That night, Eric came an hour after sundown. He drove up, so we’d have warning. I’d hoped he would come, and I’d been pretty sure he would have cooled off enough. Right after supper, I’d asked Amelia and Bob if they’d like to go to a movie in Clarice.

“You sure you’ll be all right?” Amelia had asked. “Because we’re ready to stay with you if you think he’s still angry.” If she’d been pleased before, it had vanished now.

“I don’t know how he feels,” I said, and I was still a little giddy at the thought. “But I do think he’ll come tonight. It’d probably go better if he didn’t have you here to make him madder.”

Bob had bristled a little at that, but Amelia had nodded understandingly. “I hope you still think of me as your friend,” she said, and for once I didn’t see her thoughts coming. “I mean, I think I’ve screwed you up, but that wasn’t my intention. I intended to free you.”

“I understand, and I still think of you as one of my best friends,” I said as reassuringly as I could manage. If I was weak-willed enough to go along with Amelia’s impulses, then it was my problem.

I was sitting alone on my front porch in that gloomy kind of mood where you remember all of your mistakes and none of your good decisions when I saw the headlights of Eric’s car zooming up the driveway.

I didn’t expect that he would hesitate when he got out of the car.

“Are you still mad?” I said, trying not to cry. Weeping would be craven, and I was forcing some steel into my backbone.

“Do you still love me?” he asked.

“You first.” Childish.

“I’m not angry,” he said. “At least, not anymore. At least, not right now. I should have encouraged you to find a way to break the bond, and in fact we have a ritual for it. I should have offered it to you. I was afraid that without it we would be parted, whether because you didn’t want to be dragged into my troubles or because Victor found out you were vulnerable. If he chooses to ignore the marriage, without the bond I won’t know that you are in danger.”

“I should have asked you what you thought, or at least warned you what we were going to do,” I said. I took a deep breath. “I do love you, all on my own.”

And he was up on the porch with me, and then he was picking me up and kissing me, my lips, my neck, my shoulders. He held my feet off the ground and lifted me high enough that his mouth could find my breasts through my bra and T-shirt.