Jail Bait Read Free

‘Kamar,’ he growled, ‘could you spare a word in the office?’ Anything to break free of this witch’s spell. Clicking his fingers, he summoned a lackey to take the young lady’s trunk and unpack but as he strode off, he heard his visitor tell the servant that he’d better feed Drusilla while he was about it.
    ‘Would that be your maid, madam?’
    ‘She has a preference for sardines and cooked chicken, unless—’ over his shoulder, Pylades saw Claudia delve into her trunk and retrieve a crisp parchment fan ‘—you happen to have a mouse handy?’
    As the feeling of faintness engulfed Pylades, he thought that at least now he had genuine grounds on which to consult his physician.
    *
    Quite what a Greek architect had been doing on a remote Etruscan promontory in the first place no one had bothered to ask, but his discovery of the spring combined with his perspicacity to develop the site had made Pylades a very rich man, you could tell from the gold clinging to his fingers and hanging round his neck. Even his fawn tunic, a masterstroke in understated elegance, had not escaped the soft breath of Midas. Claudia studied the retreating back of her host. Greek, of course, could mean anything—blond Adonises to strapping gladiator types, snooty Athenians to the proud Andros islanders—but unless she missed her guess, Pylades, with his swarthy skin and stocky frame, hailed from shepherd stock.
    And as for that beanpole strutting at his side, either Kamar had no use for the likes of tonic waters, manicures and mudbaths or the remedies weren’t working. With lips that turned perpetually inwards, he seemed as devoid of humour as he was of hair—in fact, he reminded Claudia of a tortoise with a particularly spiteful attack of the piles.
    Still. At least, Kamar hadn’t tried to make a pass at her—unlike that dirty-minded little toad, Pylades. Who the hell did he think he was dealing with? Some little bit of fluff playing second fiddle to a man who wants the best of both worlds while she has the worst of one?
    ‘I am no man’s mistress,’ she informed the gurgling watercourse as she strode across the footbridge. Claudia Seferius is master of her own damned destiny, thank you.
    She began to hum a jaunty marching song. It wasn’t strictly true, of course, what she had told Pylades about her attendants following on. In situations such as this, a girl couldn’t be too careful and it was best she brought no servants, not even her bodyguard, and even more advisable she left no forwarding address. When the heat over the Tullus incident died down, she’d slip home, but until then? Until then, no one knew where to find her. Unless one counts the sender of the letter…
    Whilst for the slaves there was no such luxury as siesta (sweatroom furnaces still need stoking, mud heated, towels aired), the silence in the banqueting hall was unnerving, broken only by the crackle of frankincense resin which burned in the wall-mounted braziers and the slap of Claudia’s soft leather sandals on the mosaic. With her eyes ranging over the gilded rafters and the statuary set in niches along the length of both walls, the voice made the hum catch in her throat.
    ‘I don’t advise the sun porch.’ The voice belonged to a young man sprawled across one of the couches. ‘It faces south and is far too hot this time of day. You’ll be burned lobster red within minutes.’
    ‘Will I really?’
    ‘The name’s Cal.’ He leapt off the seat and, to Claudia’s astonishment, performed a backward flip which ended in an elaborate bow. ‘Short for Calvus, and since you’re a new girl in school and this resort is vast, you’ll need to be shown a few ropes.’
    ‘Not by you.’ He was young. Maybe twenty. Which made him a full five years younger than herself.
    ‘I feel you—’
    ‘You’ll feel nothing,’ she said, sweeping past. ‘Better men than you have tried today.’
    Man? Even as it formed on her tongue, the word jarred. The quality of