Page 27 of Mountain Void

“Morning,” he said.

Charlie looked up, meeting his gaze.

The clock on the wall clicked over to six.

Early enough to have the conversation that he knew they needed to have, before he had to head in to work.

Lorenz stepped fully into the kitchen, resting one hand on the back of the chair across from her.

“Morning. Would you like some coffee?” she asked, her tone casual.

Coffee wasn’t what he wanted, but he did want her relaxed. “Please,” he said. She poured it and set the mug in front of him. She didn’t offer him sugar. She, too, remembered.

“Have you been up long?” he asked.

She shook her head once. Then, without preamble: “I can’t do this again, Lorenz.”

“Charlie, I—”

“No,” she interrupted. “It’s not that I can’t; it’s that I won’t do this again. I don’t need you—or your magic cock—anywhere near me.”

Lorenz’s mouth fell open. The cock in question twitched. His cock would always respond to her. But that wasn’t the point now, so he forced himself to think of something else.

“I don’t care if you’re the only man in the world who can make me come. I. Don’t. Care.”

This time, his cock did more than twitch.

Let me make you come again.

No. He couldn’t start thinking with his cock.

Lorenz tried again. “Listen, Charlie, last night was—“

Charlie’s gray eyes narrowed. “Please tell me you were going to say fun.”

Not the word he had in mind.

“It was fun, right, Lorenz?” She paused, biting her lower lip in a way that was just her.

“Last night was amazing, Charlie.”

“Amazing sex,” she stressed.

He inclined his head. “Amazing sex.”

And so much more.

Charlie sighed, standing up. “Don’t try to make this into something it isn’t. Please. The sex was great. You want that again? Call me. You want flowers and candlelit dinners? We burned that bridge a long time ago, you and I.”

I want it all.

He’d never been so sure of anything in his life. Having held her in his arms the previous night, he had no idea how he’d ever managed to let her go. But that wasn’t what Charlie needed to hear.

Charlie smiled gently, as if encouraged by his silence. “Let’s keep things simple. Let’s—“

A metallic clang split the morning.

Charlie’s head turned toward the window. Lorenz was already on his feet.