Grumpy Orc Protector

I volunteered to become the enemy's captive.

I did not expect my grumpy guard to become the one man I could not leave behind.

Mila has always wanted a place among the leaders shaping humanity's future on Tajss. When Lady General Rosalind asks for women willing to infiltrate the Urr'ki city and search for a path to peace, Mila steps forward.

The mission sounds simple. Pose as a lost human. Allow herself to be captured. Study the enemy from inside their home. Find something that can stop the Zmaj from launching a war that could wipe out an entire species.

Then Samhaja breaks another warrior's nose for touching her.

Samhaja is a powerful Urr'ki Kapatan with no patience for reckless Star Women, endless questions, or feelings he cannot control. He gives Mila his home to keep her out of the Shaman's prison, feeds her, guards her, and orders her to stay out of trouble.

Mila does not take orders well.

Forced together inside a city ruled by fear, they clash over everything. She calls him an arrogant ass. He locks the door for her own protection. She escapes through a window. He carries her home before the Shaman's priests can find her.

But beneath the growls, arguments, and impossible attraction, Mila discovers a different man. Samhaja is honorable, gentle when it matters, fiercely loyal to his missing Queen, and horrified by what the Shaman has turned his people into.

When Mila witnesses a ritual sacrifice and sees citizens dragged away for questioning their rulers, her mission becomes terrifyingly real. The Maulavi are watching Samhaja's home. The human captives are being separated. Anyone who challenges the Shaman disappears.

Trusting each other could get them both killed.

Then Samhaja learns Mila came to his city as a spy after he has already given her his body, his protection, and the most sacred parts of his heart.

Mila must convince him that her deception was meant to save his people, not destroy them. Samhaja must decide whether duty means obeying the rulers who control his city or fighting for the Queen, the woman he loves, and a future he had stopped believing could exist.

Their love gives them something more dangerous than desire.

Hope.

With the Queen's fate unknown and whispers of a hidden resistance spreading through the city, Mila and Samhaja must choose whether to hide their bond or risk everything to save both their peoples from the Shaman and the war racing toward them.

Grumpy Orc Protector is a steamy alien orc romance featuring a fake captive heroine, a gruff protective warrior, grumpy/sunshine chemistry, forced proximity, sharp banter, one house, an undercover peace mission, cultural conflict, hidden rebellion, protective devotion, found family, and a committed happily-for-now while the Red Planet Dragons of Tajss saga continues.