Last time on Healing Blood:

I rested my head on his shoulder and just watched him in the warm light of the fire, wondering what it was like for him to look the same even as he aged and aged and aged inside. Wondered about him killing Pam and thought about him leering at me after the maenad attack. I thought about him picking glass out of my arm in Dallas and me cleaning his feet in my kitchen. I thought of him posturing with Quinn in Rhodes and stabbing Longshadow in his office. I thought of him dancing with me at Fangtasia, in Rhodes, in this very living room last week. I let my finger trace the lines of his face, and before I knew it I'd followed the path he'd showed me the other night, the one carved by a knife over and over again.

Eric just sat there and watched me with that look he got sometimes, that look I still couldn't decipher. But then his lips twitched up and his fangs slid down and he tilted his chin down and his eyebrows up in a way that I knew so well meant that he knew I was mooning over him. He might as well have puffed up his chest and beat on it, he was so proud. And even though it rankled, I also couldn't deny how adorable he looked when his whole face smiled like that. What was that word?

"Incorrigible," I whispered and returned his smile, feeling a little proud myself. I could just tell he was on the verge of one of those belly laughs I loved so much. Somewhere in the background I heard the guitar still playing. But from where we were snuggled on the floor in front of my couch, I couldn't have cared less.

Eric leaned over and brushed my lips with his. It was like my whole body whimpered and my ribcage felt too small for all the emotions running around in there.

"My Sookie," he sang. I shook my head and laughed, nailing him with a little kiss.

And then Nando's mind was cooing over how sweet we two were and I coughed and turned my head. I could feel the heat in my face, knew what I must look like to them—some silly human pet and her vampire master. But then I could hear Nando's thoughts and knew he didn't think of me that way. If anything, he saw him and his vampire honey in Eric and I. When I glanced at Mr. Garcia Lorca—I was afraid to see myself in his face—he wasn't even looking at me. And if I could have read his mind, I'd bet he wasn't thinking of me either. He was totally focused on Nando. … The way Eric sometimes was with me.

I swallowed hard.

Before I could start feeling the shame that was snaking up my spine, Eric lifted my face and then took my hand in his and stood us both up.

"And I love you. Now, dance with me."

. .

. .

Chapter 30: Dancing with Duende

. .

Sookie's POV

Eric moved me to the middle of the room, his strong hands and gripping my hips. My skin instantly went prickly, and it wasn't from the heat of the fireplace. I put my hands over his and looked at him over my shoulder. I imagined threading my fingers through his soft hair, pulling him in for a kiss, his fingers sliding up my thighs.

Eric raised his eyebrow at me in disapproval—he'd told me to stand still facing forward—and the look in his eyes froze me where I stood. They were molten. (A good word of the day.) You know when you light a barbeque and the flames start out regular red and orange, but as they get hotter and the flames get more intense, they turn blue, almost white? Like that. The light from the fireplace flickering on him only made his eyes seem to waver like their own flame. His eyes swept over me, rippling my skin like a pebble on a lake.

His fingers dug into my hips and he leaned down to me.

"Eyes forward."

And then he was gone, and I had to fight the impulse to back up and find his heavy weight again. Instead, I tucked some hair behind my ear and shifted my weight back and forth on my heels. I took a moment to appreciate that just a week and a half ago, I was barely upright, let alone wearing heels and getting ready to mambo with a certain tall, surprisingly lithe vampire. I shifted from one hip to the other and bounced a little on my feet, confident that no matter what else happened, I could always dance.

I wouldn't think too much right now about what—and who—had made me want to dance.

Well, I didn't think we were actually going to mambo. Eric said something characteristically cryptic about teaching me an "erotic dance." I didn't know what he meant but if there was a chance I'd get to rub up against him in a socially acceptable way, I wouldn't pass it by.

So I stood, facing forward and looking at that photo of Gran in her youth, in some beautiful, long gown, staring back at me coyly. Had she ever danced with her fairy man, I wondered. And then I felt a little sick, imagining her going behind Paw-paw's back with my real grandfather.

But just then, Eric approached, and I swallowed, frozen in place by the stare he was giving me. If I didn't know that walking out of this house would send me reeling and wailing with fear, I'd swear Eric had up and transported us to one of my romance novels. Suddenly, I felt like I should be wearing some big, overdone gown, with a pile of hair on my head. I tilted my head slightly and could imagine Eric with his hair braided in that special way he had, wearing a velvet waistcoat (that's what they always called them in my books, though I never did figure out what those were) and a flowy white top underneath.

I'll tell you this: Eric could give Claude a run for his money in that romance-novel cover model contest any day of the week. I narrowed my eyes at him, thinking of all the places I could bite and suck and about what always happened not long after the heroes and heroines in my books danced to music like this. I almost wished I was wearing one of those stuffy bodices so Eric could rip it, I thought, eyes intent on the little tufts of hair curling up from the top of his shirt. I couldn't wait to get Eric's thigh between mine and press my chest against his.

I held my hand up and Eric gently held my fingertips, leaning down and brushing his lips over the back of my hand and then the thin blue veins of my wrist, all the while holding my gaze. I blushed, thinking that that hooded look he was giving me reminded me of the one he got as I rushed toward my happy moment. My body reacted to the memory, tensing and opening at once. It felt like more than the polite way to start a dance. It seemed like a promise. A dare. I narrowed my eyes slightly at him and nodded almost imperceptibly.

