"I will not be long, Cameo. Watch Sozo for me. And feed that mule before it finds a way into my bread." Her hair tumbled from its restraint. Adia yanked the hairpin away. "Here. Take this. It is worthless to me."
Smiling, Cameo tucked the pin into her sun kissed tresses.
Adia turned away, marching a determined line toward the harbor. Her neighbors would be watching her. There was no doubt of that. They would want to see how she would react, what she would do. They would not be disappointed.
She saw the ship as she rounded the crest of a dune. It was Demetrius. Her heart raced at the sight of him standing, strong legs slightly astride, hands splayed at his waist, while he directed his men. The years and sun had deepened the bronze of his skin, a stark contrast to the short white tunic he wore. Hard work carved his muscles into lines so sharp they rivaled the finest statues.
A word was said to him. Demetrius turned, slowly, and his dark-eyed gaze caught sight of her. A smile spread over his face. He jumped from the ship and landed mere inches from the edge of the water.
Hold your position. Let him come to you.
He owed her that much. And in a few minutes he was going to realize he owed her a lot more.
With each stride forward, pleasure beamed all the more on his face. Had it been night, Adia was certain it could have been mistaken for a light beacon.
He quickened his pace, his arms opening to her.
"Adia, my love!"
With a hearty laugh, he seized her around the waist and then covered her mouth with his.
Adia melted in the embrace. Old emotions and feelings she thought long dead sprang to life. He danced his tongue with hers, and retook what he had left over two years before. Quivering with sensation, she clutched his shoulders. It was all too much. His hand drifted to cup her breast, and Adia recovered her senses. Bracing herself, she bit his tongue as hard as she could.
Demetrius yelped in pain. Before he could recover, she whipped first one palm and then the other against his cheek. For extra measure, she did it again.
"Woman, have you gone mad?"
In reply, she jammed her knee deep into his groin.
Demetrius doubled over in agony. On the ship his men fell over in gales of laughter. Satisfied, Adia pivoted on the toe of her wooden sandal and took the path home.
Nods of approval followed her along the way. So did someone else. It took Demetrius little time to recover, but his incapacity allowed her to keep ahead. She anticipated this. He would fail this time. He would know the shame she had borne all these years.
Adia caught a warning glance from one of the street vendors and picked up her pace. It was not necessary. As she neared the tiny rooms she shared with Cameo and Sozo, the child broke free of Cameo's hold and raced toward her.
"Mama. Love."
Adia scooped him into her arms and whirled around to face Demetrius. He was rooted in place right in the center of the market place-his jaw open to his chest. Things worked out better than she had planned.
"Yes, my sweet one. Love. Mama loves you. And, look, here is your Papa. Your Papa. Yes. Who planted his seed deep with sweet words and false promises then disappeared from the face of the world only to return when he felt the need to rut once more. Your Papa. Who swore undying love and devotion, yet never once bothered to share the news with his own kin. Look upon him, Sozo, and see what a true bastard is."
She left Demetrius standing among the snickers, and returned to the shade of her home before her quivering body could crumble. No tears. That would not do. By now someone would have drawn him aside-most probably Aurelius, whose aged eyes missed nothing. Aurelius would tell him all.
How she found herself with child a month after Demetrius departed to trade. How her father cast her aside. How his family refused help because her word was not good enough. How Aurelius offered her shelter until the babe was born. How the villagers scorned and snickered as they did him now. And how Adia came into her own, raised a child, scratched out a living and then took in her own sister when their parents died of fever.
Then he would rush to his family and demand answers. Their reply should not shock him. After all, he held the secret of the love he professed, if it had been love at all.
Once all sources had been checked, Demetrius would come back to her again if only to claim the child. Adia gave him two hours. He was back in one.
From the corner of her eye she saw him enter the courtyard with a large bag slung over his shoulder. Her pottery held more interest. When Adia did not look up, he dared a step forward. Cameo scuttled into the house.
