Chapter Text
They were halfway back to the Lincoln when the cashier called out to add, "A Lincoln with a big hole in the trunk does stand out!"
Eric gave the torn metal a glance, but shrugged away the concern. They were close to Bon Temps, and they wouldn't need to stop again. As they climbed into the car, he noticed that Sookie had cleaned off her bloody neck in the convenience store's bathroom. He pulled away from the pumps and turned back onto the frontage road that would reconnect them with I-20. In the rearview mirror, he saw two police cars pull into the gas station's parking lot, sirens wailing.
"He's right," Sookie said.
"I should have taken the truck," he replied easily. It was too late now, and he wasn't very concerned.
"How's your face?"
He lifted a hand to his face, which was no longer in pain. He felt the tiny bumps left behind by the net, but they were fading fast. "It's getting better," he said.
There was a moment of silence, and then she asked carefully, "What happened?"
Another police car with flashing lights sped by them on the opposite side of the median, illuminating Sookie's face in red and blue as he turned to look at her. He shifted his gaze back to the road and told her, briefly, what had happened, up until they threw the net over him.
"Your mind must have been somewhere else," she mused.
He held his gaze straight ahead. "Yes, it was." His mind had been "somewhere else" ever since she came walking into Fangtasia.
"So then what happened?" she asked.
"The heavier one hit me with the butt of his gun, and it took me a small time to recover."
"I saw the blood."
"Yes, I bled," he said, reaching back to touch the spot where the bump had been. He explained to her how he had escaped the net.
"So you got free?"
Her intonation was a prompt to continue, so he told her about going to the spigot and then finding her. He looked at her, but she seemed to have nothing to say in reply. "Tell me what happened in the store," he said at last.
"They got me confused with the other woman who went in the store at the same time I went to the ladies' room," she said. He remembered the other blond who had walked in with her. "They didn't seem to be sure I was in the store," she continued, "and the clerk was telling them that there had been only one woman, and she'd gone. I could tell he had a shotgun in his truck—you know, I heard it in his head—and I went and got it, and I disabled their truck, and I was looking for you because I figured something had happened to you."
Was she asking to get herself killed? And what kind of protector was he if he was the one who needed saving? He set his jaw. "So you planned to save me and the clerk together?"
"Well… yeah," she replied, as if nothing could be more obvious or understandable. "I didn't feel like I had a whole lot of choices there."
He said nothing. The fact that she had no choice – the fact that she had to put herself in that dangerous position – was because he himself had been careless. Even so, she would be impossible to protect if she had such a foolhardy disregard for her own safety.
They sat in silence for about fifteen minutes before Sookie spoke again. "You don't seem too happy about something."
Still he didn't answer her. He didn't know what to say. Apologize for being so distracted by her that he let two bumbling, would-be assassins throw a silver net on his head? Berate her for insisting on saving that store clerk, who was nothing to them? Another half-hour of uneasy silence stretched between them.
"Would there be something wrong with me rescuing the two of you?" Sookie pressed as they passed through Bon Temps.
Her driveway was a disgrace, with deep ruts that could wreak havoc on any car's alignment. He gritted his teeth and cursed under his breath. She was looking at him expectantly, and he knew he couldn't avoid answering her any longer.
"Yes, there is something wrong with that," he told her, though his pride would not allow him to elaborate. He turned off the car. "And why the hell don't you get your driveway fixed?" Oh, well done. Take your anger out on her.
She flung open her car door, and he followed suit. For a moment they stared at each other over the top of the car, then she walked around it to face him, her eyes blazing. They were also tearing up, and he felt immediately sorry.
"Because I can't afford it, that's why!" she said, on the verge of hysteria. "I don't have any money! And you all keep asking me to take time off from my job to do stuff for you! I can't! I can't do it anymore! I quit!"
If only they were fully bonded by blood, he could calm her. If she didn't look so willing to stake him at this moment, he could pull her into his arms and comfort her. He mentioned Bill's name carefully, but that certainly didn't help.
Her eyes narrowed as waves of anger rolled off of her. "He's spending all his money on the freaking Bellefleurs. He never thinks about giving me money." She raised her chin and met his eyes defiantly. "And how could I take it? It would make me a kept woman, and I'm not his whore. I'm his…" Her voice broke. "I used to be his girlfriend." Alone, alone, alone, her blood cried to him, and it was physically painful.
