δåıŋŧѕ/δıŋŋєяѕ

Recovery

***

Tuesday morning…

“Mr. Northman?”

My eyes were still closed and I was barely conscience when my brain started slowly getting messages from my body.

Sookie was snuggled up to me and I could feel her breath against my chest between nibbles as she ran her fingertips over my dick.

There just wasn’t a better fucking way to wake up than this.

“What are you up to?”

“I’m planning.”

“What are you planning?”

“I’m planning where to put my medal.”

“Medal?”

“The medal I’ll get when I win.”

Oooh. Bitch. “That’s so sad.”

“What is?”

I took my hand from her side and slid it between her legs. She was already wet when I found her clit and started to rub circles around it. “That all your hard work will be wasted. I’m the one that needs to start planning.”

She chuckled and gave my nipple a chew, wrapping her hand around my cock to start stroking. “Do you expect me to believe you don’t already know where you think you’d put it?”

Pulling. Squeezing. Ungh. “It’s not as much the ‘where’ as it is the ‘how’.”

She put her thumb over my sweet spot and rubbed it in time with pumping… “Tell me about it.”

Her knee slid up the outside of my leg and once my fingers were buried she started kissing me. Nibbling my lips…

But no tongue.

In the darkness of our room, I’d almost forgotten…

“Sookie, are you sure this is a good idea?”

She gave me a squeeze and giggled into my neck when I grunted. “Don’t worry, Eric…” She started moving to push me onto my back and straddle me. “…I promise I won’t hurt you.”

She pushed down onto me and started rocking and it felt like it had been forever… Two days… Too long… It had been the furthest thing from my mind, but now…

Inside her…

My hands on her hips as she moved over me… Around me… Holding us together with her perfect muscles…

She moved slow at first, like she was making sure everything still worked. Her legs didn’t seem as strong… Maybe even shaky, but she didn’t seem to pay any attention to it…

She stilled herself just long enough to tell me to ‘stop worrying’. I almost told her that I couldn’t help it, but she didn’t give me the chance…

She pulled her knees up, just enough that all of me was buried as she drew her muscles in started moving her hips in big circles… ffffuck…

It felt so good that I almost forgot… Almost…

Sookie put her hands over mine as she sped up and the rotation of her hips became a back and forth… She gave my arms a tug and when I sat up she wrapped them around her, leaving our fingers laced together… leaving her arms twisted behind her…

Her mouth went to my neck… blowing… chewing… her hips moved faster…

She let go of my hands to wrap her arms around my neck… my hands went to her ass, helping her move…

Heaving out deep breaths… shaking when she inhaled…  pitching forward… grinding back…

She started to whimper… shake… every breath that left her had my name on it…

Her arms pulled us closer… every part of her body was wrapped around me… fingers twisted into my hair…

Fuck… her head fell back… biting her lip… both of us gasping for air… She felt so fucking good…

Then she was frozen… everything stopped, everything but those muscles…

Jerking and throbbing… the room started to spin…

Moaning into her neck when I came…

I held her to me while we calmed down. It took us both a few minutes to start breathing right again…

**

I rolled over to her, flopping my arm across her hips and kissing her shoulder. “Are you alright? I was worried you’d hurt yourself.”

She smiled over at me. “I’m great. I need to hurry up and get my shower before the sun comes up though.”

I chuckled at her. “I’ll be nice, you know. Is there anywhere you really don’t want to get pierced?”

She started laughing. Oh fuck.

“Sookie, what’s so funny?”

“I never lose this kind of bet.”

“Never?”

“Nope. Never ever.”

FUCK! My Id started packing his shit. He didn’t want to be around when that needle goes into my dick! Fuck!

“I hate you.”

She smiled and rolled enough to give me a kiss. “Don’t be a pussy. It’s not as bad as you think.”

“And what do you have it to compare to?”

She snickered. “You’re pouting again… There are twice as many nerve endings in my pencil eraser than in your whole blackjack, buddy.”

Not feeling better. “I’m gonna need more than that.”

She shrugged. “That’s all I have. Sorry.”

“Then change the subject.” I wasn’t pissed at her. It was a rookie mistake to make a bet when I didn’t know her track record. I was pissed at myself for being a retard.

She took my hand and laced our fingers together. “Okay then, will you tell me how your talk with Rachael went?”