Demetrius tossed the bag on the tile and fell to one knee. "Adia, my love."
A scathing gaze traveled down her nose to him.
He pressed his hand to his heart. "You are my love. You must never doubt that."
She punched down the side of her clay. "I have had plenty of opportunity to do exactly that. And for good reason. You have been gone for over two years and I have heard naught of you. Others have, but not I."
"I was trying to protect you-"
"Thank you. The humiliation was much more pleasant."
"Adia, please, if I had known-"
"If you had checked. Or if you had mentioned to someone, anyone...let me see, what were those words?" She cocked her head to one side as if trying to recall, although they would be embedded in her soul for all eternity. "Ah, yes...that my lips were sweeter than cherries. That my scent was more wonderful than a thousand flowers carried on a gentle sea breeze. That you loved to bury yourself in my rose petal softness."
His head dropped.
"But you said nothing. Imagine my dismay, my horror, my upset, when your family thought I was nothing more than an opportunist trying to take advantage of a hard working trader's absence. 'It could not be,' they said. 'Demetrius would have said something.'"
She balled the clay in her fist and slammed it to the pedestal. "But you said nothing. Nothing!"
Demetrius caught her shoulders before she could demolish the object further. Despite her rigidity, he forced her to look at him.
"The fault was mine, love. The shame is now mine and I will bear it fully. If I must, I will climb to the highest hill and proclaim my error to all. My goal was to protect you from gossip in my absence, not this."
Tears obscured her vision. Adia blinked them away. He would not sway her. But he had already seen her resolve falter and moved in.
"I love you, Adia. I will always love you. You were always in my thoughts. All I did was for you. I made a fortune for us, for you, for the family we would have...the son we already have." He waved his hand to the bag. "Gifts for you. More riches are on the ship. For you."
She swallowed the lump in her throat. "And I would give them all up if you had only stayed. If your pride had not been so great that you refused business with your father and brothers. I needed you, not riches. I needed you and you were gone."
"And now I am back and we are together. By the time the sun sets tomorrow we will be as man and wife." He drew her close.
Adia pushed him back. Not now. She must be strong.
With a sigh, he let her go and then pulled his bag toward them. Peering inside, he drew out a necklace of beads. All the colors of the rainbow danced before her eyes.
"For you, my love." He tied the strand around her neck.
Adia stared at the beads and fingered them gently. She was losing her battle. Tears choked her throat. The hand he placed on her knee seared her flesh. Much as she longed to punish him, to hurt him, she loved him too much to make him suffer for very long.
"And tell me, Demetrius," she turned her brown eyes up to his. "In these long years when you pined for me, did any other woman warm your bed?"
Guilt flooded his eyes. He stumbled for a response. "A...man has needs, love. It was over two years. They meant nothing to me."
A growl tore from her throat. With a shove of her foot, she sent him tumbling. "A woman has needs, too." She raced for the steps and took them two at a time
to the roof.
Demetrius caught her elbow and whirled her around. "And did you fulfill them?" His face was inches from hers.
Adia narrowed her gaze to match his. "Every night. Every man who came within my reach. Ask anyone. They will all tell you. That is what a whore is for, is she not? You should know."
He gave her a hard shake. "Lies."
She jerked free. "Yes, but nothing less than you deserve." Adia snapped the necklace free and dropped it into the cistern. "Leave. I have managed on my own all these years. I no longer need you, or your pity."
Demetrius took a step forward. For one brief moment, she thought he would take what he wanted from her, and in some part of her mind she longed for him to do so. Undressing her as he had done so many times in the past, his gaze traveled the circuit of her face, her body. He reached for her, snapped back, and trotted down the steps and onto the street.
Her knees crumbled, yet somehow Adia forced herself to move. By the time she reached the sanctuary of her room, tears blinded her. Falling to her narrow bed, she gave in to the agony of her heart.
It felt like hours that she lay there crying, and it may well have been. But her first awareness that time had passed was when Cameo nudged her shoulder.
