‘Saw that, did you? Right. This is your final warning! I’ve done my bit, it’s about bloody time you started doing yours, do you hear me?’
Orbilio reckoned every deity in existence probably heard her-and was undoubtedly quaking in their celestial shoes with it. ‘Have you considered the possibility they’ve already fled in terror?’ he asked mildly.
‘Better still! If Gaius’s ancestors were half as bad as the present lot, good riddance.’
‘Not ideal, then?’
She snorted. ‘His mother’s a viper in human form, his sister’s got feathers for brains and his daughter would try the patience of Poseidon.’
‘I hear she’s marrying Scaevola next month.’
‘Damn right.’ She sounded relieved.
‘Is he the one with the weak chin and gappy teeth?’
‘No, that’s Marcellus, the one whose hands cover more ground than a legion on the march.’
‘At least that’s a problem I don’t have to contend with,’ he replied. ‘In-laws, I mean, not your brother-in-law’s wandering hands.’
In many ways, he rather wished he did have an inlaw problem, because once the notion of remarrying had entered his head there seemed little he could do to dislodge it. Petronella had come round eventually, as he knew she would, but it wasn’t what you’d call a satisfactory encounter. Physically, maybe (although even then he felt it was a question of going through the motions), but spiritually these casual encounters were turning more and more into emotional suicide since Claudia Seferius had crashed into his life. Like it or not, she was part of him now. Day and night she walked beside him, he saw her face in every mental picture, heard her voice in every conversation. His stomach lurched at the memory of her the other night, hair tumbling over her breasts, the moonlight on her face. In a pretence of questioning the Thracian, he’d bent over her bed to drink in the smell of her. The crumpled pillows, the spicy perfume, the brush of fine linen against his hand…those memories would take a long, long time to fade. Assuming he ever allowed them to.
‘You’d been married, though?’
His pulse quickened. So she’d been interested enough to find out about him?
‘Long ago, yes. She ran off with a sea captain and the last I heard they were holed up in Lusitania with three plug-ugly kids and a herd of goats. Or maybe it was the other way around?’
Mother of Tarquin, he loved it when she smiled. Her eyes were the colour of beechnuts, her cheeks as soft as sealskin. Orbilio folded his arms across his chest to stop himself reaching out.
‘Hardly a love match, then?’
‘She was a flighty piece to start with, despite her patrician blood. Frankly, I was glad to see the back of her.’ He wondered why he was telling her this. More to the point, he wondered why she was listening. ‘But it was the old, old story. Her father, my father, a good marriage contract. Of course, it all blew up in their faces when she ran off.’
Everyone knew Roman law and the role of the father in the family, but suddenly it was important to tell her that his own father no longer had a say in what Orbilio did.
‘Her father demanded the dowry back, my father refused and so it went on. The case went to court, but unfortunately the strain was too much for the old man. He collapsed and died.’
Could he make it any plainer without shouting it out? My father’s death releases me from the burden of arranged marriages, Claudia. Do you hear what I’m saying?
‘Don’t let Flavia hear that story, it might give the little madam ideas. Her opinion of Gaius is extremely low at the moment.’
He paused. ‘And you?’
‘Scaevola is an excellent choice,’ she replied emphatically, leaving him with the feeling she’d deliberately misinterpreted him. ‘However’-there was a flash of emotion in her eyes that he couldn’t define-‘never let it be said I tried to influence the child in the matter of her marriage.’
The atmosphere had changed. A second ago it had been joky and relaxed, suddenly it was taut. He had the impression she was telling him something. Something important. But for the life of him he didn’t know what. Orbilio the star-crossed lover vanished, Orbilio the investigator was pricking his ears, alive to the slightest nuance. She was polishing a spot on the marble with the hem of her tunic.
‘How’s Gaius?’ he asked, forcing his eyes not to stare at her bare leg.
If she was surprised by the question she didn’t show it. Orbilio had not only helped to carry Seferius across to his own room, he’d sat up while the doctor made his examination.
‘Oh, you know my husband. The quack told him to take it easy, but Gaius went off anyway, swearing he wouldn’t miss the Wine Festival yesterday, not for all the mud on the Nile. Orbilio, my patience with you is running out. Could you please explain what you’re doing in my house?’
This second change in tempo threw him completely. He should have known, he thought, she was always doing this. Yet every time he found himself caught on the wrong damned foot.
‘I’m still your guest, remember?’
‘Uh-uh. You moved out.’
‘I what?’ He looked round wildly. ‘Claudia, you haven’t thrown my stuff into the street? Please tell me you haven’t thrown my stuff into the street!’
Four days had passed since Rufus had brought the news about Caldus, four days and nights in which Orbilio had been chasing his tail following every single lead. He’d eaten when he’d remembered, slept where he dropped, practically. His eyes were gritty, his limbs where leaden, in fact he was almost dead on his feet, but, by Jupiter, he was this close to solving this bloody murder! The last thing he wanted to hear, when it boiled down to it, was that his clean clothes had been trampled by oxen then stolen by beggars.
‘What did you expect? We’d heard neither hide nor hair of you for a week. This isn’t a common tavern, you know.’
‘It’s been two days, don’t exaggerate. And you missed me every single hour of them, admit it.’
He wanted to scoop her in his arms here and now. Whirl her round and round until they were dizzy. He wanted to pull the pins from her hair in that little pool of morning sunshine over there. Then he’d slide her rose pink tunic down-over her shoulders, her breasts, her hips. To a backdrop of splashing fountains he’d ease off her breast band, untie the tiny thong that hid her delicious feminine secrets and together they would dance under the open sky, laugh as they kissed, cry as they loved…
‘Don’t be absurd! I’ve got better things to do than moon after some little upstart masquerading as a relative.’
Dammit, Claudia, you don’t have to be so bloody brutal!
‘Oh, stop sulking, Orbilio! I haven’t thrown all your stuff out, just the oik. Seeing as you weren’t here to do it.’
Rufus? Oh shit, he knew there was something he’d forgotten! Even as he was dashing out on Tuesday night, he had a feeling there was something he’d forgotten to do. Well, he was buggered if he was going to apologize. She was being totally irrational about the kid, anyway. Irrational and unreasonable!
‘How did he take the eviction?’ Funnily enough, he’d grown used to the lad’s chirpy banter and his wily ways. He didn’t like to think of Rufus fending for himself again.
‘I believe he muttered something about it being my gaff, I could do what I liked in it and sodded off without another word. You could do worse than learn from him, Orbilio.’
He didn’t know quite which way to take that and decided the best course was to stay silent. Watching her yawn and stretch, thrusting out those splendid breasts, he found his mouth had gone dry. Absently he sipped the wine Claudia had poured for her husband’s ancestors.
‘By the way, the Thracian escaped,’ he said nonchalantly.
She flashed him a look. ‘Why?’
Mother of Tarquin, Claudia, you’re wonderful, you really are! Is it surprising no other woman matches up to you? I tell you Otho’s escaped, yet you don’t ask how. You don’t gasp or clap your hand over your mouth in horror. You don’t scream and say we must post a guard in case he comes back. You don’t panic and cry What shall I do? What shall I do? You ask why.