Time to get her out of there.
To keep her heels from dragging and making noise, I had to lift her onto my shoulder. I had never done such a thing, and the procedure was awkward. Lucky for me she was so small, and lucky I’d practiced blocking things out of my mind all these years. Otherwise, the way Lorena dangled, completely limp, and the way she was beginning to flake away, would have freaked me out. I gritted my teeth, to hold back the bubble of hysteria starting up my throat.
It was raining heavily as I carried the body to the pool. Without Eric’s blood, I could never have lifted the weighted edge of the pool cover, but I managed it with one hand and pushed what was left of Lorena into the pool with one foot. I was aware at any second that someone could look out the windows at the back of the mansion and see me, realize what I was doing—but if any of the humans living in the house did so, they decided to keep silent.
I was beginning to feel overwhelmingly weary. I trudged back down the flagstone path through the hedge to the car. I leaned on it for a minute, just breathing, gathering myself. Then I got in the driver’s seat, and turned the key in the ignition. The Lincoln was the biggest car I’d ever driven, and one of the most luxurious cars I’d ever been in, but just at the moment I could take no interest or pleasure in it. I buckled my seat belt, adjusted the mirror and the seat, and looked at the dashboard carefully. I was going to need the windshield wipers, of course. This car was a new one, and the lights came on automatically, so that was one less worry.
I took a deep breath. This was at least phase three of the rescue of Bill. It was scary how much of this had happened by sheer chance, but the best-laid plans never take every happenstance into account anyway. Not possible. Generally, my plans tended to be what I called roomy.
I swung the car around and drove out of the courtyard. The drive swept in a graceful curve and went across the front of the main building. For the first time, I saw the facade of the mansion. It was as beautiful—white painted siding, huge columns—as I had imagined. Russell had spent a pretty penny renovating the place.
The driveway wound through grounds that still looked manicured even in their winter brown state, but that long driveway was all too short. I could see the wall ahead of me. There was the checkpoint at the gate, and it was manned. I was sweating despite the cold.
I stopped just before the gate. There was a little white cubicle to one side, and it was glass from waist level up. It extended inside and outside the wall, so guards could check both incoming and outgoing vehicles. I hoped it was heated, for the sake of the two Weres on duty. Both of them were wearing their leathers and looking mighty grumpy. They’d had a hard night, no doubt about it. As I pulled to a stop, I resisted an almost overwhelming temptation to plow right through those gates. One of the Weres came out. He was carrying a rifle, so it was a good thing I hadn’t acted on that impulse.
“I guess Bernard told you all I’d be leaving this morning?” I said, after I’d rolled down my window. I attempted a smile.
“You the one who got staked last night?” My questioner was surly and stubbly, and he smelled like a wet dog.
“Yeah.”
“How you feeling?”
“Better, thank you.”
“You coming back for the crucifixion?”
Surely I hadn’t heard him right. “Excuse me?” I asked faintly.
His companion, who’d come to stand in the hut’s door, said, “Doug, shut up.”
Doug glowered at his fellow Were, but he shrugged after the glower didn’t have any effect. “Okay, you’re cleared to go.”
The gates opened, way too slowly to suit me. When they were wide, and the Weres had stepped back, I drove sedately through. I suddenly realized I had no idea which way to go, but it seemed correct to turn left, since I wanted to head back to Jackson. My subconscious was telling me we had turned right to enter the driveway the night before.
My subconscious was a big fat liar.
After five minutes, I was fairly positive I was lost, and the sun continued to rise, naturally, even through the mass of clouds. I couldn’t remember how well the blanket covered Bill, and I wasn’t sure how light-tight the trunk would be. After all, safe transportation of vampires was not something the carmakers would cover in their list of specs.
On the other hand, I told myself, the trunk would have to be waterproof—that was sure important—so light-proof couldn’t be far behind. Nonetheless, it seemed vitally important to find a dark place to park the Lincoln for the remaining hours of the day. Though every impulse told me to drive hard and get as far away from the mansion as I could, just in case someone went checking for Bill and put two and two together, I pulled over to the side of the road and opened the glove compartment. God bless America! There was a map of Mississippi with an inset for Jackson.
