Page 42

A s afternoon set in on the second day of the ransom deadline, Felix allowed himself to abandon any scrap of hope he’d been clinging to.

The sun dipped closer to the horizon with each passing moment.

The pirates grew restless. They didn’t relish sitting at anchor for this long, doing nothing, and in his moments on deck he overheard some low conversations in which they debated leaving early.

If Felix had maintained any hope of the money arriving, he would have interjected that organizing a sum of money as large as fifteen talents took time.

A guard would have to be hired, and it would have to be transported in separate carts if going by land or separate boats if by sea, due to the weight of the metal.

But he knew there would be no money. His time as a free man was running out, the last drops of water slipping through the water clock.

Now, in his spot in the bow hold, he heard raised voices from the deck, and an increased pattern of footfalls sounded on the wood over his head.

It was difficult to tell the hour down here in the dark, but he bet that either sunset had arrived, or the pirates had given up and decided to leave early.

Footsteps thumped on the ladder that led below deck. A moment later, Felix squinted as one of the pirates entered the hold with a flickering lantern. Felix braced himself, expecting to be thrown into the aft hold with the rest of the captives.

The pirate hauled Felix to his feet and dragged him into the small corridor that separated the bow and aft holds. But instead of thrusting him into the aft hold, the pirate shoved him up the ladder.

“What’s going on?” Felix asked in Greek as he climbed, his weakened muscles protesting the effort.

Maybe they weren’t moving him into the other hold.

Perhaps this was the moment the pirates decided to exact retribution for wasting their time.

Maybe their frustration had outweighed their greed and they were about to slit his throat.

He imagined his blood spilling out onto the deck, his lifeless body splashing into the water, quickly sinking beneath the waves.

A shiver of dread ran through him, and he stumbled on the ladder before catching himself, his hands shaking where they gripped the wooden rungs.

He drew in a deep breath—perhaps one of his last—and forced himself to be calm.

There was honor in facing death with equanimity, like the defeated generals who chose to fall on their swords rather than be slaughtered or captured by an enemy.

If the only remaining thing in his control was giving himself an honorable death, he’d do it.

“Your money is here. Finally,” the pirate growled as he followed Felix up the ladder.

“What?” The pooling dread ignited into shock. Felix climbed faster, emerging onto the deck to squint in the light of a brilliant sunset.

It was impossible. Perhaps Siro hoped to convince the pirates to accept a smaller ransom, but Felix knew that wouldn’t end well.

Felix hurried to the rail, and what he saw on the water below made his heart stop for a moment.

Two small boats bobbed on the waves, each riding low in the water, laden with crate after crate.

Siro was in one of the boats, nearest the ship.

And in the boat further back…there was a woman.

A palla covered her head, but the wind caught it, tugging it back.

Golden rays of light shone on auburn hair. Felix’s breath stuttered in his throat as a fresh surge of shock flooded his body. Lucretia. She was here? And how—?

Eyes moving with frantic speed, he counted the crates. Enough to make up fifteen talents of silver. How? How did they manage it?

Siro waved to him. “Good afternoon, sir,” he called, sounding for all the world as if he was greeting Felix on any other day. “Are you all right?”

“Fine,” Felix replied. “Is it—is it all there?”

Siro patted the crate closest to him. “Fifteen talents, as requested.”

“But—how?”

Siro glanced back at Lucretia, who had risen to her feet despite the swaying boat. “I’m not entirely sure myself, sir.”

As soon as Lucretia saw Felix’s pale face appear over the rail of the pirate ship, she shot to her feet. The boat lurched beneath her.

“Sit down!” barked the boat’s pilot, who had sailed them the distance from Ostia to this hidden cove.

Lucretia ignored him, focusing only on Felix.

This whole time, she had known intellectually what happened to him. He’d been kidnapped by pirates, which was a risk for those who traveled by sea.

But now, seeing him aboard the pirate ship, a bolt of visceral understanding shot through her in a dizzying rush. He’d been taken captive, held on this ship in probably very uncomfortable accommodations, in danger every moment of being sold into slavery.

And that was what he had saved Marcus from. In the brief moment he had to act, he’d thought first of Marcus’s safety and lost his own chance at escape.

Her heart splintered as she fully realized what he had sacrificed.

Then, their eyes met, and her heart knitted back together. A smile grew on her face, despite the circumstances.

He gave her a searching frown, his eyes skimming from her to the crates of silver. Likely he was trying to figure out how they managed to raise the entire sum. That would have to be a story for later.

While she’d been gawking at him, Siro, in the other boat, was busily negotiating with the pirates, arranging for half of the silver to be hauled aboard before Felix’s release.

The pirate crew set up a system of ropes and pulleys which lowered down a wooden platform, onto which they could secure a crate.

It seemed to take forever for the first seven crates of silver to be hauled up.