I don't know if it was that memory or all the making out we'd been doing, but I felt like... Was I that turned on? No, I... I couldn't be. I gulped hard and swished my thighs together wetly. I closed my eyes.

"Sookie..."

It was just a soft whisper. Probably as loud as shouting to Mr. García Lorca, but so faint I more felt it than heard it. I turned my eyes to look at the goosebumps that rose around where his breath drifted up my arm. I didn't know why, but I hesitated to meet his eyes. I felt like I could light the night with my cheeks. I swept my gaze over Eric's strong legs, lingered on that belt buckle with the things dangling from it—as if he needed to draw more attention to that area. My eyes slowly lifted up, admiring the strong planes of his body and how the fabric of his shirt pulled just slightly against them to hint at how gorgeous he was naked.

My God. I was in so much trouble. And at the moment, I couldn't say I minded.

His fingers drifted down, and after a moment of cross-eyed arousal, I realized he was tracing the blue line of my vein with the lightest touch of his calloused fingertips. Holding my hand aloft, Eric shifted and switched passed my fingers from one of his hands to the other. He stepped close and the coolness of his body was a nice respite from the heat of the fire.

"There was a time, dear one," he started, his voice soft, "when religion was even more violent and threatening than it is here and now," he whispered against my skin. "The fanatics of the Iberian Peninsula make the Fellowship of the Sun look like riled kittens."

I read, so I knew a little history. I hazarded a guess. "The Spanish Inquisition?"

Eric chuckled breathily and I caught the scent that was purely him. A tingling rush spread out under my skin. He smiled that impish grin and nodded, returning his gaze to the sensitive flesh on the inside of my elbow. I swear, this man could turn any part of me into an erogenous zone.

"Not expecting that? Few do," he smirked, and I rolled my eyes. Trust Eric to know that one bit of pop culture. He was standing in front of me now, so I could see clearly when he shrugged and bent over me. "It was a brutal time, for humans and vampires."

"Bet you loved that," I said, but my biting tone disappeared into a gasp as Eric leaned down to nuzzle my inner elbow and trace his cool tongue down to my wrist.

"Sometimes," he shrugged when he came up to meet my eyes, sounding a little too offhand. I looked at him out of the corner of my eye wondering what he was hiding. I wanted to be irritated, but all I could do was marvel that he looked the same 500 years ago as he does now. It didn't seem fair.

I pulled away from him, seeing him clearly for the first time that night. Yes, he probably looked exactly the same during the Spanish Inquisition. That face—that beautiful face that was always looking at me like I mattered for reasons I couldn't fathom—was the last thing a lot of humans ever saw. Even now, that's likely true. I worried for a moment over my ability to love a killer—thinking for the hundredth time about all those women who fell in love with serial killers on death row. Thinking about Arlene. I wondered again at what my Christian upbringing would say about it. Would it tell me to turn the other cheek? Or remind me that murders (along with sorcerers and whoremongers) will have their place on the lake of fire and brimstone—and experience their second death? That's what the Fellowship said. But then, after Dallas and after Arlene helped those two zealots kill my sister-in-law and try to kill me, I figured they were setting up for their own bit of lakefront property.

But if that were the case, I'd be there right along with Eric and Rene and all the rest of them. I can't say I regretted being the last thing a few humans—and supes—saw as I punched their number. With most of them, I'd do it all over again, and a few more were on my list. Anyone could kill. I knew that better than just about anybody. Besides, if I was going to exclude killers from my dating pool, I wouldn't have a fella left.

Even without the bond, Eric could tell I was upset by the mental sidetrip I'd just taken myself on. He held my hand firmly and smiled, staring at my chest. Figures—I'm thinking about murder and the fate of my eternal soul, and he's thinking of sex. And darn it if it didn't smile right back.

Though his eyes were unrepentantly glued to my chest, he still seemed to be thinking about something besides my boobs. "We all do what we must," he shrugged, and I swallowed down the bile. "The humans were the least of my concerns, though. There was order to be created in my world, new alliances to form—not all of them pleasant." His eyes flickered over my face before his hand brushed the nape of my neck, massaging a little. He didn't stop until I sighed and closed my eyes.

Then he spun me around, holding my hand over my head until I came to a stop and then he bowed, kissing the heated skin of my hand again. "Anyway," he breathed against me, "The point is, in addition to expelling humans from Spain, they also frowned on sex in all its expression." He held my hand out and stepped away from me, punctuating his sudden bow with, "This dance, for instance, was outlawed for obscenity."

Eric raised his eyes to mine and it's almost like he hadn't just shrugged off the Spanish Inquisition as just another human inconvenience. I'd hate to hear what he thought of the Holocaust. All I could see was that challenging, hungry look that told me he wanted more than blood, and all night long. Oh. Oh my gracious.

I was such a bad Christian. Right at that moment, I didn't care much about harm done to others, either.

