Page 13 of ORC’d By the Emperor

“I don’t care how big it is,” I gasp out. “Just put it in. Please put it in!”

The rubbing on my back stills, then his arm moves up.

His hand is so large and strong, he has no problem pinching my head between his thumb and index finger and pulling it back to tip my face up.

This time, there’s nowhere to look but at him as his gold eyes bore into mine.

Ivar the Terrible is more handsome than I remember from… well, just a few minutes ago. Up close, I can see the sharp beauty in his harsh features and the contrasting tenderness in his golden gaze.

However, his face hardens to stone when he asks me, “Does this mean you are amenable to my lifelong claim?”

Chapter 10

Amenable

Am I amenable to his lifelong claim?

I struggle with my answer.

Amenable is not the right word at all.

And as for lifelong? Hell no.

More like, I desperately need to clear this sex haze so I can concentrate on getting to that red door, finding a mage cave, and returning to the Lower Realm and the test that will put my life back on track.

But I know better than most about using semantics to the advantage of your end goal.

“Yes. I accept your claim right now,” I answer with a little bit of misdirection.

“Blood and Gold!” the crowd cheers, which appears to be the Orc version of “Huzzah!”

As if in punishment for my half-truth, the most powerful cramp yet rolls through me, erasing my ability to strategize and leaving only the desperate ache of out-of-control lust behind.

“Ivar, please… I need you. It hurts. Ivar, it hurts…”

The Blood and Gold cheers instantly turn into hisses again. And someone I’m fairly sure is Grak calls out, “Registry Bride must address Emperor by title!”

But the Emperor removes his hand from the back of my head. He holds it up to the crowd with all four fingers up and the thumb tucked into his palm.

They immediately quiet, and he announces with a stony-eyed sweep of the crowd below the dais, “Little Bride will call Emperor Ivar! Emperor commands this!”

Then he adds, a lot more quietly to me, “I like the sound of my name on your pretty lips.”

Pretty…

Vance never called any part of me pretty. He was too busy complaining about me being “too hard” to marry—while also throwing in digs every time I failed to cook or clean for a high-value man like himself. According to him, I was “wasting too much time on orders for your weird little fangirl store.”

My heart flutters like I’m a pre-Army teenager again, and hot, vulnerable tears pool in my eyes.

“Ivar…” I scrape my short nails over his granite pecs, clinging to him as I plead, “Please claim me.”

The remaining hardness drains out of Ivar’s expression.

“Ah, Little Bride, you have made me so happy with this assent. I wish to deny you nothing. But I refuse to hurt you.”

His eyes take on a fierce glow. “I will take a knife to my heart before I allow myself to do that.”

“But…” Panic rising in my chest, I struggle to find a way to say that him not claiming me right fucking now hurts much worse than him doing so.