Why couldn't she see that accepting a lover's gift did not make her a whore? If she were his, he would cherish her and shower her with gifts, not as some kind of vulgar payment, but because it would give him pleasure. No doubt Bill was the same. Before he could express this out loud, she had moved on to another subject.
"Where do you get off, telling them that I'm your… your lover?" She flushed pink. "Where'd that come from?"
That topic was not up for discussion at the moment. He answered her in what he hoped was a quiet, calming voice. "What happened to the money you earned in Dallas?"
A tear escaped the corner of her eye, but she seemed not to notice. "I paid my property taxes with it."
He regarded her with a mixture of surprise and swelling affection. "Did you ever think," he said slowly, "that if you told me where Bill's hiding his computer program, I would give you anything you asked for?" I would do that anyway, if you would let me. "Did you not realize that Russell would have paid you handsomely?" She puffed up with righteous indignation, and he smiled down at her. "I see you didn't think of those things."
"Oh, yeah, I'm just an angel," she snapped. "Someone's waiting in my house, Eric."
She walked away from him and reached under an old rocking chair on the porch, while he stood there dumbly, his mind unable to settle on any one thing. But then realization slapped him in the face and jarred him to attention.
"Sookie!" he shouted, already running toward her.
But it was too late. She unlocked the door and someone inside the dark house knocked her out with an object he couldn't make out. He growled, his fangs extending, as she slumped to the ground. He ran towards the house, but he was stopped by the sharp, pinching pain of two bullets as they tore into his leg and chest. Cursing, he ran for the cover of the trees and pulled out his cell phone.
"Master?" Pam answered. "Are you b—"
"Pam, who's near Bon Temps? I need to know now."
She recognized his tone and didn't fuck around. "Well, Bill is. He called a little while ago to see if you were back here. I think he's going straight to Sookie's. Might be there already."
Perfect. Pam wouldn't be offended that he hung up on her, not that it mattered. He shut his phone and shoved it into his pocket. The bullets had fallen out of him, and his wounds were beginning to heal. Bill appeared at his side just as he crept to the dark porch. They nodded at each other, and then Eric threw open the door.
With a roar, he grabbed the first person he saw and ripped the man's throat out. There would be no mercy for any of these fuckers. In a blind rage, he tore apart several more bodies, hardly sparing a glance at their faces. Bill was just as vicious, and their work was accomplished in no time. He was surprised at himself for thinking with relief that this part of Sookie's house wasn't carpeted.
They both rushed to her. She was covered in blood. "Sookie?" he said anxiously. "Sookie?" He pressed his fingers to her wrist. "Do we need to take her to the hospital?" He could detect no feeling – nothing – from her.
Bill felt for the pulse in her neck and looked visibly relieved. "Her pulse is strong. I'm going to turn her over."
He sent a silent prayer to gods who probably didn't exist. "She's alive?"
"Yes."
Eric leaned closer, trying to see her face. "Is the blood hers?" He couldn't see any injuries, and with all the blood spilt around them, it was hard to isolate her pure, sweet scent.
"Yes, some of it," Bill replied as he indicated one nasty cut on her cheek.
He inhaled her scent and relished it. "Hers is different." Nothing like the filth that he could still taste on his tongue.
"Yes, but surely you are full by now."
Even if he drank the blood of every person in Shreveport, he would be hungry for Sookie's blood, but there were things to be done now. He stood up and surveyed the damage they'd done. "It's been a long time since I had real blood in quantity," he remarked.
"For me, too," Bill replied as he prepared to move Sookie. "We'll need to put them all out in the yard and clean up Sookie's house."
"Of course."
He sat beside her, his back to the sofa, as Bill turned her over. Her tears echoed what her blood told him: pain. She looked at each of them in turn, blinking back the tears to see them clearly. What they had done to her attackers wasn't nearly as bad as the fuckers deserved.
"Can you speak?" he asked her gently.
She opened her mouth to answer him, then shook her head.
"She needs a drink," Bill observed, leaving her side to fetch one.
