AN: Forgive the mistakes, I lost my beta.
"Sitting here now… with you in this life. No, I settled. With this life, that ending would not be one I would call happy. The nightmare of a life, yes, that ending was more than I would have hoped for or even prayed for. I got lucky. The funny thing is, the man I ended up with in my nightmares, I don't even know him all that well in life. I would have started working for him after high school, with no other job prospects; it would have been a lifesaver." Sookie admitted, in another life, she owed Sam Merlotte a lot.
"You are still swimming in the same pond with the same supernaturals." Eric countered.
"Yes, but this time, I only jumped when I was sure I would win the fight." He smiled at that.
"Indeed, Miss Brigant."
"It helped that I accepted that I wasn't entirely human. I am mostly human, but the small supe in me is powerful.
"There is strength in acceptance," Eric said softly.
"Funny thing is, nightmare Sookie would have balked at that, despite knowing it was the truth. To think I was so determined to get that life I had back when that life wasn't that great to begin with. You look up rose-tinted glasses, and you'll see my picture." She chuckled humorlessly.
"How did you get started?" Eric asked.
"I was in college, my junior year when Desmond approached me with the job offer a few days before the Christmas break. One of the A.P's handmaidens went missing while on holiday in Italy. She put the initial team together and me in charge. It was six of us. I took Jason and gran because she suggested it, and on the first day, I saw why. Jason, just being himself, got us our first lead without knowing it. He was flirting with a pretty red-haired at the bar in the hotel. Her boyfriend turned out to be a were and one of the kidnappers. Never seen Jase so disappointed when he showed up." Sookie giggled. "They knew exactly who they had kidnapped. The queen of Italy thought he could get the A.P to become her own personal oracle. She thought the A.P would come for her handmaiden."
"I can see why she thought that. The A.P has done it before," Eric murmured.
"Had she gone, the queen's plans would have worked, so she hired me. It took just over a week, and we found where they kept her and rescued her." Sookie smiled, remembering how great it felt to have rescued her.
"So that is what happened to Alessia. I always wondered about her sudden disappearance and Lorenzo taking over without so much as a whimper from anybody." He chuckled. "Only she would attempt something so foolish." He added.
"You knew her?"
"Yeah, before she became queen, I was around a century or so. I liked her because she hated Appius on sight, and Francesco, the king at the time, trusted her implicitly. Appius and I were gone before he could utter a word." Eric cracked up laughing. "Appius ranted and raved at the disrespect, but it was all he could do in the end." Eric chortled.
"Yeah, getting to her was not an easy feat." Eric's eyes widened, and he sat up straight.
"You kidnapped Alessia?" His voice rose an octave with incredulity.
"I called the A.P to tell her of the successful mission. Tomáš and Patrick were joking about giving Alessia a taste of her own medicine. The A.P said there was a million in it for us and ended the call. We stood there looking at each other and just silently agreed to try. We spent nearly two days working on a plan."
What was the plan?" Eric asked eagerly.
"Get Lorenzo onboard. We were never going to get to Alessia, but he could. He was infuriated with her plan to kidnap the A.P and quickly agreed to help me. He delivered her to us silvered in a duffle bag the following night." Eric just stared at her.
"Isn't that how you delivered Compton to the queen?" Eric looked on the verge of crying as he laughed.
"I liked it, so I adopted it." Sookie shrugged. "I have delivered many a vampire that way. I've got a storage room full of duffle bags.
"The guys couldn't believe I had convinced Lorenzo to hand over his queen. On the flight home, they kept talking about how if I ever decided to do that for a living instead of law. They would happily work for me. By the time we landed in New York to go our separate ways, I had decided. Tomáš called a friend and told him about the job, and he accepted my job offer. I remembered Luna; she was brilliant at undercover work. Thankfully, she accepted my job offer. I needed three female security staff, and the weres already on my team; most knew someone who would make a great addition to the team.
I have two witches on my team, Lafayette and Jesus, a couple. I have eleven security guys, a male and a female…" Sookie chuckled, looking a little embarrassed. "You know how the Russians had agents trained in using sex as a weapon."