“Oh shit! I forgot to… I’m sorry!…” I’d gone into ‘thug mode’ while I was talking to Alc and had completely forgotten to tell Sookie about the conversation. I rolled over and grabbed my phone from the night stand so that she could look through the pictures while I gave her the details…

“…since there’s so much going on right now, I told her I would call about meeting them next week.”

Sookie gave me a kiss and went back to smiling at the picture of freckles. “Do you want to wait to go to Miami so that you can go to St. Louis?”

“No.” Absolutely not. She was right about us needing some time alone together.

“Are you going to procrastinate until you aren’t excited anymore and then talk yourself out of wanting to meet her?”

I growled at her. “No. I’m going to spend the week feeling things out around here and then call her Monday night to make plans for us to meet her.”

“Us? Shit! You don’t want her to come to Bon Temps, do you?”

Her little outburst worried me. “Why?”

“Because, if they come here for you to meet, you won’t get a word in edgewise. I know you’re new here and all, but you’ve got to realize that a toll booth in our driveway would make a bank.”

“That’s pretty much what I told her. I was thinking about us flying up to St. Louis the weekend after Miami. That’s almost two weeks that we can talk on the phone and get to know each other a little.”

“You want me to go with you?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

“Are you sure that you don’t want it to be a private thing?”

“Just the four of us is ‘private’.”

“Any excuse to get me into a hotel room, huh?”

I smiled at her. “That’s a perk.”

She giggled and snuggled into my chest… It felt better than it ever had before.

**

She’d insisted on showering by herself again. I know that she was doing it alone to spare me. I hated it. I understood. I was grateful. But I still hated it… I sat on the side of the bed, waiting just like I had yesterday. Hoping she wouldn’t slip and fall… Hoping she wouldn’t be as drained after this one.

I jumped when the door opened and she stood in the doorway and giggled at me. She was wearing a pair of brown dickies, a pink wife beater and pink vans. The two of us really were cut from the same cloth when it came to dressing for comfort.

She walked over to me, easier than she had yesterday, and sat on my lap. “I forgot to thank you.”

“For what?”

“My phone. I love that you went to the trouble of storing all of those numbers for me. And I love the green skin. YOU… are awesome.”

I smiled at her. “You’re welcome. I can’t take the credit though. Marnie suggested tweeting and facebooking that you needed the contact info.”

She smiled into a kiss. “Stop that. An idea without action is worthless.”

“Hellen Keller?”

She nodded.

“Well, then… since you’re ‘always right’ and I ‘always do the right thing’…”

She smiled… “We’re a perfect fit.”

**

I was about to ask her if she would consider getting back into bed for a while since it was still before 5. I knew she was going to tell me ‘no’, but I still wanted to ask. There was a knock on the door. Jack.

As soon as the door was open, he threw his arms around her waist like he was scared.

Sookie pet his head and shushed him. “Jack, honey, what’s wrong?”

“I had a bad dream.”

She winced as she squatted down to his level and hugged him. “You’re not old enough to give me the ‘man answer’ yet. What was it about?”

“I dreamt my mom came back.” Fuck. Poor kid. It made me wonder how deep Carm’s ‘boogie man’ analogy went. Christina Crawford wasn’t as spooked about her mother finding wire hangers.

She faked a giggle. “Is her cooking that bad?”

He gave her a snotty laugh against her shoulder.

Sookie gave a grunt when she stood up with him. He wrapped his legs around her like a toddler would as she walked out.

I resisted the urge to follow. Sookie had left our room for a reason so I went to our closet to grab my clothes for the day and could hear them through the wall right away. She’d taken him to Alc.

Group therapy, I suppose.

**

When I was done in the shower, I was more awake than I wanted to be considering the sun wasn’t up yet.

I debated tip toeing by the ‘Herveaux Suite’ but I thought I’d not ‘be a guy’ and actually show some concern…

I knocked softly, not wanting to wake up Carm if he had managed to sleep through the talking.

When I cracked the door slowly, the first thing I saw was Alc lying in bed holding Jack against his chest and they were both asleep.

As the door opened wider, I saw Sookie on the other side of the bed, snuggling with Carm. Jack’s hand was reached out and holding hers.

I closed the door again and started for the kitchen to start a pot of coffee, worried about how important Sookie had become to the boys. She is definitely better than the alternative of them glomming onto the first girl Alc dates, but I had to worry about how they were going to do with the change of moving into their own house…

They went from having an insanely jealous and belligerent mother to staying with the perfect mother figure. I didn’t want to leave this house after one day. It would be understandable for them to be attached to her…

Then I realized that was probably exactly why she took him back to Alc; so that he can start to associate Alc with comfort. Smart. Always right.

