Tangled Web (5 page)

“I can understand that.” The lines in his face smoothed out, and he returned to the map. “I think your suggestion has merit. After hearing each of my advisors tell me why I should build the aqueduct in his province, yours is the only one that wasn’t spurred by any political gain.”

“Perhaps it was based on personal gain.”

“What do you mean, Azurha?”

She trailed her fingers down his arm, admiring the warm cords of muscle along it. He was strong enough to put up a good fight if she didn’t succeed on her first attempt to prick him with the poisoned needles. She’d have to be prepared for that if she found enough courage to carry out her plan. “Perhaps I wish to gain your favor.”

“Why?”

The word came out as command rather than a question, but she hesitated all the same. She knew why she wanted to gain his favor, but if she admitted that, she would expose a weakness. In her business, her enemies would jump on any opportunity to take advantage of that. Even if she came clean and told him about Pontus’s plan, she’d still be arrested and executed for her role in it. Or worse, for all the assassinations she’d committed. She was the Rabbit, after all.

Words failed her. She lowered her lashes and looked away.

A knock at the door preceded the familiar click of the locks, ending their conversation for now. Azurha bit back a smile as Varro slowly opened the door and ushered a slave into the chambers. All she needed was a few more minutes, and her job would be complete.

She only wished she didn’t have to wait as long as she had to kill him. It would have been much easier to have done it before he kissed her, before he seemed to value her opinion. Before she’d let information about her past slip out.

The slave set a tray on the table and silently exited. Varro lingered in the doorway. “Will you require anything else, Emperor Sergius?”

Titus slid his bright blue eyes in her direction. “I don’t think so. I’ll send for you if I do.”

“Very well. Good evening.” Varro gave them a curt bow and disappeared from the room.

The door closed, and they were alone once again. Azurha reached for her comb. It was now or never.

Titus’s hand clasped her wrist, preventing her from pulling the instrument of death from her hair. “Why do you want to gain my favor?”

Her breath caught. She could easily free herself by ramming her elbow into his throat, then stabbing him before he recovered. Why was she holding back?

He wrapped his arm around her and pulled her to her feet. Their bodies melded so his cock pressed against her stomach. Had he grown tired of her teasing? Was he going to try and force himself on her? Adrenaline flowed through her muscles, tightening them. And yet, she couldn’t resist the way his eyes seemed to caress her face like she was the most fascinating creature he’d ever seen.

She wanted him so badly.

Never show a target how weak you are
.

She brushed her lips against his, forgetting every lesson that Cassius had taught her about how to be an assassin.

Titus loosened his grip on her, and his jaw fell lax in surprise. It took him a second to recover. He still held her close to him, burying his nose in her hair. “You still haven’t answered my question.”

“Yes, I did.” She angled his face down and stroked his cheek. “Should I make my desire more obvious?”

His pupils dilated, and he licked his lips like he wanted to devour her. “And what do you desire? My wealth? My crown?”

She shook her head. “Just for you to keep your word.”

“My word on what?”

“You promised last night…” She hesitated. Just mentioning it awakened the rush of strange emotions that tested both her resolve and her sanity. “You promised you would make me come.”

That was all the encouragement he needed. He led her to the cushions, settling her onto them like she was a delicate orchid. Then he knelt in front of her and drew her dress up to her waist with agonizing slowness. His mouth covered hers, seeking confirmation of her desire.

She gave him what he sought. Her tongue twisted around his, each stroke making her want to whimper. She hooked her leg around his waist and drew him closer. He tightened his grip on her thighs, slowly drawing them apart.

When Titus touched her, a warm glow flowed over her skin and clouded her mind. Instead of making her feel like a sullied possession there only to fill his needs, he seemed more interested in fulfilling hers. His light kisses trailed down her neck, across the tops of her breasts, then along the tops of her thighs.

For a few blissful moments, she was lost in a dream that this could become her life, to lie back on silk cushions while the most powerful man in the empire catered to her every desire.

Azurha pushed that dream out of her mind and reminded herself once again why she was here. She reached for her comb as his face disappeared from view. It was the perfect time to strike. He was so preoccupied with her body, he would never see it coming.

The first swipe of his tongue over her sensitive nub sent such strong shockwaves through her body that the comb clattered to the floor.

No man had ever touched her there, especially not with his mouth. Yet he pleasured her like a man well-versed in the intricacies of this part of a woman’s body. He held her hips down, controlling the way they rolled in response to his touch, while he sucked gently on her clit. Within seconds, he’d reduced her to mere moans.