"You have a swallow and a raven." Eric had to admit it was clever.
"Funny enough, the raven is Russian; he uses his accent rather effectively." Sookie laughed. "I have two vampires, I think you know one, Mael and Zoe, she is my nighttime receptionist and PA." Eric nodded. Mael was over three centuries old, rivaled Eric in looks, and a skilled fighter. Mael is an excellent choice. "I am looking for a female vampire to join the team for fieldwork. I've had a couple, but neither worked out. Honestly, that last one… I nearly broke the one cardinal rule I have for myself and damn near killed her. Well… not really, I knew what she was up to the minute she interviewed for the job. I needed someone in less than twenty-four hours, so I used her. Two days later, she was gone."
"What did she do?"
"She glamoured Jason to steal my laptop, looking to steal my client list. Not that getting her hands on my laptop would have helped her get the list. The contract she signed would have made it impossible."
"Magically bound to the contract stipulations?" Sookie nodded. "Oh, I would have still killed her," Eric growled.
"I know," Sookie murmured. "Can I try something?" She looked somewhat nervous.
"Yes, go ahead."
"Try to resist my instructions," Sookie said. For several seconds, nothing happened, but he stayed seated and waited. "Stand up." Eric shifted but didn't stand.
"I had to resist." His voice was low, a little awed.
"Can I try something else?"
He smiled. "Go on." His curiosity had gotten the better of him.
Sookie laid her hand on his, almost as though caressing the back of his hand. "Stand up." His cheeks came off the seat, but he forced himself back down.
He let out a bark of laughter. "Huh, just like touch heightens what you can hear and see, it increases your influence."
"Exactly." Sookie smiled. "I find the older the vampire, the more difficult it is. It doesn't work on the A.P at all. Works too well on humans and weres."
Eric suspected she wasn't keen on her ability to manipulate. "You don't use it very often, do you."
"No, but I have used it a few times. I used it to help a friend who suffers from PTSD. In my nightmares, you and Niall helped him and paid him to keep an eye on me. This time, with Claudine's help, Terry is doing well." It's the only time she was grateful for the ability to effectively hypnotize without much effort. It was the closest description she had to what she could do. Even Desmond didn't know what to call it, and he'd had the ability for centuries.
"Considering how much we vampires use glamour even after the reveal, it is used even more by those unable to adapt. I will be the last person to have an issue with your gift or your use of it. Honestly, Sookie, I will encourage you to use it." Eric said.
"I hypnotize people without their knowledge and exploit that weakness."
"You just described glamouring. I have learned that you cannot glamour people to do what they wouldn't ordinarily do." Eric argued. "I have to get going. I will call you, and the invite to Fangtasia stands."
"I know." She chuckled. "I will make use of it this time." She intended to. After all, if she timed it right, it would be the perfect chance to get her hands on a lawyer.
"You are just determined to make me ask about your weekend." Pam stood in the doorway, arms crossed petulantly. She'd lasted longer than Eric could have ever predicted. "One minute you are bored enough to put a damper on my happiness from miles away; next, you are as giddy as a pimple-faced pubescent teenager with a promise of blowjob." She groused.
His only response was a raised eyebrow, but in truth, she had his excitement level spot on. "Sophie-Anne sent Compton to poach in Bon Temps, which ended in spectacular failure. Compton was delivered back to her yesterday morning in a duffle bag." Eric laughed joyously.
Pam uncrossed her arms and took the seat in front of his desk. "Who?" Pam asked eagerly.
"Remember the rumored telepath." He'd always known she wasn't a rumor.
"The one you were tempted to inquire about when sixty thousand disappeared from the accounts." Pam had talked him out of it, as they were both sure the guilty party was Longshadow. There was no need to pay so much to telepath to confirm what they already knew. "Wait a second, the telepath essentially lived down the road."
"Yep, and Sophie-Anne sent Compton to do what I don't know. Having met her, he stood about as much chance as a Fairy bleeding in a room full of vampires."
"So that's who had you on cloud infinity at the weekend."