As if on cue, Nando started strumming his guitar, and my head raced. Was this the Lambada? Was it that old? I tried hard to rein in my laughter when an image popped in my head of ladies with big powdered wigs and men in short trousers bumping and grinding with each other, but it was no use. Eric shot me a look that dissolved that image into one of him pressed against me like Johnny on Baby, and I found my mouth opened slightly. I couldn't say I'd mind doing a little dirty dancing with Eric. I knew he could sweep me off my feet. He'd done it plenty of times—literally.

I stood up straight and Eric whispered, "Don't move, lover."

The quiet music reverberated in my small living room. It wasn't anything like what it was before. There was no thumping, no melody to hitch my cart to. It was more... forceful somehow, but also slower. Just when I thought Nando was going to up and stop playing, he'd pluck out another deep, resonant chord and the whole room would throb with it.

"Keep watching me, Sookie," he said, drawing closer to me. "Don't close your eyes." He wrapped his free arm around my waist and, like the human-shaped puddle of goo I was, I molded around him. I pressed my head back to look at him and breathed shallowly. I could feel his hard body pressed into all my soft spots. I was so on edge and he hadn't even touched me yet, at least not in any way that counted.

His fingertips ghosted just down my side, over my ribs and what I meant as a laugh came out as a breathy moan-laugh hybrid. I felt myself blush deeper.

He leaned in so close I thought he was going to kiss me and I opened my mouth slightly to receive him.

But he didn't. Instead, he whispered into my lips, "Would you like me to teach it to you?"

I laughed in kind of an excited hiccup and nodded my head, leaning in to run my lips over his Adam's apple. I felt him growl against all my sensitive parts and I was almost dizzy by the time he pulled back.

He placed his hand behind his back and held his shoulders back proudly. Then he started circling me in slow, florid steps, measured to the throbbing melody of the guitar.

My skin prickled with awareness of him, the hair on my arms standing up like a tuning fork and following his progress as he began to move. On a particularly heavy down stroke of Nando's guitar, Eric paused in front of me and, at arm's length, dropped the hand he was still holding and traced just his fingertips down my throat, past my clavicle and over the tops of my breasts. He stopped just shy of my perked-up nipples and I wanted to make a tiny hop to close the distance. The lift of Eric's eyebrows told me I shouldn't. I raised my own eyebrow to him.

So it was a game. Oh, it was on.

When the music went back to a tinkling melody, Eric began moving again, pausing only when he got to my other arm, to take my hand and nuzzle the veins of my other wrist. That really shouldn't be as sexy as it was, but the white-blue flames of Eric's eyes made it scorching. I needed his cool touch to douse me a little.

When he got to just behind me, he ran his fingertips over the curve of my butt and the sensitive top of my thighs. I sighed and closed my eyes.

And so it went. Turned out, this was the opposite of the Lambada. No bumping, no grinding. Just Eric circling me slowly, stopping at north, south, east and west to tease me, in ever closer spirals. I wasn't to touch him or stop him, and sometimes I was so aware of the vampire poet and his musician boyfriend that I was beet red.

Though this little dance started with his fingertips brushing my skin, soon he was dragging his big hands across my lower belly, spinning me around just so he could cop a feel of my butt, kneeling in front of me and running his hand up under my skirt or kissing my belly. Just like in that first shower we had together, he never touched me where it counted, and I about whimpered in frustration. And no matter how much I tried to turn away, to ignore that Eric was doing this to me in front of an audience, Eric wouldn't let me look away from him. He held my gaze, calming me with a look that made me feel shy when I really wasn't. He wasn't trying to humiliate me. He was just a big, horny vampire. My big, horny vampire. I had smiled at him and caressed his face, breaking his rules. He kissed my fingertips.

Finally, he was pressed against my back with his hand sneaking up my thigh to tease my oversensitive flesh there, and whispering in my ear, "I will buy you five of these dresses if I can rip this one off you tonight."

He nipped at my neck and licked up the trickle of blood there. He growled and I could feel what my blood, my dress... me—what I did to him pressing into my lower back. I leaned back into him and closed my eyes, grabbing at the fine fabric of his fancy dress pants and did a little groping of the skin underneath myself.

Let the bodice-ripping begin, I thought.

Then Eric moved away from me and I turned to him, confused and irritated. But just as quick, he'd taken my hand again, bowing and kissing it as he looked up at me. He rose to his full height and suddenly was still the way only a vampire could be. He was like one of those paintings in the Scooby-Doo cartoons I watched as a kid—everything frozen but the eyes, which watched you with some kind of sneaky intent behind them.

He held his hand out for me and then I got it. It was my turn. I smiled. What's good for the goose is good for the gander. Let's see how he likes it.

I thought about all those novels I'd read, and thought about what little I knew about Spain and then I looked at Eric. So ancient and beautiful. And yet somehow here with me now, teaching me things, being attentive. My stomach clenched and rolled, overwhelmed with the sensation and confusion of being wanted by someone like Eric. Sometimes I didn't exactly know why, but looking in his eyes just then, I felt beautiful... and loved. And I was overcome with a wave of love and lust so strong that, with our guests here, there was only one thing for me to do—channel it into a dance.