**

I could hear my father start moving around while I was pouring my coffee, so I poured another cup and sat down with my phone to check my phone for messages. Nothing. Confusing and beautiful at the same time.

I had to try not to laugh at the menacing look on my father’s face when he came into the room. Just because he was an early riser, doesn’t mean that he’s in a good mood about it.

“Morning.”

He growled. “Unfortunately. What’s got you up so early?”

“Early getting to bed. Sookie got up a little while ago.”

“I heard.”

“Shit. Sorry.”

“What was that shit last night?”

Deep breaths. I’d seen the dirty looks last night. “You looked pissed at me… but you got the whole explanation. What are you wondering about?”

“You beat a guy until he shit his pants.”

“I hadn’t touched him yet when he did that.”

“Since we’ve been here, you’ve shot a man in the head and brutalized another human being.”

Ok. I saw where this was going. I got up and went back to my room and took the copies of the confessions from the desk. When I came back, I set them on the table in front of my father. “Someone who does that is NOT a human being.”

“Those are his confessions?”

I nodded as I grabbed the coffee pot. I didn’t figure this was going to be a ‘one cup’ conversation.

“How much of it can be true when you nearly killed him? He’d have told you whatever you wanted to hear.”

I shrugged. “I don’t care if Bill confessed to killing  Hoffa, the Black Dahlia, the Lindberg baby, TuPac and being the Jack the mother fucking Ripper. What we know he did is on that paper. He’s a piece of shit and he’s lucky that he isn’t getting the death penalty.”

“You have no remorse? You broke a man.” No. No remorse. None. Not this time. Breaking men was what I was good at. Some are easier than others. He was a peach. Or… would have been if his target hadn’t been my Sookie.

I took the pile of paper from the table. “I don’t really care if you don’t approve of it. He deserved it. I didn’t do anything to him in an official capacity that I wasn’t likely to do to the prick if I ran into him in Dirges again. At least this way, these confessions will keep that skid mark away from Sookie for the rest of his life.”

“You don’t care…?”

I cut him off by reading… “This confession is written by William Thomas Compton. I have been made aware of my right to have a lawyer present and have declined. On Thursday, November 26^th, 1998 I attended Thanksgiving dinner at the Stackhouse family home on the invitation of Sheila Stackhouse. After the meal was over, Sookie and I went for a walk in the woods surrounding the property where she attempted to return my engagement ring to me. We argued and she ordered me off the property so I went home. Later that night her mother called to tell me that Sookie had left Bon Temps to return to school in Nashville. She told me that I missed my chance to reconcile with Sookie because Sookie was living with a man that she intended to bring home to visit at Christmas…

…I didn’t think about it beforehand and started driving without even packing a bag. I drove straight to Sookie’s apartment. Sheila had given the address to me. I intended to talk to her, but through the door I heard her laughing and I heard a man’s voice. I watched her through her windows until it seemed like they went to bed…

…I slept in my car, waiting for her to be alone in the morning. I watched again as they got ready to leave the house together and then followed them on foot to Espress-Oh. He was giving her a piggy back ride most of the way there. Just before they walked into the coffee shop, he leaned over and gave her a kiss and grabbed her ass. It infuriated me. I’d left my car back at her apartment and I wasn’t thinking clearly. I went back into the alley behind the building and paced. That’s when I decided to kill the man I’d seen with Sookie…

… I was still making my plans when Sookie came out into the alley with a bag of garbage. As soon as I saw her, something made my blood boil.  I grabbed her from behind and slammed her head into the side of the dumpster, knocking her out, I quickly started removing her clothes…

Want me to keep going, Dad?” He looked like he was going to be sick and I hadn’t even gotten to the way the mother fucker gave perfect detail, knowing that I’d be reading it.

“No.”

“Are you sure. He’s pretty specific. Like how he used her uniform shirt to clean her blood off his dick and then kept it as a souvenir.”

“Eric. That’s enough.”

