From Dead to Worse

I was glad he’d found a way to attend.
    I took a deep breath, banished Bill’s dark gaze from my consciousness, and smiled at the camera. I occupied my designated space in the pictures to balance out the wedding party, dodged the googly-eyed cousin, and finally hotfooted it up the stairs to change into my bartender’s rig.
    There was no one up here, and it was a relief to be in the room by myself.
    I shimmied out of the dress, hung it up, and sat on a stool to unbuckle the straps of the painful shoes.
    There was a little sound at the door, and I looked up, startled. Bill was standing just inside the room, his hands in his pockets, his skin glowing gently. His fangs were out.
    “Trying to change here,” I said tartly. No point in making a big show of modesty. He’d seen every inch of me.
    “You didn’t tell them,” he said.
    “Huh?” Then my brain caught up. Bill meant that I hadn’t told the Bellefleurs that he was their ancestor. “No, of course not,” I said. “You asked me not to.”
    “I thought, in your anger, you might give them the information.”
    I gave him an incredulous look. “No, some of us actually have honor,” I said. He looked away for a minute. “By the way, your face healed real well.”
    During the Fellowship of the Sun bombing in Rhodes, Bill’s face had been exposed to the sun with really stomach-churning results.
    “I slept for six days,” he said. “When I finally got up, it was mostly healed. And as for your dig about my failing in honor, I haven’t any defense ... except that when Sophie-Anne told me to pursue you . . . I was reluctant, Sookie. At first, I didn’t want to even pretend to have a permanent relationship with a human woman. I thought it degraded me. I only came into the bar to identify you when I couldn’t put it off any longer. And that evening didn’t turn out like I’d planned. I went outside with the drainers, and things happened. When you were the one who came to my aid, I decided it was fate. I did what I had been told to do by my queen. In so doing, I fell into a trap I couldn’t escape. I still can’t.”
    The trap of LUUUUVVVV, I thought sarcastically. But he was too serious, too calm, to mock. I was simply defending my own heart with the weapon of bitchiness.
    “You got you a girlfriend,” I said. “You go on back to Selah.” I looked down to make sure I’d gotten the little strap on the second sandal unlatched. I worked the shoe off. When I glanced back up, Bill’s dark eyes were fixed on me.
    “I would give anything to lie with you again,” he said.
    I froze, my hands in the act of rolling the thigh-high hose off my left leg.
    Okay, that pretty much stunned me on several different levels. First, the biblical “lie with.” Second, my astonishment that he considered me such a memorable bed partner.
    Maybe he only remembered the virgins.
    “I don’t want to fool with you tonight, and Sam’s waiting on me down there to help him tend bar,” I said roughly. “You go on.” I stood and turned my back to him while I pulled on my pants and my shirt, tucking the shirt in. Then it was time for the black running shoes. After a quick check in the mirror to make sure I still had on some lipstick, I faced the doorway.
    He was gone.
    I went down the wide stairs and out the patio doors into the garden, relieved to be resuming my more accustomed place behind a bar. My feet still hurt. So did the sore spot in my heart labeled Bill Compton.
    Sam gave me a smiling glance as I scurried into place. Miss Caroline had vetoed our request to leave a tip jar out, but bar patrons had already stuffed a few bills into an empty highball glass, and I intended to let that stay in position.
    “You looked real pretty in the dress,” Sam said as he mixed a rum and Coke. I handed a beer across the bar and smiled at the older man who’d come to fetch it. He gave me a huge tip, and I glanced down to see that in my hurry to get downstairs I’d skipped a button. I was showing a little extra cleavage. I was momentarily embarrassed, but it wasn’t a slutty button, just a “Hey, I’ve got boobs” button. So I let it be.
    “Thanks,” I said, hoping Sam hadn’t noticed this quick evaluation. “I hope I did everything right.”
    “Of course you did,” Sam said, as if the possibility of me blowing my new role had never crossed his mind. This is why he’s the greatest boss I’ve ever had.
    “Well, good evening,” said a slightly nasal voice, and I