Chapter 13 Chantel
CHANTEL
Igaze at the bruise blooming purple across Faugh's knuckles, at the angry split in his bottom lip that's still oozing blood, at the furious tension radiating from every massive inch of him, and my brain just completely stops processing.
"What do you mean you're not leaving?" I manage, my voice coming out higher and more frantic than I intend. "Faugh, we don't have a choice. The building was sold. We got the eviction notice. You can't just, you can't just will your way out of corporate real estate law by punching people!"
He doesn't respond immediately. Instead, he crosses to the kitchen sink, running cold water over his knuckles with the kind of methodical precision he applies to literally everything, even basic first aid.
I watch the blood swirl down the drain, pink against the white porcelain, and feel my stomach twist into anxious knots.
"Faugh," I try again, softer this time, moving toward him. "Please talk to me. What happened? Did you get into a fight with the landlord? Because that's assault, and they can press charges, and—"
"I did not fight the landlord," he interrupts, his deep voice clipped and precise despite the barely leashed fury vibrating beneath it.
He turns off the water, dries his hands on a dish towel with deliberate care, and finally turns to face me fully.
"I had a physical disagreement with the developer's corporate security in an alley outside their headquarters while my legal team worked. "
I blink at him in absolute disbelief, my eyes going wide as saucers.
My mouth opens and closes a few times without producing any actual words, just a series of pathetic little clicking sounds that would be embarrassing if I wasn't too shocked to care.
"Your... your what?" I finally manage to squeeze out, my voice coming out as more of a strangled squeak than actual speech.
I look down at the deed in my trembling hands, then back up at his infuriatingly calm face, then back down at the papers, as if the words might rearrange themselves into something that makes sense.
They don't. Nothing about this makes sense.
"My legal team," he repeats, as if this is a perfectly normal thing for a person to have. "I retained them this morning after you received the eviction call. They have been working all day to finalize the paperwork."
My brain is scrambling to keep up, trying to connect the dots between Faugh leaving this morning in a tailored suit and returning tonight with bruised knuckles and mysterious legal documents. "What paperwork? Faugh, I don't understand what you're—"
He reaches over to the coffee table with deliberate, measured movements, his huge frame shifting with the kind of careful grace that comes from a lifetime of navigating spaces built for smaller bodies.
His long fingers, close around the thick folder with surprising gentleness, cradling it like it might shatter under his strength.
When he extends it toward me, the motion is slow and intentional, giving me time to process what's happening.
His amber eyes, sharp and unwavering, lock directly onto mine with an intensity so focused it feels like the rest of the world has simply ceased to exist. I watch his gaze track across my face, taking in every micro-expression, every flutter of my eyelashes, every barely perceptible widening of my pupils.
That singular focus makes my breath catch, hitching on the exhale in a way that's equal parts terrifying and electrifying.
In that moment, suspended between his steady offering and my frozen uncertainty, I feel the full weight of whatever he's about to tell me pressing down like gravity itself has changed.
I take it with shaking hands, flipping open the cover to reveal pages and pages of dense legal text, official stamps, notarized signatures. My eyes scan the first page, struggling to make sense of the formal language, until three words jump out at me in bold print.
Deed of Ownership.
"What..." I flip to the next page, then the next, my heart pounding so hard I can hear it in my ears. Property address. Legal description. Transfer of title. "Faugh, this is... this is the deed to the building. Our building. The entire apartment building."
"Yes," he confirms, his voice steady and absolutely certain. "I purchased it this afternoon. The developer accepted my offer. We are no longer being evicted because I am now the landlord."
The folder slips from my numb fingers, landing on the coffee table with a heavy thud that echoes in the sudden, suffocating silence.
He bought the building.
He bought the entire goddamn building.
"How..." I choke out, my throat tight and my eyes starting to burn. "How did you... Faugh, buildings cost money. Like, actual money. You can't just—"
"I used the remainder of my dowry gold," he says simply, as if he's telling me he picked up groceries. "My legal team was able to liquidate it quickly through a specialized dealer. The developer was motivated to sell; the transaction was completed within hours."
