Living Dead in Dallas (Sookie Stackhouse #2)(41)
Author: Charlaine Harris

There was only silence for a few minutes, while the car bumped out of the alley and drove through the night.

"Silent Shore Hotel, right?" said the driver. She sounded kind of growly. Then I realized it was almost the full moon. Oh, hell. They had to change at the full moon. Maybe that was why Luna had kicked over the traces so readily at the Fellowship tonight, once it got dark. She had been made giddy by the emergence of the moon.

"Yes, please," I said politely.

"Food that talks," said the passenger. His voice was even closer to a growl.

I sure didn’t like that, but had no idea how to respond. There was just as much for me to learn about shape-shifters as there was about vampires, apparently.

"You two can it," Luna said. "This is my guest."

"Luna hangs with puppy chow," said the passenger. I was beginning to really not like this guy.

"Smells more like hamburger to me," said the driver. "She’s got a scrape or two, doesn’t she, Luna?"

"Y’all are giving her a great impression of how civilized we are," Luna snapped. "Show some control. She’s already had a bad night. She’s got a broken bone, too."

And the night wasn’t even halfway over yet. I shifted the ice pack I was holding to my face. You can only stand so much freezing cold on your sinus cavity.

"Why’d Josephus have to send for freakin’ werewolves?" Luna muttered into my ear. But I knew they’d heard; Sam heard everything, and he was by no means as powerful as a true werewolf. Or at least, that was my evaluation. To tell you the truth, until this moment, I hadn’t been sure werewolves actually existed.

"I guess," I said tactfully and audibly, "he thought they could defend us best if we’re attacked again."

I could feel the creatures in the front seat prick up their ears. Maybe literally.

"We were doing okay," Luna said indignantly. She twitched and fidgeted on the seat beside me like she’d drunk sixteen cups of coffee.

"Luna, we got rammed and your car got totaled. We were in the emergency room. ‘Okay’ in what sense?"

Then I had to answer my own question. "Hey, I’m sorry, Luna. You got me out of there when they would’ve killed me. It’s not your fault they rammed us."

"You two have a little roughhouse tonight?" asked the passenger, more civilly. He was spoiling for a fight. I didn’t know if all werewolves were as feisty as this guy, or if it was just his nature.

"Yeah, with the f**king Fellowship," Luna said, more than a trace of pride in her voice. "They had this chick stuck in a cell. In a dungeon."

"No shit?" asked the driver. She had the same hyper pulsing to her – well, I just had to call it her aura, for lack of a better word.

"No shit," I said firmly. "I work for a shifter, at home," I added, to make conversation.

"No kidding? What’s the business?"

"A bar. He owns a bar."

"So, are you far from home?"

"Too far," I said.

"This little bat saved your life tonight, for real?"

"Yes." I was absolutely sincere about that. "Luna saved my life." Could they mean that literally? Did Luna shapeshift into a… oh golly.

"Way to go, Luna." There was a fraction more respect in the deeper growly voice.

Luna found the praise pleasant, as she ought to, and she patted my hand. In a more agreeable silence, we drove maybe five more minutes, and then the driver said, "The Silent Shore, coming up."

I breathed out a long sigh of relief.

"There’s a vampire out front, waiting."

I almost ripped off the blindfold, before I realized that would be a really tacky thing to do. "What does he look like?"

"Very tall, blond. Big head of hair. Friend or foe?"

I had to think about that. "Friend," I said, trying not to sound doubtful.

"Yum, yum," said the driver. "Does he cross-date?"

"I don’t know. Want me to ask?"

Luna and the passenger both made gagging sounds. "You can’t date a deader!" Luna protested. "Come on, Deb – uh, girl!"

"Oh, okay," said the driver. "Some of them aren’t so bad. I’m pulling into the curb, little Milkbone."

"That would be you," Luna said in my ear.

We came to a stop, and Luna leaned over me to open my door. As I stepped out, guided and shoved by her hands, I heard an exclamation from the sidewalk. Quick as a wink Luna slammed the door shut behind me. The car full of shapeshifters pulled away from the curb with a screech of tires. A howl trailed behind it in the thick night air.

"Sookie?" said a familiar voice.

"Eric?"

I was fumbling with the blindfold, but Eric just grabbed the back of it and pulled. I had acquired a beautiful, if somewhat stained, scarf. The front of the hotel, with its heavy blank doors, was brilliantly lit in the dark night, and Eric looked remarkably pale. He was wearing an absolutely conventional navy blue pinstripe suit, of all things.

I was actually glad to see him. He grabbed my arm to keep me from wobbling and looked down at me with an unreadable face. Vampires were good at that. "What has happened to you?" he said.

"I got… well, it’s hard to explain in a second. Where is Bill?"

"First he went to the Fellowship of the Sun to get you out. But we heard along the way, from one of us who is a policeman, that you had been involved in an accident and gone to a hospital. So then he went to the hospital. At the hospital, he found out you had left outside the proper channels. No one would tell him anything, and he couldn’t threaten them properly." Eric looked extremely frustrated. The fact that he had to live within human laws was a constant irritant to Eric, though he greatly enjoyed the benefits. "And then there was no trace of you. The doorman had only heard the once from you, mentally."

"Poor Barry. Is he all right?"

"The richer for several hundred dollars, and quite happy about it," Eric said in a dry voice. "Now we just need Bill. What a lot of trouble you are, Sookie." He pulled a cell phone out of his pocket and punched in a number. After what seemed a long time, it was answered.

"Bill, she is here. Some shapeshifters brought her in." He looked me over. "Battered, but walking." He listened some more. "Sookie, do you have your key?" he asked. I felt in the pocket of my skirt where I’d stuffed the plastic rectangle about a million years ago.

"Yes," I said, and simply could not believe that something had gone right. "Oh, wait! Did they get Farrell?"