JB lived close to downtown in half a duplex. He asked me very sweetly to come in, but I told him I had to get home. I gave him a big hug, and I advised him to call Dr. Sonntag. I still didn't know her first name.
He said he would, but then, with JB, you couldn't really tell.
Then I had to stop and get gas at the only late-night gas station, where I had a long conversation with Arlene's cousin Derrick (who was brave enough to take the night shift), so I was a little later getting home than I had planned.
As I unlocked the front door, Bill came out of the darkness. Without a word, he grabbed my arm and turned me to him, and then he kissed me. In a minute we were pressed against the door with his body moving rhythmically against mine. I reached one hand behind myself to fumble with the lock, and the key finally turned. We stumbled into the house, and he turned me to face the couch. I gripped it with my hands and, just as I'd imagined, he pulled down my pants, and then he was in me.
I made a hoarse noise I'd never heard come from my throat before. Bill was making noises equally as primitive. I didn't think I could form a word. His hands were under my sweater, and my bra was in two pieces. He was relentless. I almost collapsed after the first time I came. "No," he growled when I was flagging, and he kept pounding. Then he increased the pace until I was almost sobbing, and then my sweater tore, and his teeth found my shoulder. He made a deep, awful sound, and then, after long seconds, it was over.
I was panting as if I'd run a mile, and he was shivering, too. Without bothering to refasten his clothing, he turned me around to face him, and he bent his head to my shoulder again to lick the little wound. When it had stopped bleeding and begun healing, he took off everything I had on, very slowly. He cleaned me below; he kissed me above.
"You smell like him" was the only thing he said. He proceeded to erase that smell and replace it with his own.
Then we were in the bedroom, and I had a moment to be glad I'd changed the sheets that morning before he bent his mouth to mine again.
If I'd had doubts up until then, I had them no longer. He was not sleeping with Portia Bellefleur. I didn't know what he was up to, but he did not have a true relationship with her. He slid his arms underneath me and held me to him as tightly as possible; he nuzzled my neck, kneaded my hips, ran his fingers down my thighs, and kissed the backs of my knees. He bathed in me. "Spread your legs for me, Sookie," he whispered, in his cold dark voice, and I did. He was ready again, and he was rough with it, as if he were trying to prove something.
"Be sweet," I said, the first time I had spoken.
"I can't. It's been too long, next time I'll be sweet, I swear," he said, running his tongue down the line of my jaw. His fangs grazed my neck. Fangs, tongue, mouth, fingers, manhood; it was like being made love to by the Tasmanian Devil. He was everywhere, and everywhere in a hurry.
When he collapsed on top of me, I was exhausted. He shifted to lie by my side, one leg draped over mine, one arm across my chest. He might as well have gotten out a branding iron and had done with it, but it wouldn't have been as much fun for me.
"Are you okay?" he mumbled.
"Except for having run into a brick wall a few times," I said indistinctly.
We both drifted off to sleep for a little, though Bill woke first, as he always did at night. "Sookie," he said quietly. "Darling. Wake up."
"Oo," I said, slowly coming to consciousness. For the first time in weeks, I woke with the hazy conviction that all was right with the world. With slow dismay, I realized that things were far from right. I opened my eyes. Bill's were right above me.
"We have to talk," he said, stroking the hair back from my face.
"So talk." I was awake now. What I was regretting was not the sex, but having to discuss the issues between us.
"I got carried away in Dallas," he said immediately. "Vampires do, when the chance to hunt presents itself so obviously. We were attacked. We have the right to hunt down those who want to kill us."
"That's returning to days of lawlessness," I said.
"But vampires hunt, Sookie. It is our nature," he said very seriously. "Like leopards; like wolves. We are not human. We can pretend to be, when we're trying to live with people . . . in your society. We can sometimes remember what it was like to be among you, one of you. But we are not the same race. We are no longer of the same clay."
I thought this over. He'd told me this, over and over, in different words, since we'd begun seeing each other.
Or maybe, he'd been seeing me, but I hadn't been seeing him: clearly, truly. No matter how often I thought I'd made my peace with his otherness, I realized that I still expected him to react as he would if he were JB du Rone, or Jason, or my church pastor.
"I think I'm finally getting this," I said. "But you got to realize, sometimes I'm not going to like that difference. Sometimes I have to get away and cool down. I'm really going to try. I really love you." Having done my best to promise to meet him halfway, I was reminded of my own grievance. I grabbed his hair and rolled him over so I was looking down at him. I looked right in his eyes.
"Now, you tell me what you're doing with Portia."
Bill's big hands rested on my hips as he explained.
"She came to me after I got back from Dallas, the first night. She had read about what happened there, wondered if I knew anyone who'd been there that day. When I said that I had been there myself—I didn't mention you—Portia said she had information that some of the arms used in the attack had come from a place in Bon Temps, Sheridan's Sport Shop. I asked her how she had heard this; she said as a lawyer, she couldn't say. I asked her why she was so concerned, if there wasn't anything further she'd tell me about it; she said she was a good citizen and hated to see other citizens persecuted. I asked her why she came to me; she said I was the only vampire she knew."
I believed that like I believed Portia was a secret belly dancer.
I narrowed my eyes as I worked this through. "Portia doesn't care one damn thing about vampire rights," I said. "She might want to get in your pants, but she doesn't care about vampire legal issues."
"'Get in my pants?' What a turn of phrase you have."
"Oh, you've heard that before," I said, a little abashed.
He shook his head, amusement sparkling in his face. "Get in my pants," he repeated, sounding it out slowly. "I would be in your pants, if you had any on." He rubbed his hands up and down to demonstrate.
"Cut that out," I said. "I'm trying to think."
His hands were pressing my hips, then releasing, moving me back and forth on him. I began to have difficulty forming thoughts.
"Stop, Bill," I said. "Listen, I think Portia wants to be seen with you so she might be asked to join that supposed sex club here in Bon Temps."
"Sex club?" Bill said with interest, not stopping in the least.
"Yes, didn't I tell you . . . oh, Bill, no . . . Bill, I'm still worn out from last . . . Oh. Oh, God." His hands had gripped me with their great strength, and moved me purposefully, right onto his stiffness. He began rocking me again, back and forth. "Oh," I said, lost in the moment. I began to see colors floating in front of my eyes, and then I was being rocked so fast I couldn't keep track of my motion. The end came at the same time for both of us, and we clung together panting for several minutes.
"We should never separate again," Bill said.
"I don't know, this makes it almost worth it."
A little aftershock rippled his body. "No," he said. "This is wonderful, but I would rather just leave town for a few days, than fight with you again." He opened his eyes wide. "Did you really suck a bullet from Eric's shoulder?"
"Yeah, he said I had to get it out before his flesh closed over it."