CHAPTER 7: Nothin' Ain't Worth Goin' To Prison For

"Tara, how can you be so calm in all of this?" Sam asked while they ate at the table.

"Calm? Maybe on the outside but on the inside I'm a fucking mess."

"Perhaps you should think this thing over."

"I'm not going to argue about this anymore. How about you put yourself in my shoes and try to understand why I have to do this. Some day I will have to confront Pam and the longer I wait, the harder it's gonna be. You know how relentless that bitch is. So it ain't no use making a run for it when she's gonna hunt me down, she said so herself. I have no choice Sam, even if it ends badly for myself."

"I understand. But you cannot tackle this all on your own. So, I'm staying."

"Sam, you saved my life and I'm eternally grateful."

"But.." Sam started to say, somehow knowing what she was going to say next.

"But you need to go back to your life."

"You are my life."

After what they shared last night, she became more than certain that the man sitting across from her was the one. He was the one she wanted to spend the rest of her life with and just about now couldn't bring herself to seeing him get hurt on her account.

"Look, you need to leave. I don't want to drag you into my mess." Tara said getting up from the table.

"So what if I want to be a part of your mess?" Sam asked rising up from out of his seat and picking up both their empty plates.

"Don't you have a business to run?" Tara asked folding her arms across her chest.

"I'm not leaving." Sam said while he put the plates in the sink.

"Sam, will you please go. I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself."

"No!" Sam said emphatically.

"You're stubborn you know that."

"That makes the two of us." Sam said closing the distance between them.

For a brief moment, they stood silently staring into each other's eyes.

"I can't allow you to do this. I don't want you to get hurt or ...what if something bad were to happen to..." Tara lowered her head with her eyes cast down unable to complete her sentence.

"Shh.. I want to do this." Sam said reaching up and gently touching her face with his hands.

"Sam..."

"I'm staying and that's final." Sam said emphatically wrapping his arms about her and hugging her tight.

Tara hugged him back. His scent, his entire being brought a calmness to her.

"Oh shit!" Tara exclaimed pulling away from him just remembering something.

"What is it?"

"You can't go." she said urgently.

"Uh, I wasn't planning on leaving."

"No, I forgot to tell you something. Last night after Pam attacked me in the parking lot, I ran over to your place to hide but someone or something else answered your door."

"What do you mean something?" Sam senses perked up.

"Well, whoever or whatever it was looked exactly like you, 'cept he didn't sound like you, or smelled like you."

"Looking like me? Are you sure?"

"Hell to the yeah I'm damn sure. Whatever the fuck it was tried to get me inside the trailer with him. I had to knee the pervert in the groin and face to get away. And that's when Pam came back."

"Oh no." Sam said looking pale and slowly taking a seat.

"Yeah, so forget what I said about you leaving. I've seen some weird shit lately so under no circumstances should you set foot in that trailer. You never know who or what is waiting for you there."

"That thing you saw was actually Tommy." Sam said with calm certainty and staring off blankly.

"Tommy? How'd he.. Fuck! Right, he is your brother. Now it makes perfect sense. He can shift just like you!"

"Not exactly like me. He's a skin-walker. Skin-walkers can shift into any creature on earth, even into something as complex as another human being which is something I can't do."

You would think Sam was a vampire by the way he suddenly lept out of his seat. With such rapid speed, he raced out the door with Tara trailing behind barely keeping up with him. One thing for sure, she didn't like the look on his face one bit.

"Sam. Look, nothing happened, okay. So don't do anything crazy." Tara began saying hoping to talk him out of whatever he planned on doing for she was certain it involved doing bodily harm to Tommy.

He paused next to his truck and turned and faced her.

"What? Don't hurt him? No. I plan on doing far worse." Sam promised.

His face hardened at the thought of his slimy brother making advances towards Tara. In a fit of rage, he hopped into his truck and started up the engine slamming the door after him.

"Sam, Sam. Listen. He didn't hurt me, alright, nothing happened. He was just being a jerk. That's all. So, stay, please, don't go." Tara pleaded as she held onto his arm in desperation. She was beginning to regret bringing up the whole incident in the first place.

It was not the first time that she had seen that cold, hard look in Sam's eyes. The last time she saw him like this was when he'd broke every bone in Calvin Norris's face. She remembered the horrified look upon customers' faces as they heard Calvin's bones crunch after every blow Sam gave him. So there was no telling what he was going to do to Tommy once he got his chance. Sam revved up his engine and Tara had no choice but to step back and get out of his way.

"Can you get a signal from up here?" He asked her as he looked at her from behind his wheel.

"Sam, please don't do some crazy shit that'll land you in jail."

"Can you get a signal?" He asked once again.

"Yes. I spoke with Lafayette this morning."

"I'll return before it gets dark."

With that he backed his truck out and drove off.

