Time stood still for a few minutes. I had to think that I was maybe a bit in shock.
As Sheriff Dearborn completed his slow and careful circuit of the bar, he arrived back at Sam and me.
By then we had another sheriff to deal with.
Eric Northman, my boyfriend and the vampire sheriff of Area Five, which included Bon Temps, came through the door so quickly that when Bud and Truman realized he was there, they jumped, and I thought Bud was going to draw his weapon. Eric gripped my shoulders and bent to peer into my face. "Are you hurt?" he demanded.
It was like his concern gave me permission to drop my bravery. I felt a tear run down my cheek. Just one. "My apron caught fire, but I think my legs are okay," I said, making a huge effort to sound calm. "I only lost a little hair. So I didn't come out of it too bad. Bud, Truman, I can't remember if you've met my boyfriend, Eric Northman from Shreveport." There were several iffy facts in that sentence.
"How'd you know there was trouble here, Mr. Northman?" Truman asked.
"Sookie called me on her cell phone," Eric said. That was a lie, but I didn't exactly want to explain our blood bond to our fire chief and our sheriff, and Eric would never volunteer any information to humans.
One of the most wonderful, and the most appalling, things about Eric loving me was that he didn't give a shit about anyone else. He ignored the damaged bar, Sam's burns, and the police and firefighters (who were keeping track of him from the corners of their eyes) still inspecting the building.
Eric circled me to evaluate the hair situation. After a long moment, he said, "I'm going to look at your legs. Then we'll find a doctor and a beautician." His voice was absolutely cold and steady, but I knew he was volcanically angry. It rolled through the bond between us, just as my fear and shock had alerted him to my danger.
"Honey, we have other things to think about," I said, forcing myself to smile, forcing myself to sound calm. One corner of my brain pictured a pink ambulance screeching to a halt outside to disgorge emergency beauticians with cases of scissors, combs, and hair spray. "Dealing with a little hair damage can wait until tomorrow. It's a lot more important to find out who did this and why."
Eric glared at Sam as if the attack were Sam's responsibility. "Yes, his bar is far more important than your safety and well-being," he said. Sam looked astonished at this rebuke, and the beginnings of anger flickered across his face.
"If Sam hadn't been so quick with the fire extinguisher, we'd all have been in bad shape," I said, keeping up with the calm and the smiling. "In fact, both the bar and the people in it would have been in a lot more trouble." I was running out of faux serenity, and of course Eric realized it.
"I'm taking you home," he said.
"Not until I talk to her." Bud showed considerable courage in asserting himself. Eric was scary enough when he was in a good mood, much less when his fangs ran out as they did now. Strong emotion does that to a vamp.
"Honey," I said, holding on to my own temper with an effort. I put my arm around Eric's waist, and tried again. "Honey, Bud and Truman are in charge here, and they have their rules to follow. I'm okay." Though I was trembling, which of course he could feel.
"You were frightened," Eric said. I felt his own rage that something had happened to me that he had not been able to prevent. I suppressed a sigh at having to babysit Eric's emotions when I wanted to be free to have my own nervous breakdown. Vampires are nothing if not possessive when they've claimed someone as theirs, but they're also usually anxious to blend into the human population, not cause any unnecessary waves. This was an overreaction.
Eric was mad, sure, but normally he was also quite pragmatic. He knew I wasn't seriously hurt. I looked up at him, puzzled. My big Viking hadn't been himself in a week or two. Something other than the death of his maker was bothering him, but I hadn't built up enough courage to ask him what was wrong. I'd cut myself some slack. I'd simply wanted to enjoy the peace we'd shared for a few weeks.
Maybe that had been a mistake. Something big was pressing on him, and all this anger was a by-product.
"How'd you get here so quick?" Bud asked Eric.
"I flew," Eric said casually, and Bud and Truman gave each other a wide-eyed look. Eric had had the ability for (give or take) a thousand years, so he disregarded their amazement. He was focused on me, his fangs still out.
They couldn't know that Eric had felt the swell of my terror the minute I'd seen the running figure. I hadn't had to call him when the incident was over. "The sooner we get all this settled," I said, baring my teeth right back at him in a terrible smile, "the sooner we can leave." I was trying, not so subtly, to send Eric a message. He finally calmed down enough to get my subtext.
"Of course, my darling," he said. "You're absolutely right." But his hand took mine and squeezed too hard, and his eyes were so brilliant they looked like little blue lanterns.
Bud and Truman looked mighty relieved. The tension ratcheted down a few notches. Vampires = drama.
While Sam was getting his hand treated and Truman was taking pictures of what remained of the bottle, Bud asked me what I'd seen.
"I caught a glimpse of someone out in the parking lot running toward the building, and then the bottle came through the window," I said. "I don't know who threw it. After the window broke and the fire spread from all the lit napkins, I didn't notice anything but the people trying to leave and Sam trying to put it out."
Bud asked me the same thing several times in several different ways, but I couldn't help him any more than I already had.
"Why do you think someone would do this to Merlotte's, to Sam?" Bud asked.
"I don't understand it," I said. "You know, we had those demonstrators from the church in the parking lot a few weeks ago. They've only come back once since then. I can't imagine any of them making a--was that a Molotov cocktail?"
"How do you know about those, Sookie?"
"Well, one, I read books. Two, Terry doesn't talk about the war much, but every now and then he does talk about weapons." Terry Bellefleur, Detective Andy Bellefleur's cousin, was a decorated and damaged Vietnam veteran. He cleaned the bar when everyone was gone and came in occasionally to substitute for Sam. Sometimes he just hung at the bar watching people come in and out. Terry did not have much of a social life.
As soon as Bud declared himself satisfied, Eric and I went to my car. He took the keys from my shaking hand. I got in the passenger side. He was right. I shouldn't drive until I'd recovered from the shock.