I glared at him. “Really? You’re sure? He was pretty entertained with himself. He wrote all about how his dick was hard the whole time he was waiting in their kitchen to jump Lafayette a month later. He described how good it felt to come in his pants in response to seeing Lafayette’s blood all over the floor. His motive for selling the fake IDs was so that Sookie’s students might kill themselves via alcohol use. And the real kicker, Dad, was that in exchange for a new identity for the Vampire, Bill negotiated for her to be one of deCastro’s victims AND get a recording of Sookie’s rape and torture out of the deal. The deal also included that she get special attention. Are you sure you don’t want to hear about what that ‘human being’ wanted as a keepsake? The whole time he was writing, he thought Sookie was dead and his dick was hard. The only reason he threw up was because of the shock value of her faked morgue photos. If you want to be pissy with me because of the other guys I’ve done that to then knock yourself the fuck out, but Bill fucking Compton doesn’t get any pity. Not in this house.”

He was quiet for a while, long enough to light, smoke and put out a cigarette. He seemed like he was deflating a little. “How did you not kill him?” Wow. He didn’t just calm down… he ‘switched sides’.

“Self control. Plain and simple.”

“This as bad as it gets?”

“For me, yes. As a rule, not even close.”

He stared at me with his mouth open slightly.

“The Vampire was close, but when Alc and I first got paired up we were handed a case where 19 girls in Kenner were snatched on their way home from school. Beaten, raped, and stabbed to death. They were all under 14. The guy… he was the father of the 4^th victim. The other 18 were a smokescreen to make him look innocent. He killed all of them to cover that he’d gotten his own daughter pregnant. I hit that guy so hard his jaw had to be wired back together, but he wrote his fucking confession. For the record, I don’t feel badly about that one either.”

**

The knock on the front door, soft as it was, made my father look like a drowning man getting tossed a life raft. He really hadn’t grasped what I did for a living (who I dealt with) and he regretted acting like a tool. For once.

I couldn’t help but feel vindicated as I got up to answer the knock and gave his shoulder a pat as I walked by him.

Corbett with an armful of grocery bags.

“Hey. Good morning.”

“Morning.”

I took a bag from him and led the way to the kitchen. “What’s up?”

“Well… Morning Jim… I didn’t think it was right leaving Deb to do all the household stuff and my place is boring as shit. I thought I’d come over and lend a hand.”

“Thanks, but isn’t Pam at your place?”

He smirked. “I got bad news for you, son…”

I started laughing. “Sookie already told me she’s getting laid off.”

“So are you going to need therapy?”

“Naw, I have a security blanket. I’ll be fine.”

He chuckled. “So Linus, where’s Sally?”

“In bed with Charlie Brown.”

He shook his head. “Scuse me?”

The look on his face was priceless. “Jack had a nightmare and came to her. She took him to Alc and they all fell back to sleep.”

He nodded and started unpacking groceries. “How d’you think they’re gonna deal with moving away from their surrogate this weekend?”

“Before Ame called last night, I’d have said they’d be fine. I’m not so sure about Jack now.”

“Alc should arrange to have the truck run a little late.”

“You think?”

“Yeah. This week will be crazy weird for them with Sookie being out of work and y’all are dipping out this weekend. If they move when y’all aren’t here… well there isn’t a stand in for their stand in. If he waits a week, a normal week that’d mirror the first week, it might be better. That cunt’s timing was impeccable.”

“Tell me about it. Jack was upset because in his dream, she came back.”

“Beautiful. Makes you appreciate Deb more, doesn’t it?”

“Makes me hate Ame more… I couldn’t possibly appreciate Smom more. Speaking of which… Sookie tell you about the Sheila show that aired yesterday morning?”

“Fuckin’ hell! What did she do?”

“She called to ask if she could come to the wedding.”

He started laughing quietly as he pulled pans out. “How did Sookie tell her ‘no’?”

“Sheila failed a pop quiz in her Sookie class.”

“Oh my God. Details.”

I grabbed the bag of potatoes and pulled out the cutting board to help. As I diced the spuds for the home fries, Dad and I told Corbett about the fucked up conversation from yesterday morning while we all laughed. I nearly pissed my pants when Corbett said that he was lucky to have gotten his dick out of ‘that bear trap’.

**

While Corbett waited for the fryer to heat up, he leaned against the counter to smoke a cigarette.

“Alright, I have a bit of a confession.”

“I love you too, but I’m marrying Sookie.”

He started laughing. “I talked to Jason.”

Well, there goes the good mood I was in. “Corbett…”

“Hang on. I told you that I wouldn’t tell him unless he called and asked. He called. He asked.”

“Is he freaking out?”

