Page 61 of The Orc's Protection
It feels chosen.
I look at her. She looks back. There is nothing else I need to know.
Chapter Twenty-One
Vraag
I do not say goodbye to her in the corridor.
The decision is made without words, carried instead in the way our hands remain linked as we leave the building together, in the quiet certainty that settles between us once we are away from the school. Snow has begun to fall—soft, steady, muting the world—and for once I do not read it as a variable to account for. It is simply there, marking time.
Riona doesn’t ask where we’re going. She simply stays by my side, an unspoken agreement unfolding step by step until the choice is complete and irreversible.
By the time we reach my apartment, the restraint I’ve been practicing thinned to something deliberate and taut, held in place by choice rather than habit.
Inside, the warmth greets us immediately, familiar and contained. I take her coat and hang it by the door, the domestic gesture suddenly charged with intention. The door closes behind us with a soft finality that echoes through my chest.
I turn to face her.
This is not urgency. This is not reaction. The danger has passed. The arguments are finished. What remains is choice—clear, steady, and impossible to mistake.
“Riona,” I say, and realize I no longer want to choose my words as carefully as I was before.
She steps closer, close enough that I can feel her heat, smell the faint trace of winter on her skin. She looks up at me, eyes calm, intent, entirely unafraid.
“Yes,” she says quietly.
It’s permission.
I lift my hand to her face, giving her every opportunity to pull away. She doesn’t. Instead, she leans into my palm, trusting the strength there, welcoming it. The control I have practiced for years tightens, then loosens deliberately and consciously.
When I kiss her, it is slow. Deep. Unmistakably chosen.
Her hands slide up my chest, fingers curling into the fabric of my shirt, and I feel the exact moment her restraint breaks—the soft catch of her breath, the way her body curves into mine, seeking more contact. My tusks brush her cheeks as I angle my head, careful even now, and she makes a sound low in her throat that bypasses every civilized thought I possess.
I deepen the kiss, tasting her fully. She opens for me immediately, her tongue meeting mine, and the sweetness of her, warm and human and entirely Riona, makes my chest rumble with a sound I haven’t allowed myself to make around her before. Low and possessive and utterly unguarded.
She responds to it, pressing closer, one hand sliding up to tangle in my hair while the other fists in my shirt. The slight pull at my scalp shoots heat straight down my spine, and I realize I’ve backed her against the wall without conscious thought, my body caging hers.
I should pull back. Should give her space. But when I start to ease away, she makes a sound of protest and pulls me closer, rising on her toes to reach me better.
“Don’t,” she breathes against my mouth. “Don’t hold back.”
The words release something in me, unraveling the last careful restraint between us. I slide one hand into her hair, tilting her head to the angle I want, and kiss her the way I’ve been imagining for weeks. Not gentle. Not careful. Just honest.
My other hand finds her waist, spanning it easily, and I feel her breath hitch as my fingers press into the softness there.She’s so small compared to me, delicate in a way that makes every protective instinct roar to life, but she’s not fragile. She’s meeting me kiss for kiss, her nails scraping against my scalp, her body arching into mine with clear demand.
When I finally break the kiss to let her breathe, we’re both panting. Her lips are swollen, flushed from the pressure of mine, and there are faint marks on her cheeks from my tusks—not painful, just evidence of contact.
“Vraag,” she says, my name barely more than a whisper.
I lean down again, this time trailing my mouth along her jaw to the sensitive spot just below her ear. She shivers, her hands tightening in my hair, and I breathe in the scent of her—arousal and warmth… addictive.
“I can smell how much you want this,” I murmur against her skin, my voice rougher than I’ve ever allowed it to be with her. “How long have you been thinking about it?”
“Weeks, maybe months,” she admits breathlessly. “Long before our first kiss.”
I scrape my tusks deliberately against the column of her throat—gentle, controlled, just enough pressure to make her gasp. “And what did you think about?”