~*0*~

"Yes, what is it? This had better be worth interrupting my much needed beauty rest." Pam said from inside her coffin.

As she held her pink iPhone to her ear, she turned on a light and checked out her face in a mirror affixed to the pink tuffed satin lining before her. She could see that the series of painful injections she received from Doctor Ludwig last night was taking effect. The injections provided no cure to her rotting problem, but, it slowed its progression and this meant that they had to be administered every day for the rest of her un-dead life.

A vampire like Pam who was up as early as noon began to feel the onset of the bleeds. The typical droplets of blood oozing from ears, nose and eyes were considered a minor set back. She ignored them and continued peering at herself in the mirror. She was pleased that her face was almost back to what it was before Marnie casted that bothersome rotting spell on her.

"Miss Ravencroft we've located the target." A male voice said on the other end of the phone.

"Finally. Text me the location and get your boys into position. They are not to do anything until I get there. Is that understood?"

~*0*~

Forty minutes later, Sam parked his truck in front of his trailer next to Tommy's van. He jumped out and ran up to the front door and quickly let himself in. No one was present but he did pick up on Tara's faint scent just on the outside of his trailer. Once he was inside, he detected two more stronger scents apart from his own. One thing for sure, he couldn't ignore the puddle of congealed bloody vomit that was left on the floor. Right away we recalled Luna telling him about her skin-walking experience, that that it made her feverish and vomit blood. So he knew for certain that Tommy was too a skin-walker.

Not bothering to close his door, he ran back out and sped off towards the back door of his restaurant. Just then, Terry stepped outside for a smoke and had just managed to see Sam zip past him.

"Hey brother..." Terry said in his usual casual manner. Sam acknowledged him with a brief 'hey' and kept going leaving Terry behind holding a lighter in one hand and a cigarette in the other.

Sam walked through the door and down the narrow hallway past his office. Everything around him appeared normal, a complete opposite of how he felt on the inside. His hands were balled into tight fists and his jaws were clenched tight. He knew Tommy was near, he could smell him. His phone vibrated away in his pocket, but he ignored it knowing full well that it was Tara trying to reach him.

He paused next to the bar and scanned the dining area. At that time of the day, it was fairly busy with customers. He sniffed the air and turned his head in the direction in which a familiar sharp metallic scent came from. There he saw in a booth in the far corner of the room a man in a suit talking with a poor excuse of a Maxine Fortenberry dressed in the most mis-matched clothing no one on earth except a circus clown would be caught dead in. Dressed in a lilac blouse, yellow skirt, green shoes and clutching a bright blue handbag was Tommy who had morphed into Maxine.

"Tommy!" Sam yelled from across the room. He didn't care what others were thinking as they looked on.

The room had fallen silent as the patrons stopped what they were doing and watched Sam stomp over to the booth where they believed Mrs. Fortenberry was just having a civil dinner conversation with a man from some energy company.

Tommy's eyes widened when he saw Sam approach. He quickly realized by the look in his brother's cold steel eyes that his cover had been blown. He knew this was the time to get the hell out of the restaurant and as far away as possible from his brother who had murder written all over his face. So he made a mad dash for the front door but not before he grabbed a cheque from out of the prospector's hands.

In two shakes of a lamb's tail, the brothers were outside and clear across the parking lot. By the time Sam had nearly caught up to Tommy, they were both well into the woods and out of plain sight of everyone inside. Although Tommy had long left Mrs. Fortenberry's ugly shoes behind in the parking lot, he still couldn't out run his sibbling. Moving about in a differently shaped body proved difficult on top of having to nurse a swollen and painful groin which Tara had something to do with.

Sam closed in and kicked Tommy squarely in centre of his back. He kicked him with such force that he flew forwards a couple of feet before landing on his stomach. The air was knocked clean out of Tommy's lungs and all he could do was gasp and cough. Sam stood over him and dropped to his knees and straddled him. Next he grabbed his shoulders and spun him onto his back before saying,

"After all I've done for you, how could you betray me like this."

Sam noticed a bruise on Tommy's face where Tara had kneed him and it matched up perfectly with what she told him earlier at the cabin.

"Sam, look man, it wasn't totally my fault. She threw herself at me." Tommy said trying to explain himself believing that the reason why Sam was after him was because of what he'd done to Luna.

"You disgusting fuck. You tried to take advantage of her when she came looking for help." Sam shouted as he took hold of the cuff of Tommy's lilac blouse.

"What? No, wait. Wait!" Tommy cried out but alas, it was too late for Sam dealt him a good punch to the face, sending one of his teeth flying out of his mouth. Tommy's mouth instantly filled up with blood and he had to spit it out.

"Tell me why I shouldn't just kill you right now?" Sam glared down at him with his fist held up high ready to strike him again.

