Black Salamander (37 page)

You don’t double-cross the Gauls and not pay the price! Galba and his co-conspirators would be dead already. By their own hand, if they had any sense, because the alternative didn’t bear thinking about.

What Claudia didn’t understand, however, was why Orbilio should choose this method. Augustus would continue at the helm without being any the wiser, it wouldn’t advance his career one single step…

Of course! She snapped her fingers and in the hollow of the hills the sound was like a twig cracking.

‘The Emperor never gets to hear about it…but neither does your boss!’ She laughed.

Who’d never know, poor little creep, how close he came to having his career shot into orbit by his patrician employee. Because it would not have been Orbilio who came out with the credit, but his boss. She watched the flecks in his hair dance in the sunlight.

‘Marcus Cornelius, that is devious, sneaky and extremely underhanded.’

‘I knew you’d approve.’

‘The Spider?’ she asked. ‘Will you catch him?’

He exhaled loudly. ‘I don’t honestly know,’ he replied. ‘Whatever happens, it’s a farm of maggots we’re opening up. Alive, he’s a thorn in Rome’s side. Kill him, he becomes a martyr. Take him as a prisoner of war, you can never turn your back.’

‘There is one solution,’ Claudia said. ‘If you ever catch him.’ She told him about the wicker man. ‘Leave him alone with the burning man’s widow…’ The hatred on that woman’s face would haunt Claudia for the rest of her days. That, and the screams of her husband.

‘Too many innocent people have died for my liking,’ Marcus said, twisting the figure-of-eight ring as his mind’s eye pictured two small flame-haired children running in the garden of their new foster home. ‘I’m glad it’s over. But one thing bothers me still. Where
did
you hide that map?’

Claudia smiled to herself. Her very first action, on arriving in Vesontio, had been to hire a carpenter to make a new cage for Drusilla. A good, solid piece of Roman craftsmanship. With the usual false bottom. Doesn’t every girl carry their secrets that way?

‘Map?’ she asked, fluttering her eyelashes. ‘What map might that be?’

Laughing loudly, Marcus rose to his feet and offered
her his arm. ‘Going my way, milady?’

Claudia glanced up the precipitous sides of the bowl, then back to the tall patrician standing at her side.

‘Definitely,’ she quipped back. ‘After all, the only way is up, am I right?’

Because, when all’s said and done, there’s a lot to be said for a hero.

About the Author

Marilyn Todd was born in Harrow, England, but now lives with her husband on a French hilltop, surrounded by chateaux, woodlands and vines. As well as sixteen historical thrillers, Marilyn also writes short stories, which are mostly crime-based. When she isn't killing people, Marilyn enjoys cooking. Which is pretty much the same thing.

www.marilyntodd.com

I, Claudia

Claudia Seferius has successfully inveigled her way into marriage with a wealthy Roman wine merchant. But when her secret gambling debts spiral, she hits on another resourceful way to make money—offering her ‘personal services’ to high—ranking citizens.

Unfortunately her clients are now turning up dead—the victims of a sadistic serial killer…

When Marcus Cornelius Orbilio, the handsome investigating officer, starts digging deep for clues, Claudia realizes she must track down the murderer herself—before her husband discovers what she’s been up to

And before another man meets his grisly end…

Virgin Territory

It just wasn’t fair. When you marry a man for his money, you expect him to leave you a shining pile of gold pieces.
Not
a crummy old wine business. How was the new young widow Claudia going to pay off her gambling debts now?

So when Eugenius Collatinus asks Claudia to chaperone his granddaughter to Sicily she jumps at the chance to escape Rome. It should be easy—Sabina Collatinus, she is told, has recently completed thirty years’ service as a Vestal Virgin.

Or has she…?

Claudia’s suspects she is escorting an imposter. And then a woman’s brutalized body is discovered

Man Eater

On the eve of the Roman Festivities, the last thing you’d expect Claudia Seferius to be doing is heading in the other direction. However, even beautiful young widows have to put business before pleasure when their vineyards are threatened.

Unfortunately, being run off the road to Etruria by a band of hooligans was not part of Claudia’s gameplan. Nor was seeking shelter in the strange home of Sergius Pictor and family—surrounded by the menagerie of wild animals he is training for the Games.

But Claudia is about to become the victim of an even crueller game. For that night a stranger appears at her bedroom door—a knife sticking out of his belly.

And before the first ray of morning sunshine, Claudia is being framed for murder…

Wolf Whistle

Had it not been for the pack of dogs nipping at her heels, Claudia Seferius would never have ventured into the mean backstreets of Rome. And thus would never have found the abandoned little boy called Jovi…

With the Empire in crisis, it certainly wasn’t a safe time for either a rich young widow or a weeping child to be out after dark, for five slave girls have been brutally murdered by a killer who strikes only on Market Day.

The victims are linked by the dragon tattoo they each wear on their arms—and which marks them out as the ‘Children of Arbil. But Arbil is no loving father—as Claudia is about to find out…

For the upcoming
Dream Boat

When Claudia’s stepdaughter goes missing, she rightly assumes it’s another attention-seeking prank. But when the hoax has her bodyguard facing execution, it’s anything but funny. In an effort to prove his innocence, Claudia tracks the girl to a commune in the hills. And soon discovers that, far from being some cozy little retreat where spoiled brats can play at being grown-ups, this is a dangerous religious cult, where one man believes in taking ultimate control. Through death.