Page 37 of Pursued By the Orc
I wasn’t sure how much he had, but based on his lifestyle and spending habits, I assumed that he had amassed massive amounts of wealth. Shaking my head, guilt bubbled inside of me. He’d given meso muchof it, though.
And for no reason at all. I hadn’t gone above and beyond in being an excellent waitress to him. In fact, I was usually slower, sitting and chatting with him and stealing bites of his food instead of focusing on ensuring he was taken care of.
Now he was here, and I didn’t know what to do. Staring at him, I tried to silently transmit to him that this was aterribleidea. His grin was feral as he rocked back on his heels, lookingexceptionallyproud of himself.
“He’ll need to shadow someone,” my boss said, and I was so busy trying to warn Krusk with my eyes that when everyone around me took a step back, I didn’t notice. “Oh, good! Emma, you’ll be his new trainer.” He released a gust of breath, relieved that the task was assigned without in-fighting.
I blinked at him before looking around and scowling at my co-workers. They didn’t look at me, avoiding my gaze. Some of them were even trying to whistle their innocence. With a groan of defeat, I moved toward Krusk while my boss hustled off and my co-workers scattered.
“What are you doing here?” I demanded, my voice a low hiss of irritation.
It wasn’t that I didn’t want to see him. That would be a blatant lie. Butthiswas unexpected and ridiculous. We saw each other every day and we had plans to see each other again tomorrow to visit my grandma. There was no way I was going to be allowed to visit herwithoutKrusk in tow.
“I wanted to see you,” he murmured, examining every inch of my face as if hehadn’tjust seen me the day before. “And I know you mentioned that you worked here, so I thought…” he trailed off, giving a shrug that conveyed exactly what I thought it did. He’d wanted to see me, so he’d made it happen.
I shouldn’t be flattered. I shouldnotbe impressed andtinglyat the thought of this male wanting to see me so much that he’d taken a minimum wage job just to do it. And yet, the warmth in my stomach and face didn’t lie. I was ecstatic that he cared enough to do it.
Clearing my throat and wondering if I had enough time to splash some freezing water on my face, I reached out to tug him by the wrist in the direction of the sorting area. He shifted our hands until his engulfed mine, but I shook it off.
“Sorry,” I said, not able to meet his eyes. “But we can’t hold hands at work.”
“We hold hands at the restaurant,” Krusk argued and I sent him a small smile.
“Yes, but it’s much more formal here. Relationships between employees is frowned upon,” I explained.
“That’s stupid,” he sniffed, but he released my hand and walked behind me instead.
“So this is where we start,” I told him, pointing at the carts already sorted and assigned to a floor number. “Each delivery person the first cart for their assigned floors and makes their rounds; then comes back down and until the deliveries are done. At that point, you can come back down and help sort for the next batch of deliveries.”
We made our way to the cart furthest away from where we were standing and I pointed into the bin. There were packages of different colors with notes from their point of origin. “This is aMagickalBureau so there’s a lot of potions and ingredients that need to be delivered. We have to be careful handling those. On the side of the cart, you’ll see what the colors mean.”
I pointed toward the left side of the cart that did a quick run-down with a color-coded chart. “It’ll be easier with sorting if you learn this off by heart,” I added, knowing how annoying it could be to sort without having any understanding of what the hell anything was. That was how I’d started and after two magickal explosions from mail that had almost ended in me losing my job, I’d had to learn really quickly.
“This is the hard part, but we’ll do it later. For now, let’s just take these up the floors,” I told him, and before I my fingers could touch the cart’s push-bar, he’d rushed ahead to grab it, giving me a big smile and gesturing for me to go ahead of him.
I shook my head before doing just that. “Thank you,” I said over my shoulder and caught him staring with avid fascination at my ass, his fangs digging into his lower lip.
“No problem,” he mumbled, his eyes never leaving where theywere staring.
I smothered a laugh, turning back to head toward the elevators and adding a little swish to my hips. I bit my own lips to hide my giggle as he groaned behind me.
CHAPTER 24
Krusk
Emma led me to what she called the ‘service elevator’ and tapped on a button before turning to look at me, amusement playing in her eyes as she glanced around to make sure we were alone.
“I can’t believe you got a job here. What were you thinking?” she asked, leaning her shoulder against the wall as we waited. I hadn’t wanted to stop staring at her ass, but her face was just as captivating.
Even more so now that I was getting to know her. I’d thought I was attracted to her before, but it wasnothingcompared to how I felt now that I knew her wit and humor and strength.
“You said you were going to take time off from yoga,” I explained with a shrug. “And I wanted to make sure that I still saw you as much as I could.”
Her lips parted in surprise and I watched as she ducked her gaze with a shy smile. “Oh,” she said, nibbling on her lower lip,trying to hide the pleased curve of her lips, but I could see it. Shelikedthat I wanted to spend time with her.
That gave me hope that my wooing wasn’t for nothing. Spending time with her was having the effect that I’d hoped for. She was getting to know me and shedidn’tdespise the time we spent together. That was fantastic news.
“Well, I don’t know how many yoga classes you can attend before you hurt yourself anyway,” she quipped, with a mischievous twinkle in her eyes.