"Cassia is here."
Adia jerked upright. Demetrius's mother had not spoken to her since the day she sought their help and was denied. She was the last person Adia wanted to see now.
"Tell her I cannot see her."
"I do not blame you," Cassia said from the doorway. She drifted into the room and sat on the stool near the bed. "Words cannot express the shame I feel over the way we behaved toward you."
Adia wiped her cheeks clear. "The fault was Demetrius's, not yours."
"Had he but spoke-"
"There is no need for explanation or apologies. It is in the past."
Cassia slipped her hand over Adia's. "But, child, there is the future to consider. Demetrius ruined the name of a good woman. A woman who loved him, who he loved. Amends must be made. Can you honestly say that you can live in this city with each other and not be drawn to one another again?"
When Adia let her head fall, Cassia patted her arm.
"I did not think so. It would not be love if you could do that. Have patience with him, my child. He is only a man, and they are not often known for their brilliance. Forgive him."
"He deserves to suffer."
She smiled. "He is suffering, as he deserves to. I said to have patience and to forgive. I did not say you had to do it soon. A little groveling will humble him, do him good, and make him easier to handle once you are wed."
Adia smiled through her tears. "Thank you."
Cassia dropped a kiss to her cheek. "Sleep well tonight. There will be a guardian at your door, for Demetrius is too foul-tempered to allow you to set foot from his sight."
Adia saw her out. Dusk was falling and with the night, clouds moved in. Thunder rumbled in the distance. With luck the roof would not leak this time.
She caught movement near the mule's trough and looked that way. Daring her to make him leave, Demetrius stared back at her. When she did not, he followed her into her rooms.
Adia jammed her palm into his chest. "All fowl sleep in the stable."
He caught her wrist and yanked it around to the small of her back. She felt him hot and hard against her belly. Her resolve crumbled as his lips pushed down upon hers.
Cameo cleared her throat. The sound pulled them apart.
Adia's cheeks flushed with warmth. "Demetrius, you must go. I can ill afford more gossip."
He stepped backward. "I missed you, Adia. My love for you never waned. I will have you again. You will be my wife before another sun sets on this city."
"Have I no choice?"
"Do you wish one?"
She slowly shook her head.
Demetrius smiled. "Good, because you do not have one."
He was nearly to the door when Adia called out his name. He glanced over his shoulder. "Yes?"
"I have missed you so."
"Tomorrow night you will be mine."
The lust in his eyes burned her and set her knees to wobbling. Left alone, it was all Adia could do to prepare the evening meal and put herself to bed.
* * *
Sleep was impossible. Adia and Demetrius were going to be together forevermore, his arms locked around her each night. Hugging herself with that thought, Adia watched the sunrise peek over the city.
Cameo's mule danced nervously in the courtyard. Seconds later the ground beneath Adia's feet rattled.
Cameo leaped from bed. Sozo cried and ran into his mother's arms.
"It's a small tremor," Adia said, clutching the child to her breast. "See to the mule."
Her sister collided with Demetrius on the way out.
"Are you and the child all right?"
Adia smiled. "We are now." Catching his hand in hers, she drew him to her bed. "It is still early. Come. Lie with us for a little while. I want to feel what it will be like after tonight."
Stretching out, Demetrius drew her against him. Sozo cuddled to her breast. Perfect. Love. Forevermore. Adia felt herself drift to sleep.
The earth beneath them trembled. Sozo screamed. She clutched him tighter. Demetrius draped his arm and leg over them both. There was a jolt. Debris showered upon them. The quake grew, shaking them like a dog would a rat.
The roof cracked. Demetrius drew them closer as if doing so could protect his loved ones from the heavy stone blocks.
They crashed upon them, crushing Demetrius and clipping Adia's neck. Sozo whimpered, then was gone.