Strands of her hair were plastered with sweat and blood to her face, and he carefully brushed them away. He kept his fingertips light on her bruised skin and masked the rage he felt. Her body ravaged twice in one night – first by her own lover, then by the Weres. If Bill weren't here in the way, he would have given her more of his blood. He wouldn't be surprised if she never wanted to see another vampire again after a night like this one.
Bill returned to her side and lifted her up slightly so she could drink her water.
When she could speak, she said hoarsely, "You killed them all." Eric answered her with a nod, wondering how she would react to the bloody massacre in her own house. But her voice was stronger as she replied with a firm, "Good," and he was unable to hold back a brief smile. "How many?" she asked.
He and Bill looked around the room, though it was hard to tell with so many bodies – and so many pieces – in the dark.
"Seven?" Bill suggested. "Two in the yard and five in the house?"
Eric didn't know how many runners Bill had chased into the yard and killed, but there were definitely six in the house. "I was thinking eight," he said.
Bill turned back to Sookie. "Why did they come after you like that?"
She took another sip of her water through the straw. It was almost gone now. "Jerry Falcon," she said.
"Oh. Oh, yes. I've encountered him," Bill told them, and his face was as dark as Eric had ever seen it. "In the torture room. He is first on my list."
Eric smiled grimly. "Well, you can cross him off. Alcide and Sookie disposed of his body in the woods yesterday."
Yesterday seemed like a week ago. Since they had dumped the body of Jerry Falcon, Sookie had been staked and healed, they had almost had sex, he had given her blood, she had rescued Bill and then had been attacked (and raped?) by him in the trunk of a car, they had escaped the gas station, and now this. It was almost unrelenting enough to be farcical.
"Did this Alcide kill him, or Sookie?" Bill asked, drawing Eric's attention back to the present.
"He says no," Eric explained. "They found the corpse in the closet of Alcide's apartment, and they hatched a plan to hide his remains."
Bill blinked in disbelief. "My Sookie hid a corpse?"
"I don't think you can be too sure about that possessive pronoun," Eric told him. He didn't bother masking his fury at Bill. But there would be another time for that discussion.
"Where did you learn that term, Northman?"
I was speaking this language centuries before you were born, asshole. "I took English as a Second Language at a community college in the seventies," he said instead, casually. He had taken the course, that much was true.
"She is mine," Bill said in a low voice, and Eric saw a flash of fang.
To Eric's surprise and utter delight, Sookie flipped off Bill. With both hands. He laughed loudly and tried to decide what gave him more pleasure: the actual gesture or Bill's horrified exclamation, "Sookie!"
He had enjoyed the laugh, but it was time to be serious again. "I think that Sookie is telling us she belongs to herself." He looked down at her with increased affection, then back up at Bill as he explained his theory that Jerry Falcon's murder was meant to be blamed on Alcide.
"So all this plot might be directed at Alcide instead of us?" Bill asked, frowning as he tried to make sense of it.
"Hard to say," Eric admitted. "Evidently, from what the armed robbers at the gas station told us, what's remaining of the gang called in all the thugs they knew and stationed them along the interstate to intercept us on the way back. If they'd just called ahead, they wouldn't now be in jail for armed robbery. And I'm certainly sure that's where they are."
Bill surveyed the blood mess around them. "So how'd these guys get here?" he asked. "How'd they know where Sookie lived, who she really was?"
The realization came to Eric as he spoke the words. "She used her own name at Club Dead." He met Bill's eyes. "They didn't know the name of Bill's human girlfriend… You were faithful."
But Bill, ever the noble martyr, refused to accept an acknowledgment. "I hadn't been faithful in other ways. I thought it was the least I could do for her."
"So the Weres may not know she was your girlfriend," Eric continued, thinking as he went. "They only know she was staying in the apartment with Alcide when Jerry disappeared." He added that none of the pack, including the pack leader, believed that Alcide had done the killing.
"This Alcide," Bill said thoughtfully, "he seemed to have a troubled relationship with his girlfriend."
"She is engaged to someone else. She believes he is attached to Sookie." It was appropriate that a Were would have a bitch for a girlfriend.
"And is he?" Bill asked. He looked as if he didn't really want to know the answer. "He has the gall to tell this virago Debbie that Sookie is good in bed."
"He wanted to make her jealous. He has not slept with Sookie." This he knew as certainly as he knew his own name.