“He was a little, at first.  I told him what’s been going on chronologically.”

“You told him that Bill confessed. That there was no way he’d ever get out, right?”

“Yes.”

“And?”

“He told me to tell you he forgives you for not inviting him to the party and that he’s your bitch.” Good mood returned.

“He was my bitch anyway.”

“Yeah… I told him that. To which he replied: ‘yea, but now he doesn’t even have to spit on it first’.”

Fucking clown. I couldn’t help but laugh. “That’s good to know. So if Jason isn’t flipping his lid… Oh, I get it. Sookie didn’t give you an ‘unless’, option. She just told you ‘don’t’. You want me to help you handle her.”

“Or help me hide.” He went back to frying small chunks of batter dipped steak. I had no idea what he was making, but he’d gotten out the ramekins so I was hopeful.

I was laughing again. “Chicken shit.”

“What!? She’s a really good shot… I just don’t want to upset her right now. Normally, I’d just tell her how it is.”

“I’ll tell her when you aren’t around. She’s moving slow enough that you should have a decent head start.”

It was hilarious how happy he was to get my ‘help’.

**

It was just after 6:30 when Carm came padding into the kitchen with a big smile on his face. “Sookie needs you.”

I rolled my eyes, cursing myself for getting into this shit. I rinsed my hands and went down the hall.

She was sitting on the side of the bed with a shit eating grin on her face. Fuck. She even makes it hard to be mad at her for stacking the deck. Brat.

When I walked around the corner with Sookie in my arms, Corbett’s eyes nearly popped out of his head. “What’s wrong? Did you hurt yourself?”

She giggled and kissed my cheek as I set her in her chair. “No Daddy. I’m perfect.”

“Why is he carrying you then?”

“Eric said I did too much yesterday. So we bet that I couldn’t stay off my feet all day.”

The worry melted from his face and he started to smile. “That’s one way to get you to settle down. What did you bet?”

“I don’t wanna talk about it.” Sookie laughed and I knew that I wasn’t going to get off the hook that easily. They were just lulling me into a false sense of security. Damn Stackhouses.

**

When the boys came into the kitchen smelling like shampoo and toothpaste, Carm gave me a high 5, then one to ‘CMC’ on his way to the fridge. He started pulling out the fixings to make his lunch and setting it out on the table. All business.

Jack on the other hand, didn’t say anything to anyone. He walked directly over to Sookie and gently climbed into her lap.

Sookie smiled sympathetically and started running her fingers through his hair again. “Jack, you don’t really want Carm to make your lunch do you? You could end up with a pickle and peanut butter biscuit.”

He shrugged.

“Sweetie, go make your lunch. I’ll still be here when you get done. Promise.”

He gave her a nod and just as gently as he climbed up, slid down. He started stacking a sandwich and filling his lunch box. It was painful to watch. The kid smiled when he found out that his mother wasn’t going to live with them anymore and had just had the wind sucked out of his sails at the idea that she live as close as in the same state.

Alc came into the room just in time to see Jack climb right back up into Sookie’s lap after his lunch was put together. He looked concerned and lost. I felt for him as much as I did Jack.

Corbett had been watching and I could swear he was fighting off some miserable flashbacks. “Hey Jack, I brought you a present…” Jack barely acknowledged him. “…When I got home last night, I edited the video from Dirges on Saturday.”

The kid’s eyes lit up a little. “You did?”

“Sure did. The disks are in the pocket of my jacket. One is a DVD so you can watch it on TV and the other one has the songs broken apart as MP4s so you can put them on your iPod to watch.”

“Do we have time to watch some of it before breakfast?”

“It won’t be ready to eat for another half hour or so, but I’m not the one to ask.”

Jack looked like he was starting to come out of his funk when he turned to look to Alc for the answer. Alc smiled at him and left to put the DVD in for them. Carm was smiling ear to ear as he ran off after his dad.

Jack looked up at Sookie. “Are you gonna watch too?”

“Hmmm, I don’t think so. I’m going to stay right here and visit. But I think when we get back from taking Smom, Dad and Marnie to the airport, we should have a sofa party and watch a movie.”

He smiled at her. “Who gets to pick the movie?”

She kissed his forehead and smiled at him. “It was my idea. I get to pick.”

“What movie?”

“How about I give you a hint?”

“A quote or a song?”

“How about one of each?”

He shifted in her lap like he was preparing himself for something big and nodded.

