JB’s mother had taught him early on that appreciated women are happy women.

I have a big hole in my heart," I said. "But it'll close over." I don't want to sound all Dr. Phil," she said. "But don't let the scab seal the pain in, okay?" That's good advice," I said. "I hope I can manage it.

Bill said, "She is mine." I wondered if my hands would move. They would. I raised both of them, making an unmistakable one-fingered gesture. Eric laughed, and Bill said "Sookie!" in shocked admonishment. "I think that Sookie is telling us she belongs to herself," Eric said softly.

The sweetest part of being a couple is sharing your life with someone else. But my life, evidently, had not been good enough to share.

Sometimes, instead of going down the road less taken, you just charge down the beaten path.

The security light made me feel safe, though I knew that was an illusion. If there's light, you can just see what's coming for you a little more clearly.

As I watched Bill, waiting with apparent calm for death to come to him, I had a flash of him as I'd known him: the first vampire I'd ever met, the first man I'd ever gone to bed with, the first suitor I'd ever loved. Everything that followed had tainted those memories, but for one moment I saw him clearly, and I loved him again.