The remainder.
The remainder of his dowry gold, that precious, irreplaceable inheritance that had been set aside since his birth, meant to secure his future and honor his clan's standing.
The very same gold that represented generations of his family's accumulated wealth, their status, their legacy in the eyes of his people.
The gold he had dipped into just weeks ago to pay six months of rent in advance and save me from immediate eviction.
And now, impossibly, he had taken what little remained of that sacred family fortune and liquidated every last coin to purchase this entire building, this crumbling old structure that housed our apartment, that held my studio space, that kept me safe.
The gold that was meant for his arranged bride. The gold that represented his entire family legacy, his clan obligations, his future. The gold he already spent a massive chunk of just to pay our rent six months ago.
And he just... used the rest of it to buy a building.
The entire, crumbling, beautiful building that housed our apartment, my studio, my sanctuary.
To buy my building. My building. The one where I paint until three in the morning, where my art lives and breathes, where I have finally begun to feel like I belong somewhere.
To protect my home. To protect me. To ensure that no landlord could ever threaten me with eviction again, that no financial catastrophe could ever tear away the one place on earth where I felt even remotely safe.
"Faugh," I whisper, and I can hear my voice cracking, feel the hot sting of tears spilling over my lashes. "That was yours. That was your money, your family's money, and you just, you just spent it all on this?"
"On you," he corrects, stepping closer, his huge body towering over me in the dim lamplight. "I spent it on protecting what is mine. You’re mine, Chantel. This apartment, this space where you create your art, where you feel safe, it is part of you. Therefore, it is mine to protect."
I press my hand to my mouth, trying to hold back the sob building , but it escapes anyway, broken and raw.
"I can't..." I gasp, shaking my head frantically. "I can't accept this. Faugh, this is too much. This is insane. You don't just buy buildings for people you've been sleeping with for like two weeks!"
His expression darkens noticeably, the sharp angles of his face becoming even more severe in the lamplight.
His massive jaw tightens with barely contained intensity, the muscles beneath his slate-green skin clenching visibly.
When he speaks, his voice drops to something lower, more primal, a deep, resonant rumble that vibrates through the very air between us.
"You are not 'people I have been sleeping with,'" he says, each word deliberate and heavy with absolute conviction. "You are not some casual arrangement or temporary distraction to be categorized with others. You are my mate, Chantel. The distinction is not semantic. It is fundamental."
"I'm a broke artist who can barely afford groceries!
" I burst out, the words exploding from me in a rush of panic and shame and overwhelming inadequacy.
"I can't even pay my half of the rent most months!
I survive on instant ramen and overdue credit card payments!
And you just spent what, hundreds of thousands of dollars? Millions? On a building? For me?"
I'm spiraling now, the anxiety clawing its way up my throat, making my hands shake and my vision blur with tears.
Because this is the thing I've been trying not to think about, the ugly, uncomfortable truth that's been lurking in the back of my mind ever since Faugh moved in with his custom suits and his leather briefcase and his literal chest of gold.
We're not equals, not by any conceivable measure, and the disparity between us yawns so wide that I can’t comprehend how we've ended up in the same room, let alone the same bed.
The gap between his wealth, his power, his sheer competence at navigating a world I barely understand and my own desperate scrambling just to keep my head above water feels insurmountable, a chasm so vast that I'm not sure anything could bridge it.
We're not even close. Not close to being on the same footing, not close to being compatible in any practical sense.
He's operating on an entirely different plane of existence, one where buildings are casual purchases and tailored suits are the baseline, and I'm down here fumbling with torn canvases and overdue bills and the constant, gnawing fear that I'm going to wake up one day and realize this was all some elaborate dream that ended the moment reality decided to reassert itself.
He's this powerful, wealthy, terrifyingly competent Orc who can buy entire buildings on a whim, and I'm a struggling artist who had to beg strangers on the internet for a roommate to avoid eviction.