And so I did. Like Eric, I started small. I curtsied like I'd seen ladies do in movies, but this time when I brought my lips to his hand, I moved to his fingers and, looking right in his eyes like the dare it was, I sucked his finger into my mouth, swirling my tongue around it and sucking lightly. Just when I saw the flame grow hotter in Eric's eyes, I let his finger slip from my mouth and smiled sweetly.

A caress of his broad chest, with an extra little rub of his nipple...

A caress of his muscled thigh...

A dip of fingertips just under his waistband...

Another curtsy, but this time when I kissed his other hand, I burrowed it into my bosom, eliciting a growl from Eric...

A caress of his neck where I'd bitten...

And his shoulder where I'd bitten...

And his wrist where he'd bitten for me half a dozen times...

I could feel the slow, determined music in my bones, could feel each chord pluck through me. I grabbed his arms and wrapped them around me as I did a slow slide down his body and back up. I smiled wickedly and closed my eyes, spinning to face him but forcing his arms off me. Well, tugging them off me and Eric let me, anyway.

I moved to his side and wrapped one of his arms around my lower back while I dipped myself backward, throwing my head back and baring my throat to him, thrusting my breasts up at him...

Eventually, I was nothing but a channel for the beat, which was coming faster now, the rhythm seeping into my little toe and left hip and everywhere else. I spun and shimmied and pressed against him. I swiveled and undulated. I switched my legs back and forth in front of me, imitating what I remember seeing a Spanish lady do in an old movie Gran used to like. I reached up behind me, rubbing Eric's neck and snaking my hands into his hair, giving it a yank. Eric growled lowly and I thought I'd earned that growl. I was proud.

Finally, the song crescendoed and Eric picked me up and lifted me above him for a second and then slid me down his body to a low, deep dip. I was panting from exertion, hot from my own sweat and what Eric did to me. I was so close to the ground I almost wished he'd just drop me and lay himself on top of me.

My arms were wrapped around his neck. His body was so close you couldn't have slipped a credit card between us. His eyes bore down into mine and mine bore up into his. It was totally silent in the room except for the crackling of the fire. And in that moment, it really was just Eric and I, like it always was when we danced.

I ran my palm up his neck, my thumb toying with his thick vein, and caressed his face. I wanted nothing but him, right now.

Eric's eyes were bare, and I could see his emotions in a way that he never allowed normally. I might have been delirious from lack of bloodflow to my brain, but I swore I could see every bit of grief, every moment that filled his still chest with pride. It all funneled into me from his eyes and I sagged against his strong hands, letting him take all my weight. My fingers traced his lips. I wanted to tell him to take me. Instead I whispered, "I can see why that was outlawed."

A slow smile spread across Eric's face and his eyes flicked across my features as he caught a few strands of my hair between his fingers. His eyes lit up with down and dirty glee and he began chuckling. It was contagious, as Eric's happiness often was, and I began to smile, watching the skin around his eyes crinkle and his body fill out with joy.

"Oh my Sookie," he whispered against my lips.

"My Eric," I teased back and ran my hand into his hair.

And suddenly his lips were on mine, or mine were on his and we were sucking and nibbling and giggling and pressing into one another. Our tongues twisted and twined and the pull of his lips tugged on something much lower. Before I knew it, I was standing upright again and gasping for breath, and yet I wanted to climb inside of him. I wanted to take whatever I could get from him, whatever he would give, I was so ... Yeah. So something.

Just as Eric's hands began traveling down my back to my butt, I heard something and jerked back. That's when I realized Eric had so bewitched me that I'd totally forgotten we had company. I slapped at Eric's chest to get him to release me, which he did after a minute, the glee in his eyes not dampened one bit by my embarrassment.

I stepped away from him but discovered real fast that was a bad idea. My legs were too shaky. Maybe I'd always be able to dance, but the bedrest hadn't done anything for my leg strength. At least that's the story I'm going with. I leaned back into Eric, almost in defeat, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't thrilled to rest my head on his chest and wrap my arms around his muscled back. He felt cool against my heated skin and I sighed happily.

To cool my jets, I glanced at the vampire poet and his guitar-playing squeeze. Mistake. I looked away real quick. If my own kissy face embarrassed me in front of others, then I was even more uncomfortable with the looks Nando and Mr. García Lorca were giving each other. They were too... personal for my eyes. Instead, I ran my free hand down Eric's back over and over again. It felt oddly cozy, us two human-vamp couples sharing a romantic night. Eric was busy running his nose over my jaw and neck and he'd started that purring thing again, vibrating against my whole body. My heart caught and then thudded double-time in my chest to catch up. I moved my fingers in tight circles against his nipple.

"You are a hard-hearted woman, Miss Stackhouse." He smirked at me, holding my hand just where it was as I flicked his nipple. He quirked an eyebrow and I rolled my eyes, not caring who saw.

The fingers of my free hand flew to the flowers in my hair and I laughed, my breath bouncing off Eric's face as he peeled back his lip to show me what our dance had done to his fangs. I leaned forward and kissed the side of his mouth gently, and then kissed his upper lip, just where his fang was peaking out.

"Eric," I whispered and looked up at him. "I have a gift for you."

Eric rumbled in pleasure and his fingers tugged lightly at the bows on my shoulder. His eyes flashed with delight. "Do I get to unwrap it?"

