Living Dead in Dallas

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?”
    Eric held up his hand to indicate he’d get to me in a minute. “Bill, I’ll take her up and start doctoring.” Eric’s back stiffened. “Bill,” he said and there was a world of threat in his voice. “All right then. Good-bye.” He turned back to me as if there’d been no interruption.
    “Yes, Farrell is safe. They raided the Fellowship.”
    “Did . . . did many people get hurt?”
    “Most of them were too frightened to approach. They scattered and went home. Farrell was in an underground cell with Hugo.”
    “Oh, yes, Hugo. What happened to Hugo?”
    My voice must have been very curious, because Eric looked at me sideways while we were progressing toward the elevator. He was matching my pace, and I was limping very badly.
    “May I carry you?” he asked.
    “Oh, I don’t think so. I’ve made it this far.” I would’ve taken Bill up on the offer instantly. Barry, at the bell captain’s desk, gave me a little wave. Hewould’ve run up to me if I hadn’t been with Eric. I gave him what I hoped was a significant look, to say I’d talk to him again later, and then the elevator door dinged open and we got on. Eric punched the floor button and leaned against the mirrored wall of the car opposite me. In looking at him, I got a look at my own reflection.
    “Oh, no,” I said, absolutely horrified. “Oh, no.” My hair had been flattened by the wig, and then combed out with my fingers, so it was a disaster. My hands went up to it, helplessly and painfully, and my mouth shook with suppressed tears. And my hair was the least of it. I had visible bruises ranging from mild to severe on most of my body, and that was just the part you could see. My face was swollen and discolored on one side. There was a cut in the middle of the bruise over my cheekbone. My blouse was missing half its buttons, and my skirt was ripped and filthy. My right arm was ridged with bloody lumps.
    I began crying. I looked so awful; it just broke what was left of my spirit.
    To his credit, Eric didn’t laugh, though he may have wanted to. “Sookie, a bath and clean clothes and you will be put to rights,” he said as if he were talking to a child. To tell you the truth, I didn’t feel much older at the moment.
    “The werewolf thought you were cute,” I said, and sobbed some more. We stepped out of the elevator.
    “The werewolf? Sookie, you have had adventures tonight.” He gathered me up like an armful of clothes and held me to him. I got his lovely suit jacket wet and snotty, and his pristine white shirt was spotless no more.
    “Oh, I’m so sorry!” I held back and looked at his ensemble. I swabbed it with the scarf.
    “Don’t cry again,” he said hastily. “Just don’t start crying again, and I won’t mind taking this to the cleaners. I won’t even mind getting a whole new suit.”
    I thought it was pretty amusing that Eric, the dread master vampire, was afraid of weeping women. I sniggered through the residual sobs.
    “Something funny?” he asked.
    I shook my head.
    I slid my key in the door and we went in. “I’ll help you into the tub if you like, Sookie,” Eric offered.
    “Oh, I don’t think so.” A bath was what I wanted more than anything else in the world, that and to never put on these clothes again, but I sure wasn’t taking a bath with Eric anywhere around.
    “I’ll bet you are a treat, naked,” Eric said, just to boost my spirits.
    “You know it. I’m just as tasty as a big éclair,” I said, and carefully settled into a chair. “Though at the moment I feel more like boudain.” Boudain is Cajun sausage, made of all kinds of things, none of them elegant. Eric pushed over a straight chair and lifted my leg to elevate the knee. I resettled the ice pack on it and closed my eyes. Eric called down