CHAPTER 15 — Smekbryll #2
And then I pinned the laundry to a clothesline using those weird clothing pins that don’t pinch open and closed like an alligator clamp. I had to give up and ask Ulda for help figuring out how to use them when simply jamming them on clothes didn’t seem to be working.
Ulda had taken one long look at me and sighed like she didn’t know how I’ve managed to make it this far in life while being so damn helpless.
“Pampered miller’s daughter,” she’d muttered, and I let my head fall back as I silently shouted, I’M NOT A MILLER’S DAUGHTER!
at the sky until she turned and caught me.
“Mayhap a deranged miller’s daughter,” she’d pronounced, blank-faced.
I’d sucked in a breath through my nose so hard my nostrils flattened, and Ulda… laughed.
“That was a joke? You were joking around with me?” I asked in shock.
She’d straightened up, the laughter sucking from her as fast as it came. “I would never waste time with a joke when you have so much work to do. Now, were you paying attention at all to how to pin the laundry or were you too busy screaming at the clouds?”
That Orc is a drill sergeant.
Despite the fact that I spent half the day with my arms in wash water, I don’t feel very clean.
Plus I’m achy. By nightfall, I want a bath in the worst way, and I go about gathering a nightdress (which Joktepitha gave me), clean panties (which Namak?ga gave me—newly sewn from new fabric so I don’t have to share koekje-wear, bless her), soap so rough it could scrub the gray off of a rhino, and hand-darned socks.
Because wood floors are freaking cold in the morning, and Ulda heard me complaining and tossed a pair of socks at me.
It was the nicest missile I’ve ever had fired at me.
I hear a noise, and when my head swivels to the door, I find Roarg leaning against the frame, studying me with a sexy tusked smile.
My heart flutters, but I grip my pile of bath paraphernalia as I focus and tell him, “You should go.”
“Oh, emerald forge.” He straightens, frowning. “What have I done wrong?”
I glance up at him and laugh. “Nothing!”
He relaxes, but raises his brows in question. “Then, why?”
“I forfeited my night. I got my period—it means I’m bleeding.”
His nostrils flare and his head jerks back. “Ah. I can smell it. You’re like one of those little flying bats—”
“Yeah, I’ve heard,” I grouse. At least he didn’t compare me to a shrew. “Anyway. As I was saying… What’s that look for?”
Roarg is wearing a hungry, predatory look. One that says I’m going to shove you down to the floor and ride you until you scream—and it makes my insides quiver and my brain melt.
He crosses to me, wraps me up in his arms, and hauls me right off my feet. Then he grins at me as he dumps me on the bed.
There’s a bar of soap under my shoulder, and my nightdress is wadded up under my head. “I don’t think you’re prepared for this,” I warn him. “There will be blood everywhere.”
Concerningly, he looks intrigued. “I like blood.”
“O-kay, that’s disturbing.”
He comes down on top of me, a wicked look in his eyes.
“I was on my way to take a bath. I feel grubby and crummy, and I need to be immersed in bubbles and hot water,” I inform him.
He props himself on his elbows and plays with a lock of my hair. “I’ll bathe with you.”
I look up at him in disbelief. “With me? Like in the same tub?”
He tugs my hair. “I worked dawn to dusk at the anvil. I’m covered in sweat and probably some metal shavings.
I could use a soaking. I’ll even haul the water.
” He sits up and yanks me up with him. He tugs me to standing and slaps me on the ass, making me yelp.
“Go get undressed. I’ll have our tub filled in no time. ”
We take a bath together. It takes less water than you’d think, especially when Roarg climbs into the tub with me. The water level rises to a mere inch from the rim, and I think that’s the only reason Roarg doesn’t fuck me in the tub.
He surprises me by stealing the washcloth out of my hands and scrubbing me head to toe.
Then I turn, knees inside of his, and scrub all of him, including his one-eyed hooded knight—which leads to a round of heated kissing and heavy petting.
After we rinse and dry off, we make our way back to my bedroom, and I drop onto my bed, draped in a rough linen towel.
He lands beside me on his back, unrepentantly naked.
And fully, hugely aroused.
“Do you still want to risk period sex?” I ask, glancing from his engorged kyrp? to his face.
His eyes are closed, and his hands are laced under his head. “Only if you want to make love.”
“It’s messy, if you’re asking for my opinion.”
He reaches for me and rolls me onto his chest, letting out a long, gusty sigh. “Then we shall simply lie here, enjoying closeness.”
“You think you’re staying all night?”
He cracks open his eyes, peering at me through slitted eyes. “What is this think I am? Wife, I am.”
I huff a laugh and pat him between his beefy pectorals. “Well, I wasn’t sure you would if we’re not having sex.”
He shrugs, and my whole body feels the movement. He closes his eyes again.
