Heart of the Gladiator (Affairs of the Arena Book 1) (16 page)

The flesh of his forearm was thick and warm. When she placed her hand there, she felt an electric tingle slide up through her entire body. “Of course I’m not blaming you. But...you know. No one exists in a vacuum. When these things start, it’s always with some slight, some tiny insult that we barely notice. And they get built and built over time.”

“You know about this, do you?”

“I practice medicine in a ludus full of men with nothing to do but learn how to fight. Before that, I practiced medicine in a garrison full of bored legionaries. I know a thing or two about sick people occupying their minds with petty hates.”

“There is nothing.” He closed his eyes and thought. “There is...” His face scrawled, mouths moving to opposite corners.

“What?”

“It
couldn’t
be that.”

Could it? There was no way. That was years ago, and such a tiny moment besides. He didn't think it possible to hold on to something so small for so long.

“I think that means it must be. Tell me.”

The wrap of her hands around his drove him forward.

“The night before my last fight, she came to my bed and offered me wine. I don’t think she knew I was to be freed the next day. It had been all arranged by Rufus, my freedom, but he and I kept it a secret. Word of these things can’t reach a crowd, you understand, otherwise it takes away the surprise. Anyway, I turned her down. I explained how I had a family, all of that. She made the threat of telling lies about her and I, and I said for her to go ahead. That only seemed to turn her on—she's a devious sort—and she said she would see me another time. I didn’t contradict her. Then I forgot about all of it. Raising a child pushes that sort of thing aside.”

Caius wished that Aeliana's face did not look so amused.

“So you scorned her and you lied to her. And you left her with three years to stew about it.” Aeliana laughed. “Oh, but
no
, Caius, I’m sure there’s nothing she could be angry about.”

“Why should she be angry? I should be angry. She didn’t know I was leaving, but she knew I was married.”

Her hands began to slide up and down his arm almost of their own accord. “I was just teasing. You have every right to be angry. And she is a cruel one, I agree.”

Everything about Aeliana felt right and good. Her touch was the first good thing he'd felt in what felt like days.

Caius pulled her into him, sudden and sure. “I don’t want to talk about another woman anymore,” he said. “I want to think of you and you only.”

His good arm was strong enough to pull her directly into his lap. At first, she was hesitant. His forehead pressed against hers. He could taste her breath, all warmth and mint. Her weight felt right in his grip.

Slowly, their lips pushed together, each not daring to break the moment of this heated want.

And then finally, they met. The taste of her tongue was sweet against his own. He pushed his hands down across the length of her spine, fingers pressing firmly on the muscles. She moaned as his touch relieved the tension underneath; her own hands wrapped against the thick cords of his neck. They eased against the thickness there, soft and sure, finding the points of tension.

All the time being so close to her body—those lips, those endless gray eyes—had kept his heart beating fast. Now he felt it threatened to explode. She made him feel strong, limitless, even with only one arm holding her tight.

Her lips cascaded down across his chin, neck, and chest. But with his mouth free of hers, Caius still needed to taste yet more of her. His teeth slipped over her shoulder, biting gently. She let out a surprised, but pleased, gasp.

“Caius,” she moaned. “Caius, I need...”

Thighs straddled across his. Her heat slid across his skin. The hardness between his own legs was already ready for her, and at that sweet, intimate feeling, he needed more. It couldn’t end with just kissing this time.

They did not think anything about the column nearby. The heat created between them was too urgent. It was impossible to imagine anything but one another.

With her hands wrapped around his neck, her position was steady. His hand slipped up against her thighs, pushing past her robes and immediately finding the pulsing mound of her sex. The response was immediate. She gasped, vibrating and clenching against him.

“C-Caius!”

“There is not another woman on this earth,” he said, “that needs to occupy my mind but you.”

Her initial shock faded slowly, and Caius did not wish to jolt or goad her. His fingers remained steady on the spot of her pleasure, administering steady pressure as he looked into her eyes. The shock and pleasure faded, replaced by cool, womanly lust. It was as beautiful as he had ever seen her. They both knew, in that moment, this was going to go as far as they wanted.

