My Orc Bosshole

MY ORC BOSSHOLE ZORA BLACK MY ORC BOSSHOLE By Zora Black Copyright © 2023 by Zora Black All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. Join the newsletter here! CONTENTS 1. Zouk 2. Carnette 3. Zouk 4. Carnette 5. Zouk 6. Carnette 7. Zouk 8. Carnette 9. Zouk 10. Carnette 11. Zouk 12. Carnette 13. Carnette 14. Zouk 15. Carnette 16. Zouk 17. Carnette 18. Zouk 19. Carnette 20. Zouk 21. Carnette 22. Zouk 23. Carnette 24. Zouk 25. Carnette 26. Zouk 27. Carnette 28. Zouk 29. Carnette 30. Zouk 1 ZOUK “Traditions and honor have always mattered to Black Iron Production more than profits. The integrity of our metal, the attention to detail, the history in our design. Why, when my grandfather started it nearly eighty years ago, he—” “Profited from both sides of the war,” I supply helpfully. “Well.” He clears his throat, making his thick jowls quiver. “I do suppose that some might say—” Fuck, he’s never going to stop. If this old man says one more word, I’m liable to punch a hole in the wall. Interrupting him is a public service, really. Though I guess this is my little Vancouver-based weapons depot now. Any damage would eat into my profits in the end. It’s tempting to break the table in two with one slam of my fist, and part of me would love to see just how high I can make him jump in terror. Still, better to save that destruction for something that warrants it. The day is still young, after all. “Just sign here.” I take an obviously long glimpse of my watch. Both to signal my impatience and because the watch cost more than a new car, so I like to show it off when I can. Then I smile at him, just to show that although he’s managed to bore me to the limits of my sanity, there are no hard feelings. He might want to buy weapons some day, after all. Best not to burn bridges. The man shifts back in his seat, and a glimpse in the mirrored window reveals that I’m baring my teeth more than smiling. But he signs the fucking thing, so same difference, really. “Well.” His hands shake a bit as he fits the pen cap back on. “I, ah, always enjoyed working with your former company.” Now I’m definitely smiling, and it’s not because I have an unabiding love for the shithole that is Valdor, my former company before I was unceremoniously and unjustly fired. It’s because, as the new owner of Black Iron Production, I’m about to single-handedly cut their weapons’ acquisitions off completely. “My lawyers will be in touch with any final details,” I say, waving toward the door. They won’t—my lawyers are the best money can buy, and I know for a fact there aren’t any final details to finish up. But humans, for some reason I’ve never understood, prefer being told to fuck off in legalese. Another flash of my teeth sends the old fool on his way a few billion dollars richer, and with a press of a button my glass window goes from mirrored to clear. I try not to think about the reasons he had the feature in place, and just peer out at my factory. A curl of warm satisfaction settles in my gut. I’ve always liked factories, truth be told. They’ve got that show on TV late at night, with that man’s buttery voice droning on while the machines carry on, creating something complicated from a hundred moving parts. And that’s how it works below—everything moving at once, like waves of metal, clanking and clanging and building something new. Of course, in this case, instead of crayons or water bottles, my machines are making axes and other lethal weapons. And Deiderich isn’t going to get his hands on any damned one of them. I’ll create an international incident first. He’s going to beg me to sell to him again by the time I’m done with him. Oh, sure, first he’ll bitch and moan. Probably give me some long, boring lecture about honor. And he’ll find other manufacturers, sure. Eventually. After I, as his former operations manager, have poached all of his clientele and sold them not only the war hammers and swords they’re searching for, but the guns he’s always refused to sell. Then, if he’s nice, I’ll sell him whatever his heart desires at a two hundred percent markup. “I’m going to destroy him,” I tell my happy little factory down below. That’s not fair, I shouldn’t get all the credit. “We are going to destroy him.” I’m going to bury his company so deep no one will even remember its name. It’s a shame that a few good workers there will have to go down with the ship, so to speak, but so be it. They saw what he did to me, his most loyal employee, all because I wanted to push his obnoxious side piece out of the office. Some, like Carnette, who had the nerve to glare at me as I was escorted out by security. Of all the people there, I would have thought that she would understand. She’s never tolerated fools with her hawk-like eyes and scissor-sharp wit. Most insultingly, after that glare, she had the audacity to look at me with, with pity. How dare she? Leia was everything she wasn’t—incapable, foolish, and completely over her head. I’m not sure what made Carnette take to her so much. At first, I’d thought it was just an act, that she was just pretending to like her because her boss did. But it was completely, unapologetically genuine. Ugh. It’s enough to make me want to hurl, and a far cry from when we first