Centurion's Honor (Imperial Desires, Book One) (12 page)

He turned to leave, but Titus’ words stilled him in the doorway.

“I hope you know what you’re doing. I hope you know that if you do this, she will never let you inside her heart again after you so cruelly walked out.”

Chapter Nine

A week had passed since the fire in her orchard and there appeared no sign that another attack was forthcoming which brought a welcome relief to Anan. Cassius’ unit, strategically stationed throughout her grounds, probably had much to do with that, she thought begrudgingly. Although she did not wish to think of him—
the brute
.
Nor did she wish to begrudge him a thing.

Out of some misplaced sense of duty he stayed out of her bed, Titus as well. Though she knew Titus could not touch her without Cassius’ permission, which Titus had only confirmed when they’d spoken briefly. He did not agree with Cassius, not in the least, but that still did not change that he did not touch her any more than Cassius did. It was maddening. It was frustrating. The absence of their touch made her body crave and her heart ache. That they did not touch her, though their gazes revealed openly that they desperately wished to, only made her longing for them worse.

When Cassius gazed upon her, flames licked her skin and her belly coiled with heat. His gaze was that intense, that provocative. Titus was no better. It had the same effect—his eyes made her burn. And at night she was haunted by the smell of them, which still lingered in her bed, the touch of them that she only experienced in her dreams.

It was maddeningly frustrating. It was torture.

That was why she’d stolen away to visit the market that day. She’d needed a reprieve, a moment alone. She was rarely left alone these days, with one or both of them watching her constantly, guarding her as if the person who’d attacked Titus returned to do her harm.

She was certain she was safe. Titus had probably only been attacked out of desperation because the intruder did not want to be caught. She doubted he would come after her, and she’d said as much, but Cassius had been adamant. That Titus had agreed with her was what raised her suspicions—there was something they were not telling her. Something they knew that made them believe she was truly in serious danger.

Anan appreciated their concern, but she’d lived with danger many times before. Through struggles for power, through war, and now these raids. She did not need a personal guard, and now that she had one she felt as if she were suffocating, the feeling was worse because it was Cassius and Titus who guarded her, and she could feel their desire for her just as much as she could feel her own.

That was why she’d slipped from her home at noon when it was busiest and headed to the market. She’d only meant to be gone for an hour so that none would notice her absence. But then she’d run into Claudius and she’d let time slip by her.

By the time she made her way home, the sun was just beginning to wane. As she approached, she experienced a sense of foreboding. Cassius and Titus stood in the archway of her home, their faces twisted in mirror images of anger.

“Your young lovers do not appear happy to see you at all.”

She glared at Claudius. “I thank you for escorting me home. That was kind of you, but wholly unnecessary, but now that you have seen me safely I encourage you to take your leave now. You do not wish to see this.”

“Ah, but I do.”

“Claudius,” she snapped, the warning heavy in her voice.

Claudius’ only response was a soft chuckle as he turned his mount around and rode off, but not before she glimpsed a decidedly wicked twinkle in his eyes. He was amused at her expense. Her eyes shot daggers at his back until he disappeared.

If Anan had been walking, she would have dragged her feet. Such as it was, she slowed her horse to a gentle canter, taking as long as she could to make her way to the entryway of her villa. But eventually she did and was forced to come face-to-face with two very furious men as she slipped from her horse and watched helplessly as her servant took it back to the stables.

How in that moment she longed to be that horse.

“A word with you, Anan,” Cassius said, and she did not mistake the tightness in his voice.

“Can it not wait? I am exceptionally tired and…” Her voice trailed off when two pairs of eyes, one crystal blue, the other sparkling green, slammed into her, stealing her breath.

Before she could form the words to protest, Cassius lightly grasped her elbow and escorted her through the vestibules of her home, with Titus on the other side of her, until she stood outside her private chambers.

With a curt nod, she dismissed Olivia for the evening and Titus shut the door behind the wide-eyed girl scurrying off.

As soon as the door closed behind Olivia, Cassius spun her around to face him.

“What were you thinking sneaking off like that?” he thundered. “It was a foolish thing you did, and all for what? To make us jealous. You put yourself in danger to spark our envy? That is foolish of you, Anan. Reckless, foolish and childish.”

She bristled at the insult but held her ground. “For once this was not about your needs, or about Titus’. This was about mine,” she shouted and Cassius reared back as if she’d struck him.

“I have always seen to your needs. I have always seen to your pleasure. Do not deny that you spent many hours coming all over my cock, drenching me with your heat. You had no cause to visit with Claudius.”

His expression was pained and she shook her head, realizing he’d mistaken her words. “I did not mean my physical needs,” she sighed. “I went to the market because I simply needed a moment to myself. I ran into Claudius while there and he insisted upon escorting me home. That is all.”

“That is not all. I would like to know what needs we have not seen to.”

She turned away because she could not bear to look at him, to stare into his eyes that were now gentle as he spoke in a soft voice full of tenderness. “It does not matter.”

“Anan—”

She spun around when he sought to press her as he closed the distance between them. She pushed against his chest, pushing him away.

“Do not stand there and pretend as if you care, when we all know you do not—”

“Of course I care,” he fumed.

“That is a lie, for if you cared you would not have left my bed with no thought of what it would do to me.” She speared his chest with her finger. “You must do your duty, Titus must do his, but do not pretend as if this has anything to do with me, with what I need.”

He grasped her fingers in his hand. “Why did you leave today?”

