Vorgak the Cruel: A Paranormal Monster Romance (Orc Mates) Read online

  VORGAK THE CRUEL

  ORC MATES SERIES

  - paranormal monster romance -

  Copyright © 2021 by Cara Wylde

  Cover by Alexandru Gui

  All rights are reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher, except for the use of brief quotations in book reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are fictitious or have been used fictitiously, and are not to be construed as real in any way. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations is entirely coincidental.

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  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  The guests had all arrived, and her husband, Chris, was in the backyard with the guys, tending the barbecue. They were all chatting, laughing, and drinking beer.

  “Are you sure about this?” Amanda asked Candace.

  Candace took a deep breath in, released it, then stepped away from the window. She looked her best friend in the eyes and nodded.

  Amanda sighed, but squeezed Candace’s hand in reassurance. “Okay, sweetie. I’m here if you need me, and everything is ready. Jason knows, and he agrees that I must help you if things get out of hand.”

  “Thank you,” Candace said in a small voice. “But it’s not if I need you... It’s when I need you...”

  “You have no hope of this going smoothly, do you?”

  “I lost all hope a long time ago.”

  “I’ll go set the table and pray to God Chris will behave like a normal human being at least this one time. You deserve better, sweetie.”

  Candace didn’t say anything. When Amanda left her alone in the kitchen, she went to the sink and splashed cold water onto her face. She wasn’t wearing any makeup because Chris had never allowed it. Her husband controlled her fully. He also made sure she didn’t need makeup by always sparing her beautiful, round face. Her body below the clavicle was fair game, though. And Candace had had enough. After two years of living in fear and never standing up for herself, she was going to claim her freedom. She was going to ask him for a divorce.

  She’d had to think it through. Chris got violent for less. Sometimes, he hit her simply because he thought she’d zoned out while he was talking to her. He pinched her and left bruises if she dared to interrupt him when he was speaking. Those were small things. Insignificant. She burned an apple pie once and sported the bruises of her punishment on her ribs for a month. It didn’t help that she had soft, pale skin that bruised easily, turning yellow, and purple, and blue when Chris decided to teach her a lesson.

  But the worst she’d been beaten had been when Chris had thought she’d looked at one of his friends from college. They’d gone out to a restaurant that evening to meet with some of her husband’s old friends. This one guy, Hunter, was the only one who showed up without a partner. All through dinner, Chris studied his wife and Hunter, as if he were waiting for something to happen, as if he were waiting for a reason to lash out later. Candace knew this, so she did her best to avoid Hunter’s gaze. In fact, she made it a point to only talk to the women at the table. But that hadn’t helped. Back home, Chris accused her that she’d smiled at Hunter, that she’d sent him subtle, seductive signals, and that he, Chris, wasn’t stupid, that he knew what was going on and it was his duty to show Candace whom she belonged to.

  Candace didn’t get out of bed for three days.

  “I’m doing this,” she whispered to herself when she saw Chris walk toward the kitchen. “I’m doing this. I am.” He crossed the terrace, and his hand was on the sliding glass door. Candace felt sick to her stomach, like she was about to throw up. “I. Am. Doing. This.”

  “Honey, we need more beers.”

  He went straight to the fridge, not even noticing the paleness of her face and the way her hands trembled. He grabbed three beers, but when he turned around, Candace was blocking his way.

  “I need to talk to you.”

  He smiled, still unfazed. “Okay.”

  “Chris, look at me. I need to tell you something important, and you have to promise me that you will listen calmly.”

  He furrowed his brows, finally understanding that something was going on. “Careful now, honey.” His voice had dropped a tone.

  She gathered all the inner strength she wasn’t even sure she had and said the words as quickly and as firmly as she could. “I want a divorce.”

  Chris blinked. The expression on his face said that he was convinced he’d misheard her. “What now?”

  “I want a divorce, Chris. I don’t want to fight, and I don’t want you to try and convince me to stay, that we can fix this. It’s over. I want it to be over.”

  He dropped the beers on the nearest counter and grabbed Candace by the shoulders. She tried to step away, but he was too fast, and she was too scared.

  “You didn’t just say that,” he said through gritted teeth. “You didn’t just say all that, Candace. Take it back, and maybe I’ll forget it ever happened. Maybe.”

  She fought back tears. “You never forget...”

  “You’re right.” He chuckled menacingly. “I have a good memory.”

  “Chris, I’m breaking up with you. Right here, right now. And there’s nothing you can do about it.”

  “Oh, I think there’s something I can do about it. You never learn, do you?”

