I attempted to make Merlotte shut his filthy shifter mouth. I tried to convey the knowledge that the other vampire who stood there with us was a dangerous one, especially with what the shifter had insinuated. Not only could he not grasp any meaning, understand subtlety, or he was just too far-gone in his rage to actually comprehend anything. "She hasn't been at work in days!" He continued. "Jason said she hasn't been home. What have you done with her?"
"Was Jason using the fact that his unwashed clothing sits undone in her laundry room as confirmation that she has not been home?"
Some of his anger deflated with that question. Some, not all, so it was still vitally urgent for me to remove him from Victor's presence, the sooner, the better for the both of us. I had no idea of what else would come out of Merlotte's mouth or just how Victor might interpret it, and then try to use it against me in any way he could. I grabbed Merlotte's arm and would not release it when he attempted to pull free. "I have nothing to explain pertaining to my wife or her location," I hissed at him. "Let us discuss just how little information I owe you concerning my wife, privately, in my office!"
I began forcing him toward my office and he must have had what Pam calls a 'light bulb moment' or realized something was amiss because he gave no struggle, nor did he say another word. He was about two regrettable minutes too late for that.
I turned back around when I heard the third set of footsteps. "The shifter and I will be having a private discussion…alone," I said to Madden. He looked much too eager to join in our conversation. "His interest in my wife is personal and does not affect Area or state business."
"It most certainly would if this was a demonstration of how you ran things in your Area." I felt Merlotte's pulse increase under my hand.
"He is a shifter, out of my domain and rule."
"If you have not yet managed to earn his respect, or at least enough that would have kept him from behaving as he has then I believe that could be Area or state business. The different groups may not always get along, but the fact that he felt it was more than acceptable to come to your place of business in a tirade, demanding answers about your wife? I believe that shows an evident weakness in your rule."
It was right there on his face. He had known earlier in the conversation that something was going on, but with Victor's statement Sam now knew he had walked in on a very tumultuous situation and that like Sookie's pancakes, he had made it 'plode. Contrary to what his behavior in the last few minutes indicated, Sam was not a stupid man. He would be on his best, or at least better, behavior if for no other reason than it was in Sookie's best interests.
That and, if he made the current mess a bigger one, I would kill him.
"Believe me, I will 'manage' the shifter," I told Victor and fortunately, said Shifter remained silent at my proclamation.
"I will ensure that you do," Victor said, and I knew he had no intention of allowing me to speak a word to Merlotte devoid of his presence. Unfortunately, there was no intention of any conversation between Merlotte and me together with Victor. We had reached a stalemate of sorts, one I was determined to win.
"You cannot have it both ways," I told him, prepared to use his own words against him. "You cannot wrongly accuse me of being so lax that I would allow any such kind of insolence, yet not permit me to discipline alone. It would undermine my authority." That did not seem as if it would be good enough for Victor and honestly, I would not expect it to; however, when I pointed out that it would eventually undermine the state's authority as a whole, he could not fight against that though he clearly wanted to.
Once again I started to pull the shifter toward the hallway that led to my office, and finally using his intelligence, Sam came quietly and gave no resistance. I made it to my office door without having heard a third set of footsteps following and considered that a small victory! I did not believe Sam agreed.
"What's going on?" he demanded when I flung him to the couch. I ran a hand through my hair and turned my back to him. Whatever had happened to Sookie most likely had happened at his bar. He might have some answers for me. I was worried that in order to get those answers he might have, I would probably have to give him the few that I had.
"Sookie is fine," I told him, starting first with that. I knew we would accomplish nothing if he did not hear those words. "She has been staying with me."
"It's not like her not to call into work."
"I apologize for that oversight."
"It's not your oversight. Sookie would call into work if she could."
He had me there. Unless something was preventing her from doing so, she would not miss work without calling. Something had prevented her from that, but it was likely none of the scenarios that were running through Merlotte's head. I doubted that he would really believe she was cursed and reverted back to her childhood nature and stature.
That would not be the first logical leap for most.
"What do you remember about the last time Sookie was at work?" I asked him while I tried to avoid telling him anything. He was not stupid, and he would never do anything to intentionally hurt Sookie, but with his anger he could do so much to inadvertently hurt her. I needed to ensure that never happened.
