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“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?