He and Sookie left the apartment together and rode the elevator to the parking garage in silence. As Sookie made her way to the mangled Lincoln, Eric hung back and made a quick phone call.
"Hello," said Alcide's tired voice.
"I am taking Sookie home. You will deliver her things to her next time you are nearby. You will see to it that that is soon. Am I clear?"
There was a low growl, but Alcide knew better than to cross Eric. "Perfectly."
"One more thing. You have never fucked Sookie, and you never will. Stop telling people that you have. I won't be as forgiving next time." He flipped his phone shut without waiting for a response and jogged to rejoin Sookie. "I had to give Bill a few instructions about cleaning up the mess he caused."
She still said nothing. After she'd buckled her seat belt, they were on their way. Every time he looked out the rearview mirror, he could see the dangerous torn metal of the trunk. He would have to send Hank Danos a replacement vehicle. Not that this was a particularly great car. Each time it failed to accelerate as fast as he would like, he cursed it under his breath. A smile tipped Sookie's mouth occasionally, but she sat in silence as he drove through the city and merged onto I-20.
It had been his selfish wish that she wouldn't forgive Bill, and he couldn't make himself ashamed of it, but he had to wonder why she didn't. She had done the same thing after the incident in Dallas: run away when the situation got difficult. If he had learned one thing about her, it was that she was no coward. So, then, what made her run?
"Had it occurred to you that you tend to walk away when things between you and Bill become rocky?" he asked carefully. "Not that I mind, necessarily, since I would be glad for you two to sever your association." He took his eyes off the road briefly to look at her. "But if this is the pattern you follow in your romantic attachments, I want to know now."
Of course, the difference between himself and Bill was that Bill always let her go. Had he been in Bill's place tonight, he would have followed her to the car and flown alongside it if he had to. All the way to Bon Temps. He would have fought to keep her. I won't let you run away from me, Sookie.
Her tone when she finally replied was icy. "Firstly, Eric, what happens between Bill and me is just none of your damn business."
Wrong, he thought, because he is my subject, and you are my… mine.
"Second, my relationship with Bill is the only one I've ever had, so I've never had any idea what I'm going to do even from day to day, much less establishing a policy."
Impossible that a woman like this could have been a virgin when Bill first had her. But he remembered her on that first night in Fangtasia, with her Sunday picnic dress and her Southern manners, and he knew it was true. Human men were fools, all of them.
"Third," she continued, and now her voice was weary instead of angry, "I'm through with you all. I'm tired of seeing all this sick stuff. I'm tired of having to be brave, and having to do things that scare me, and having to hang out with the bizarre and the supernatural. I am just a regular person, and I just want to date regular people. Or at least people who are breathing."
He wanted to tell her that she was too good for a "regular" man, that she was not a regular person. She was better. He wanted to tell her that he could breathe if he wanted to, even though he didn't have to. He wanted to tell her that she didn't have to be brave; she simply was. He wanted to pull over the car and finish what he had started the night before in Russell Edgington's mansion.
But he could feel what she felt, and none of these things would have helped. She felt isolated, exhausted, and betrayed. She felt used. Her eyes were pained when they met his.
"I'm listening to what you say," he said slowly. "I can tell you mean it. I've had your blood. I know your feelings." There was something else he wanted to say, but he couldn't think of a way to say it without offending her. "You are… spoiled for humans."
She understood him. "Maybe I am, though I don't see that as much of a loss, since I didn't have any luck with guys before." She sighed. "But I'd be happier with no one than I am now."
I would make you happy, he almost said. I succeed at everything I attempt, and I would do everything in my power to make you happy.
They both fell into silence. Gradually her feelings shifted into contentment, something he didn't want to disturb, even though he wanted to talk to her. It had been a long time since he'd been so interested in another person. After so many years, human lives tended to blend together and become essentially the same dull story. But he found that he was curious about Sookie's life. He wanted to learn everything he could about her. He realized with some surprise that he wanted to tell her about himself. Perhaps one day he would show her the sketches he had kept of his children, recopied many times over the centuries as paper wore away.