“You never quit on your music. No matter what happens. Cuz anytime something bad happens to you, that’s the one place you can escape to and just let it go. I learned it the hard way. And anyway, look at me. Nothing bad’s gonna happen. You gotta have a little faith.” The quote wasn’t familiar, but I got a fucking lump in my throat because of the sentiment.

Jack beamed at her. “Ok. How about the song?”

Sookie smiled at him and cleared her throat. “You better not make fun of me for sounding goofy…” She cleared her throat again…

“…Well it’s a marvelous night for a moondance…
…With the stars up above in your eyes…
…A fantabulous night to make romance…
…Neath the cover of October skies.” I’d been hypnotized by the sound of her voice again… She really did have the voice of an angel.

He clapped when she was done and it made her laugh. “That’s not fair though. Moondance is in a lotta movies.”

“That’s why I gave you such a unique quote. I could have told you ’11 years and 16 days, I’ve been counting’.”

“How many times have you seen it?”

“It’s my favorite movie ever. I’ve seen it 100 times and I keep it on my iPod and listen to it when I’m driving.”

…A second later the surround sound in the living room rattled the house with the drum beat of Candyman.

Jack kissed her cheek and gracefully left her lap… then he thundered into the living room. He sounded like a one man herd of elephants. More importantly, he was smiling.

Corbett walked over to Sookie and held his hand out with a huge, approving smile on his face. “Good call on the movie, baby girl. That’ll be just what the doctor ordered.”

She slapped him 5 and stretched a bit for him to kiss her cheek.

When I asked what movie she was talking about… the brat told me that my suspense would be over when Jack’s was.

**

None of us in the kitchen knew that Smom and Marnie were awake until we heard extra cheering at the end of Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy. They didn’t join us either. Not on their own anyway…

When breakfast came out of the oven (Corbett made a steak version of Sookie’s breakfast casserole) Corbett slid a fried egg onto the top of the two smaller ramekins and took them to the kids so that they could keep watching.

When he came back, he was carrying Marnie and Smom. One over each shoulder… and they were both laughing their asses off…

The only sounds made while we were eating, were made by our forks. I didn’t dare tell Sookie, but I liked Dad’s steak version more than her sausage.

Hadley and Hunter came in to pick the boys up for school just as we were all leaning back in our chairs, feeling the effects of eating too much breakfast. Fucking bloated… I felt like the Nutty Professor… Hercules, Hercules…

**

The kids both left for school with smiles on their faces (thank God) and the smokers had just fired up when there was a knock on the door. We all shared a round of looks, none of us wanted to get up to answer it. They all started looking at me.  Assholes.

Another more aggravated knock came as I was slowly getting out of my chair… Pam. Pam in a mood.

“It took you long enough.”

“Good morning to you too, Pam.”

“Where’s Tweedle Dumber?”

“Cancun, with his wife.”

There was no humor on her face at all, for that matter, there was nothing on her face and her eyes looked like they were waiting to suck someone’s soul from their body. “Your partner. Prick.”

Whoa! “He’s in the kitchen, twat.”

She took a step and tried to bow up on me. “You need to watch it. I’m in no mood for your bullshit.”

“You know what? Since you haven’t even bothered to tell me what lit the fuse on your tampon, you don’t have to be in the mood for it. You just have to deal with it. And this IS me watching it.”

She snorted at me and stomped to the kitchen and I followed her. I was ready to beat her ass. Really. She wanted to act like a man… Fuck. Scratch that. I really have been sucked in by the reverse feminism shit…

“Herveaux! What did you say? And to who?”

He turned in his seat just enough to give her a confused look. “Whom.” I had to try not to laugh that he was correcting her grammar. She’d been shouting at me, so he would’ve heard what kind of mood she was in. He was poking the bear.

“Fuck you. What did you say?”

“And to whom?… I heard you. I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about. Try using smaller words. I’m kinda dumb.”

“Alright Forrest fucking Gump… Do you think you can explain to me why the director came to my office to give me the day off?”

“Uh… maybe the Ghostbusters were booked for the day GOZER! What the fuck crawled up your ass?”

“You were a pissy bitch through the whole briefing yesterday and were all buddy-buddy with the AD and now I’m getting the Cock-Network vibe at the office.”

“Well then it wasn’t me. I aired out my shit list while I ate lunch with these folks. I said jack shit out of the meeting about the job.”