"No no no no no! That ain't how it went. Luna came over and one thing lead to the next. Look, I'm sorry, but, she wanted to screw and I couldn't refuse."

"Luna? The fuck are you talking about?" Sam paused and realized that that other scent he picked up in his trailer was indeed Luna's. He allowed Tommy a moment to talk.

"She'd come over and she thought I wuz you and we fucked. That's all. It didn't mean nothin'. I'm sorry Sam."

"I don't fucking care that you slept with Luna." Sam yelled and punched him again across his jaw.

"Shit! Then why the fuck are you so angry about?" Tommy spat, blood running down his chin.

"Who else was at my trailer last night?"

Tommy knew it was a rhetorical question. So he answered anyway.

"Tara."

"Why Tommy? Why?"

"'cause I figgered if I could get away foolin' Luna, then I could fool Tara too. But, she's smart and when she tried gettin' away, I donno what came over me, I just reacted. I didn't mean to harm her none Sam. I ain't no good. I'm fucked up." Tommy said with tears in his eyes.

"You had no right to touch her." Sam said with all the anger that was pent up inside of him.

The moment Tommy came into Sam's life, everything had been nothing but trouble. Apart from being disrespectful to him, one day he up and stole all of his money. Although Sam got every penny back, he came very close to shooting his no good brother dead but got him in the leg. Of course he ended up paying for his physiotherapy sessions ever since. Eventually, he forgave him and took him back in. But after what the low-life did to Tara last was the last straw. It nearly costed her her life and he couldn't come to terms with it. He thought brother or not, he wasn't going to let this ass-wipe get away with shit anymore.

Enraged, Sam wrapped his hands about Tommy's neck and began to squeeze. Tommy gasped for air and spat up blood and vomit. His face grew purple and he thrashed his head from side to side.

"Why didn't you help her? She could've died because of you." Sam said while he choked the life out of his brother.

"Sam! No!" shouted a deep male voice which seemed to come from out of no where.

Then a pair of large hands grabbed him from behind and lifted him clear off of his brother who had by this passed out and morphed back into himself. Whoever picked him up with such ease was obviously quite strong.

"How is he?" Asked Alcide who set Sam back down onto his feet but kept a close rein on him.

"He's barely breathing. But his face and neck is fucked up that's fo' sho'." said Lafayette who was bent over Tommy. Next to Lafayette was Jesus looking on.

"He isn't going to make it." said Jesus observing how shallow Tommy's breathing was.

"We got to take him to the hospital." said Alcide and he let go of Sam.

"It'll be too late Alcide." Jesus replied gravely.

Lafayette felt around in his jacket and found a small vial of V. It was Eric's thousand year old blood which he had been forced to sell on the black market on the donor's behest. He quickly removed the rubber cap and poured the red liquid into Tommy's gaping mouth.

"What the fuck are you doing?" An alarmed Alcide asked.

"Watch." Lafayette replied calmly.

Then, within a few seconds, Tommy's bruises and cuts disappeared, but, most importantly his breathing improved as all four men looking on watched his chest rise and fall at a normal pace. Jesus was unpreturbed by all this for he had seen Lafayette do the very same thing to Calvin Norris the night Sam crushed his face in. The funny thing is that after all that was said and done, the inbred told Lafayette and Jesus to fuck the hell off and took off without so much as saying 'bitches, thanks for saving my worthless life'.

Tommy didn't wake up right away. He remained on his back and slept soundly on the dusty ground, a stark contrast to the state he was in just a minute ago. Sam fell to his knees right next to his brother. Blood was on his shirt and sweat rolling down his temples. He had a blank expression on his face and it took him a good while before he came to his senses and said something.

"Tara called you didn't she." Sam asked as he looked on his younger brother.

"Yeah, she called me when me and Jesus just got in from Mexico." Lafayette said looking down at Sam who was holding his bloodied knuckles.

"She called me too when at first she couldn't get through to Lafayette. She explained everything to me. Sam, I don't blame you for getting upset at your brother for what he done and there ain't no tellin' what I would have done if someone harmed my Debbie, but you can't go off beatin' up on people like that. Nothin' ain't worth goin' to prison for." Alcide said.

"Yeah, Tara told me that once a long time ago. If it wasn't for her finding you guys, I'd be the next one up for an execution."

"Execution? No employer o' mine walkin' the green mile befo' I gots somethin' to say 'bout it. 'specially when he gone hit me up wid a nice raise." Lafayette said and he meant every word and even though he didn't know it, it helped lighten the mood.

"Come on guys, we need to clear this place before someone comes by." Alcide said picking up a sleeping Tommy who was much smaller in comparison to him. In his arms he looked like a child.

"Didn't y'all notice, but why the fuck is Tommy in a motha fuckin' dress?" Lafayette asked.

~*0*0*~