He had to hear how my heart thudded the Macarena at that. I breathed deep to catch my breath but all it did was draw Eric's attention to my cleavage.

I slapped his hands away and pulled back, wiggling out from under him. Then I ran my hand from my neck to the tops of my breasts, just to pay back some of the teasing he'd done earlier.

"Oh yes," I said. "But not until later. When we're alone."

My gaze flicked to the poet and guitarist and Eric quickly turned to them. He did a single nod and Mr. García Lorca bowed.

"We will take our break now, won't we, Nando?" he purred leaning down to nuzzle into the loose curls around Nando's ear.

Nando smiled and closed his eyes and then moved to rest his guitar carefully against the far wall. He took his vamp's hand and started leading him toward the front door.

Suddenly remembering my manners, I turned to them. "Um, there's sangria in the kitchen if you want a drink."

Mr. García Lorca chuckled low in his throat, and maybe it was how worked up Eric had made me, but that might have been the dirtiest chuckle I'd ever heard. He opened the door and pulled Nando close. "Oh, we have our refreshments taken care of."

He rested a hand on Nando's neck and I could see the blush on Nando's cheek.

I quickly turned away. "Uh, yeah. Well, you enjoy."

Yep, that was me. Smooth as a ton of bricks.

Eric's POV

Lorca's low chuckle sounded again and I knew how he felt. I was urgent to feast on my own human. But just before he shut the door, Lorca called out to me in his modern Spanish. It wasn't a dialect I knew, but I was able to piece together what he said.

"The duende," he whispered in Spanish, his gaze resting on Sookie. "She runs in your blood and you in hers."

I stilled, surprised at his observation. But I shouldn't have been.

I had seen Lorca speak at Sophie-Ann's court years ago, not long after his turning and return to America. In his human life, he'd created this idea of duende—an explanation for creativity that spoke to the consuming pain, not the joy, of creation. His duende was no gentle muse. It was a dark figure, a mischievous goblin or fairy, something that attempted to overtake you, to nearly kill you. I tightened my arm around Sookie. He'd taught that it affected all forms of art, but particularly song or dance, a form that required the artist to push outside herself, to locate the "dominant profile" of the music and seek to build a physical manifestation of it—he'd called it the music's "architecture"—and Sookie captured that spirit with everything she had, from the point of her toes to the batting of her lashes.

I peered down at my Sookie—finally mine—and ran my hand down her sweat-dampened back and back up to the nape of her neck. Mine. As usual her gaze was not reverent or even soft. It was spiked with annoyance that we were speaking Spanish in front of her.

I looked down at her again briefly, suddenly calculating what this observation could mean for me—and for Sookie—in de Castro's court.

"You are brave," Lorca added in Spanish, interrupting my train of thought. I looked at him, studiously dispassionate. "You know the duende does not come at all unless she sees that death is possible. But with duende, it is easier to love than understand."

Watching him, I didn't dare believe his kind eyes, or trust that he would not betray this realization to his masters. Plans began forming themselves in my mind. But I would deal with them later.

The most important thing was to get him away from my Sookie and settle her. Then I would face the poet.

"Si," I concluded, switching back to English. I rubbed the nape of her neck soothingly and watched as her eyes softened. "I have finally caught my fairy."

As I saw Sookie's ire flare again, I knew I'd said the wrong thing. As Sookie rounded on me, her finger already pressing into my chest and her expression a muddle of anger and confusion and despair, I thought, My excitable duende. I enfolded her in my arms, enjoying the way her warmth seeped into my skin through our clothes. Far too many clothes. I brushed wisps of hair over her shoulder and felt myself grin as she shivered. I couldn't remember the last time I'd grinned so much.

Her eyes flickered across my face, and I could see she was processing what I said. It was of no matter, and I found myself reaching back in my mind to discover what I could have said that would so upset her.

"That is where you are wrong, Senor. You can never catch duende," Lorca said from the door, and I knew his voice was so low that Sookie was straining to hear him, though he now spoke in English. Her lean toward Lorca's voice pressed her breasts deliciously into me and I growled by instinct. "You have only to experience it and enjoy it while it lasts."

Sookie's POV

I had no clue what they were talking about but if Eric thought he could go around bragging to his vampire buddies that he'd caught himself a fairy, he had another think coming. For someone who's so often calculating, he sure had a lot of nerve to up and start announcing that I was a fairy. But then, maybe after the Fairy War, the cat was out of the bag. Still, after what I'd been through, that seemed… dangerous.

But if Mr. García Lorca's interest was piqued, he didn't show it. He just stuck his head back inside and shook his head at Eric, a dark smile on his face.

With that, the door clicked shut. I heard Nando laugh throatily on the porch and I threw my shields up so fast I almost gave myself a headache. I did not need to be in on their private pleasure. And I wasn't sure I was going to let any pleasure happen between Eric and me, either, until I understood what they'd been talking about. If there was anything I'd learned about the supernatural world, it was that when supes talk about you, you'd better run for the hills.

I was thinking all this as I approached the side table holding Eric's gifts. I grabbed them and lowered myself onto the couch next to him. I'd been planning to make myself comfortable on his lap, but not until I understood what the hell they were talking about. His arms were resting on the couch cushions and he looked so luminous in the firelight. And so relaxed. Sometimes I hated my honeybun.