“Then what were you talking to the AD about?”

“Not that it’s any of you Goddamn business, but it was guy stuff. Dick size, ammunition, sports and beer.” Biting the inside of my mouth to keep from laughing… so was the rest of the audience to the train wreck.

“Fine then. What was on your shit list? You know, the one you aired over lunch.”

“Again, none of your business, but I mentioned to my friends that I think you suck at your fucking job. I put it out there that you did fuck-all on this case and that the only credit you didn’t take during the briefing was on the work Rene did on the forgery end. I’m so fed up past my fucking chin of how insanely lazy you are that I even told Sookie to shut up when she tried to defend you. As I vented, I glossed over the fact that your talent for deduction doesn’t qualify you to be a meter maid and that you would even make a shitty receptionist… Before you fucking slip another catty insult into asking me to clarify… There are 14 unaccounted for minutes between you leaving Corbett’s house and arriving at the right florist. Tell me Sherlock, how long did you sit in the empty parking lot of an abandoned florist fixing your makeup and not noticing that even though I told you that Sookie was at the florist her car wasn’t there? And if you were qualified to operate a phone, you might not have had the chance to perfect your lip liner!… Do you have anything else you’d like to throw at me? Or do you need a hint that right now is the perfect fucking time to shut your mouth unless there’s an apology waiting on deck?”

“I’m your superior. You don’t get to talk to me that way. I do my job…”

He put his finger in the air. “Excuse me. Hold up. You need help with a few things already… YOU are not my superior. You just outrank me. I do get to talk to you any fucking way I please when you come to where I live to jump on my shit for something you have no proof of because it didn’t happen. And you do NOT do your job. Eric and I have only ever given you status reports. I can’t remember the last time you had a hunch, let alone had one pan out. This case… this time, Sookie was our fucking handler. Kenya was more helpful than you were… Sorry. You were saying?”

Oh. My. God. I don’t think I’d ever seen Alc more ‘on’. I guess years of arguing with Ame gave him an edge in the pissing match department.

“Could I trouble you for the reason behind your sudden change in perspective?”

“Oh, so now we’re going to switch to professionalism, huh?”

“Herveaux!”

“We moved in as soon as Kenya got there.”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“Kenya covered twice the distance in half the time as you did AND secured the station before she left. And 6 minutes was the difference between Sookie just being unconscious and being dragged through broken glass and pinned in a walk-in… What’s changed, SIR, is that while Sookie blames herself for not leaving when Eric told her to, Eric blames himself for waiting on your useless ass and my kids blame the ‘bad guy’, Forrest Gump blames the stupid mother fucker that thought that being an overbearing feminazi makes you valuable to any part of law enforcement. But since he’s not here, I’ve decided to take it out on you for being arrogant and selfish enough to fake it.”

“You sexist prick!”

“There wasn’t a sexist thing about anything I just said.”

“You accused me of putting on makeup instead of being on point.”

“YOU were wearing a fresh coat of gloss.”

“Now I know why your wife…”

“YOU DO NOT want to finish that sentence!”

“Oh really? Why not?”

“Because I have a fresh box of fuck-you labeled ‘Pam’s personal life’. If you want to run that race… you won’t win. Do you have any Bureau business to discuss or were you about to leave?”

She turned around and stared up at me. “Do you mind telling me why there was a message from Cater on my desk when I got to work this morning?”

“Oh! Goody. My turn?” I smiled at her.

“What did Cater want?”

I guess she forgot who she was dealing with. I took a step towards her and held her stare, knowing I’d win. “Perhaps she lost my number. We had a date last night.”

“Oh really? What did you do on your little date?”

“We stunk up a room somewhere.” Alc, Corbett and Sookie all started laughing, making it hard for me to keep a straight face. Assholes.

“Northman, tell me what the fuck Homeland Security is calling me for, right now.”

“Pam?”

“WHAT?”

“Why haven’t you just called her to find out?”

“Are you calling me lazy now too?”

“Not in so many words. Why haven’t you returned that call?”

“Just tell me what she wanted!”

I started to chuckle. I couldn’t help it. “It seems like it would have just been easier to have called Jennifer, huh?”

She was fuming. She took a step back and raised her voice as though the volume she was already at wasn’t loud enough. “You sons of bitches can call this whatever you want, but you’re ganging up on me!”

I raised an eyebrow at her. “You should make up your mind.”

“About what?”

