Page 33 of Falling for the Grumpy Orc
Now I’m back, and I realize he’s not entirely gone. Memories of him still linger in all the people who remember him. And inside me.
I clear my throat, dragging in a deep breath that does nothing to loosen the knot in my chest.
“I’m looking for a good slab for a mantelpiece I’m working on. Something thick, good grain. I was thinking hickory, oak, or even walnut.”
Emory watches me for a heavy beat, like maybe he hears everything I didn’t say hidden between the things I did say. Then, with a grunt, he nods toward the warehouse.
“Follow me.”
I fall into step beside him. A few minutes later, I run my hand over a promising slab of walnut, feeling the dense grain beneath my fingertips.
Emory nods toward the slab. “Good choice. I’llhave the boys prep it for you.”
I step back, pleased to find the tightness in my chest gone, replaced by a warm buzz. Like being here, I can feel a bit of my old man with me.
I pay for the slab and go wait by my truck while the warehouse guys wrap it up for me, basking in the warm midday sun. But then my gaze drifts toward the far end of the parking lot, where the scrap piles sit in uneven heaps of broken planks and discarded offcuts. Movement catches my eye, someone hunched low, sifting through the wreckage with slow, deliberate motions, next to what looks like an old shopping cart, overflowing with junk.
The person, a human man around fifty years old, turns his face to me and stares for a moment before returning to his task. Those worn blue eyes, that eagle beak of a nose, and those high cheekbones all echo inside my brain to form the image of a man that is as engraved into my memory as my own reflection.
My breathing stills. Blood rushes to my head and the sound of my own heartbeat drowns the noise from the lumberyard.
Joren Veckett. The drunk driver whose car swerved in front of my father’s truck and stole my parents’ lives from them.
The name slams into me like a physical blow, rattling through my bones. For a second, I'm certain my mind is playing tricks on me. The last time I saw him, he was standing in a courthouse, his expensive suit pressed to perfection, his expression carefully blank as the judge read the sentence that meant nothing. A fine. Probation. A slap on the wrist for something that stole everything from me.
But this man? This man is barely recognizable.
His back is curved forward, spine bowed as though the weight of the years has settled on his shoulder. His clothes are worn thin at theelbows, the fabric fraying and stained. His hands, once pristine and manicured, shake as they sift through the discarded wood, fingertips ghosting over broken edges like a man searching for something that isn’t really there.
My pulse hammers in my ears.
Joren mutters under his breath, eyes darting among the scraps. His fingers close around a piece of lumber no thicker than my thumb, movements slow, deliberate. He places the scrap of lumber on top of the pile and pushes his cart away, but the front wheel catches in a hole in the pavement and tilts to the side.
He doesn’t see me.
I take a step forward, the gravel crunching under my boot. His head jerks up, and for the first time in nearly twenty years, our gazes meet.
Hollow. That’s the only word for his eyes.
No recognition flickers there, no guilt, no understanding. Just a skittish wariness, the look of a stray dog expecting a kick.
“I ain’t stealing.” His voice is as hollow as his gaze, worn and brittle. “I got permission to take those. Emory says I can take as much as I want. Gotta keep myself warm, he says.”
He bends down and picks up the scrap of wood, then clutches it closer to his chest, his fingers curling over the rough, splintered surface. It’s an instinctive gesture, protective, almost defensive.
My fists clench without my permission. Heat coils in my gut, ugly and familiar. I’ve spent years imagining this moment, the things I would say, the weight of my fury behind them. But now?
Now, I’m standing in front of a ghost.
This is the man who stole my parents from me. The man who destroyed lives and walked free. And yet, looking at him now, all I see is someone condemned.
Joren flinches when I move, like he expects me to strike him.
I don’t.
Instead, I step around him, toward the overturned cart. I put it back up on its wobbly wheels, then step backward and out of his way.
Joren stiffens, his breath catching. For a moment, he just stares at me, uncertain, confused. Then, hesitantly, he steps forward. His gaze flicks to me, brief, unsure.