The tables had turned on her. She’d been in control of her life since the day she gained her freedom, yet here she was, completely vulnerable in front of a man all because he promised to give her something she’d never experienced before.

No, she couldn’t let herself fall into his trap. She fought her desire, threading her fingers through his hair, preparing to snap his neck before she’d surrender to him. Her head lolled to the side, and she caught a glimpse of the poisoned comb a few feet away. The light flashed on the polished lapis, taunting her for her weakness. She reached for it in a final effort to stay in control, but each flick of his tongue pushed her closer to the abyss she both feared and welcomed. Unable to fight it any longer, she let herself fall. Her vision blurred, and the first violent waves of ecstasy shattered her consciousness. She frantically repeated his name and dug her nails into his shoulders to keep from slipping into insanity.

All the tension bled from her muscles, leaving her limp and exhausted by the time her orgasm faded.

The flutter of gentle kisses trailed up her neck, along her cheek, and finally traced the outline of her mouth. “Did that satisfy your needs?”

The husky timbre in his voice rolled through her body and warmed her like a sunbeam through an open window. This was what made Titus so different from her master. The latter would have left her a bruised and crumpled heap on the floor once he came. Titus stroked her head and continued to plant sweet pecks on her face.

She cast one more glance at her comb and drew in a shaky breath. “For now,” she whispered and tucked her head under his chin.

8

“No, that’s not what I was looking for,” Titus told the dressmaker.

She held up another dress, one the color of ripe raspberries. “How about this?”

He tried to imagine Azurha wearing it, and his mind immediately wandered to the game she played with the food the other night. If she wore that color, would he be able to keep his lips off of her? “Maybe.”

A thin line of annoyance creased the dressmaker’s brow. “Is there anything in particular you were looking for, Your Imperial Majesty?”

“I didn’t know you were the type to fancy women’s clothes,” Marcus said from the door way. The dressmaker’s gasp of horror only made him snicker. No one else would dare tease the emperor in such an informal manner.

Titus let the comment roll off his back. If it had been one of his nobles, he would’ve considered it an insult, a jab at his masculinity. But Marcus rarely took anything seriously. “It’s not for me, but if you’d like to model a few of them…”

“No thanks.” Marcus waved his hands in front of him before helping himself to a glass of wine. “I don’t think I’ll do them justice.”

The dressmaker gave a dignified “hmph” and held up another dress. “How about this one?”

The pale gold might have flattered the creamy skin of a Deizian woman, but not Azurha. “No, that won’t do.”

“Are we picking out something for your new concubine?”

“Yes.”

Marcus met his gaze, the desire to say something more flickering in his eyes, but he instead turned to the dressmaker and said, “What do you have that would be fetching on a concubine?”

The dressmaker’s mouth flapped wordlessly for a moment, her cheeks growing red. Then she turned and started digging through her trunk. “I don’t know if this is something Your Imperial Majesty might be interested in, but some of the madams in town have requested this style for their girls.”

She held up a white linen dress that looked as though it came straight off the walls of an Alpirion temple. The pleated neckline almost seemed alien to him, but his desire to see Azurha in it took over his power of speech. He merely nodded.

The dressmaker smiled. “Do you require anything else, Your Imperial Majesty?”

He shook his head. “Please leave the dresses with my steward so he can have them delivered to the harem.”

She draped both the white dress and the raspberry dress over her arm and backed away, her head bowed until she reached the doorway to the throne room.

Marcus followed her and immediately closed the door. “And here I thought your grandfather had outlawed Alpirion fashion.”

“In this instance, I’ll let it slide.” He sat in his chair. “What brings you in today, besides finding an opportunity to have fun at my expense?”

Marcus immediately sobered. “I wish I were here just for that.” He lowered his voice. “I’ve been hearing rumors that there’s a price on your head, and the assa
ssin who kills you will get a reward that rivals the royal treasury.”

Titus’s chest tightened. He knew he wasn’t popular with the nobility, but for them to plan such a coup was almost unheard of. “Who is behind it?”

“Judging from the amount, I’d say more than one noble.”

He forced himself to laugh in an effort to relieve his friend’s worry. “And what will happen after they kill me? Who will take the throne? I suspect the empire will be torn into civil war if they succeed. And with the border failing, the Barbarians would overrun the planet.” He sank further into his chair, feeling a bit more at ease after he logically plotted the consequences. “It would be political suicide.”

“Not everyone is as far-thinking as you.”

“Just out of curiosity, where are you hearing such things?”