  He slapped her over the face. Hard. For a second, Candace couldn’t believe he’d done it. He’d protected her face all this time, not wanting people to see that he abused her on a daily basis. He’d just broken his own rule. He slapped her again, and that was when she whimpered and tried to run. He grabbed her by the arm, squeezing tightly, and slammed her into the sink. She cried out when the edge of it dug into her lower back. She was curvy and petite, and compared to Chris, who was tall and leaning on the burly side, she almost looked like a child.

  “This time, I’ll teach you good,” he spat. “Divorce... Who got it into your head that you could divorce me? Was it that bitch of your mother?”

  “You know I don’t talk to my mom...” She was crying now, tears streaming down her face. She wanted to shout for help, to shout after Amanda, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it. Once again, she wanted to fight him so badly, but she was helpless.

  “Divorce,” he laughed as he grabbed the first thing he could reach. It was a bottle of wine he’d taken out of the basement an hour earlier. “Divorce...”

  “Chris!” Amanda yelled from the threshold. “What are you doing? Are you insane?”

  He dropped the bottle and took a step back, allowing Candace to squeeze out from between his big body and the sink. As Amanda wrapped his wife into a hug, he ran a hand through his hair.

  “Amanda, you should stay out of his,” he said in a low voice. But he didn’t sound as menacing as before.

  “What’s going on here?” That was Amanda’s boyfriend, Jason, who came in from the back yard. “Dude, what did you do? Did you hit her?”

  “I didn’t hit her.”

  “Then why is she crying?”

  “Because she’s stupid, that’s why she’s crying!” Chris lost his temper. “You two, get out of here, and get out of my house! This is none of your business.”

  “I think it is,” Amanda said bravely. “Candace wants a divorce, and she will get it. Do you really think that none of us knows what you’ve been doing to her? Do you think that she doesn’t have friends?”

  “You don’t talk to me like that, woman.”

  “Hey!” Jason punched Chris right in the jaw. “You don’t talk to my girlfriend like that, you piece of shit!”

  Candace screamed when she saw the two men started fighting. They were destroying the kitchen, and her first instinct was to place herself between them and make them stop. She felt responsible. They were fighting because of her, and now their other friends had abandoned the barbecue and were heading inside to make things either better or worse.

  “Don’t.” Amanda started pulling her into the living room. “Remember the plan. Your suitcase is in the trunk of my car. We’re going now.”

  “But Chris...”

 
“He will give you the divorce, whether he likes it or not. But we have to leave now.”

  “But Jason...”

  “Don’t worry about him. He can take care of himself.”

  “I’m so sorry, Amanda. I’m so sorry...”

  “Shh, sweetie. It’s not your fault.”

  Amanda pushed Candace into the passenger’s seat, made sure she had the seat belt on, then jumped behind the wheel. In a matter of minutes, they were on their way to the nearest institute.

  * * *

  “What if I’m making a mistake?” Candace was hyperventilating. With a trembling hand, she tried to have a sip of water.

  “About leaving him, or about...”

  “About the institute. About... the orcs.”

  Amanda shook her head. “If you want, I can drive you to your mother’s place.”

  “No!” The thought of that made Candace panic even more. “No. He’d find me there.”

  “You can stay with me and Jason for a while...”

  “He’d find me there, too.”

  “Sweetie...”

  “You don’t understand. After today, if he gets his hands on me, he’ll kill me.”

  “We’ll call the police.”

  “No one can protect me.”

  “He’s just a man...”

  “No, this is the only way.” She was starting to regain some of her courage. “It’s a good plan. At the institute, I will be safe. They have guards. And once a woman offers herself as tribute, she is protected.”

  Amanda sighed. “I’ll take you wherever you want me to take you. I want you to be safe. And happy.”

  “I don’t know about happy, but I know I’ll be safe there. And then, when an orc claims me as his mate, I will be even safer. Chris won’t dare come after me once I belong to a horde.”

  They were silent for a while. The more distance she put between her and Chris, the more Candace felt like she could breathe more easily. This was good. It had to be. Aside from Amanda, Candace didn’t have anyone else she could trust. Chris had made her cut ties with her family and all her friends. She hadn’t talked to her mother in a year. Every time Candace called her, she’d only talk about how she was being a fool for not having children sooner. Her mother was convinced that if Candace were pregnant, Chris wouldn’t hit her anymore. In her mind, all Candace needed to do to improve her situation was to start making babies, and then her husband would respect her. Not that Candace didn’t want to have children, but the risk of Chris taking revenge on them when he thought Candace was guilty of some random thing was too big.

  Well, maybe her mother would be happy to learn that Candace was going to have babies soon. Just not her husband’s. Also, her bundles of joy were going to have green skin, pointy ears, and sharp teeth. Would that bother sweet, old Nanna? Candace smiled at the thought. It was a miracle she could amuse herself like that when her entire world was falling apart.

