Cornelia kept that look before her when she’d marched her brother into his study. “Gaius,” she’d said without preamble, before her courage could fail, “you should make preparations for a wedding feast early next week. I am going to marry Centurion Drusus Sempronius Densus, and it would be better to have the wedding soon, since I am going to have his child.”

Gaius’s mouth, which had just closed after hearing the word wedding , dropped open again.

“It’s not a grand match, but it is respectable,” Cornelia continued as serenely as she could, though her heart was thumping loud in her own ears. “Drusus’s family is solid equestrian class in Toscana. No, Gaius, don’t interrupt me. Drusus’s record as a Praetorian has been distinguished, and the treason charge laid against him by the Vitellians has been lifted. Gaius, I told you not to interrupt. Drusus will be calling on you this afternoon to discuss details.”

She’d been halfway across the tablinum before Gaius whimpered, “What am I going to tell Tullia?”

“Gaius.” Cornelia turned, giving her brother an exasperated look. “Tullia isn’t the paterfamilias of the Cornelii. You are. Act like it!”

That had been that. In a week’s time the family would see yet another wedding—but for once, not Lollia’s. Cornelia wriggled pleasurably under the masseuse’s fingers at the thought.

“What are all those old bags over there hissing about?” Diana padded naked into the steam of the caldarium, toweling her sweat-damp hair. “They’re nearly making the sign of the evil eye at us.”

“Oh, just our scandalous Cornelia,” Lollia said airily.

“I am not either scandalous.” Cornelia couldn’t help the defensive edge in her own voice. Not that she was ashamed of Drusus, or herself . . . but she’d never been an object of salacious gossip in her life. “It’s a perfectly respectable wedding.”

“Respectable?” Diana snorted, stretching her arms out so the bathhouse attendant could scrape the sweat off with a strigil. “You’re dropping a foal in six months.”

“Well, we thought we’d make our home outside Rome.” Cornelia propped chin on hand as the masseuse moved from her shoulders to her back. “Then no one will know how long we’ve been married . . .”