“Do you want us to treat you like another cop or do you want to be obeyed like you’re our mother. You can’t have it both ways. The chasm is too wide.”

“I’m not your mom!” No shit.

I took a step to fill the gap between us again. “Then you really need to shove the damsel-in-distress routine up your fucking ass and stop throwing the sexism card out. Right now, you need to get down on your knees and thank God that I’m enough of a sexist to not deck you. That’s what us guys do to keep each other motivated, focused even. If I had shit the bed half as bad as you did on this case, Alc would have knocked my dick in the dirt and vice versa.”

“I could write you both up for insubordination.”

“That would be a fun meeting.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it might be interesting to see the look on your face. They read the charge… Northman and Herveaux…”

Alcide was having too much fun with this. He butted in, “How come your name goes first?!”

I rolled my eyes at him. “… Herveaux and Northman were disrespectful to their immediate superior… Then we get to defend ourselves. We could start with the fact that on a case where more than 5000 man hours were clocked, you put in SEVEN, including the 5 hours it took for you to get to Bon Temps.”

“Do you have any idea how miserable working together is going to be now?”

“Do you have that poor of a memory that you don’t remember that we only spent about 3 hours each week in the same building? I think we’ll manage.”

She snarled at me and tried to shove by me, but ended up knocking herself back a step when she bounced her shoulder off of my arm. She slammed the door after herself.

**

As soon as she was gone, I started shaking my head. “Corbett, I’m sorry. I know you’ve got to go home to that…”

I stopped talking when he started laughing. “That was fucking awesome. I’m moving in!”

Alc lit another cigarette and held his hand out. “Feels good to have ‘em back doesn’t it?!”

I nodded and slapped his hand. “Amen.”

And that was it. We sat around the table for a while and just talked and joked around except for a few brief moments…

Corbett’s phone was on the table while he was washing dishes with Smom’s help and he got a text message.

He had Sookie read it to him. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

He smirked over his shoulder. “Reply: Leave your key on the counter.”

“Daddy! I’m not breaking up with your girlfriend for you!”

“If you don’t, Alc will.” Alc confirmed the statement with an ear to ear smile and waggling eyebrows so the rest of us started laughing.

As Sookie typed she was grumbling ‘fine’ and a few other things that ‘polite’ conversation would blush at.

A minute or two later there was a reply. “I don’t understand.”

Alcide sat up and looked evil. “Oh! I GOT THIS ONE!… Send: ‘take 6 minutes, it might come to you’.”

Corbett laughed so hard that it took him a while to tell Sookie to send exactly that.

Evil fucking Stackhouses…

**

It was barely after 9:00 when there was another knock on the door. Holy shit… what now?

Alc answered the knock on the door since I had lucked into a lap full of Sookie.

Sookie and Marnie were snickering back and forth so eavesdropping on who was here wasn’t working out.

Alc came back into the room with a stranger. Mid 40s. Short; about 5’10”. Dirty blond hair kept short but trendy (lots of product holding it up). Goatee. Well tailored, light gray suit with a lavender shirt and tie. Lawyer?

Alc didn’t have the chance to introduce him to anyone before he maneuvered around to stand right in front of Sookie and me. Judging by the look of horror on his face, I thought he was a friend of Sookie’s.

I was wrong.

He reached down and took Sookie’s hand, kissing it. “Miss Stackhouse, I’m more sorry than ever that I took my time introducing myself. Your pictures don’t do you justice! You are more stunning in person, even considering your current condition. I look forward to seeing you at 100%. I hear you are quite a spectacle!”

The guy was theatrical as a minimum. When he took Sookie’s hand I noticed his manicure and his British accent was probably exaggerated by his bravado.

“That’s all really sweet, and I’m really proud of you for managing to make a Google search sound ominous. Maybe now that your chap stick is all over my ass, you can settle down enough to tell me who the fuck you are and why you’re in my kitchen so early.”

The look on Alc’s face told me that I should be worried, but the guy smiled at her like he was entertaining a sassy child.

“Pardon me. Where the fuck did I leave my manners?” He patted his pockets to make a joke out of it. His eyes lit up suddenly and his hand went into his breast pocket. When he pulled it out, his middle finger was up and he had smirk on his face. “Ah! Here they are!”

Sookie started to laugh and he put his hand out again, this time to shake mine.

“Assistant Director Andrew Marshall.”

My fiancé just told off my new boss. Fuck me.

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