"Just …" I tried to think of something reasonable, couldn't. "Tara, it'll cost me my life if you do."
She twitched, and gave me a steady stare. Who wouldn't? But Tara had been through a lot in her life, and she was a tough, if wounded, bird. "I'm so happy to see you here," she said. "It was lonely being in this crowd by myself. Who's your friend? What is he?"
I always forgot that other people couldn't tell. And sometimes I nearly forgot that other people didn't know about Weres and shifters. "He's a surveyor," I said. "Come on, I'll introduce you."
"Sorry we left so quickly," I said, smiling brightly at all the men. "I forgot my manners." I introduced Tara to Alcide, who looked appropriately appreciative. Then it was Tara's turn. "Sook, this is Franklin Mott."
"A pleasure to meet you," I said, and extended my hand before I realized my faux pas. Vampires don't shake hands. "I beg your pardon," I said hastily, and gave him a little wave instead. "Do you live here in Jackson, Mr. Mott?" I was determined not to embarrass Tara.
"Please call me Franklin," he said. He had a wonderful mellow voice with a light Italian accent. When he had died, he had probably been in his late fifties or early sixties; his hair and mustache were iron gray, and his face was lined. He looked vigorous and very masculine. "Yes, I do, but I own a business that has a franchise in Jackson, one in Ruston, and one in Vicksburg. I met Tara at a gathering in Ruston."
Gradually we progressed through the social do-si-do of getting seated, explaining to the men how Tara and I had attended high school together, and ordering drinks. All the vampires, of course, ordered synthetic blood, and Talbot, Tara, Alcide, and I got mixed drinks. I decided another champagne cocktail would be good. The waitress, a shifter, was moving in an odd, almost slinking manner, and she didn't seem inclined to talk much. The night of the full moon was making itself felt in all kinds of ways.
There were far fewer of the two-natured in the bar this night of the moon cycle. I was glad to see Debbie and her fiance were missing, and there were only a couple of the Were bikers. There were more vampires, and more humans. I wondered how the vampires of Jackson kept this bar a secret. Among the humans who came in with Supe dates, surely one or two were inclined to talk to a reporter or just tell a group of friends about the bar's existence?
I asked Alcide, and he said quietly, "The bar's spellbound. You wouldn't be able to tell anyone how to get here if you tried."
I'd have to experiment with that later, see if it worked. I wonder who did the spell casting, or whatever it was called. If I could believe in vampires and werewolves and shape-shifters, it was not too far a stretch to believe in witches.
I was sandwiched between Talbot and Alcide, so by way of making conversation I asked Talbot about secrecy. Talbot didn't seem averse to chatting with me, and Alcide and Franklin Mott had found they had acquaintances in common. Talbot had on too much cologne, but I didn't hold that against him. Talbot was a man in love, and furthermore, he was a man addicted to vampiric sex … the two states are not always combined. He was a ruthless, intelligent man who could not understand how his life had taken such an exotic turn. (He was a big broadcaster, too, which was why I could pick up so much of his life.)
He repeated Alcide's story about the spell on the bar. "But the way what happens here is kept a secret, that's different," Talbot said, as if he was considering a long answer and a short answer. I looked at his pleasant, handsome face and reminded myself that he knew Bill was being tortured, and he didn't care. I wished he would think about Bill again, so I could learn more; at least I would know if Bill was dead or alive. "Well, Miss Sookie, what goes on here is kept secret by terror and punishment."
Talbot said that with relish. He liked that. He liked that he had won the heart of Russell Edgington, a being who could kill easily, who deserved to be feared. "Any vampire or Were-in fact, any sort of supernatural creature, and you haven't seen quite a few of them, believe me-who brings in a human is responsible for that human's behavior. For example, if you were to leave here tonight and call a tabloid, it would be Alcide's bounden duty to track and kill you."
"I see." And indeed, I did. "What if Alcide couldn't bring himself to do that?"
"Then his life would be forfeit, and one of the bounty hunters would be commissioned to do the job."
Jesus Christ, Shepherd of Judea. "There are bounty hunters?" Alcide could have told me a lot more than he had; that was an unpleasant discovery. My voice may have been a little on the croaky side.
"Sure. The Weres who wear the motorcycle gear, in this area. In fact, they're asking questions around the bar tonight because …" His expression sharpened, became suspicious. "The man who was bothering you … did you see him again last night? After you left the bar?"
"No," I said, speaking the technical truth. I hadn't seen him again-last night. I knew what God thought about technical truths, but I also figured he expected me to save my own life. "Alcide and I, we went right back to the apartment. I was pretty upset." I cast my eyes down like a modest girl unused to approaches in bars, which was also a few steps away from the truth. (Though Sam keeps such incidents down to a minimum, and it was widely known I was crazy and therefore undesirable, I certainly had to put up with the occasional aggressive advance, as well as a certain amount of half-hearted passes from guys who got too drunk to care that I was supposed to be crazy.)
"You were sure plucky when it looked like there was going to be a fight," Talbot observed. Talbot was thinking that my courage last night didn't jibe with my demure demeanor this evening. Darn it, I'd overplayed my role.
"Plucky is the word for Sookie," Tara said. It was a welcome interruption. "When we danced together on stage, about a million years ago, she was the one who was brave, not me! I was shaking in my shoes."
Thank you, Tara.
"You danced?" asked Franklin Mott, his attention caught by the conversation.
"Oh, yes, and we won the talent contest," Tara told him. "What we didn't realize, until we graduated and had some experience in the world, was that our little routine was really, ah-"
"Suggestive," I said, calling a spade a spade. "We were the most innocent girls in our little high school, and there we were, with this dance routine we lifted straight off MTV."
"It took us years to understand why the principal was sweating so hard," Tara said, her smile just rascally enough to be charming. "As a matter of fact, let me go talk to the deejay right now." She sprang up and worked her way over to the vampire who'd set up his gear on the small stage. He bent over and listened intently, and then he nodded.
"Oh, no." I was going to be horribly embarrassed.
"What?" Alcide was amused.
"She's going to make us do it all over again."
Sure enough, Tara wiggled her way through the crowd to get back to me, and she was beaming. I had thought of twenty-five good reasons not to do what she wanted by the time she seized my hands and pulled me to my feet. But it was evident that the only way I could get out of this was to go forward. Tara had her heart set on this exhibition, and Tara was my friend. The crowd made a space as Pat Benatar's "Love Is a Battlefield" began to play.
Unfortunately, I remembered every bump and grind, every hip thrust.
In our innocence, Tara and I had planned our routine almost like pairs figure skating, so we were touching (or very near) during the whole thing. Could it have looked more like some lesbian tease act performed in a stripper bar? Not much. Not that I'd ever been to a stripper bar, or a porno movie house; but I assume the rise of communal lust I felt in Josephine's that night was similar. I didn't like being the object of it-but yet, I discovered I felt a certain flood of power.
Bill had informed my body about good sex, and I was sure that now I danced like I knew about enjoying sex-and so did Tara. In a perverse way, we were having an "I am woman, hear me roar" moment. And, by golly, love sure was a battlefield. Benatar was right about that.