  “Are you ready for this?” Amanda asked as she parked the car in front of the institute.

  “Yes.”

  “What do you even know about orcs?”

  Candace shrugged. “They didn’t want to come to our world.”

  “But they did, and the war lasted two years. Two awful years.”

  “It’s over now. We have peace, and as long as we give them brides to warm their beds and bear them children, they will stick to their mountains and caves, and leave us alone.”

  “They’re huge, monstrous, green-skinned beasts, Candace.”

  “I doubt an orc can be more monstrous than my husband.” She got out of the car and retrieved her bag from the trunk.

  A middle-aged woman welcomed her at the gate. She was the manager of the institute, and she told the guards that it was fine, and the two young women could come in.

  “You should’ve called,” she said. “I’m Penelope Roberts. Do both of you want to volunteer as tributes?” She did notice there was only one bag.

  “No. Only me. I’m Candace West, and this is my friend, Amanda. She just... brought me here.”

  The manager eyed Amanda. “Then her job is done.”

  “Please, can she stay a few minutes longer? Just while I talk to you about...”

  “Fine. Follow me to my office.”

  They crossed the courtyard and entered the building. Candace noticed that it was old and rundown in a few places. She knew the institutes weren’t luxurious and barely had enough funds to accommodate the tributes before the orcs claimed them, but at least some of those funds went to well-trained guards at the gate and around the perimeter, and that made this place the safest for Candace. For now. Once in her office, Mrs. Roberts asked for Candace’s ID, which Candace quickly provided, then motioned for her to go ahead and tell her story.

  It took Candace five minutes to explain the situation. She didn’t want to go into detail. All Mrs. Roberts needed to know was that she’d been in an abusive marriage for the past two years, that she wanted a divorce, and that her husband would kill her if he found her.

  “I’m sorry about your pain, about how much you endured,” the manager said in a soft voice. She’d been cold earlier, but now she was looking at Candace with kind eyes. “I’d be happy to host you here, with the other soon-to-be orc brides, but you must understand that it’s not up to me. I mean, it is... But on one condition.”

  “What condition?”

  “You must be fertile.”

  “Oh. Of course.”

  “Have you ever been pregnant?”

  “N-no. We used protection.”

  “What kind of protection?”

  “C-condoms.” Candace blushed slightly.

  The manager nodded. “All right. You’ll have to take some fertility tests, and if you can have children, you can stay, and you have my word that the institute will find you a good lawyer and get the divorce sorted out for you. But if you can’t...”

  “I can! Of course I can!” Candace’s heart beat wildly in her chest. It had never occurred to her that she might not be able to have children.

  “Then follow me. We can see the doctor right now.”

  “Can my friend come?”

  Mrs. Roberts sighed. “Yes.”

  Candace took Amanda’s hand in hers, and together, they followed the woman to the doctor’s office.

  Chapter Two

  After the fertility tests, Amanda had to leave. For one, she had to get back to Jason and make sure he was fine, and secondly, the manager had made it clear that the institute only accommodated future orc mates. So, Candace said goodbye to her friend, then settled into her room, which she shared with three other young women. The mattress was old, and the toilets and showers were communal, but at least she didn’t have to worry that someone would hit her if she breathed too loudly. That night, she slept like a log, too exhausted to even worry about what would come next. She woke up sore and just as tired, went to breakfast with the other girls, then waited in the cafeteria with a cup of cold coffee before her. She didn’t know what to do with herself. She’d turned off her phone and left it in the room, so she wouldn’t be tempted to check the messages she knew Chris had flooded her with.

  Right before lunch, Mrs. Roberts came to take her to her office.

  “Are the test results in?”

  “Yes.”

  “So quickly?”

  “This is an important matter, so yes.”

  “Well?!”

  The manager smiled at her over the desk. “You’re perfectly healthy and fertile, Candace. Welcome to the institute. Your lawyer will join us this evening. We’ll have dinner together. Until then, feel free to check out the classes we have on orc culture and traditions. If you’re going to do this right and change your life, then you need to learn about what’s expected of you.”

  Candace let out a sigh of relief. Chris was going to be forced to give her the divorce now that she’d offered herself as tribute, and that meant she would soon be free. But then she remembered that some people thought being an orc mate was the same as being in jail or dead, and her enthusiasm vanished.

  “Mrs. Roberts... Maybe it’s inappropriate to ask, but... What do you know about orcs?”

  “Everything you will learn in our classes.”

  “No, I mean... Are they cruel and abusive? Are they so horrible? I’ve just escaped an abusive relationship, and I can’t stop thinking...”