Which would have helped if I’d had any idea where I was at the moment.
People making desperate escapes aren’t supposed to get lost.
I took a few deep breaths. I pulled back out into the road and drove on until I saw a busy gas station. Though the Lincoln’s tank was full (thank you, Eric) I pulled in and parked at one of the pumps. The car on the other side was a black Mercedes, and the woman pumping the gas was an intelligent-looking middle-aged woman dressed in casual, comfortable, nice clothes. As I got the windshield squeegee out of its vat of water, I said, “You wouldn’t happen to know how to get back to I-20 from here, would you?”
“Oh, sure,” she said. She smiled. She was the kind of person who just loves to help other people, and I was thanking my lucky stars I’d spotted her. “This is Madison, and Jackson is south of here. I-55 is maybe a mile over that way.” She pointed west. “You take I-55 south, and you’ll run right into I-20. Or, you could take . . .”
I was about to be overloaded with information. “Oh, that sounds perfect. Let me just do that, or I’ll lose track.”
“Sure, glad I could help.”
“Oh, you surely did.”
We beamed at each other, just two nice women. I had to fight an impulse to say, “There’s a tortured vampire in my trunk,” out of sheer giddiness. I had rescued Bill, and I was alive, and tonight we would be on our way back to Bon Temps. Life would be wonderfully trouble-free. Except, of course, for dealing with my unfaithful boyfriend, finding out if the werewolf’s body we’d disposed of in Bon Temps had been found, waiting to hear the same about the werewolf who’d been stuffed in Alcide’s closet, and waiting for the reaction of the queen of Louisiana to Bill’s indiscretion with Lorena. His verbal indiscretion: I didn’t think for one minute that she would care about his sexual activities.
Other than that, we were hunky-dory.
“Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof,” I told myself. That had been Gran’s favorite Bible quotation. When I was about nine, I’d asked her to explain that to me, and she’d said, “Don’t go looking for trouble; it’s already looking for you.”
Bearing that in mind, I cleared my mental decks. My next goal was simply to get back to Jackson and the shelter of the garage. I followed the instructions the kind woman had given me, and I had the relief of entering Jackson within a half hour.
I knew if I could find the state capitol, I could find Alcide’s apartment building. I hadn’t allowed for one-way streets, and I hadn’t been paying awful close attention to directions when Alcide gave me my little tour of downtown Jackson. But there aren’t that many five-story buildings in the whole state of Mississippi, even in the capital. After a tense period of cruising, I spotted it.
Now, I thought, all my troubles will be over. Isn’t it dumb to think that? Ever?
I pulled into the area by the little guard cubicle, where you had to wait to be recognized while the guy flipped the switch, or punched the button, or whatever made the barrier lift up. I was terrified he might deny me entrance because I didn’t have a special sticker, like Alcide did on his truck.
The man wasn’t there. The cubicle was empty. Surely that was wrong? I frowned,
wondering what to do. But here the guard came, in his heavy brown uniform, trudging up the ramp. When he saw I was waiting, he looked stricken, and hurried up to the car. I sighed. I would have to talk to him after all. I pushed the button that would lower my window.
“I’m sorry I was away from my post,” he said instantly. “I had to, ah . . . personal needs.”
I had a little leverage here.
“I had to go borrow me a car,” I said. “Can I get a temporary sticker?” I looked at him in a way that clued him in to my mindset. That look said, “Don’t hassle me about getting the sticker, and I won’t say a word about you leaving your post.”
“Yes, ma’am. That’s apartment 504?”
“You have a wonderful memory,” I said, and his seamed face flushed.
“Part of the job,” he said nonchalantly, and handed me a laminated number that I stuck on the dashboard. “If you’ll just hand that in when you leave for good, please? Or if you plan on staying, you’ll have to fill out a form we can have on file, and we’ll give you a sticker. Actually,” he said, stumbling a little, embarrassed, “Mr. Herveaux will have to fill it out, as the property owner.”