His eyes widened, and he rose from the couch about to start another tirade. I do not know if it was my hand that I had put up in case he tried to charge me again. I do not know if the look on my face matched the feeling I had in my head and that stopped him. I do know that I very much appreciated that he stopped and sat back down on the couch.
I took a seat behind my desk as he said, "You said Sookie was fine."
I nodded and said, "She was fine when I left her and I have not felt anything from our bond that would suggest that had changed."
He looked angry at my mention of the bond, and then he said, "Something's up."
"Something is up as you put it," I told him before again asking about Sookie's last day at work.
He shrugged and said, "It was work." Oh yes. He was going to be fabulous help.
"Was anything that you remember out of the ordinary, even the smallest bit?" If he did not remember anything, could I have been wrong in my thinking that it happened at his bar? Was the demon that placed the curse so powerful that it placed a curse on the entirety of the bar so no one would remember what happened?
Sam shook his head. "I wasn't out front too much. I was in and out stocking the bar. Sookie told me she was taking a break in my office…," He paused as if he remembered something.
"What?" I asked him, curious at his hesitation.
"She came back from her break and was serving a woman I didn't recognize."
"Is that unusual?"
"For a weeknight, anybody but a local's a bit unusual."
"Did anything seem off about her?" I asked, excited that I may have found my first real clue.
"Other than being not from Bon Temps, nothin' that I can remember."
"But Sookie served her?" He nodded at that and I asked him for a description of the woman.
"I don't know, Eric…," he told me as he sighed and collapsed himself back on my couch. "She was ordinary, nothin' special." I fought my inclination to put Merlotte's head through a wall. One, I did not want to have to spend the night with the odor of spackling in my office. Two, though it really did not seem it, Merlotte might be able to tell me something helpful. Maybe. Eventually.
He must have seen the look on my face because he tried. He tried as he told me, "She had blond hair, but it was a dye job. She was a few inches taller than Sookie…," He paused and his eyes lit up. I hoped he had remembered something useful before he started wagging his tail; his description fit most of the females in the state.
"There was a smell. I don't know if it was from her, but I remember running into the kitchen thinking something was burnin', it was on fire. Everything was fine, but I still smelled it."
That was something that I could work with and it almost confirmed Amelia and Cataliades' thoughts that there was a demon involved. Now I just needed to establish why the demon had targeted Sookie. I thought of the vampire that most likely still stood out at my bar. I thought of the King who was a state away. If they had wanted to get to me, using Sookie would be a way to go. I just did not think that they, especially Victor, would stay quiet for this long.
I thought of the Fae. Niall was supposedly getting his house in order after just having won a war. It seemed whenever there was war, there were always a few on the losing side who could just not let go. They had targeted Sookie before. Could they be doing so again?
I had no answer for that, but it was my hope that Cataliades would. I had anticipated hearing from the lawyer tonight, but I knew that he, too, was fighting for his safety and there was no guarantee he would be able to get back to me this evening. Hell, there was no guarantee he would be able to get back to me this week, this month. I knew that he cared for Sookie and for her he would get back to me as soon as he was able.
It just killed me that I had no idea when that would be.
"Do you remember Sookie leaving that night?" I said, trying to return the focus to something I could work on and then work through.
He thought for a few seconds before he told me that he did not. "She just wasn't there. She had a rough night and I figured she just left early."
"Rough night?" I asked. I did not expect the malicious look the shifter shot me at my question.
"She never blamed you. She understood that you were trying to keep yourself," he hesitated, and then added, "and her safe. She understood that in her head, but that didn't mean she still wasn't hurt by you leaving her alone." I had surmised as much already. I knew that because I had felt it coming from her through our bond. I knew that from the voicemail she left me. I may have known, yet hearing it, hearing it aloud and from another man, the shifter, cut me deeper than I would have ever cared to admit.
"Her leg had been bothering her that night. She hit it against something and fell into the booth of the woman she was serving. It was a difficult night," he repeated.
"You did not call to see if she had made it home after you realized she was just missing?"