Rustling in the bushes broke the perfection of the moment. They rearranged themselves quickly, trying to hide. It was the guard from before, looking a bit embarrassed.

“The column is moving again,” he said.

They simply sat, still somewhat trapped in another’s embrace.

“You two...” he smiled. “You do whatever you like in the future. I’m a discreet fellow. And a fan.” He nodded at Caius. “But you may want to be more careful about it.”

––––––––

T
hough Porcia traveled with Otho to Capua, Roman propriety demanded that she actually enter the party some few minutes after him. There were already suspicions of their affair floating around in the high circles of Roman society. The only oblivious one, really, seemed to be her husband. Were she to actually enter a grand party at the same time as Otho, arm in arm, there would be an enormous scandal.

The gossip in her felt shivers of excitement when she imagined such things. But it was that same gossip that knew she would take far worse a hit than Otho. Women did not have much in the way of protection in Rome, and even less when they were flagrant about enjoying themselves. Even the old cuckolded Emperor Claudius had to get rid of his wife after she dragged his name through the mud one too many times.

She wore an appropriately expensive stola wrapped with a striking red tunic. A flash of blue was embroidered upon one shoulder, as close as she could get to matching the stripes of purple on Otho’s toga. Anything actually purple was just too damned expensive; the only reason only the Imperial family wore it was because they were the only ones who could actually afford it.

The party was hosted by the Governor of Puteoli, who held the property in Capua where they were now. It was not uncommon for men of high social rankings, particularly those put in charge of entire cities, to own dwellings in multiple places. From the state of this house in Capua, it must have had a staff on hand every day of the year to keep it so clean and the gardens so well-maintained.

The house itself was modestly sized and extravagantly furnished. In one corner of the atrium where the guests all gathered, great plates of figs surrounded veritable mountains of crab meat and freshly butchered beef, all freshly seasoned with the finest spices from the eastern half of the Empire. Slaves dressed in nearly sheer fabrics floated from one part of the crowd to another, carrying golden trays with wine and tiny desserts.

Porcia made niceties with the first few people she met—an old friend from her time in Neapolis who had married
clearly
beneath her station; a former consul’s wife; the son of a slave who somehow had become the man in charge of the legionaries stationed in Capua—but all the while her head was on a swivel, looking for Otho.

Something about the man set her body on fire. She could not help the way he made her feel. All that she could do, really, was hope that somehow she encouraged similar feelings in him as well. If she were to divorce Rufus and marry Otho—one of the richest young men in the Empire, and the nephew of the man ruling Rome—it would be an enormous step up for her.

And, naturally, for her son Marius. Porcia didn't have much interest in motherhood in the traditional sense. But, if she were to raise the adopted son of the nephew of the Emperor...her pulse quickened at the thought. Emperors had been made from less legitimate places in the hierarchy.

She found Otho arguing with Buteo, the rival lanista to her own ludus in Puteoli. She raised an eyebrow, enjoying how sweaty and desperate he seemed.

“Really, Senator, I must protest. You cannot have a match between
beast
and
man
in the primus of the games honoring the Emperor. It is unseemly.”

Otho set his goblet down on the tray of a nearby slave. “You would speak to me of what best honors the Emperor, lanista?”

The games in celebration of Emperor Severus would last for months. Tomorrow’s celebration at Capua was the first show in a long series around the Italian peninsula, with another in Puteoli in six weeks time. No doubt Buteo hoped to elevate his own men in the games and bring down those of House Varinius.

“I...” Buteo gulped. “I only mean to say that my fighter—my best fighter, who fights as Hector—he would be the man you want in the primus. Why, a match between him and Orion, the retarius of House Varinius, would be—”

“Enough.” Otho grabbed another, fuller cup of wine from another tray. “I have heard enough.”

Hope struck Buteo. “And so you’ll do it?”

“Of course not. I arranged that primus myself. I want to see it. Civilization versus nature. It seems a fitting spectacle to honor my uncle. I shall hear no more of the otherwise.”

