“Then I’ll prepare to leave tomorrow,” I decided. Arranging my life to please myself instead of others was one thing, but there was no point in being foolhardy. One of my shutters had come loose in the night’s breeze; I rose from the cushioned wall bench and crossed the room to close it. Capodimonte was unseasonably warm considering it was November, but the nights were winter cold again. I hoped the French froze in their camp.

“I’m glad you’ve seen sense, Giulia.” My mother-in-law smiled. “I’ve already spoken with your sister downstairs; she’s planning to leave tomorrow as well. We’ll accompany her at first light, and strike out for Rome. Back and forth across the papal states at my age; goodness, but I feel like a message case sometimes—”

“Not to Rome.” I turned and faced my husband and my mother-in-law. “Orsino was just inviting to take me to Carbognano.”

“Was he?” Adriana looked at her son, who stood gazing at me with eyes suddenly alight. “Dear boy,” she clucked. “You know that will never happen.”

“Why not?” I challenged. “Even the Pope cannot excommunicate a man for taking back his lawful wife—”

“Excommunicate?” Orsino stammered.

“He’s always threatening to excommunicate me.” I brushed that aside. “It’s not important.”

“Some people would think it important,” Adriana murmured.

“Stay out of this!” I felt anger rising in my throat, all the hot words I’d ever choked back at my mother-in-law, at my husband, at my family—at the whole lot of them who had connived to put me in the Pope’s bed. Rodrigo’s motive for wanting me there had at least been passion, straightforward as the sunlight. What was their excuse? Even if I had enjoyed my time in Rodrigo’s bed, it did not excuse their greed.

Adriana ignored me, looking at her son. “I do hope you haven’t bedded her during this unwise little visit, Orsino. The Holy Father took it very hard before—it was all I could do to keep him from taking Carbognano and Bassanello away from you in punishment. You aren’t supposed to lay a finger on her; that’s the arrangement, and you know it.”

Orsino blushed. “I—that is, she’s my wife, there’s no wrong done if we—” He broke off, red as a sunset. “What I mean to say—”

“Oh good.” She patted her son’s arm. “You didn’t.”