“Sure,” I said. “No problem.” I gave him a cheery wave, and he retreated to the cubicle to raise the barrier.
I drove into the dark parking garage, feeling that rush of relief that follows clearing a major hurdle.
Reaction set in. I was shaking all over when I took the keys out of the ignition. I thought I saw Alcide’s pickup over a couple of rows, but I had parked as deeply in the garage as I could—in the darkest corner, away from all the other cars, as it happened. This was as far as I had planned. I had no idea what to do next. I hadn’t really believed I would get this far. I leaned back in the comfortable seat just for a minute, to relax and stop shaking before I got out. I’d had the heater on full blast during my drive from the mansion, so it was toasty warm inside the car.
When I woke up, I’d been asleep for hours.
The car was cold, and I was colder, despite the stolen quilted jacket. I got out of the driver’s seat stiffly, stretching and bending to relieve cramped joints.
Maybe I should check on Bill. He had gotten rolled around in the trunk, I was sure, and I needed to make sure he was covered.
Actually, I just wanted to see him again. My heart actually beat faster at the thought. I was a real idiot.
I checked my distance from the weak sunlight at the entrance; I was well away. And I had parked so the trunk opening was pointed away from that bit of sunlight.
Yielding to temptation, I stepped around to the back of the car. I turned the key in the lock, pulled it out and popped it in my jacket pocket, and watched as the lid rose.
In the dim garage, I couldn’t see too well, and it was hard to make out even the fuzzy yellow blanket. Bill appeared to be pretty well concealed. I bent over a little more, so I could arrange a fold further over his head. I had only a second’s warning, a scuff of a shoe against the concrete, and then I felt a forceful shove from behind.
I fell into the trunk on top of Bill.
An instant and extra shove brought my legs in, and the trunk slammed shut.
Now Bill and I were locked in the trunk of the Lincoln.
Chapter Twelve
DEBBIE. I FIGURED it had been Debbie. After I got over my initial flood of panic, which lasted longer than I wanted to admit, I tried to relive the few seconds carefully. I’d caught a trace of brain pattern, enough to inform me that my attacker was a shifter. I figured it must have been Alcide’s former girlfriend—his not-so-former girlfriend, apparently, since she was hanging around his garage.
Had she been waiting for me to return to Alcide since the night before? Or had she met up with him at some point during the craziness of the full moon? Debbie had been even more angered by my escorting Alcide than I could have imagined. Either she loved him, or she was extremely possessive.
Not that her motivation was any big concern right now. My big concern was air. For the first time, I felt lucky that Bill didn’t breathe.
I made my own breath slow and even. No deep, panicky gasps, no thrashing. I made myself figure things out. Okay, I’d entered the trunk probably about, hmm, one p.m. Bill would wake around five, when it was getting dark. Maybe he’d sleep a little longer, because he’d been so exhausted—but no later than six-thirty, for sure. When he was awake, he’d be able to get us out of here. Or would he? He was very weak. He’d been terribly injured, and his injuries would take a while in healing, even for a vampire. He would need rest and blood before he’d be up to par. And he hadn’t had any blood in a week. As that thought passed through my mind, I suddenly felt cold.
Cold all over.
Bill would be hungry. Really, really hungry. Crazy hungry.
And here I was—fast food.
Would he know who I was? Would he realize it was me, in time to stop?
It hurt even worse to think that he might not care enough anymore—care enough about me—to stop. He might just keep sucking and sucking, until I was drained dry. After all, he’d had an affair with Lorena. He’d seen me kill her, right in front of his eyes. Granted, she’d betrayed and tortured him, and that should have doused his ardor, right there. But aren’t relationships crazy anyway?
Even my grandmother would have said, “Oh, shit.”