"So now you're runnin' around telling folks about my background?" I hissed in a whisper, not wanting Mr. García Lorca to hear, even if he already knew. I held the gifts just out of his reach. "What—now you can brag you got yourself a fairy for a pet?"

Eric fingered the bow on my shoulder and chuckled without much amusement. When he looked up at me, his eyes made me stop cold. I couldn't quite get my mind around what I was seeing. Was Eric sad? And why was he looking at me like I was about to run? Funny how that look made me want to.

"Are you offering, lover?" he asked, and I didn't like the weird tone in his voice one bit. A panic started rising in me, like this was a turning point for us, and not in a good way. "To be my pet?"

Eric's POV

The amber of the firelight lit up Sookie's shoulder, and I fixated there, fingering the little bow that taunted me. I focused there as my mind ran on to an image of Sookie in my bed, every morning, of rising to her warm and naked every night, of feasting on her, body and blood. Of keeping her safe, always. Of watching over her. Of knowing when she was in trouble. Of, perhaps, erasing the troubles of the last two months, of Sookie being well in body and spirit.

I found I was gripping her shoulder and had curled her toward me.

But she was not the pliant Sookie of my fantasies. Instead, she stiffened and struggled against my hold, mumbling against my chest as she pushed the flat of her hand against me, "Not hardly."

I found I didn't mind. I nodded and smiled, the expression coming more naturally than last time. I let her up and caressed her shoulder, brushing past the bow.

"No lover," I responded, and I could hear that my voice was deep and low. "Lorca is referring to duende—a kind of fairy or goblin. A mischief-maker." I allowed the chuckle forming low in my chest to bubble up, as I watched her eyes flash with disdain. She had no idea how predictable she was. Still, her spine softened a bit as I ran the back of one knuckle over her delicate throat and clavicle. "It's a Spanish concept, one Lorca used to explain artists who reach a transcendent state. He lectured about it in his human life."

Her brow was furrowed, and I watched her as she began to process the concept. I took great pride in the current slowness of her thinking, because it meant that my touch, my dance, had had the intended effect.

I tilted her chin so she would look up at me, and I could see her mind catching up. Before she could ask the question I could see forming in her mind, I looked into her eyes, shaking her chin just a little, remembering her contrary behavior, her refusal to stay with me so many months ago when I'd offered up my home.

"It is an irrational creature with a dash of the diabolical in it." She jerked away and I laughed. But just then, I was overcome with other memories, of an unarmed human stopping her car for a scared and threatened vampire over a year ago. I considered my thoughts and plunged ahead. I would not admit that the demon or Pam's idiotic advice-column sanctimoniousness had any sway over me. "It is everything. It is life"—I stroked her neck down to her breasts, laying my hand over Sookie's heart, which was hammering with recognition. She clung to me slightly, her eyes going soft. I brushed my lips over her temple—"it's death. It's the understanding of the complimentary nature of the two. It raises your awareness of the mortality. It helps you appreciate the fleeting nature of every experience." I pulled her to me again, and this time she didn't resist. "It is the trembling of the moment, followed by the long silence."

Sookie's POV

Oh.

I reached up and caressed Eric's face, those gifts forgotten on the floor at Eric's feet. Was that pain in his eyes? I snuggled into him, because it seemed like the thing to do.

"It certainly is not a pet—nothing you can possess, no matter how you want to." He pulled me onto his lap, and, damn him, I let him. "It's something you fight with, you do battle with. You never give in. Neither does it. You know it's there when your soul aches."

He tightened his arms around me in a near death grip and I thought for a moment that I was going to lose this fight.

Eric's POV

"Oh," she said, confusion and realization turning the word into a conviction. I, meanwhile, had an odd sensation—not at all pleasant—of feeling unmoored, of floating, of Sookie's scant weight holding me down. She leaned in close and, as if to anchor me, brushed a soft kiss my chest. I answered her kiss with one of my own, mind soft, thoughtful, as I examined this new sensation within me. I disliked how Sookie was changing me in some ways.

She leaned back and looked at me, her gaze hungry. I brushed my hand over her shoulder again and played with a strand of hair as I composed myself.

"And of course," I whispered against her ear, feeling more myself, "it's very, very troublesome."

I pulled back and smiled to see the scowl settling on her fine features. I chuckled and pulled her closer, nuzzling her neck. "My duende," I murmured into the damp skin there.

And just like that, she seemed to give up her fight, squeezing me back gently and settling against me. Mine. I tightened my fingers on her hips and she responded, rubbing against my very prominent erection, tentatively at first.

For one fine moment, it was as if Victor and Niall and Bill had never come between us. It was as if she truly were my wife, and I her husband, as if we could have what we'd both longed for a year ago—to have a home, to be married. What I promised her all that time ago when I didn't know myself but knew her intimately.

I felt Sookie's breath deepen, and for a second I thought she'd fallen asleep, hand resting against my erection and all. But then she sucked in another deep breath and pulled back. Reluctantly, I released her. She stood unsteadily and, with hooded eyes, backed away from me. She picked up her dishes, and turned from me, her skirt flaring in the most delicious way. I felt a faint growl vibrate my chest as she turned and walked toward the kitchen, swishing her hips widely for my benefit.