Lucretia couldn’t see much from down here, but it appeared the pirates were opening each crate as it arrived to verify that the contents were all silver before sending the platform back down to retrieve the next crate—just in case Siro had tried to adulterate the silver with something else.

Finally, Siro’s boat had been emptied of its half of the ransom.

A rope ladder swung down over the side of the ship.

Lucretia held her breath as Felix climbed down, one rung at a time.

He seemed to be uninjured, which was better than she might have hoped, but no doubt he was exhausted from the ordeal.

She let out her breath as Felix’s feet touched the deck of Siro’s boat. He released the ladder and turned to greet Siro, speaking words she couldn’t hear and clasping his secretary’s arms with a weary smile.

Siro’s boat rowed away from the pirate vessel, and Lucretia’s progressed forward, preparing to deliver the second half of the ransom.

Felix said something to the pilot of the other boat, who maneuvered so their boat pulled up alongside Lucretia’s, a handsbreadth of space between them. With surprising agility, Felix hopped over the gap into her boat.

His arms were around her before she could even take a breath. “Felix,” she gasped, hardly able to believe this was real. After what happened between them, she never would have imagined that she’d be here, hugging him as if her life depended on it.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered in her ear, his voice rough and unsteady.

“For what?” She drew back to look at him, verifying her earlier assessment that he was overall uninjured, despite the deep shadows beneath his eyes.

“Firstly, because I fear I smell terrible.”

She laughed. He did, but she didn’t care. “Your staff will have a bath waiting upon our return.”

“Praise Vesta.” He lifted his eyes skyward with a smile.

Their boat had reached the side of the pirate ship, and the process of unloading and hauling up the crates of silver recommenced. To stay out of the way, Lucretia led Felix to the aft of the boat, where they could sit on a narrow bench.

Instead of sitting beside her, Felix dropped to his knees in front of her.

“I must also apologize for how I schemed against you.” He clasped her hands.

“My greatest fear on that ship was that I would never get the chance to tell you how wrong I was, or to ask for your forgiveness. I don’t deserve it, but I want you to know how deeply I regret betraying you. ”

She stroked the back of one of his hands. “It has been pointed out to me that you didn’t actually go through with your plan against me . You thought better of it on your own, didn’t you?”

“I should never have investigated your guardian. Not after our truce.”

“No,” she agreed. “But you also risked everything—your life, your freedom—for Marcus’s sake. He told me what you did. You saved him and ruined your own chance of escape.”

“I was hardly thinking at the time. It was not a fully considered decision.”

“That’s my point,” she said. “When presented with an instant to make a life or death decision, your gut instinct was to sacrifice yourself to save my son. If that’s not worthy of forgiveness, then I don’t know what is.”

He blinked up at her, his gray eyes wide and disbelieving. “Do you mean…”

She pulled him up to sit beside her. “I forgive you, Felix,” she whispered.

The words felt as much like a blessing for herself as for him.

They eased the knot of tension wound tight inside her and filled her with a warm sense that finally, the broken pieces of her world were shifting back into place.

She drew him into another embrace, gentler than their previous frantic one. His arms skimmed over her back, a hand coming up to cradle her head reverently, as if she was the most precious thing in the world.

“Thank you,” he whispered. Then he pulled back, as if a sudden thought had seized him. “Lucretia, how did you get this much money? I know Siro wouldn’t have been able to retrieve it from the temple bank.”

Her heart squeezed as she realized he must have believed his rescue would be stymied by their inability to access his fortune. How hopeless he must have been, waiting powerlessly for the deadline to expire and his fate to be sealed.

“I obtained a loan,” she replied. “Publius Calpurnius Lentulus was good enough to understand the circumstances and come to my aid. Though there will be substantial interest, I fear.”

“He loaned you eight talents of silver? I can’t believe anyone would undertake such a risk, interest or no.”

Lucretia hesitated. Should she reveal how far she had been prepared to go to see him freed? Or should she brush it off as an act of kindness on Lentulus’s part?

Tell him , she decided. He deserved to know how much he meant to her. “I did offer significant collateral.”

“Your house?” he demanded. “You risked your home—on me?”

She shook her head. “The house belongs to Marcus. I put up my ships.”

He stared at her, utter incredulity stark on every plane of his face. “Why, by the furthest reaches of Dis, would you risk such a thing?”

She smiled tremulously. “Because I love you.”

“You love me,” he repeated, as if he didn’t understand the words.

“Despite my better judgment, I fear.” Her smile grew. Warmth filled her, so strong it chased away the chill of the sea air, which grew cooler every moment after sunset. “I love you, Felix.”

His gray eyes searched her face, as if waiting for her to laugh and reveal it was all a prank. She gave him a few moments for the truth of her words to sink in.

“I love you too,” he finally whispered, and pressed his lips to her forehead.