My mouth fell open. "That would be terrible of me, to ask him to bring her in, to betray her. I won't do it."
"But you can see that would be best for all of us," Eric said. "Bill or Heidi goes up to her, shakes her hand-then they will have her scent, and we'll know. Sam doesn't need to do anything beyond that. We'll take care of everything else."
"What would that 'everything else' be?"
"What do you think?" Bill asked impatiently. "She has information we need to learn, and she seems to be a key part of the plot to implicate Eric in a murder. This woman is a murderer herself, most likely. We need to make her talk."
"The same way the Weres made you talk in Mississippi, Bill?" I snapped.
"Why do you care if something happens to the bitch?" Eric said, his blond eyebrows rising in query.
"I don't," I said instantly. "I can't stand her."
"Then what's your issue?"
And I had no answer.
"It's because we were talking about involving Sam," Bill told Eric. "That's the stumbling block."
Suddenly they were on the same side, and that side was not mine.
"You're sweet on him?" Eric said. He couldn't have been more surprised if I'd said I had a crush on Terry's Catahoula.
"He's my boss," I said. "We've been friends for years. Of course I'm fond of him. And he's nuts about that furry bitch, for whatever reason. So that's my issue, as you put it."
"Hmmm," Eric said, his eyes examining my face with a sharp intensity. I didn't like it when he sounded thoughtful. "Then I'll have to call Alcide and make the request for Jannalynn's scent official."
Did I do as they requested, which would in some way be a betrayal of Sam? Or did I let Eric call Alcide, which would officially involve the Long Tooth pack? You couldn't call a packmaster unofficially. But I couldn't lie to Sam. My back stiffened.
"All right," I said. "Call Alcide." Eric pulled out his cell phone, giving me a very grim look as he did so. I could see a war starting, another war. More deaths. More loss. "Wait," I said. "I'll talk to Sam. I'll go into town to talk to him. Right now."
I didn't even know if Sam was home, but I walked out of the house and neither vampire tried to stop me. I'd never left two vampires alone in the house before, and I could only hope it would be intact when I returned.
Chapter 10
When I began driving back into town, I realized how tired I was. I thought very seriously about turning back, but when I contemplated facing Bill and Eric again, I kept driving north.
That was how I came to see Bellenos and our Hooligans waitress bounding across the road after a deer. I braked desperately, and my car slid sideways. I knew I'd end up in the ditch. I shrieked as the car slewed and the woods rushed up to meet me. Then, abruptly, my car's motion stopped-not by hitting anything, but by being nose down in the steep ditch. The headlights lit up the weeds, still whipping, bugs flying up from the impact. I turned off the engine and sat gasping.
My poor car was nose down at a steep angle. The rain had had twenty-four hours to soak into the previously parched soil, so the ditch was fairly dry, which was a real blessing. Bellenos and the blonde appeared, working their way around the car to get to my door. Bellenos was carrying a spear, and his companion appeared to have two curved bladed weapons of some kind. Not exactly swords; really long knives, as thin at the point as needles.
I tried to open the door, but my muscles wouldn't obey my command. I realized I was crying. I had a sharp flash of memory: Claudine waking me when I fell asleep at the wheel on this same road. Bellenos's lithe body moved across the headlights, and then he was by my door and wrenching it open.
"Sister!" he said, and turned to his companion. "Cut this strap, Gift."
A knife passed right by my face in the next second, and the seat belt was severed. Oh, damn. Evidently, they didn't understand buckles.
Gift bent down, and in the next instant I was out of the car and she was carrying me away.
"We didn't mean to frighten you," she murmured. "I'm sorry, my sister."
She laid me down as easily as if I'd been an infant, and she and Bellenos squatted by me. I concluded, with no great certainty, that they weren't going to kill and eat me. When I could speak, I said, "What were you out here doing?"
"Hunting," Bellenos said, as if he suspected my head were addled. "You saw the deer?"
"Yes. Do you realize you're not on my land anymore?" My voice was very unsteady, but there was nothing I could do about it.
"I see no fence, no boundaries. Freedom is good," he said.
And the blonde nodded enthusiastically. "It's so good to run," she said. "It's so good to be out of a human building."
The thing was ... they seemed so happy. Though I knew absolutely I should read them the riot act, I found myself feeling not only profoundly sorry for the two fae, but frightened of-and for-them. This was a very uncomfortable mix of emotions. "I'm real glad you're having a good time," I wheezed. They both beamed at me. "How did you come to be named Gift?" I just couldn't think of anything else to say.
"It's Aelfgifu," she said, smiling. "Elf-gift. But Gift is easier for human mouths." Speaking of mouths, Aelfgifu's teeth were not as ferocious as Bellenos's. In fact, they were quite small. But since she was leaning over me, I could see longer, sharper, thinner teeth folded against the roof of her mouth.
Fangs. Not vampire fangs, but snake fangs. Jesus Christ, Shepherd of Judea. Coupled with the pupil-less eyes, she was really scary.
"Is this the way you do in Faery?" I asked weakly. "Hunt in the woods?"
They both smiled. "Oh, yes, no fences or boundaries there," Aelfgifu said longingly. "Though the woods are not as deep as they once were."
"I don't want to ... to chide you," I said, wondering if I could sit up. They both stared at me, their eyes unreadable, their heads canted at inhuman angles. "But regular people really shouldn't see you without your human disguises. And even if you could make other people perceive you as human ... regular human couples don't chase deer in the middle of the night. With sharp weapons." Even around Bon Temps, where hunting is practically a religion.
"You see us as we really are," Bellenos said. I could tell he hadn't known that before. Maybe I'd given away a powerful bit of knowledge by revealing that.
"Yeah."
"You have powerful magic," Gift said respectfully. "That makes you our sister. When you first came to Hooligans, we weren't sure about you. Are you on our side?"