This was a warning, whether Buteo knew it or not. Porcia once had seen Otho beat a slave for pestering him once too often about the way a broach sat on his toga. Such beatings were not uncommon in Rome; slaves were simply property. But Otho had certain...extremes of character. She tried to believe they enhanced his other virtues—especially in the bedroom.

“Yes, Senator, I agree that the match you have in mind would be a spectacle. But must we relegate it to the
primus
? It is not proper to—”

Otho snapped his fingers. Guards snapped at his heels instantly, and Otho set them upon Buteo.

As they dragged him off and out of the party, Otho said loudly, “Keep your mouth shut, Buteo, and I’ll consider letting you stay in the games in Puteoli. But your services are no longer required in Capua. I’ll send a man ‘round to collect your fees.”

Buteo barely had time to protest before being tossed through the front door.

It took all of Porcia’s self-control not to wrap herself around Otho at that very moment. Such displays of his enormous power excited her dearly.

But again, she could not risk the ire of Roman society—and Otho’s wrath in turn—were she to do anything more than smile. She approached him with a full cup of wine to replace the one he downed as Buteo left. Otho could drink as well as any man and better than most.

“A horrible man,” said Porcia. “You are well to put him in his place.”

“I agree.”

The voice came from a large, severely round man who had been collecting a plate of meats and fruit from the table behind Otho. The Governor of Puteoli, Gaius Numerius Trio. Porcia had only met him a handful of times. He dealt often with Rufus, arranging many games with him, but Porcia often excused herself from his company. He was, to her mind, disgusting to look at. Though she was hardly a stoic, she still found obesity in others something akin to an affront to the senses. That Trio seemed to revel in his large bodyweight made him all the worse to be around. As he spoke, he popped little mounds of crab meat into his over-sized mouth.

“Yes, yes,” said Trio, “a disagreeable sort altogether. I do believe he’s called on my house more than fifteen times in the last month, trying to get me to leverage you in his favor, Senator.”

Otho shared Porcia’s sentiments about the overweight, and so of Trio as well. In fact, Otho rather despised anyone with a deformity. He’d had a dwarf as a slave for about a month, doing his honest best to torture the unfortunate creature with demeaning duties and harsh discipline. When the dwarf disappeared from his house one day, Porcia knew better than to question Otho about it.

“It’s too bad you could not dissuade him from speaking to me directly.” Otho swirled his wine. “As satisfying as that might have been, just now.”

“I’m afraid, perhaps, that my frequent refusals likely sparked him speaking to you directly. You are given a great many honors of late when it comes to the games, Senator. I must assume you have become somewhat accustomed to such attentions.”

Otho sniffed and sipped his wine. “Perhaps. I think people often think too much of themselves in my presence, so as to bear the burden of asking me for whatever niggling favors worm into their heads.”

Porcia opened her mouth and closed it. Otho appeared a little drunk to be as honest as that. How many glasses of wine had he downed before she arrived?

The governor leaned in, popping in another morsel. “And you were not worried, Senator, about those high in the strata calling it overkill?”

“What’s that?”

“Well, you are to be editor at these games in Capua and then in my city of Puteoli. Another man might have been satisfied with one or the other.”

“I am not as other men, Governor. And I do not believe in overkill.”

“So I have heard. You do like to order for death in the arena, do you not? Woe to the fighter who fails under your editorship. I wonder what might happen if the crowd began to turn against you?”

“The crowd loves blood as much as I.” Otho wagged a finger. “You are trying to make me feel guilty, yes? For being editor. I know you petitioned for the position yourself.”

Trio shrugged. “All men of high position petitioned for that position, Senator.”

“Yes, but you
run
the city of Puteoli. And you labored for months to ensure that there were games there in the first place. You did all the arrangements as if you had already secured the position. Why, I barely had to do any work at all. One could say I simply swept in and enjoyed the fruits of your labor.”

“Rome finds glory in the labors of many men, Senator.” Trio spread his hands. “So long as the populace is entertained, what need be there for jealousy?”