I cried out with the release of it all. Everything I’d been holding on to— the resentment, the anger— faded away into puddles of nothingness.
Charlie began to thrust, biting on my shoulder while his hand pulled at my hair and his fingers worked my nipple. I whimpered with pleasure, feeling myself going to putty in his hands.
“Do you think I don’t know you?” Charlie whispered as he fucked me. “Do you think I don’t remember because our bond isn’t there? Because I know exactly who you are, Ava-Marie, and I remember everything about you.”
I was wrapped up in too much desire to give anything more than a mindless moan. He slammed into me harder, faster, until he gasped as he came inside of me. I met my peak when he arrived at his, biting down on my tongue so I managed to suppress calling out his name.
Our bond had caused us to experience the pleasure of the other’s climax whenever we met it, but that was gone now.
Yet this almost felt… better. I couldn’t explain it. He quivered, emptying himself into my core. Charlie clutched me to his body so tightly I thought our spirits might meld together again.
Obviously, when that didn’t happen, both of us fell forward. We collapsed onto the bed, curling away from each other and becoming silent. Now that the sex was over, reality was setting in.
Shit. That wasn’t a goodbye fuck.
That was making love. Despite my determination that this marriage was over, it obviously wasn’t. No matter how hard I tried to convince myself that I didn’t love Charlie anymore, all of those tales were lies. Losing the bond had shattered us, but my feelings were still there, plain as day.
I still loved him. And I think he made his feelings pretty clear about me.
But this wasn’t about love anymore.
The lump in my throat was still there. We’d lost the bond, but hardly anything had changed. We couldn’t read each other’s thoughts, couldn’t feel each other’s emotions, and I couldn’t read Oberi.
But all the important things still remained. Charlie could read me like a book whether his soul was attached to mine or not. He’d studied me and been my companion for years. He didn’t need magic to know what I was feeling or thinking.
Just like I didn’t need our bond to understand him. And he didn’t want to let me go. There was nothing magical still holding us together, no spirit bond or soul tie, so why did I still feel this way?
I wrapped my arms around my body and didn't say anything. I felt cold and empty. “What did we do?”
He cringed. “Uh…”
“I’m sorry. This was all my fault. I made a stupid mistake.” I was so furious at myself right now for caving into my worst impulses.
“It wasn’t a mistake,” Charlie muttered, so quietly I’m sure he thought I didn’t hear.
I acted like I didn't. I reached out to grab something to wear, before I realized my clothes were in the bathroom and the rest of my things were in the Ladies’ Court. I knew Charlie couldn’t see me, but it’s not like I wanted to have this conversation with him when my tits were out.
“Here.” He held out a white button-up of his that had been draped over a chair nearby.
Whatever. Better than nothing. I slipped on the stupid shirt that aggravatingly smelled like him, and he said, “That was… nice.”
Nice was a polite way of saying it’d been mind-blowingly amazing, but a good time in bed didn’t save your relationship when you were two psychos trapped in a toxic cycle. “It was nice, but it doesn’t change anything.”
Charlie didn’t say anything right away, but once he did, he spoke in a whisper. “Maybe it should.”
The mattress was soaking wet from the bathwater, the sheets were as twisted as our psyche, and we were just a mess. Two people stuck in a complicated situationship who could only give the worst of themselves to each other.
I figured we might as well get straight to the point. After all, how could it get any worse?
I sat up, leaning against the headboard. "Charlie… who are we?"
“What do you mean?” He reached for a pair of pants, pulling them on before he sat on the bed beside me. We weren’t touching, but we were close… enough.
“I mean, as a couple. What do we do together?”
“We do all kinds of things. What are you getting at?”
I was getting frustrated. He didn’t understand what I meant, and though I knew it wasn’t on purpose, it felt like it was. “I know music and sex is our thing, but what else is there? Our whole lives can’t be spent writing songs and going to BDSM conventions. What’s left now feels so… empty.”