Biting my lip, I trace along his very nice, very bare chest with my fingertips.
Eyes sliding partway open, he starts slowly petting my thigh.
We end up fucking.
It’s a full-on scarlet tide event. Along his hip bones and groin, his green skin stains with my blood, and while I’m a little freaked out, Roarg seems to like it.
This does not disturb me less.
Thankfully, we pushed my towel under me while we did the deed, but damn. “I’ll have to wash out this towel with so much water. It looks like it was used to soak up a crime scene. I hope you’re happy.”
Roarg gets up and leaves the bed.
Surprised, I blink at him. “Where are you going?” I’ve been very spoiled; I like that I’ve had Roarg to myself every night. Suddenly and with no little amount of shock, I realize I don’t want to sleep without him.
He smirks at me. “You’ve pleasured me so well that I’ll do your women’s work and wash out this towel myself.”
“Wow. That was somehow sort of sexist and sweet. Congratulations?”
“You best rein in that sass, or you’ll find yourself on your back atop a second towel. And then I’ll have two to wash.”
I give him a considering look that makes him smile. He swaggers to me and tries to catch my face so he can kiss me—but his hands are bloody. I pull away, cringing. I point to my pitcher and basin on the nightstand. “Please. Wash up.”
“How about,” he says, still stained and buck ass naked as he saunters for my door, “I wash this towel out first and then I only have to wash up once more when I get back?”
“Sounds like a fine plan,” I confirm.
With a shake of his head at my squeamishness, he strolls out of the room, tossing me a sexy over-the-shoulder smirk.
***
When he returns, he climbs into bed and flops down on his front. He raises his arm so I can snuggle against his side.
“Roarg?”
“Hmm?” he replies sleepily.
I roll my lips together, wondering why I’m driven to ask this. “Why don’t you cum in me?”
His head raises off the pillow so he can eye me a little incredulously. “Because when I asked if you wanted me to, you told me no?”
“I did…” I confirm, and I fish my hand under his chest, stopping right under his heart, which thuds strongly against my palm, heating fast, trapped by his skin and the blanket. “I thank you, by the way, for asking me.”
He relaxes, and his big shoulder twitches in a lazy shrug.
“It is your choice, if you want to carry brats. If you don’t, then I for one love your breasts, and your offer to let me nestle my length between them for me to seed last night pleased me to no end.
” He gives me a satisfied look. “Still does, kwa?ara.”
I give him wide eyes at his frankness.
He laughs under his breath. His smile is slow and almost asleep.
His big hand cups my cheek, his thumb brushing my hair away from my brow bone.
“I will never expect or ask you to give me brats. But should you decide you want them, you have only to tell me. Of course, I’ll need to build a bigger house, because we’re going to end up with a passel of little ones.
” He leers at me. “Endless skorbrijking will do that.”
I choke, and he laughs, rolling mostly on top of me.
He falls asleep with his face buried in my neck, his body heavy as a truck.
The wild thought that I can live happy like this for the rest of my life strikes me like a lightning bolt.
I stare over his wide shoulder, my thoughts loudly dancing through my head.
I’ve held Opkug and Crushosh a lot in the last thirty-some hours.
That was by design—not mine, but my sisterwives, of course.
I see that now, their motives. Having me hold them and burp them and play with them—and having me watch Roarg hold them and burp them and play with them—were actually a devious set of deliberate maneuvers meant to give me crazy thoughts.
And it’s working.
I am having crazy thoughts.
Do babies give off pheromones? For sure, Orc babies do.
Because I can smell the sweet-smelling baby Roarg and I would make. I can see its gently pointed ears, its adorable nose, its cupid’s bow mouth. Its angelic baby eyes looking up at me as I nursed my daughter or son for the first time.
My belly clenches, making me bite my lip and shake myself. I hook my chin on Roarg’s meaty shoulder with a conflicted sigh. I address my womb: I’m going to tell Ulda she should hit me tomorrow if you don’t stop thinking about Roarg babies.
Of course, I sure as heck can’t tell Ulda why she should hit me. She for sure wouldn’t if she knew I was getting a case of baby fever.
I’ve never had it before, but suddenly I know the urge is real, that I have the beginning symptoms of this fever, and I need to stop it, pronto.
You’ll be lucky if you leave here not pregnant—and you WILL be leaving.
I inhale the earthy, delicious man-smell coming off of Roarg’s skin, absorbing the virility of him, feeling his hard body pressed to mine, resting so heavily but so perfectly on mine—feeling achingly good—and I hope I get out of here fast. Because I like Roarg.
And he’s making it no secret at all that he likes me.
Now with me having what should be unwelcome—not yearning—baby thoughts, Ulda is right: we’re getting attached to each other…
Dangerously so.