"But he likes her."
Eric smiled a little. "Doesn't everyone?"
"You just killed a bunch of guys who didn't seem to like me at all," Sookie interjected. "Bill, how'd you get here?"
Bill told them that he had made a deal with Edgington – a smart move – and that his car had been returned to him. The Weres had used the internet to discover where Sookie lived.
Eric shook his head. "These computers are dangerous things." He enjoyed the new technologies as much as any other vampire, but the old ways had definitely been less complicated and worrisome.
"Her face is swelling," Bill observed.
He was right; just in the past few minutes, her cheekbone had turned an ugly purple, and bruises were rising up all over her face. He could only imagine what shape the rest of her was in.
"Eric okay?" she asked in a weak voice.
He reached down again to smooth her hair with his fingertips, touched that she cared. "I will heal," he assured her, "especially since having all that good blood." Her eyes drifted shut. "Sookie?" he murmured.
"Good," said Bill. "She's out. Help me get her into bed."
"I will. Just a minute." He called Fangtasia again and told Pam to send some workers to Sookie's house with cleaning supplies. Pam knew exactly what "cleaning supplies" were.
Bill lifted Sookie into his arms and followed Eric, who kicked bodies and other debris out of the way. He flipped on lights as he went, until they were both in Sookie's room. Though Bill didn't look especially pleased about it, they worked together to remove her bloody clothes, sponge the blood off of her skin, and slip a soft nightgown over her body, which was just as bruised and swollen as her face. Eric pulled back the covers of her bed, then brought them up under her chin after Bill had laid her down. Bill tucked the covers securely around her, and they both found themselves staring silently down at her.
"We better start cleaning up," Bill said at last.
They worked quietly as they removed the bodies and set them outside. Other than a rug, nothing appeared to be ruined or permanently stained. The Fangtasia workers arrived shortly after, and Eric pointed into the house without a word. He and Bill were left alone on the porch.
"Did you rape her?" Eric asked. "In the car."
A long silence. "Yes."
The hard punch in his jaw sent Bill staggering back, but he didn't utter a word of protest. Eric crossed his arms and stared straight ahead. "Go home. I'll see that the mess is taken care of."
His crew were fast and thorough, the benefits of much experience, and an hour later he was on his way back to Fangtasia. Dawn was very near, but he had one more item of business. He would make the phone call and then sleep in the emergency space below his office. The Shreveport phone book didn't include Bon Temps, so he opened his laptop and found the number he needed.
"Randy Burgess," said the man in an annoyed growl.
"Eric Northman. You get something to write with, Randy. I want you to fix Sookie Stackhouse's drive, and I want it done first thing tomorrow. I don't care what orders you have waiting. Am I clear?"
He had hired Randy Burgess before, so the man knew better than to question anything he said. "Y-yes, sir."
"Use the most expensive kind you have, do the whole drive, and make it beautiful. I don't care what it costs. Throw in whatever extras you like, and bill me. Are you writing all this down?"
He could hear the raspy whisper of a pencil on the other end of the line. "Got it," Randy said.
"Don't knock on her door. She's ill, and I don't want her to be disturbed. That will be all."
"I'll take care of everything to your satisfaction, Mr. Northman." Randy was clearly awake now. The promise of money tended to have that effect.
* * *
When he rose the next night, Pam was already in his office. "Finally!" she exclaimed. "Tell me everything that happened."
He obliged her, then chased away her satisfied grin with her orders for the night. "Go to Sookie's house. She may have been able to wash up and take care of herself today, but I doubt it. She could use another woman to help her."
Pam gaped. "You want me to play nurse maid to a human?" He didn't need to reply, because his face told her everything. She knew that look. "I will, Master. Anything else?"
"Bill and I will be there at seven. Make sure she knows we're coming."
He arrived when he said he would, surprised when Bubba answered the door. Sookie was sitting on an ottoman, wearing pink pajamas with a matching robe and slippers. The swelling on her face had gone down a little, but not enough to satisfy him. Bill sat on the chair behind her and was brushing her hair while Pam watched with amusement. He imagined himself in Bill's place, caring for her in this oddly intimate way, and he discovered that he was jealous. It was an emotion he barely remembered.