Noticing that the fuel light had come on, he took an exit in Arcadia. Sookie yawned and rubbed the back of her neck. "Want me to do it?" she asked, motioning to the gas pump.
"No, thank you." That she would offer, in her condition, was endearing. He watched her as she walked inside slowly, chatting with another woman who had a bad dye job.
The nozzle gave its loud thump to indicate that the tank was full, and he screwed the fuel cap back on and clicked the small door closed. He rarely paid for gas with cash, but he didn't want to use his credit card until he was back in Shreveport. He flipped through bills in his wallet as he walked towards the door, his mind wandering onto Sookie.
"Now!" someone shouted, and before he could drag his distracted mind back into the present, a silver net engulfed him.
He dropped to his knees, grinding his teeth against the burning pain. There were two of them. The larger one, who held a shotgun, walked around and bludgeoned the back of Eric's head. He fell beside the truck and cursed them in several languages.
Sookie. Fuck. With any luck, her sense of self-preservation would overcome her innate bravery and keep her out of the way as the two men robbed the convenience store. But he knew better than to rely on Sookie's sense of self-preservation. He closed his eyes for a few minutes and smelled his own blood. The pain didn't seem as bad now. He maneuvered his body until the net caught on part of their truck, then he rolled easily out. His skin was covered with burns, not to mention the blood from the wound on his head. He made his way to the opposite side of the store, where he had noticed a water spigot as he pumped the gas. The cold water would be welcome on his skin, which still felt like it was on fire.
A sound from the back of the building got his attention, and he crept around the edge slowly to find Sookie. She didn't see him, so he slipped up behind her. "Sookie," he whispered, covering her mouth with his hand so she wouldn't cry out and give them both away. "Sorry. I should have thought of a better way to let you know I was here."
She gave a slight nod and said his name against the palm of his hand. Any other time, he would have relished the feel of her lips on his skin. Now, however, he freed her mouth and stepped back a little.
"We gotta save him," she said urgently.
He cocked his head to one side and stared at her. "Why?" He couldn't imagine which of the two bastards deserved to be saved.
"Because he's getting beaten for our sakes," she replied in an exasperated voice that was almost too loud. "And they're probably gonna kill him, and it'll be our fault!"
Ah, so she meant the gas station cashier. But he didn't know how a robbery could be construed as their fault. "They're robbing the store," he explained. "They had a new vampire net, and they thought they'd try it out on me. They don't know it yet, but it didn't work. But they're just opportunistic scum." Now can we please get the fuck out of here?
"They're looking for us."
He felt a sudden wave of anger from her, so he answered her calmly. "Tell me."
"When they came in the store, they asked for me. Well, not by name, but by description. Those guys weren't just trying out a new net. They were after us, both of us. I never would have gotten out of there if the clerk hadn't lied to them and distracted them for me."
He nodded. Then the man did indeed deserve to be saved. "Give me the shotgun."
"You know how to use one of these things?" she asked, and he could have sworn he saw a smirk tease her mouth.
"Probably as well as you." He was full of shit. He hadn't the first clue how to use a shotgun.
A glint of determination lit her eyes in the dark. "That's where you're wrong."
Before he could argue with her, she ducked down and ran around to the front of the store, with him right behind her. She pointed the shotgun up in the air and fired it, falling back against him from the force of the gun and from the debris that crashed down from the ceiling of the building. She steadied herself and aimed the gun at the attackers, who had the good sense to stop beating up the already very bloodied cashier.
"Let the young man go." There was steel in her voice, and it was sexy as hell.
"You gonna shoot us, little lady?" the bigger man asked with a sneer. They still stood behind the counter, which was on a raised platform.
Sookie moved the gun to point directly at him. "You bet your ass I am."