A playful grin split Marcus’s face. “In the shipping business, you hear a lot of rumors at the docks. It helps that I can blend in easier there. As long as they don’t see my eyes, they think I’m a typical Elymanian sailor.”

Titus rubbed his jaw, mentally cataloging all his potential enemies. When he reached twenty, he stopped. “It would be helpful to know who was behind it.”

“I’ll keep my ears open. In the meantime, don’t let Pontus’s gift go to your head. And by head, I mean the one above your shoulders, not the one below them.”

A twinge of unease coiled in at the base of his spine. “Surely you don’t think she’s a threat, do you?”

“She has access to you when you are your most defenseless.”

He remembered how she had blindfolded him the first night. He’d let his guard down completely, had left himself vulnerable to her. If Pontus had sent her to harm him, she’d had ample opportunity to do so. “You don’t have to worry about her. The only thing she’s done is torture me with her teasing.”

Marcus cocked a brow. “You mean you haven’t—”

“No.” Titus stood and paced, trying to work some of his frustration out. “It’s not that I don’t want to. I just can’t bring myself to…”

“To what?”

“To force her to do something she doesn’t want.” He remembered how it had been with Lucia. She’d lay there in their bed as he came inside her, her expression one of bored acceptance rather than pleasure. She’d been forced into their marriage as much as he had, and they had both been completely miserable. No wonder she’d sought pleasure in another man’s arms. He thought he’d done the right thing by offering her a divorce so she could be with the man she loved, never thinking she would rather preserve her Deizian honor by drowning herself than lose her place as his wife.

“She’s a concubine, Titus. They’re only trained to do one thing.”

He couldn’t deny that she was well skilled in the art of seduction, but something didn’t quite fit. She seemed too well-educated, too well-travelled to be a woman who’d spent her entire life pleasuring men. There was something in her past that she wanted to keep hidden from him. And if he wanted to gain access to it, he’d have to be patient.

“Maybe, maybe not,” he replied.

…

Azurha sat on a bench while an Alpirion slave pinned her hair into place. How odd to be waited on by someone of her own race. She couldn’t tell if resentment or envy glowed from the girl’s eyes when they met, but she was glad not to have to meet her gaze for now.

So far the gods seemed to be on her side. After taking inventory of her resources this afternoon, Azurha decided to use a slow acting poison to kill Titus.

It troubled her a bit to realize she couldn’t bring herself to kill him with her own two hands. She’d never had that trouble before, not since she sliced her master’s throat with a broken piece of crockery. Why the hesitation now? Was it because he seemed to seek out her opinion, to value it as though she was one of his trusted advisors rather than a simple concubine? Was it because he seemed content once again to allow her into his bed yet not seek his own pleasure from her?

The memory of his tongue exploring her most intimate recesses made her sex quiver. That was why. No man had ever worried about what she wanted, about what she thought and felt. Even after gaining her freedom, she still answered to the whims of her clients. Posing as a concubine, she should be serving the emperor, fulfilling all his sexual fantasies, not moaning in pleasure when he sucked on her clit.

Her skin flushed, and when she heard the locks to the harem click, she almost bolted for the door. She craved one more night with him, and the poison she’d chosen would give her enough time to enjoy him before it took effect.

Varro stepped into the room with a swath of white material draped over his arm. “Emperor Sergius requests you wear this tonight.”

Azurha almost laughed out loud. The virginal white suited a bride, not a concubine. She wondered if Titus had some sick sense of humor she didn’t know about. She took the dress. “As the emperor commands,” she replied with a half-smile.

The slave followed her into her dressing room and helped her change. Her heart skipped a beat when she remembered the small vial of poison tucked between her breasts, but she managed to conceal it from the girl.

The new dress was of a different style than most of the women in the empire wore. The thin white linen gathered in intricate pleats over her breasts and fell in crisp lines to her lower legs, revealing the curve of her calves. It reminded her more of traditional Alpirion clothing, something her grandmother might have worn before Titus’ grandfather stripped her people of their identity and forced them into slavery. Anger coursed through her veins. Was he trying to mock her?

The slave girl must have recognized the style, too, because her eyes widened when she secured the thin linen strap over one shoulder. Emperor Gellius may have outlawed their clothing, but paintings of Alpirion ladies still floated around the empire. Her lips formed a thin line. “He must wish to reenact his grandfather’s conquest,” she whispered under her breath as she arranged the matching palla to conceal Azurha’s hair and face.

Azurha placed her finger over the girl’s mouth. “Be careful what you say inside these walls. You do not want to make enemies. There are far worse masters out there than the emperor.”