Okay. I had stay calm. I had to breathe shallow and slow to save air. And I had to rearrange our bodies, so I could be more comfortable. I was relieved this was the biggest trunk I’d ever seen, because that made such a maneuver possible. Bill was limp—well, he was dead, of course. So I could sort of shove him without worrying too much about the consequences. The trunk was cold, too, and I tried to unwrap Bill a little bit so I could share the blanket.
The trunk was also quite dark. I could write the car designer a letter, and let him know I could vouch for its light-tightness, if that was how you’d put it. If I got out of here alive, that is. I felt the shape of the two bottles of blood. Maybe Bill would be content with that?
Suddenly, I remembered an article I’d read in a news magazine while I was waiting in the dentist’s office. It was about a woman who’d been taken hostage and forced into the trunk of her own car, and she’d been campaigning ever since to have inside latches installed in trunks so any captive could release herself. I wondered if she’d influenced the people who made Lincolns. I felt all around the trunk, at least the parts I could reach, and I did feel a latch release, maybe; there was a place where wires were sticking into the trunk. But whatever handle they’d been attached to had been clipped off.
I tried pulling, I tried yanking to the left or right. Damn it, this just wasn’t right. I almost went nuts, there in that trunk. The means of escape was in there with me, and I couldn’t make it work. My fingertips went over and over the wires, but to no purpose.
The mechanism had been disabled.
I tried real hard to figure out how that could have happened. I am ashamed to confess, I wondered if somehow Eric knew I’d be shut in the trunk, and this was his way of saying, “That’s what you get for preferring Bill.” But I just couldn’t believe that. Eric sure had some big blank moral blind spots, but I didn’t think he’d do that to me. After all, he hadn’t reached his stated goal of having me, which was the nicest way I could put it to myself.
Since I had nothing else to do but think, which didn’t take up extra oxygen, as far as I knew, I considered the car’s previous owner. It occurred to me that Eric’s friend had pointed out a car that would be easy to steal; a car belonging to someone who was sure to be out late at night, someone who could afford a fine car, someone whose trunk would hold the litter of cigarette papers, powder, and Baggies.
Eric had liberated the Lincoln from a drug dealer, I was willing to bet. And that drug dealer had disabled the inner trunk release for reasons I didn’t even want to think about too closely.
Oh, give me a break, I thought indignantly. (It was easy just then to forget the many breaks
I’d had during the day.) Unless I got a final break, and got out of this trunk before Bill awoke, none of the others would exactly count.
It was a Sunday, and very close to Christmas, so the garage was silent. Maybe some people had gone home for the holidays, and the legislators had gone home to their constituency, and the other people were busy doing . . . Christmas, Sunday stuff. I heard one car leave while I lay there, and then I heard voices after a time; two people getting off the elevator. I screamed, and banged on the trunk lid, but the sound was swallowed up in the starting of a big engine. I quieted immediately, frightened of using more air than I could afford.
I’ll tell you, time spent in the nearly pitch-black dark, in a confined space, waiting for something to happen—that’s pretty awful time. I didn’t have a watch on; I would have had to have one with those hands that light up, anyway. I never fell asleep, but I drifted into an odd state of suspension. This was mostly due to the cold, I expect. Even with the quilted jacket and the blanket, it was very cold in the trunk. Still, cold, unmoving, dark, silent. My mind drifted.
Then I was terrified.
Bill was moving. He stirred, made a pain noise. Then his body seemed to go tense. I knew he had smelled me.
“Bill,” I said hoarsely, my lips almost too stiff with cold to move. “Bill, it’s me, Sookie. Bill, are you okay? There’s some bottled blood in here. Drink it now.”
He struck.
In his hunger, he made no attempt to spare me anything, and it hurt like the six shades of hell.
“Bill, it’s me,” I said, starting to cry. “Bill, it’s me. Don’t do this, honey. Bill, it’s Sookie. There’s TrueBlood in here.”
But he didn’t stop. I kept talking, and he kept sucking, and I was becoming even colder, and very weak. His arms were clamping me to him, and struggling was no use, it would only excite him more. His leg was slung over my legs.
Sookie Stackhouse 8-copy Boxed Set Page 70
