Page 14

F elix’s arm throbbed as he returned home after the incident with Lucretia. His steward’s eyes widened when he beheld the wound, but Felix waved off his help. He wanted to be alone.

In his bedroom, he shed his bloodied tunic and dabbed a wet cloth against the wound, wincing. He was lucky her aim hadn’t been better. Even her small knife could have seriously wounded or killed him if it struck the wrong spot.

The image of her, fierce and vengeful, stuck in his mind as he cleaned his arm.

There had been a moment where he actually feared she was going to slit his throat.

He could still picture the fury in her eyes, the hardness of her jaw as she questioned him.

If his answers had been anything less than satisfactory, he had no doubt she would have killed him for harming her son.

He had known from the start it was wrong to see Marcus without his mother’s knowledge.

But he had done it anyway, his sympathy for Marcus outweighing his better judgment.

This was what happened when one was guided by emotions, not logic—the result was a near-death experience in an alley and a bloodied arm.

He should never have come between Lucretia and her son, not that he meant any harm. Their business feud could continue, but Marcus should never have been part of it.

And poor Marcus: Felix regretted disclosing the truth of his bullying to Lucretia.

It was clear the boy hadn’t wanted his mother to know, but telling the whole truth had seemed like the only way to stop Lucretia from dismembering him.

He wanted to apologize to Marcus, to explain himself, but he knew Lucretia would have his balls if he made any attempt to communicate with the boy.

But perhaps an apology was still in order, if not to Marcus directly.

Felix summoned someone to help bind his arm, as he couldn’t tie a bandage one-handed. Then, he found a blank wax tablet and a stylus. Ignoring the throbbing in his arm, he wrote:

Lucius Avitus Felix to Lucretia of the Cornelii: I wish to reiterate that I truly meant no harm, though I recognize it was wrong of me to have any interaction with your son without your knowledge. Please accept my apologies. Marcus is lucky to have you as a mother.

He read over the note. He felt as if there should be more to say, but those few lines seemed to be all that was appropriate.

He couldn’t, after all, tell her how magnificent she’d looked, eyes blazing fierce as Minerva, as she threatened him.

Couldn’t admit how his pulse had raced as she pressed her knife to his throat, both with fear and an unwilling excitement at her proximity.

He found himself wondering if the wound would scar, if he would forever be marked by her.

If it did, if he was, he didn’t think he would mind.

He snapped the wax tablet shut. Gods, he was pathetic. Lusting over a woman who despised him. He needed to get ahold of himself.

When Lucretia returned home after casting her curse, she went straight to Marcus’s bedroom and tapped on the door.

“Go away.” Her son’s voice, low and curt, sounded through the door.

“Could we please talk? I know what happened earlier—”

“I don’t want to talk,” he snapped, bitterness edging his voice.

Lucretia flinched. In all of their arguments, he had never sounded so hostile. She debated pushing the issue, forcing him to face her, but relented. Perhaps it was better to give him some space.

“Very well,” she replied. “I’ll have your dinner brought to your room.”

She paid a visit to the kitchen, asking for Marcus’s dinner to be delivered to his room and hers to her study, then spent the rest of the evening alone.

In the morning, a letter from Felix arrived. She read over the short missive. She hadn’t expected an apology, and her eyes lingered on the neatly inscribed sentences. Despite wanting to believe the worst of Felix, his words did seem genuine.

Marcus is lucky to have you as a mother . She didn’t need reassurance from Felix, but his words partially quieted the thorny, uncertain part of her that feared she was making mistakes.

Now that she had some distance from the events of yesterday, she questioned if she had overreacted. The image of the blood staining Felix’s arm was vivid in her mind. Never before had she caused someone physical harm, and much as she told herself he deserved it, her conscience prickled.

But Felix wasn’t her concern—Marcus was. She still couldn’t believe he had gone behind her back like that. Yesterday’s anger had cooled, leaving melancholy in its wake.

Her heart ached for him. If Cornelius was still here, would Marcus have gone to him? Maybe Marcus thought that she, as a woman, couldn’t understand.

And maybe he was right. Lucretia, after all, had never dealt with the sort of violence boys inflicted upon each other.

To her, the simplest solution was to speak to their parents and see the perpetrators disciplined.

But yesterday Felix had said that would only make things worse, and he seemed to know from experience.

Clearly, Marcus had been seeking help and guidance she couldn’t provide. So she had to figure out a way to give that to him that did not involve interaction with her greatest rival.

When Marcus returned home from school, Lucretia was waiting in the atrium, so he couldn’t avoid seeing her. He stopped short, a surly set to his jaw.

Lucretia cleared her throat and held out a plate of walnut-stuffed dates—Marcus’s favorite. “I want to apologize,” she said without preamble. “I fear yesterday got out of hand.”

His eyes flicked up to hers in surprise. She realized he must have expected her to scold him, not apologize. He approached and took the offering of food.

“I will look into a boxing teacher for you,” Lucretia continued. “A real professional. Would you like that?”

Marcus surveyed her for a moment, then gave a slow nod. She expected him to retreat to his room, but he paused. “He’s not so bad, you know,” he said, then turned down the hallway toward his room, popping one of the dates into his mouth.

Not so bad was practically a ringing endorsement from Marcus. But then again, Marcus didn’t know how Felix was systematically working to undermine her business operations. And her business was Marcus’s legacy. If Felix succeeded in dismantling it, Marcus would lose his rightful inheritance.

Her mind returned to that confrontation in the alley.

The Felix who only cared about himself would have immediately offered up the knowledge about Marcus being bullied.

But yesterday, he’d hesitated, only revealing it after multiple threats.

He’d done his best to preserve Marcus’s confidence, until he had no choice.

Could she have been wrong in her initial assumption that Felix had only helped Marcus in the hopes of gaining something he could use against her? It seemed difficult to believe of someone like Felix—cold, avaricious, money-minded above all else.

But maybe, there was a small, kind part of himself he kept carefully hidden behind his aloof facade.

A part that would help a struggling boy for nothing in return, that would spend what had to be hours over the course of weeks teaching him how to box so he could defend himself.

Maybe she had been slightly, marginally wrong about Felix.

Just a tiny bit.