"I'm not sure you're the one to be sayin' anything to me about not callin' her!" He had me there, but that was something I would never admit out loud, or admit it to him anyway. "Did you feel anything from her that night?"
His question to me caught me off guard. I quickly answered no because I had not, not anything that would be helpful anyway. I had felt her frustration while it echoed mine when she realized that I would not be seeing her again that night. I felt her pain and dismay while she must have been leaving the voicemail. I could not remember feeling anything else. I did not feel when she was cursed. As a matter of fact, I did not even realize anything was wrong until I woke the next evening.
What the hell could have caused that? My list of questions had just increased.
"What's wrong with her?" Sam asked, his voice concerned.
I explained to him that I was not going to tell him. I could see the anger returning to his face so I put up a hand to try and ward him off. "You could easily be used to try to obtain information, especially if it was determined to have happened at your diner."
"I would never-," he started to say. I interrupted him and said, "You could be forced."
It seemed as if he saw the logic of that in his head. "If you need help, will you let me know?"
I tried to keep my voice steady as I told him, "If there was anything you could do to help Sookie, I would let you know." I would have, not for him, but for her.
"And she really is okay?" I nodded. "I guess I'll have to trust that."
"I will need you to listen for information." It was his turn to nod while he told me he would do that as he turned and started to make his way out of my office.
"We still need to do something about Victor and you can never come into my bar like that again," Merlotte seemed to know exactly what would appease Victor.
"I'm not just gonna let you beat me up so you get to prove to your bloodsucker boss that you're a big, tough vampire," he told me.
"I would not give him the satisfaction," I told him and I meant it.
Sam sighed before he said, "So what do I need to do? To keep me safe, to keep Sookie safe, to not make it any harder for you to get us all out of this mess…what do I have to do?"
I thought for a few seconds before telling him, "Go home. You leave through the back door, and I will return to the bar and deal with Victor." I would not look forward to that. "Do not go into work for a few days. Try not to leave your house in that time. Victor will need to believe you were properly chastised. So, you think you could act the part?"
He grumbled, but admitted that it could have been the lesser of two evils. He was about to walk out the door when he turned and said, "She's safe?"
"Yes."
"You'll make sure she stays safe?"
"As long as I am on this planet."
He looked at me and gave me one last nod of his head before making his way out of the club using the back door. Once he was gone, I took a shower and changed my clothes, all to act the part that I had punished Merlotte before I returned to the bar and played nice with Victor. I wondered if he knew I was imagining all the ways I could kill him while we talked.
I walked into my house much later than I planned. Victor kept me at the club, but only by his mere presence. He did have some questions for me, but they were actually reasonable questions, much the same as Pam had experienced when she dealt with him. I still did not give him accurate answers, but I was more concerned with what could have caused his change in tactics. Was it simply a coincidence or was it part of a larger picture? With Cataliades not getting back to me yet this evening, it would not appear that any of my questions were to be answered this night.
I was about to go down to my room having sensed that Sookie was still asleep, but finding Amelia perched on the top step stopped me. Before I could say anything she said, "Sookie's down there. I didn't want her to wake up and be scared." She said it as if it had happened before. She continued by saying, "She woke up a few hours ago after having a nightmare. She wouldn't tell me what it was about, but she wanted to sleep in your bed. She said she felt safer. I didn't think you'd mind."
"I do not. Call me in the future though if she is frightened."
"I didn't know if you'd be able to talk," she said, and managed to keep most of the accusation out of her voice. Most, but not all.
"Call hereafter," I told her while I stepped over her and started down the stairs. I had tried to keep the anger out of my voice, but I was not entirely sure I succeeded. I was not sure if I was more angry with myself for Amelia's words being true, or with her for simply calling attention to them.
I knew Pam had been there earlier and would be back before the sun rose. My guess was that my child was shopping though I was not entirely sure I wanted to know for what she was shopping.
I went downstairs and walked softly over to the bed where Sookie lay sleeping. Her eyes were moving behind her closed eyelids and I hoped that she was having much better dreams. I knelt down and moved back some of her hair that had fallen into her face and she stirred, not in a deep sleep. I gently called her name, wanting her to be awake when I moved her.
"You're home," she said with a smile on her face.
"And checking on you as I promised."