"And if she misses, I will get you," Eric added. He bared his fangs at the two men who had had the utter stupidity to fuck with him. If he weren't making such an effort to contain himself, they both would have been dead already.
"The vampire got loose, Sonny."
Apparently the big one was Sonny. "I see that," he replied.
While the two attackers stood helplessly looking back and forth at each other, Sookie, and Eric, the cashier made his way away from them.
"I see you found my shotgun," he said to Sookie with a slight smile. He walked behind them, and Eric heard three beeps as he dialed 911 on his cell phone.
Eric laid a hand on Sookie's shoulder. "Before the police get here, Sookie, we need to find out who sent these two imbeciles." He stepped around her and glared at Sonny, who appeared to be the one in charge. "Come down here." The bastard wisely obeyed. "Stay," Eric commanded him. He studied Sonny's face and smirked a little at the coward's trembling lip. "Who sent you here?"
"One of the Hounds of Hell."
He raised his eyebrows. Those damned Weres.
"A member of the motorcycle gang," Sookie murmured.
Eric nodded and stepped even closer to Sonny. "What did they tell you to do?"
"They told us to wait along the interstate," the thug answered immediately. Perhaps he wasn't entirely stupid. "There are more fellas waiting at other gas stations."
"What were you supposed to watch for?" Eric pressed.
"A big dark guy and a tall blond guy, with a blond woman, real young, with nice tits."
Eric snarled and slammed his fist into the bridge of Sonny's nose. "You are speaking of my future lover," he hissed. "Be more respectful. Why were you looking for us?"
It seemed the Weres, at least, had connected him with Bill and Sookie, though they probably didn't know that their "tall blond guy" was Eric Northman. They had seen Leif carry Sookie from Club Dead and leave with her and the other vampires. He hoped that was the only connection they had to go on.
"We were supposed to catch you," Sonny whimpered, tentatively lifting a hand to staunch the flow of blood from his nose. "Take you back to Jackson."
"Why?"
"The gang suspected you mighta had something to do with Jerry Falcon's disappearance. They wanted to ask you some questions about it. They had someone watching some apartment building, seen you two coming out in a Lincoln, had you followed part of the way. The dark guy wasn't with you, but the woman was the right one, so we started tracking you."
Eric listened quietly during this explanation, then turned to Sookie to see if Sonny was telling him the truth. She gave a slight nod.
"Do the vampires of Jackson know anything about this plan?" he asked.
"No, the gang figured it was their problem," Sonny shrugged. "But they also got a lot of other problems, a prisoner escape and so on, and lots of people out sick. So what with one thing and another, they recruited a bunch of us to help."
Eric looked at Sookie, who had been concentrating on both attackers as Sonny answered Eric's questions. "What are these men?" he asked, knowing she would understand him. He didn't want to say too much in front of the human cashier, who doubtless knew nothing about the supernatural world around him.
"Nothing," she replied after a thoughtful pause. "They're nothing."
They're less than nothing. "We need to get out of here. We weren't here," he told Sonny sternly, indicating himself and Sookie, "this lady and myself."
"Just the boy," Sonny said, glamoured into submission.
The other attacker seemed to be under the impression that a vampire had no way of forcing him to open his eyes. Eric smiled, leaned in front of the man's face, and blew. His eyes flew open, and Eric had him under control before he could close them again. "The lady and I weren't here. Just the cashier you tried to rob." Gently, he eased the shotgun out of Sookie's hands and returned it to the young man who had saved her. "Yours, I believe."
"Thanks." The cashier leveled the gun at the attackers and carefully avoided Eric's eyes. "I know you weren't here, and I ain't saying nothing to the police."
Eric smiled. He flipped open his wallet and tossed two twenties on the counter. "For the gas," he told the young man. "Sookie, let's make tracks."
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I was hoping to be done with book 3 in this part, but there was just too much. Only one more chapter, and we can get to the good stuff! ;-) I'm planning to post the next chapter this week, so the wait won't be as long as usual.
Thanks as always for your reviews!