“Only a little,” she said evenly. “I will need time to find Julia. You will give us that time. Provide us somewhere to live—not here; the stink of your boy is too strong. And a little money.”

“I am not as rich as you may think I am, Regina.”

“And no doubt your tastes are expensive. Then give us work. Brica can serve in your shop, perhaps.” She ignored Brica’s bemused reaction; she would deal with her later. “My demands will be reasonable—only what I need. I’m sure we can work something out.”

“So that’s why you’ve trekked across Europe, with your doe-eyed daughter in tow. Extortion! How delicious. And if I refuse?”

She shrugged. “I am persistent and dogged. I will explore all facets of your character and your past with your patrons, and other equites, and your business contacts in your guilds. Oh, and your boy—was his name Sulla?”

“I have nothing to be ashamed of,” he flared. “This is not Britain. This is Rome. Things are done differently here.”

“Then,” she said mildly, “no one will be disturbed when I tell them how you groomed me for your pleasure from the time of my menarche, and the way you used me on that night in Verulamium. I wonder now if that had something to do with your preference for boys. Perhaps on some level women disgust you, Amator? Perhaps you set out deliberately to hurt me? Oh, and of course I will tell them how you abandoned your obligations to your child all those years ago, and how you destroyed your father’s life with your theft—”

He leaned toward her, his depilated eyebrows flaring red. “You can’t harm me, little chicken.”

“Perhaps not. But it will be interesting to try.”

He held her gaze for long heartbeats. She kept still, refusing to show how her heart was hammering—for if he called her bluff she had no alternative plan.

But then he laughed. “I always did like you, Regina. You had a spark. It wasn’t just your boyish little body, you know.” He clapped his hands and ordered his perfumed boy to bring more wine.

Chapter 25

Chapter 25

Pina was no support.

“You got what you wanted, didn’t you? You wanted your contadino. You wanted something nobody else has.”

“No, I—”

“Now you’re different. Congratulations.”

Lucia thought she saw something in Pina’s face as she said this, just a flicker of remorse or pity. But Pina turned her back, just like the rest.

Nobody would speak to her. No, it was worse than that. Nobody would even look at her. It was as if waves of disapproval spread out from Rosa and Pina, eventually engulfing everybody Lucia knew.