After Bubba wished them all a good night and left, Eric turned to Pam. "What was he doing here?"
It was Sookie who answered. "Bubba's the one who killed Jerry Falcon." He listened with satisfaction as Sookie explained what had happened, and Pam laughed when the story ended.
"That he followed you to Jackson," she said in wonder, "when his instructions were just for here, for one night... that he kept following his instructions, no matter what! It's not very vampiric, but he's certainly a good soldier."
Eric had to agree, even though Bubba's good soldiering had interrupted their happy interlude two nights before. "It would have been much better if he'd told Sookie what he'd done and why he'd done it."
Sookie rolled her eyes. "Yes, a note would have been nice. Anything would have been better than opening that closet and finding the body stuffed in there."
Pam laughed again. "I can just see your face! You and the Were had to hide the body? That's priceless."
"I wish I'd known all this when Alcide was here today." Sookie closed her eyes and leaned her head back while Eric and Bill both absorbed this information.
"Alcide Herveaux came here?" Eric asked at last, fully aware that he was taking the bait.
"Yeah, he brought my bag," she said. "He stayed to help me out, seeing as how I'm banged up."
Bill had stopped his ministrations on her hair, and Eric caught Sookie smiling at Pam. He also caught Pam's wink. So this would be their punishment, then, his and Bill's. Enduring whatever these two females decided to say.
It was Pam who opened the fun and games. "I unpacked your bag for you, Sookie. Where did you get that beautiful velvet shawl thing?"
"Well, my first evening wrap got ruined at Club – I mean, at Josephine's," Sookie explained. Again she smiled. "Alcide very kindly went shopping and bought it to surprise me. He said he felt responsible for the first one getting burned."
Eric gritted his teeth, determined to say nothing. The Were gave her a shawl. He had given her a new driveway… about which she had so far said nothing.
"He has excellent taste for a Were. If I borrow your red dress, can I borrow the shawl, too?" Pam would pay for this later. She must be counting on it.
"Sure," Sookie replied in a voice that was much too perky for her condition.
"Isn't it nice to get gifts from men?" Pam sighed. "Especially handsome men." Sookie giggled but said nothing. Pam seemed to realize that there was no more fun to be had here, so she stood up abruptly and announced, "I think I'll run home through the woods. I feel like experiencing the night."
Sookie's eyes widened. "You'll run all the way back to Shreveport?"
"It won't be the first time," Pam replied with a shrug. She took a few steps, then turned around again. "Oh, by the way, Bill, the queen called Fangtasia this evening to find out why you are late with her little job. She had been unable to reach you at your home for several nights, she said."
"I will call her back later from my place," Bill said. He had returned to brushing Sookie's hair, and Eric wondered how much more he could brush before it started falling out of her head. "She'll be glad to hear that I've completed it."
During the exchange between Pam and Bill, Eric had been clenching and unclenching his fists. At last, his temper got the better of him. "You nearly lost everything," he said to Bill in a growl. Everything being Sookie, his mind added, seemingly of its own accord, and it only made him angrier.
Pam wisely left, and Sookie looked uneasy.
Bill glared at him. "Yes, I'm well aware of that."
"You were a fool to take up with that she-demon again."
"Hey, guys," Sookie said, waving a hand between them, "I'm sitting right here." No thanks to him, Eric thought. He wasn't going to back down, not now, and from the looks of it, neither was Bill. Sookie stood up. "Okay, I'd hoped to avoid this, but…" She turned to Bill. "Bill, I rescind your invitation into my house."
Eric smiled with real happiness as Bill's feet walked him backwards out of the room. Sookie had chosen, and she was choosing him – the one who had been beside her every step of the way.
Then she looked at him and said his name in that same tone, and he knew that he was wrong. She was rejecting both of them. Just as she had told him in the car, she wanted no more part in what they had brought to her life. And how could she be blamed? He barely heard her speak the words when the irresistible force began to compel him backwards. She regarded them for a second, side-by-side on her porch, then closed the door in their faces.
"Now we've both lost her," Bill said.
Eric turned away from the door and looked out over the brand-new driveway. He had told himself that he wouldn't let her run from him, and he meant it. Whatever was left of his heart, it wanted her, and it wouldn't be refused.
"I haven't," he said, and he took to the air.