Yes. My wife. My duende. Mine.

A breathy laugh came from her and she looked at me over her shoulder. She knew exactly what she was doing to me. I tensed, for a second imagining chasing her again. She blushed and I wondered if she'd had the same thought.

"Relax, Eric," she chided, though her tone was far from convincing. "We have plenty of time. And plenty more of the date to go."

Sookie's POV

I walked back in the room feeling a little saner, a little more put together, and a lot horny. As I approached Eric, I scooped the presents off the floor and held the little gift bags forward, hooked on my index finger.

Instead of reaching for the bags, of course, Eric reached forward and began smoothing his hands up and down my legs.

Before I let myself just fall on top of him and straddle him, I moved to sit on the couch, crossed my legs at the ankle and dropped the bags onto his lap. He laughed and moved to pull me until I was pressed into his side.

"Dear one," Eric laughed. "Is this the photo of you I requested?"

I flashed to Eric's request for a naked photo of me, like the ones of him that were crowding my dresser now. I closed my eyes at the thought of all those naked Erics and shook my head.

"Heh. Not likely. But I still think you'll like it. Open up."

Eric raised an eyebrow and then frowned. You'd think he'd never gotten a gift bag before. He started pulling out the tissue paper like it was Kleenex from a tissue box and letting it flutter to the ground.

"Oh for heaven's sake," I huffed and snatched the bag from him. I reached in and pulled out the small box and then dropped to the floor beside him. I held the box out in front of his nose and did the honors. As the lid slid up I said, "Now, it's not me, but I hope that when you're walking around without me, these will remind you of me."

I looked at the cuff links nestled into the padding of the little white box, the little illustrations of a blond pinup with her hands behind her head and her breasts thrust outward decorating them, and glanced at Eric's eyes, which were already flashing with humor. Eric's laugh was loud enough to make the single-pane glass of the living room windows shiver. He pulled me onto his lap and kissed and licked at my neck, his cool breath tickling my saliva-wetted skin. My nipples perked up automatically. I laughed too, even though nothing was funny—just for the pleasure of it, just for the joy of hearing Eric's laugh like that.

"My lover," he crooned at me as I fiddled with the cuff links in his fancy shirt, trying to figure out how to remove them. Distractedly, he removed the link in one quick movement and began replacing it with the new link. "You always surprise me."

He seemed genuinely tickled and surprised and I was proud of myself for having pulled one over on such an old guy. I gingerly dropped the old cuff link into the box and picked up the second one. Eric held his wrist out to me and, on impulse, I kissed his veins of his wrist before threading the link through the French cuffs. I could swear that Eric stilled at that.

"What? You don't think I know what cuff links are?" I asked, and I could hear the thread of irritation in my voice. Suddenly it occurred to me that he might be slumming, entertaining himself with a down-home girl between queens and socialites, who of course would think nothing of paying $100 for a pair of cuff links.

I felt Eric's big hand on my waist an instant before I was flush against him. It happened so fast that my brain was still working out how to get the link to stay in place when I found myself eyeball to eyeball with a very entertained vampire.

"My lover," he started slowly, softly, kissing my lips and nibbling until the irritation started to fade of its own volition. "I never thought you'd give me another woman to take around with me while you are here," he whispered into my lips. "Thank you. I love them."

He'd moved on to my neck and was sucking on that spot behind my ear that makes my brain short circuit. "You're… ahh... welcome," I panted out when I could catch my breath. Good lord. Could a person have a heart attack from too much arousal? What I was feeling couldn't be good for a body. I clung to him tighter anyway.

His hands were everywhere and suddenly I felt a big palm press into my breast, squeezing and sending a thrill through my nipple. I grunted none too ladylike.

"Of course, I prefer the real thing," he murmured against my skin. "But I suppose these will suffice."

I dug my nails into his shoulders. "Suffice, huh?" I grunted again and began to move against him, pressing myself rhythmically into his hand, his chest, his arousal.

In a flash I was laid out flat on the couch and a big vampire was pressing me into the cushions. I couldn't have been happier for the weight of him on me. His knee nudged between mine and the syrupy flow of pleasure from where his muscled leg hit my soft skin made me feel almost drunk. Sangria's got nothing on Eric, I thought absently right before Eric's mouth and tongue made me forget my words.

I vaguely felt air on my thigh and hip, and then cool, calloused hands running over the skin there, teasing under the lace of my panties. I heard some soft high-pitched sounds off in the distance and after a moment realized they must be me. And then I felt a long, hard finger slip inside my flooded core and my whole body bowed. I bit my lip so I didn't scream in pleasure. I wasn't sure why, but I knew there was some reason not to make a loud fuss right now.

He felt so good, so right inside me. So right. So right. It was all I could think as I turned my head to the side and squeezed my eyes tight as I felt another finger pinch down on my little bundle of nerves, rubbing over it in superfast circles. I whimpered out my breaths, trying to remember to breath. He was just... Oh Lord in Heaven, Eric was just everything right then. I couldn't think of anything else. I let my knees fall open as wide as I could make them in this particular position and bucked my hips, seeing little flashing lights of warning behind my eyelids.

