The household gods were inside it. Made of silver and bronze, they were heavy. She’d need something substantial to lay a man out cold, but any of those statuettes could do that, given her strength and training as a gladiatrix. She knew where to strike to kill.
She eased across the room, her bare feet twitching against the cold, smooth stone. The cupboard creaked open. It sounded loud, but so did her own heartbeat.
She had little time to choose and so was relieved when her hand closed around an idol of the perfect size and weight. She grabbed it and retreated soundlessly to a protected area behind the door to await the intruder.
As if summoned by her thoughts alone, the door to her bedroom pushed open and a man materialised, tall and muscular and garbed in a dark cloak.
He didn’t see her. His attention was focused on the bed. In another moment, he’d move closer to it and realise that no one lay there. She hefted her weapon and rushed forwards to crush his skull.
The man caught movement from the corner of his eye, gave a shout and threw up one hand. Severina realised who the attacker was the moment the bronze statuette in her hand fell forwards.
She couldn’t alter gravity, but she managed to twist, jerking her hand backwards enough to avoid killing Lucan. Or at least, she hoped she had.
He dropped hard and fast, blood spurting from the gash on his head. Her gorge rose in Severina’s throat at the thought of what she’d done.
‘Gods, be merciful,’ she prayed. She looked down at the idol she held, feeling strangely betrayed. She tossed it to the bed with a shudder, then hurried to light a lamp with shaking hands. She knelt beside Lucan, biting her lip as she tested the rapidly swelling lump on his skull. She bent and put her ear to his face. He was breathing.
‘What were you doing, sneaking into my bedroom like this?’ she murmured. ‘And you smell like wine! Are you drunk?’
The prone figure didn’t respond. She jumped up and ran out, across the atrium and up a stairway to the small room Ariadne shared with the cook.
By the time she and Ariadne returned with cool compresses, Lucan was beginning to stir and to groan.
She ran to him in utter relief. ‘Oh, Lucan. Oh, Lucan.’ She kept saying the words, making little sense and not caring that she didn’t.
‘Severina,’ he breathed. ‘You hit me?’
‘I thought you were an intruder.’
He made a sound somewhere between a laugh and a groan. ‘Just help me to a bed, will you? My head hurts like hell.’
Ariadne caught Severina’s hand. ‘He mustn’t go to sleep. I’m no physician, but I know that much. A head injury like this…he shouldn’t sleep.’
‘Don’t go to sleep, Lucan,’ Severina said. She helped him move to the bed.
He fell heavily on to the mattress. ‘Only if you’ll stay and talk to me.’ His lids half-lowered, his gaze slid to the slave. ‘None will accuse me of compromising your virtue, will they?’
‘Of course not,’ Ariadne said, tucking a pillow beneath his head. She didn’t seem to question Lucan’s presence in the room in the first place.
‘Then stay, Severina. Please.’
Severina nodded, suddenly aware that she stood barefoot in her thin nightclothes in a dimly lit room, with Lucan’s long body in the bed a few short feet away.
Ariadne placed the compress on Lucan’s brow. He winced at the slight pressure.
‘Don’t get up for a while,’ Ariadne ordered. ‘Don’t exert yourself, but don’t go to sleep, either. I’ll be back shortly with something for the pain.’
Lucan muttered assent. Severina stood rooted in place, suddenly unsure as Ariadne departed. Lucan lay against her pillows with his eyes closed, the wet compress plastered against his hair. He looked slightly pale, his hair damp, but otherwise he seemed strong and manly. Utterly attractive. She swallowed hard.
As if he sensed her indecision, he lifted a hand and beckoned her closer.
She stepped forwards. He opened his eyes. ‘I need to talk to you,’ he said. ‘That’s why I came. I couldn’t sleep and hoped maybe you’d still be awake.’
‘I was. That’s how I heard you. You’d be a terrible thief, you know that? You bumped around and made enough noise to wake the dead.’
Lucan’s low laughter warmed her. She realised suddenly how much she’d missed his wicked sense of humour.
‘I’d have been quieter if I’d known what lay in wait for me. God help me, I keep forgetting you were a gladiatrix. What did you hit me with, anyway?’
She picked up the bronze statuette and handed it to him. He studied it, fingering the distinctive diadem on the head of the idol, with its full sun hung between two tall horns of a cow.
‘Isis. I should’ve guessed. Protector of women. The irony does not escape me.’
His eyes found Severina’s again. ‘I didn’t know you worshipped the Egyptian goddess.’
‘I don’t. She was already in the house when I took—I mean, when you took—possession of it.’
‘This property is yours and you know it.’
‘But one slip like that in front of the wrong person and I’ll lose it for both of us, won’t I?’ Severina’s voice held a sharp edge.
Lucan struggled to sit up. ‘That’s what I came to talk to you about.’ He settled himself into a comfortable position higher against the pillows. ‘The hearing’s in three weeks, but I think we can do something in the meantime to strengthen our case.’
He smiled, and the smile reached all the way to his beautiful, fiery eyes. ‘Let’s get married.’
‘You can’t be serious.’
‘I’m completely serious. You need to save the inn. I need a wife before my father chooses one for me.’
‘But we’ve already…Lucan, we’ve been through this before.’
‘No. It’s not the same offer as before.’
Severina eyed him suspiciously. ‘It’s not?’
‘No. I’m not offering a true marriage. This would be in name only. A business relationship between you and me to solve both our problems.
‘A business relationship. No…?’
‘Business only, Severina. Without obligation to fulfil those embarrassingly intimate conjugal duties.’
Severina drew in a long breath.
‘Unless you want to,’ he added hopefully.
Severina snorted and crossed her arms. Lucan grinned at her. That grin made her stomach flutter.
Dear gods. She could hardly control her physical response to him. She certainly shouldn’t be considering marriage to him, even one made for convenience. But desperation did strange things to people, and she was desperate.
‘In name only. And only for a short time?’
‘Till divorce do us part.’
Severina’s frown deepened. She wanted to trust Lucan, but there was much to consider. And here alone with him in a dimly lit room, with his tall body stretched out in her bed, was hardly the time or place to consider all the implications.
‘I’ll give you your freedom the minute you ask for it,’ he said quietly. ‘When you want to leave, I’ll let go. But who can know the future? Maybe you’ll be happy with me. Maybe you’ll never ask to go. Maybe we’ll fall in love and make a dozen pretty little babies.’
Without thinking,