"Do you have to go to sleep now?"
"Soon."
"You'll need your bed back then," she told me, but she did not make a move to get out of it. I saw a sleepy glint in her eyes and though I would want nothing more for her to be with me during the day, I knew that it could not be, no matter how much I longed for it.
"You would not want to be locked down here with me all day," She nodded her head though not in agreement with my words.
"What would you eat?" I asked. She pushed her arms under the covers and I could smell the snacks she had packed for herself before she pulled them out to show me. "You would be bored," I told her.
"Nope," she said, popping the 'p'. "I brought books and coloring and I can make up stories!"
"And when you needed to use the bathroom?" I asked her.
I could see that she had no response for that one. "Maybe I should be upstairs. But who will stay with you when you have your nightmares?" she asked.
I looked at her little face filled with so much concern for me. "If I know you are safe and well, I will not have any nightmares," I answered. "Amelia said you had a nightmare?" She nodded and told me that it was a very scary one. "Do you want to tell me what made it so scary?"
"There's other kind of magic out there. Not yours and mine, but other, right?" she asked. I nodded and told her that there was. Her voice was vey quiet as she told me about her dream. "Someone with other magics, two someones, took me away. They took me away and they hurt me," she said, closer to an actual whisper. This was the way adult Sookie had sounded in the days that followed her kidnapping, after I had taken her back to her own home. "They hurt me right here," she said while she pulled her leg from under the comforter and pointed to a spot on her leg. I had not noticed it before, but she still had a faint scar there. There was further proof that I was, in fact, dealing with an adult Sookie in a little Sookie's body rather than a true regression.
"That must have been very scary," I told her, unsure what to say. Was I supposed to treat it as the nightmare she believed it to be or the memory it truthfully was?
"It was," she answered back. "I was very scared, but you didn't come to save me. You couldn't come to save me," she said, and suddenly I felt that we were no longer discussing a dream. "Your boss wouldn't let you!"
"I would have been there if I could have."
"You took care of me after. You fixed my boo-boos!"
"I tried. I did all that I could," I told her. I wondered if she realized that we were not simply speaking of her dream.
"Yes. Yes, you did," she told me while she looked right at me. It was then I realized that this was yet another conversation I should have had with Sookie. My only hope was that to talk about it now might help her remember and could help us in talking about it in the future.
"You won't let them take me again."
"They will never," I told her. Even if they were still alive, they would not have ever had a second chance to take her.
"You make things better, Eric," she told me. I was glad one of us thought so! Though it was always my intention when it came to Sookie, I was not certain that I was, indeed, making things better, but that was a discussion for another night as sunrise rapidly approached.
"Up to bed with you," I told her as I lifted her from my bed. Her little arms wrapped around my neck and I knew that was something I would very much miss. I hoped I would not soon have to miss her adult arms around my neck. "Do you want one surprise before bed?" A nod to my neck was all the response I received.
I rose up gently from the floor as to not frighten her and slowly began flying us up into her bedroom. Once she realized we were moving, Sookie let out a squeal. I flew us up to her room and right up onto her bed. I knelt down and kissed her forehead as I told her I hoped she had nicer dreams.
"Goodnight, Eric," she said, even though it was much closer to morning.
Goodnight, Sookie. Have a good day and I will see you when the sun sets."
As I was walking back downstairs, Pam met me and walked with me the rest of the way. "Amelia was talking to Tray earlier. He's been having a hard time. Amelia didn't say anything specific, didn't even really say anything about Sookie, but she overheard the conversation."
"And it gave her more memories," I said while I climbed into my bed.
Pam followed and I noticed that we would be sharing the bed again tonight. "Is that a bad thing?" she asked while she made herself comfortable.
"I do not know. I just do not know," I answered and her hand slipped into mine. It was something that worried us both, all the unknowns. It was not the most comforting thought to have as Death and the sun overtook me.
Sookie's memories sure seem to be fickle creatures at the moment. I do hope that you have enjoyed this chapter. Many, many thanks to MsBuffy and her editing abilities for her help on this chapter.
Merry Christmas to all those celebrating today! To those that aren't, I do hope you have a fantastical day and a great start to your weekend!