Caroline Storer - The Roman’s Revenge

This was the second time Flavius had meddled in her life, had effectively sold her to the highest bidder. The first time had been nearly four years ago when Livia had just turned sixteen. Flavius had been instrumental in persuading their father that a marriage between her, and the elderly Senator Faustus Grattus Galvus, would increase their father’s standing in the Senate. Livia, being a woman with no worth apart from her body, had had no choice, no matter how much she had protested at the time, and within a week she had found herself married to a man old enough to be her grandfather.

She shuddered, blocking out that period of her life which had made her so unhappy. And now, it was as if history were repeating itself, but instead of being a young girl of sixteen, she was a widow of twenty, on her way to marry another rich and powerful man for no other reason than to increase the political standing of the Drusii in the cutthroat arena of the Senate. Flavius, having reached the age of twenty-eight had recently been appointed quaestor , and was doing everything in his power to work his way up to gaining a place in the Senate, knowing full well that competition for the coveted seats was fierce. If it meant marrying his sister off to the highest bidder then so be it…

Naïvely, she had thought that her second marriage could have been a love match, someone she could have chosen rather than the men of her family, but that had been a foolish dream; a dream which would never have been allowed to happen as she well knew now.

She shook her head. She didn’t want to think about what lay ahead. Opening her eyes, she spent a few more minutes staring sightlessly ahead, until she risked turning to where the man had been watching her. Thankfully, he had gone, and the breath she hadn’t even realised she had been holding, hissed out of her lungs in relief.

The stranger had unsettled her. Not because he had seen her slap Magia. It had been the only way she could stop the older woman from becoming so hysterical, that she was fast becoming a danger to herself. No, it had been the mocking expression in his grey eyes as he watched her, judged her, and found her wanting, that had grated on her already stretched nerves. Maybe, if he knew what she had endured today, he might not have judged her so badly.

But if she were also honest with herself, he had also unsettled her in the only way a man could. Never in all her twenty years had one man made such an impact on her in such a short space of time, and she wondered who he was.

Slave? No, not a slave, for a slave wouldn’t have been so bold as to approach her; and a slave definitely wouldn’t have looked at her with desire in his eyes as he had done…and he wouldn’t have looked at her as if he’d wanted to devour her.

No definitely not a slave. She didn’t even think he was liberti either. Again a freedman wouldn’t have been as bold as he’d been, she was sure of that. That only left merchant or sailor. She favoured sailor, as his threadbare tunic and powerful body were evidence of a life of hard work, whereas merchants tended to be rich older men, content to let others do the hard work.

Livia shivered as she remembered the few brief moments their eyes had met, and the words he’d spoken to her. His voice had been a low husky rasp which had sent tremors of desire through her. She had never felt such an attraction to a man before. It had been visceral and instantaneous and she had been acutely aware of the height and power of his body.

And although he was big, he carried muscle rather than excess flesh, and he carried it well.

Very well indeed. She could see the many hours spent working on the ship had honed his body to the peak of physical perfection, if the width of his shoulders were anything to go by. His skin was a deep golden bronze, testimony to his work outside. His hair, a deep dark brown, almost black like a raven’s wing, had lifted with the breeze which blew in off the sea, and Livia had wanted nothing more than to run her fingers through it and feel the strength of him as she pulled him into her arms…

She had to acknowledge he was one of the most physically perfect specimens of manhood she’d ever seen. He even rivalled the gladiators she had seen perform in Rome’s arenas.

Mesmerised by his physical beauty, her eyes had been drawn to the one thing that marred his perfection – a scar which ran across his left cheek up into the hairline of his dark brown hair. But even the scar didn’t detract from the handsomeness of his face, rather it added to it, giving him a hardened, tough look which made her heart beat faster. Temptation had clawed at her, a powerful urge, that made her want to step forward and reach out her hand to stroke the hard planes of his face, to feel the strength of his body for herself.

But she hadn’t of course. Dutiful daughters, and half-sisters, of one of Rome’s most powerful families didn’t do rebellious things like that. To do so would be to ruin her, and her family’s reputations. And the reputation, and standing of the Drusii amongst Rome’s elite, was the one thing which had been drummed into Livia from the moment she had been born.

So she shook her fanciful thoughts away. Thinking about handsome men, and how their bodies would feel against hers as they kissed her, was the thinking of young, foolish girls. And Livia was anything but foolish. Livia was practical, and dutiful, which was why she was on-board this ship, and on her way to marry someone she detested.

But for a moment she could dream couldn’t she?

The door to her cabin flew open with such a loud crash as it slammed against the wooden wall, it caused Livia to jump in shock. Trembling with fear, she lowered her hands; hands which had been clamped over her ears in the vain hope of drowning out the noise of the storm that had been raging for hours now, and the even more pitiful screams of the slaves trapped in the galley below.

She was about to get up from where she had sat huddled on her bunk to close the door, when eyes widened, and her breath hitched in something approaching fear, as she met the shadowed silhouette of the mocking stranger she had seen on her first day on board the ship three days ago.

Only this time, there was no trace of mockery on his partially shadowed face as he stood there.

Water streamed down his face, and his wet hair was plastered to his skull. His jaw was clenched so tightly, Livia could see a nerve pulsing there. His muscular chest rose and fell with exertion, the force of the storm raging outside obviously so fierce, he’d used every ounce of his strength to make his way to her cabin.

Once again Livia’s impression of him was of raw hard power, all broad shoulders and bulging biceps. His soaking wet tunic clung and moulded every muscle and sinew of his massive body, and she could even see the delineations of the slabs of hard muscle of his stomach through the thin material. Instantly she became aware of his potent masculinity.

As he stood silhouetted in the doorway of her cabin, filling the space with his height and breadth, Livia stared at him, unable to break eye contact, as if she were some small forest animal awaiting its fate at the hands of a much larger beast. She stiffened when he stepped into the cabin, his bulk shrinking the space with the full force of his presence.

Finally, she was able to see his eyes for the first time as he stepped in from the relative darkness behind him, and Livia couldn’t stop the tremor that shook her when she met his piercing gaze. A gaze, she noticed, which bored into hers with no emotion whatsoever evident in their grey depths.

His face was an inscrutable mask, and she realised with a jolt, he seemed to be fighting his own internal battle, as if he were somehow questioning his own reasoning as to why he was here in her cabin.