Adia struggled for breath, struggled to move. Both were impossible. She could not even cry. At least they would be together in death. The last thing she heard as she slipped into darkness was the mule's hysteric braying in the courtyard.
* * *
"Quake!" the nurse shouted.
Alec and the team draped their bodies over Dani's. The tremble was mild, yet still unnerving. "God, I hate those things." Alec glanced down at his patient. Her eyes fluttered. "What the hell's going on here, Joe? She's coming out of it."
As if to confirm those words, Dani groaned.
"Damn it, get her back under right now."
"I don't understand what-"
"Just do it." He stretched the kinks in his back and longed to rub the growing ache in his head. Earthquakes always gave him a headache. The bigger the quake, the worse the ache. Hopefully he could finish here before it got too bad. Dani was depending on him, and he wouldn't let her down.
* * *
Chapter Three
Alec stripped off his gloves and slung them into the disposal container. He couldn't remember a time in recent history when he had been this furious at work. Joe Pinkus was the best anesthesiologist around. Mistakes didn't happen with him. Yet he was exactly who Alec blamed.
Hands braced on hips, Alec swung on the man. "Mind telling me what happened in there?"
Joe fanned out his hands. "I'll be damned if I know. She had enough to keep her knocked out until well after she reached the recovery room. The best I can figure is that the quake caused something screwy with the equipment."
"Then you'd better check it out. I don't want to see that happen again."
Joe clamped his lips tight. "I know my job, Alec."
"It sure didn't look like it in there." He jerked his thumb toward the double doors.
"You got a bitch, then file a report." He pushed by, clipping Alec's shoulder with his own.
Alec's fist curled of its own accord. Shocked at the violence in that act, he forced himself to relax. When he looked up, Kevin, arms crossed, was propped against the sink while he appraised the situation.
"What's the matter with you? In all the years I've known you, I've never seen you go off like that."
"I don't know. Something about having a patient wake up while I'm sewing her face has me a little rattled."
The reply oozed sarcasm, as well it should. Kevin wasn
't fooling anyone. If the situations were reversed he would have behaved in the same way, if not worse.
"No." Kevin shook his head. "You weren't right before you began. Something was bugging you then. And don't give me that line about her mistaking you for someone else. What gives? It's not like you to let your personal life get in the way of the job. Is it Andrea?"
Alec rubbed the ache at his temple. "You know better than that."
"Yeah, and I also know that she's not going to rest until she has her claws firmly in you. I've never seen a woman so determined."
"She can look somewhere else." Alec cracked his neck on one side then the other. "Her parents, too, for that matter. You know they actually had the nerve to set us up tonight for this dinner. Cruel as it sounds, the accident actually kept me from dealing with them." He sighed. "For a minute there I thought that car was going to nail me."
Kevin dropped his arms to his sides. "You were involved in the accident? You didn't tell me that."
"I came this close to being the victim." He measured a space between his thumb and forefinger. "The guy crashed into the car behind me."
A low whistle followed. "I can see where you would be a little shook up under the circumstances."
It was more than that, but how could Alec explain what he couldn't understand? He was alert, functioning. Nothing interfered with the surgery. Yet unease pervaded his senses. If he stopped long enough to dwell on it, his nerves danced on edge. While he worked on Dani Morgan, Alec chalked it up to the urgency of the situation. Now, he didn't know what to call it.
Kevin clapped him on the back. "Come on. I'll buy you a cup of coffee while we wait for her to come out of recovery."
They made it as far as the corridor when Andrea cut across their path. "Finally. How dare you stand me up!"
She was crisp perfection; Alec would give her that. A royal blue suit clung to her slender figure. Sequins along the collar fell deep into her cleavage. A slit up the side of her too tight skirt finished revealing what the short length teased at. She was on the hunt, and he was the prey. Not one bleached hair was out of place. How could it be with the can of hairspray holding it down? She kept it short, almost to the point of looking like a man. But if anyone doubted her sexual inclinations, one glance at her clothing chased it away.
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