“Because I needed to be alone. Because I needed to be away from you.” She looked at Titus. “The both of you.” She did not relish the pain that clouded his emerald eyes, but it was the truth.

“Why did you need to be alone today?” Titus asked, intuitively listening to what she did not say.

“It is difficult being in your constant presence, enduring the desire that still beats between us when neither of you will touch me. It is torture.”

“Is it enough to send you into the arms of another?” Cassius’ hand tightened around her fingers.

“Could you blame me if it was?”

“Yes,” he breathed out, heavier than normal, his other hand clutching her hip. “Yes I would. Before I would let you go to the arms of another, I would have you come to me, to us.”

She tore out of his arms, her heart breaking at the agony of doing so, her body screaming in protest, the loss of his strength, his warmth.

“What? And have you blame me for tempting you back into my bed, for once again being the cause of you failing to do your duty?”

She spun away from them, her body shaking, and she ignored them when they called her name. She pulled away when Cassius tried to touch her.

“I want no part of a man, of men, who would cast me aside because of their duty, who would put it first, above the woman they claim to care about. I want no part of a man who would not search for another way to be with me, who would so easily accept defeat, so easily give me up at the first sign of danger, or hardship, or whatever other obstacles that relationships between men and women encounter.” She faced them then, but she did not see them, not really.

All she saw was an empty bed that had been cold without them, that had been cold before them. She did not wish to go back to that again and she hated that their rejection had forced her to face a pain she’d thought long buried, a pain she’d not felt since she’d walked in on her husband bedding her slave in his bed and experienced the shame and humiliation of finally realizing why he never visited hers.

“I want no part of a man who is too much of a coward to simply admit he does not want me, and would lie to my face to spare me rather than tell me the truth.”

A cold, heartbreaking silence stretched between them and it was a long time before she realized the words she’d spoken had been for her husband, and not for them.

She turned her back so they would not glimpse the humiliation reddening her cheeks, or the moisture that swam in her eyes.

“We are not your husband,” Titus finally said, his voice soft.

“I know, but you hurt me just the same. And I will not beg for what I should never have to.”

With her back still facing both men, she undressed before them, something she’d done so many times before that she did not realize she’d even done it, nor did she feel shame.

It was only when she turned to slip into bed that she realized they had removed their tunics and stood naked before her, watching her as if waiting for something, some unspoken permission they both should have known they did not need to have—not to enter her bed.

“You do not have to beg,” Cassius said, closing the distance that separated them to pull her into his arms.

“You will never have to beg,” Titus whispered from behind her, against her ear. “Not for what you should not have to, not for what has always been yours.”

They fell into bed then, a tangle of arms and legs as their bodies joined together, becoming one, so that nothing stood between them, so that nothing separated them.

Somehow she found herself flat on her back beneath Cassius’ hard, powerful body with her legs spread and Titus’ hands clutching her thighs as he pressed against Cassius’ back.

It was as wondrous as it was erotic. Cassius against her, Titus against him, with Titus holding her thighs splayed wide and open.

Titus powered into Cassius on a long, deep groan. Cassius gasped and the motion sent him plowing inside her. She cried out as she clutched his shoulders, her back arching. And he palmed her breasts, lifting them so that he could feast upon her nipples, sucking the dark berry flesh into his mouth.

And that is how they made love, long into the night. With Titus plowing his rod into Cassius, with Cassius pummeling her channel with his cock. Their bodies came together in unison, in harmony, as they each gave pleasure, as they each took it until they were shuddering in release. Until their moans blended as one, as they found climax in each other’s arms.

* * * * *

And in each other’s arms was where Olivia found them the next morning just before dawn.

The young girl shook her awake, but when she moved, she roused Cassius and Titus with her.

“Yes, Olivia, what is it this early in the morning?”

“It is a message.” Olivia looked to Cassius and Titus. “For the
Decurio
and his second.”

“From whom?” demanded Cassius.

“I was only told it is from your legion commander. His messenger awaits in the atrium.”

Both men transformed right before her eyes, their bodies now rigid as they slipped out of bed. She quickly dismissed Olivia before the girl fainted right there at her feet and stood to pull her tunic over her body.

“What is it?” she asked when they were alone once again.

“I imagine we have been summoned,” Cassius said, donning his armor.

“By your legion commander? What for?”

“That is what we shall soon find out,” Titus said with a wink.

Pulling on a nearby
stola
,
she followed after them to greet the young soldier whose message was as Cassius had suspected.

The both of them, Cassius and Titus, had been summoned to meet with the legion commander, but that was all the messenger would say. They departed immediately, leaving one of the soldiers in their unit the task of guarding her until they returned at dusk.

Before they left, Titus assured her they were not in trouble, that no ill would befall them, and that they would return, but such was Titus’ way. That Cassius remained silent, his eyes conveying what his lips would not, even as they still did not ease her mind, was more telling than any word Titus had spoken.

Cassius did not know why they’d been summoned, nor would he make a promise he could not keep.

As such, she stood in the archway until they disappeared from sight atop their horses. Olivia had woken her so early that, with the house quiet once again, Anan was reminded that most were still asleep.

Actually all were still asleep save her, Olivia and the young guard Leviticus who would have the dubious task of her personal guard throughout the day.

The first order of business was sleep and she returned to bed and ordered Olivia to do the same, while poor Leviticus was forced to stand guard outside her door, in a home that still slept soundly.