And then his big thumb filled my mouth when I staggered for breath and I found myself sucking it, delirious with what he was doing to me, how he was controlling everything about my body just then. I bucked and he pressed, swirled, growled, nuzzled. I sucked. I swirled my tongue over the pad of his thumb, trying to draw him into me in some kind of way as his fingers invaded me and sent me hurdling into a great, shining moment.

When I came back to myself, I found myself licking sweet remnants of Eric's blood from my lips and looking around dazedly for my vampire lover. I found him kneeling on the carpet in front of the couch, his mouth licking up evidence of my pleasure from my super-sensitive thighs. I tried to tell my legs to move, my stomach to engage so I could scoot myself into a sitting position, but my whole body just lay there, boneless. The best I could do was murmur some wordless thing to get his attention.

"This will suffice—for now," he said, lifting my far leg and giving one long lick up the gusset of my panties which, it turned out, were still in tact and again covering my ticklish lady parts. I shuddered as an aftershock ran through me. I lifted a heavy arm and caressed his golden head. I sighed and nodded and then lifted my head to look at him, confused.

He held up his now-rumpled dress shirt and the cuff link flashed in the firelight. "They will suffice," he repeated, smirking at how out of it I was. "But eventually I will have you on here. You will yield to me in this just as you have yielded to me in other, more pleasurable things."

He raised a challenging eyebrow and lowered his head to continue to clean me up. Any protests were swallowed up in the sensation of his cool tongue and soft lips on my thighs.

"Did I drink your blood?" I finally asked, when I felt like my body might respond to my commands. I pulled myself upright and flipped my skirt back down, checking my top to make sure I was still covered and testing the bows on my shoulders to make sure they were still in place.

"Oh yes, dear one," Eric chuckled, his big hand cupping my jaw, his thumb tracing my lips. "You have a powerful bite when you are so motivated."

You'd be a great vampire went unsaid.

I swung my legs down and crossed them, studying my unpainted toes as I did so. I felt at my hair and felt something poking me. I shifted to find the roses squashed under my fanny. I looked at them mournfully, but couldn't help smiling inside at what caused these to fall out of my hair.

I looked at Eric, still kneeling in front of me, rumpled and ready—really ready. I thought of how long I'd fought him, how he'd brought me back to life so recently and how I'd been so close to death because of him, too. I thought about how I ached for him when he wasn't here and, sometimes, even when he was. I thought how him being in my life brought me closer to death every day, and how fighting against this bond—blood bond or otherwise—made me miserable and energized me at once.

I didn't know what to do with him. I placed a hand on his shoulder and caressed his neck. I leaned in to kiss him.

Unbidden, I thought, My duende.

. .

. .

A/N: *peeks out* *clears throat* Uh, hey there. Anyone there still? An apology seems way too meager at this point, but I have to do it. I'm so sorry it's been more than 10 months since I updated. And I've been so touched by the sweet PMs I've received telling me how much you love the story and encouraging me to continue it. (And to the one person whose tone I misread-sorry about that, too.)

Believe it or not, I've been working on this chapter since the moment I posted the last one. I actually have had a draft for quite a while, but it was never quite right, and then all sorts of this got in the way. Some of them were ff related: I wrote a story for the Age of Eric Contest (Bitter Fruit, my Healing Blood side story, won honorable mention!). I wrote a piece for our FF friend Ali (also known by the Vampire Ladies of Twitter-we should totally get shiny pink bomber jackets that say that, btw, a la the Pink Ladies). I judged the I Write the Songs Contest.

Some were personal: In the last several months, I started dating again, I started dating men (which, surprise!, I'd never done before), I got a new job and I moved. Whew. I'm exhausted just writing this.

Anyway, all this is my way of explaining that I always intended to finish this, I never forgot about it and I love these guys. I still intend to finish this story, and I hope I'll get chapters up faster.

Now, on this chapter: First, a huge shout-out to my good buddy, my collaborator and my muse, , whose superior beta skills and unflagging encouragement made this chapter possible. If you're happy to see this story is back, thank us by going right now to read An End Has a Start, her stellar TB/SVM crossover story. It's so great. So much action and adventure and some hot scenes. And the best rendering of Sookie and Eric I've read in FF (sometimes better than CH, too, IMO). Actually, just do yourself a favor and read all her stories. She's got one in the works right now that's so amazing, I can't even form words. So good! Check her out.

Also, the dance: The dance Eric and Sookie do at the beginning of the chapter is extremely loosely based on the sarabande. If you look up on iTunes Folies D'Espana or Sarabande, you'll get a flavor for it, though most of those are from the Baroque Age-later than when Eric learned it and long after it had been made palatable for the delicate sensibilities of the ruling class. The first version, though, came from the colonies in South America and is listed on Wikipedia (so it must be true!) as so erotic it was outlawed for obscenity.

But that's where my research hit a dead end. Suffice to say, the dance that they actually do is completely cooked up by my and bears no resemblance to any dance, living or dead. It's just my excuse to paw the Viking. :)

Anyway, thanks for reading everyone. I really really appreciate it.

Disclaimer: Not mine. Don't sue.