Page 20 of Obeying the Orc
A look of amusement crossed Knot’s handsome features. One dark eyebrow shot up. “Finished? Natalee, darling, I’m not planning on leaving anytime soon.”
Heat engulfed my face, and I found I couldn’t hold his gaze for more than a second. My confidence in working as a siren fled. I’d thought I could be a pretender without any trouble. Julianne. Not Natalee.Julianne, Julianne, Julianne. I would return to being Natalee when I boarded a ship bound for the Northern Isles. I swallowed past the burning in my throat.
“You mean to stay the entire night, then?”
“Yes, Natalee, and then in the morning, I mean to take you home with me.” He propped himself up on one elbow. “I mean to make you my wife.”
Hiswhat?
He reached for my hand, but I flinched as if I’d just been slapped, and his hand froze in the air above mine.
“You don’t even know me,” I blurted, taken aback by his suggestion.
“We spent time together, Natalee, by the river. I realize it was some weeks ago but…”
“A few conversations don’t count. Besides, folks around here seem to think you will eventually come to your senses and take up orating again. The temple is just sitting there empty, waiting for you. The rectory, too. You might change your mind, but you most certainly won’t be able to follow your calling if you’re married to a siren.”
“I want a wife, Natalee. I’ve been alone for long enough. My calling is to take a wife and start a family.” He ran a hand across my stomach. “You don’t belong here. I saw how nervous you were up on stage when those miners were bidding on you.”
“I wasn’t nervous!” I said defensively. “The auction was my idea. I wanted to show Madame Sage that I am serious about working here and being a siren. And the more I drum up business for myself, the sooner I’ll have enough money saved to return home. I don’t plan on staying in Faircross for the rest of my life. I belong in Jathaway, with my family. I never should have traveled here in the first place.”
“If you want to return to your family in Jathaway, why do they not send you the funds you need to return home?”
I pressed my lips together and closed my eyes, fighting back tears. “Please leave.”
“I’m not going anywhere, Natalee.”
Opening my eyes, I stared at Knot, thinking he looked most handsome with his dark hair disheveled from our lovemaking. No, not lovemaking. Fucking. That’s what we’d done. He’d paid fifty gold pieces to fuck me. To use my body for pleasure. Never mind that I’d shared in that pleasure. My whole body still tingled in the aftermath of the intense releases he’d drawn from me.
“If you are still so estranged from your family that you cannot ask them to pay your way home, what do you think your life will be like when you return? What if they won’t accept you?”
I sniffled and wiped at a tear, cursing myself for crying in front of him. “My oldest sister and her husband will probably take me in. My family doesn’t have to know the trip to Black Dragon Island was a failure. I’ll tell them Logan had success in the mining business before he died. They don’t need to know where my money came from. I could start over then. I could find a husband and have the family I thought I’d have with Logan.”
“Natalee, I would be a good husband to you. Strict perhaps, but fair, and caring. Far as I see it, you’ve just become my wife-in-truth, right here in this bed. Say yes, and let me spend the rest of my life taking care of you and keeping you safe. We can get to know one another better after we are wed.”
My bottom lip quivered. “It could never work.”
“Why not?”
“Because of where we are. Look around, Knot. You’re lying in a whore’s bed. I sold myself to you tonight.”
“I came here, knowing tonight was your first night going upstairs, Natalee. I heard about it last week from a drunk miner, then I stopped in for a drink early yesterday and Floura confirmed tonight was the night. I came here this evening to make sure you only went upstairswith me. Because I have every intention of making you my wife. Marry me.”
The temptation to sayyeswas strong, but I knew it wasn’t right. Gods, how it hurt to refuse him. But I couldn’t allow him to throw away the possibility of becoming the town priest. If proper ceremonies honoring the gods weren’t held in the temple soon, especially during the change of the seasons, there was no telling what calamities might strike Faircross. I didn’t want to condemn the town to tragedy.
My heart ached. Why couldn’t he have realized he was ready to settle down and marry during his last trip to town, when he’d invited me to a picnic? Now any chance we might’ve had at finding happiness together was shot.
“I won’t have you wasting your future on me,” I said.
“Natalee, please don’t talk that way about yourself. You’re a good female. You only ended up here by circumstance.” A flash of understanding crossed his visage. “You were staying with the Foxthornes directly before coming here. Why did you leave their home?”
“You must go now, Knot.Please.”
My expression must have given away some of the dark truth behind my departure from the Foxthornes’ residence, because his nostrils flared, and he tensed. “What did Mr. Foxthorne do to you?”
“Nothing! He did nothing!” I pushed at him, trying to force him off the bed.
“Don’t lie to me, Natalee. I want to help you. Talk to me.”
