Lady of the Eternal City Read Online Free PDF Page B

seclusion.” He paused, and Sabina’s pulse leaped.
He suspects, dear gods, he knows . . .
    Hadrian spoke. “Were you dallying with a lover?”
    Sabina couldn’t help it; she burst out laughing. Slightly hysterical laughter, but Hadrian didn’t seem to hear that. He just lifted his eyebrows.
    “I assure you,” Sabina managed to say at last, with utter truthfulness, “I was not dallying with any lover.” Very,
very
far from it.
    “Then what?”
    “I don’t like Rome, Hadrian, and I don’t like the former Empress either. Why is it such a mystery that I wished to avoid both?”
    His lips twitched, and he began to walk again. “That is, perhaps, fair.”
    Sabina breathed a little easier, moving along at his side. She’d always been an excellent liar, but Hadrian’s ear for deceit was honed like a hunting dog’s nose for blood. She had absolutely no desire to test his instincts in any lengthy discussion about what she
had
been doing the previous year. “As you wish.”
    “What I wish, now that I am returned to Rome, is that you confine yourself to your new duties as Empress. Do not seek to advise me, manage me, or embarrass me. In the past you’ve shown a tendency for all three. I have been indulgent.” His voice was calm. “No more.”
    “I see.” She spoke steadily. “Wear purple and be silent, is that it?”
    “Be chaste, as well. You may have had a lover or two in the past—”
    “Come, Hadrian. I’m no harlot, and I never was.” Outrage pricked Sabina’s throat as though she’d swallowed a thorn.
A handful of discreet and fully acknowledged dalliances outside a marriage we both knew from the beginning would have no passion in it; just a handful compared to your endless parade of bedmates, and now
I
am the bed-hopping whore?
    “You have been both discreet and moderate in your bedmates,” Hadrian allowed. Generous of him. “But now you are an emperor’s wife, and discretion is not enough. You are a symbol of Rome’s virtue. I was willing to turn a blind eye in the past, but an emperor cannot be made a fool of. Do I make myself plain?”
    No use asking if Hadrian meant to give up his own bedmates: the strapping young slaves and handsome soldiers with whom he stocked his bed. “You make yourself very plain indeed, husband.”
    He looked annoyed at her coolness. “A touch of gratitude would be appreciated. After all, at least I do not require heirs of you. I know how we would both dislike that prospect.”
    “Quite.” It
was
something to be grateful for. They had not shared a bed in years—Sabina had known from the beginning of their courtship that Hadrian preferred male flesh, and it had not troubled her in the slightest. Hadrian had his men and she had her liberty; it had left them free to be friends instead. But they were no longer friends; she no longer had her liberty—and he still had his men.
    The words burned her tongue, but she forced them out. “Thank you, Caesar.”
    He dropped her hand, summoning his dogs, his aides, and his guards with a snap of his fingers. “Return to your chambers. I meet with the Arvals next, and your presence is not requested.”
    Old Empress Plotina heard that as she approached, and she looked smug. “Dear Publius,” she began, but he strode past her without a glance, calling for his secretaries.
    “I don’t think it matters anymore who is Empress or former Empress, Plotina,” Sabina said. “Dear Publius means to do it all without interference from either of us.”
    Plotina sniffed as she stalked out after her protégé, but Sabina did not think Hadrian would be hanging on her advice as he had when her patronage had been worth something. The words of a curse rang through Sabina’s mind, and she could see the letters stark and black as she carved them:
May the Empress die alone, neglected, bitter, and without power.
    But I am the Empress too
, Sabina thought with a wrench of her stomach.
And I am just as alone, just as neglected, just as