Page 46 of My Orc Package Deal

I was in a mood.

I was just in a good mood, was that illegal?

You got dicked down good, girl.

Yes, yes. I was aware of what had happened.

What happened was that my husband—my very large, very focused, very thorough husband—had spent the better part of last night doing things to me that I, despite knowing the English language quite well, could not completely describe but probably involved words like debauched, and this morning I had woken up pleasantly sore in ways that reminded me I had a body.

A completely sated body, one that could drive a male to worship me, apparently.

You are so embarrassing.

I was aware.

You know, for years you’ve been merciless when it comes to cutting silly words from sex scenes your authors send you. Member. Nubbin. Debauched. Ravished. Moist.

Perhaps I could reconsider my position on ravished. But nubbin was a stupid word I would continue to red flag.

I’d soaked in his huge bathtub for almost an hour while the boys played video games, the sound of them arguing about respawn points drifting through the walls. They hadn’t gone through the woods out back to their secret fort today, but I didn’t bother asking why.

The tub was absurd—some custom orc-sized claw-foot situation that I could float in without touching either end—and since Korrad had shown me how to use it last night, I’d made full use of it this morning.

God bless a male who owned his own bubble bath.

I just lay there and floated and let myself feel good about my life choices.

Here’s the thing about keeping score: I was still doing it. Korrad had told me, more than once, that this was unnecessary and that I owed him nothing. And intellectually, I accepted that.

My internal tally board apparently did not.

But even she—my own mental accountant, who had been crossing and recrossing columns for weeks, who lay awake adding up what he’d given against what I’d given and found the ratio humiliating—even she had to admit that last night had been…uh…significant.

Korrad had been focused, attentive. Every time I’d started to think about reciprocating, about making sure it was good for him too, he’d redirected me so smoothly I barely noticed until I was already somewhere else entirely.

I’d lost count of how many times I’d orgasmed—yay for magic orc biology, amiright?—but Korrad had come twice. The second time, I’d made a point to rub his cum all over my pussy, and was delighted to report no adverse effects. Which was good, because I’d been so very ready for him to fill me up with that delicious cinnamon treat.

Next time, he’d whispered, after cleaning me up again, and I’d fallen asleep on that promise… Only to wake up a few hours later with his head between my thighs again.

So yeah, it was no wonder I was humming now, chopping up fruit to go with the chicken salad sandwiches I’d made for me and Jay.

Milo was eating his peanut butter and jelly sandwich with that methodical focus he brought to all meals: systematic, no components touching, crusts left until last.

When I set Jay’s plate in front of him, he said, without looking up from his chips, “Thanks, Mom.”

Casual, just like that. Mom. Like it was the most natural sentence in the world.

I took a second.

Keep it together, Kesha.

I was keeping it together. I just—I remembered the way it had felt the first time Milo called Korrad Dad, that clenching in my chest, and this was the same. Jay calling me Mom didn’t mean he was replacing Sharra. It meant he was twelve and had decided this was how things were now and moved on with his life, the way kids do when the adults finally stop dithering.

I loved that kid so much it made me breathless. How had Milo’s best friend become mine so quickly? The same way this home and this island had become mine?

I set out the peaches—from the Saltaire Farm Stand, perfectly ripe, the kind of summer fruit that tastes like the platonic ideal of what summer fruit is supposed to be, the kind that makes you annoyed you ever tolerated a grocery store peach—and pushed the bowl toward Milo.

He was watching me with a frown that told me—from experience—that he was wrestling with something big.