He considered denying it, but the cat would be out of the bag if Sookie did visit the club. "I met her a year before the reveal. I let my frustrations get the better of me and almost became the production line for V." Pam sat forward.
"What do you know about Oklahoma?" Pam asked. The thought of her maker becoming a consort to some vampire who was only a few years older than Pam herself was unthinkable.
"I'm hoping to get a spy in her court soon. I am hoping to find a way to preempt Appius.
"The minute he realized the boy was that damaged and worse, a hemophiliac, he should have destroyed him."
"Not Appius, that would be admitting to his failure, and he will not do that," Eric murmured.
"And what if you can't find a way."
"Pray that I do." He whispered.
"What about… you still haven't told me her name." Pam rolled her eyes.
"Sookie Susannah Stackhouse Brigant."
"That's a mouth full." Pam snarked.
"In our world, she is Susannah Brigant. In the human world, she's Sookie Stackhouse… long story." He interjected before Pam could ask.
"Can't you ask her to help?" Pam asked. "If everything they say about her is true, she could help." His phone rang then.
"Hello, my favorite Viking." His smile had Pam rolling her eyes.
"I'm the only Viking, you know." He retorted, his smile getting more prominent.
"I am finally accepting your invitation to visit your bar. I should be there in a few minutes. I am not queuing." He was sure she was pouting.
"Pam will be on the door." Without a word, the vampire in question sped out of his office. "See you soon." He was surprised by his excitement at the idea of her visiting Fangtasia. He owned several businesses, but Fangtasia, although not the most profitable, was the most rewarding as a vampire.
Pam heard the roar of the bike as it sped towards them long before it came into view. Pam knew a Ducati 748 when she saw one; this one had a custom paint job of purple with black decals. She bet her entire shoe collection it was the telepath. The full-face helmet was pulled off to reveal a head of blonde hair, and she would admit a rather pretty face. "He does prefer blondes," Pam mumbled.
"Don't I know it," Sookie chuckled as she walked toward the bar.
"Hello, Miss Ravenscroft." Her genuine, warm smile surprised Pam. Even though Eric had explained that she knew them, it was a surprise.
"Hello, Miss Brigant." Pam returned with a smile of her own.
Call me Sookie."
"Well, Sookie, call me Pam."
"Can I?" She jerked her head towards the bar.
"Yes." Sookie didn't miss Pam's frown as she stared towards the back of the bar.
"He's on the phone with Stan," Sookie said without preamble.
She handed door duty to Clancy and followed Sookie into the office. She had always intended to but would give it a few minutes before she did. "Appreciate you letting me know." Despite the report of a missing vampire in Dallas, he smiled at the sight of Sookie.
"Oh, before anything else, Callisto, the maenad, wants her offering. Sam is sleeping with her, so I don't know how you are gonna top that." She giggled at his horrified look. "At least this time, she didn't claw my back, leaving me needing a life-saving operation." Sookie groused.
"You spoke to her?" Eric asked.
"Absolutely not. It's why I rode my bike here. I went the long way around, avoiding her, but I knew what she wanted. She would have clawed my back to send a message to you. That particular nightmare kept me shivering in bed all day." Sookie's tone conveyed the fear that the nightmare had induced in her. It had been the previous night in her nightmares, but she wasn't taking any chances.
"Pam, if you could deal with her, I might have to go to Dallas, a vampire is missing. They suspect the Fellowship." Eric groaned. In truth, he hoped Sookie would go with him. The telepath's chuckle had him thinking she'd heard the thought.
"In my nightmares, after I recovered from the surgery, you simply informed me that you'd loaned me out to the Area 6 vampires in Dallas. You know what's funny, I only agreed if Bill could come with me. In the end, you were the one that saved my life, not Bill." She shook her head in disdain. "Anyway, that's all it was… a nightmare." She cleared her throat. "Farrell was taken from The Bat's Wing by Godfrey; he is a known renouncer. That's just the tip of the iceberg." Sookie took the seat in front of his desk.
"That is why you picked tonight to come here." Eric surmised. Her actions didn't anger him, he would have done the same. "So you will help." He added.
"Of course, Stan has something I want." She smiled radiantly at him.