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“Oh, yes,” Eggs said, deciding not to confront my statement. “Yes, Eric’s . . . very large. It’s good to have some diversity.”

“This is as rainbow as Bon Temps gets,” I said, trying hard not to sound perky. I endured Eggs’s continued struggle with the button. This had been a big mistake. Eggs was just thinking about Eric’s butt. And other things about Eric.

Speaking of the devil, he snugged up behind me and ran his arms around me, pulling me to him and removing me from Eggs’s clumsy fingers. I leaned back into Eric, really glad he was there. I realized that was because I expected Eric to misbehave. But seeing people you’d known all your life act like this, well, it was deeply disgusting. I wasn’t too sure I could keep my face from showing this, so I wiggled against Eric, and when he made a happy sound, I turned in his arms to face him. I put my arms up around his neck and raised my face. He happily complied with my silent suggestion. With my face concealed, my mind was free to roam. I opened myself up mentally, just as Eric parted my lips with his tongue, so I felt completely unguarded. There were some strong “senders” in that room, and I no longer felt like myself, but like a pipeline for other people’s overwhelming needs.

I could taste the flavor of Eggs’s thoughts. He was remembering Lafayette, thin brown body, talented fingers, and heavily made up eyes. He was remembering Lafayette’s whispered suggestions. Then he was choking those happy memories off with more unpleasant ones, Lafayette protesting violently, shrilly . . .

“Sookie,” Eric said in my ear, so low that I don’t think another person in the room could’ve heard him. “Sookie, relax. I have you.”

I made my hand stroke his neck. I found that someone else was behind Eric, sort of making out with him from behind.

Jan’s hand reached around Eric and began rubbing my rear. Since she was touching me, her thoughts were absolutely clear; she was an exceptional “sender.” I flicked through her mind like the pages of a book, and read nothing of interest. She was only thinking of Eric’s anatomy, and worrying about her own fascination with Cleo’s chest. Nothing there for me.

I reached in another direction, wormed into the head of Mike Spencer, found the nasty tangle I’d expected, found that as he rolled Cleo’s breasts in his hands he was seeing other brown flesh, limp and lifeless. His own flesh rose as he remembered this. Through his memories I saw Jan asleep on the lumpy couch, Lafayette’s protest that if they didn’t stop hurting him he would tell everyone what he’d done and with whom, and then Mike’s fists descending, Tom Hardaway kneeling on the thin dark chest . . .

I had to get out of here. I couldn’t bear it, even if I hadn’t just learned what I needed to know. I didn’t see how Portia could have endured it, either, especially since she would have had to stay to learn anything, not having the “gift” I had.

I felt Jan’s hand massaging my ass. This was the most joyless excuse for sex I had ever seen: sex separated from mind and spirit, from love or affection. Even simple liking.

According to my four-times-married friend Arlene, men had no problem with this. Evidently, some women didn’t either.

“I have to get out,” I breathed into Eric’s mouth. I knew he could hear me.

“Go along with me,” he replied, and it was almost as if I was hearing him in my head.

He lifted me and slung me over his shoulder. My hair trailed down almost to the middle of his thigh.

“We’re going outside for a minute,” he told Jan, and I heard a big smacking noise. He’d given her a kiss.

“Can I come, too?” she asked, in a breathless Marlene Dietrich voice. It was lucky my face wasn’t showing.

“Give us a minute. Sookie is still a little shy,” Eric said in a voice as full of promise as a tub of a new flavor of ice cream.

“Warm her up good,” Mike Spencer said in a muffled voice. “We all want to see our Sookie fired up.”

“She will be hot,” Eric promised.

“Hot damn,” said Tom Hardaway, from between Tara’s legs.

Then, bless Eric,