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It settles Charlie, too. He grunts and the muscles beneath me soften.
“Love you, bean.”
“I love you, too, Charlie.”
He strokes his hand down my back and I feel him go still. The woodsmoke scent of his magic thickens as he says, “I’ll wait for you, Teddy. Always.”
“Chaz—”
Our Pledges lock together. Charlie’s magic flares deep within me. I’ll always know where he is; I’ll always be able to find him. And he’ll always know where I am; he’ll always have the certainty that I’m returning to him.
The relief in that certainty is more profound than being back in my own Time.
“It’s done,” he says. “I’m glad of it. Ever since you told me we weren’t together in the future, I’ve felt like I needed to do something. Bind you to me somehow. We’ve just done it. I can feel it. I’m not sorry, even if it means I wait my whole life for you to come back to me. I’m good with it.”
“Fuck, Charlie.”
He pulls me in so he can stamp a kiss onto my soul.
When he lets me up for air, I glance around, realizing that I’ve just given a Deathless Pledge to one fiancée and not the other. I don’t want Gabe to feel I’m picking Charlie over him.
It registers that the rest of our big bed is empty. And cold. The bedroom’s dark, no light filtering through the open bathroom door.
“Chaz, where’s Gabe?”
Charlie sighs.
A moment of complete panic freezes me. Did something happen to Gabe while I was trapped in the future?
“He’s with Darwin,” Charlie murmurs in my ear. “It ... everything went to fuck, bean. You disappeared right in front of us. You didn’t go into the Earth like you usually do. You just fucking vanished. And I just ... I couldn’t believe you were gone. I wouldn’t let it go. I kept looking for you everywhere. Seeing everything as a sign you were coming back. It became too much for him. He ... left. Moved in with Darwin.”
I freeze for a different reason.
“He left you alone?” I croak.
“Yeah,” Charlie admits, stroking my back. “Yeah, he did. I don’t blame him for ditching my arse—”
“Heleftyoualone,” I repeat.
Charlie’s silent, rubbing my back, pressing me closer to him. Finally, he whispers, “I’m so fucking glad you’re back.”
“We tried to send dreams. Did he tell you? Did he have dreams of me? That I was safe in the future, but I’d lost my magic and I was doing everything I could to get back to you. Did he tell you?”
“No. I haven’t seen much of him. It’s been a couple of days—”
“How many?” I demand.
“Dunnow. Maybe four. Yeah, four. He moved out while I was away at regionals—”
“He didn’t go to regionals with you?” My voice drops to something low, something hard and cold.
“Nah. I wouldn’t have asked him to anyway. He was hella stressed. You were gone and midterms were bearin’ down on us. Tryin’ to study and stay focused while we were worryin’ about you was dead hard. Fuck, I’m just hoping I did well enough to keep my scholarship. And Gabe wanted to pull his grades up to a B for you so bad.”
“You went to regionals all alone? No one to cheer for you?”
“Yeah. Coulda used a cheering section, too. Whole team was gutted about you not being here. We lost both matches. Got knocked out. But, hey.” He rolls his body under mine, showing me exactly how happy he is to see me. “Guess what that means?”
Charlie Miller, horniest bastard ever born. “You bloody beg.”