The slave nodded in understanding and lowered her eyes. Azurha’s heart ached for her. She knew the fear of being bought and sold at a moment’s notice, being torn from her family and forced into the service of a monster. She stroked the girl’s cheek to reassure her. “Do not fear. I won’t whisper this to anyone.”

As she followed Varro to the Imperial chambers, she asked, “Where did he find a dress like this? I thought they were outlawed.”

The servant merely shrugged. “The emperor has more resources at his hands than you can imagine.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Perhaps he merely wanted to see you in it.”

Or out of it
. She wondered how long she’d stay in this dress once his lips touched hers.
One more night of this charade
, she promised herself.
By tomorrow, the poison will make him too ill to summon me to his chambers
.

Other than the sound of their footsteps, silence filled the long corridor. Azurha’s chest tightened, making it harder to breathe. After all the people she’d killed over the last decade, why was this assassination so nerve-wracking? Cassius’ voice filtered into her mind.
Because you got too close to your target
.

The flash on the bronze plate jerked her from her thoughts, and iron-fisted determination seized control of her. She wouldn’t fail tonight. By the end of the week, she’d be a rich woman looking for a small estate somewhere far from here.

“I took the liberty of having dinner set up for two,” Varro said as he led her inside. “If the emperor doesn’t find this to his liking, I’ll send something else. I found it rather odd that he requested honey be served with every meal. Emperor Sergius has never had much of sweet tooth.”

She bit her bottom lip to conceal her smile. If he only knew how the honey had been used two nights ago. A fist of remorse clenched her gut when she realized she wouldn’t feel his tongue lapping it off her breasts again.

“I see we’re a bit early,” he continued as he surveyed the empty chambers. “You’re to wait here until he returns. Good evening, Lady Azurha.” He bowed his head slightly and closed the doors behind him. A loud click echoed through the room.

She unwound the palla from her head and tossed it on the cushions. Time to stop playing games. She removed the vial from between her breasts and poured the powder into one of the goblets on the table. Then she added a small amount of wine, swirling the liquid to dissolve the poison, before filling it to the brim. Even if Titus was paranoid enough to hire a food taster, he wouldn’t detect it until tomorrow. All she needed to do now was make sure he had a sip of wine before beginning with the evening’s pleasantries.

Disgust filled her when she noticed her trembling hands. She balled them up into fists and forced herself to sit on the cushions while she waited for her prey.

…

“I think you handled those sycophants rather well, Titus,” Marcus said with a touch of laughter in his voice. “The only other thing I’d suggest is hanging the threat of execution over their heads if they follow you outside the throne room.”

Titus chuckled. After being chased back his private quarters last night, he made it very clear that anyone who followed him past the door tonight would suffer the consequences. Anyone except Marcus, that was. They’d been friends practically since the cradle, and most of the court knew that. In fact, some of the nobles had begun whispering their thoughts in Marcus’ ear as soon as Titus’s father became ill, hoping to gain favor with the heir to the throne through him.

“I’m just grateful for a few minutes of solitude.”

His friend nodded. “Any plans for the evening?”

Heat rose into his cheeks. Despite his determination to remain focused on the needs of the empire, his thoughts kept returning to the Alpirion temptress waiting for him in his chambers. Was it wrong of him to want to see her dressed like the women who adorned the exquisitely erotic paintings he’d seen hung in art galleries? “I’ll be dining with Azurha.”

“Azurha?” Marcus cocked one eyebrow. “Is that her name?”

“Yes.” He hoped his clipped reply would end the conversation, but his friend had other ideas.

“Alpirion?”

“Yes.”

“You never struck me as the type who found the darker skinned women attractive.”

Titus stopped and spun around on his heel. “Just because I’m forced to marry a Deizian woman doesn’t mean my tastes are exclusive to them. Azurha has these eyes that make me…” His voice drifted off as he remembered the hunger in those teal eyes as he made her come last night. His cock stiffened. If this conversation continued much further, the evidence for his desire would be on display for anyone to see.

“So, in other words, she’s not your normal Alpirion slave girl?”

“Far from it.” But she was also a gift from Pontus and, therefore, needed to be handled with caution. If he could gain her trust, perhaps he could learn the truth behind why his cousin sent her here.

He pressed his hand against the plate outside his door, and his fingers tingled. Simple magic like this, he could handle. Reinforcing the barriers was an entirely different matter. He dreaded repeating that over and over again every day of his reign. Gods forbid if he needed to call upon stronger magic like his grandfather did when he finally conquered the Alpirions.