Page 47 of Till Orc Do Us Part

"Drokhaz!"

Every muscle in her body locks. She collapses backward against me, trembling through waves as I keep thrusting up into her. Her heel kicks over a stack of sheet music.

"Fuck," she pants, limp as a marionette with cut strings. "Stealing...your tie...to garrote you later..."

I bite her pulse point. "Try."

Her laugh comes out broken, sweaty hair plastered to my chest. I slow but don't stop, chasing the coiling tension in my gut. She twists, nails raking down my sternum.

"Look at you," she breathes, pupils blown wide. "Orc warlord brought low by a...secondhand bookseller..."

My hand flies to her throat. Not squeezing—cradling. My thumb brushes her frantic pulse. "Broughthigh," I correct hoarsely.

Her smile could ignite wildfires.

Her sweat cools sticky between our chests. I count her breaths—twelve, twenty, thirty-seven—before she stirs.

"Anniversary sale ledgers..." she mutters, squinting at the shredded papers beneath us. "Wereinsidethe filing cabinet yesterday."

I pluck a scrap of invoice from her hair. "I’ll replace the cabinet."

"That’s not?—"

"Double the security deposit."

Her laugh punches out, brittle. "How romantic."

A Scholastic Book Fair poster clings to my forearm when I sit up. Rowan watches me peel it off, her gray eyes tracking my every movement like I might vanish mid-motion. Static crackles as I tug my dress shirt from underWar and Peace’sspine.

"You missed a button." She nods at my collar.

"I know." Fastening it would mean admitting this ends.

Her toes brush my thigh when she stretches. "So. What happens after a real estate titan demolishes local small business property?"

"Rebuild."

"Ah." She plucks a pencil from her bun, twirling it like a baton. "With steel reinforcements? Parking garages?"

I stare at the crescent marks her nails left on my wrist. "Whatever you need."

"Need." The pencil stills. Her smile fades. "What if I need?—"

My cufflinks snap into place with military precision. "It’s simpler if we?—"

"Don’t." She sits up abruptly, her torn blouse gaping. "Don’t do that corporate hedge-speak bullshit. Not here."

The silence weighs heavier than my armor. Outside, a delivery truck beeps. Real life marching on.

Her knees crack when she stands. "I don’t need your guilt-mortar charity, Drokhaz. Just..." Cotton whispers as she re-ties her skirt. "Forget the cabinet."

I capture her wrist as she turns. Her pulse flutters against my thumb. "Rowan."

"Don’t." She shakes free, clutching a Byron anthology to her chest like a shield. "Just...go run your empire."

My polished oxfords crunch over colored pencil shards as I retreat. At the door, her voice hooks between my ribs:

"What now?"