“Thank you, Charis. That would be wonderful.” Talk about an understatement! It would be almost as good as Drakon’s kisses.
Heat rushed up her face. She pressed her knees together to keep her legs from shivering with the liquid heat between them. The man must have the most talented tongue in history. She couldn’t help wondering how skilled he was with the rest of his body.
What was she doing? She shouldn’t be thinking about him. She should be focusing only on her mission. If she let herself be distracted by a handsome man, she could mess up everything. Don’t be stupid, she warned herself Get the fragment and get out of Dodge.
“Are you feeling unwell, Zoe?” asked Charis. “Your cheeks are fiery-red.”
Zoe was saved from answering when a servant came to announce the men were ready for the naming ceremony. She followed the other women to the larger courtyard where the men, some leaning against columns to keep on their drunken feet, waited. She scanned the crowd for Drakon and frowned when she saw him talking to that boor Archippos.
The ceremony was simple. Charis’s husband, Kyros, held up his son and announced that his name would be Bion to honor Kyros’s father who had died the previous warm season. Everyone cheered and cups of wine were raised in toasts for good health and long life.
As the guests offered gifts to Charis and her son, Zoe stepped back into the women’s section. She felt like an intruder. She was an intruder who had arrived with no gift and now was adding to Charis’s work by asking her to send a message to Agnodice.
When she bumped into a hard body, she turned, hoping to see Drakon. Without Archippos. Instead, she came face-to-face with Kyros. He looked to be more than a decade older than his wife. Why was he lurking in the shadows while the celebration was in full swing?
“I appreciate you allowing me to attend your son’s naming,” Zoe said.
“You are welcome anytime.”
She started to thank him, but choked on her words when he caught her by the nape of her neck and tugged her toward him. Odors of wine and rancid oil billowed around him.
Zoe was shocked. Kyros had a beautiful wife and a healthy son, so why was he looking at her like he wanted to strip her bare and take her right there?
“Drakon has Poseidon’s own luck finding beautiful women.” He trailed a finger along her left arm.
She pulled away before he could touch the ESC band. “Thanks,” she said in a tone that suggested he think before he said or did anything else stupid.
He didn’t take the hint. He moved nearer, trapping her in a corner, out of sight from the rest of his guests. His mouth ground into hers.
Zoe owed Athens’s oppressed women a favor, and she’d repay it by teaching this jerk some manners. He’d messed with the wrong woman tonight. She tried to ignore Kyros’s pawing as she shifted her weight to her right leg to put space between them, then aimed her knee at his crotch.
A hand caught her leg. The heat racing through her identified it as Drakon’s even before Kyros shoved her away. Drakon kept her from hitting a column, then stepped between her and his brother-in-law.
“What in Hades do you think you are doing?” Drakon asked. He shoved his wine goblet into Zoe’s hands.
Kyros’s answer was a distant whisper as Zoe was assaulted by images from the cup. Not just the powerful heat of Drakon’s fingers, but someone else’s. She struggled to bring the image into focus. White and brown…hairy…Archippos. He must have handed the goblet to Drakon. Why couldn’t she see his face? She concentrated and gasped when she saw another face over his. A younger face with a cruel smile. A reflection from his youth? No, this face seemed completely different.
Then it was gone, and she saw Archippos and Drakon laughing and conversing. Who belonged to that other face?
Kyros’s laugh broke into her thoughts. “I was only keeping her entertained, Drakon, while you did business with Archippos.”
“She is not a courtesan. She is my guest.”
“You brought her here. That makes her my guest.”
“No longer. Come, Zoe.”
She was so glad to be rid of Kyros that she didn’t mind when Drakon treated her like a well-trained dog. She handed Kyros the goblet and followed Drakon.
He left her in another section of the house so he could retrieve the sandals they’d left in the entry. A shadow shifted on the wall. She looked back and saw nobody. It must have been the flickering oil lamps.
“Thanks, Drakon,” she said when he returned. She strapped on her sandals before she went with him around a corner. They passed a large room with a loom and supplies for weaving.
“Kyros should be thanking me.” Drakon grinned. “If I hadn’t stopped you, he would be unable to fulfill his husbandly duties for many days.”
She realized she’d never seen him smile so playfully. It made her wonder what he had been like before going into Poseidon’s service. But there was no time. Once she found the bronze fragment, she would leave. For the first time, that thought made her sad.
The thought startled her. Before today, she hadn’t even known Drakon existed. She couldn’t let herself get tangled up ancient Athens. Not with anything, and most especially not with anyone.
Chapter Five
Every street looked the same to Zoe. When she asked where they were going, Drakon said, “You will have to stay at my house tonight. Tomorrow we can find somewhere else for you to stay.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea. How many women live at your house now?”
“One serving woman.”
“Someone is sure to notice another woman there.”
“Not if you remain in the house.”
“Yeah,” she muttered under her breath. “Like that’s gonna happen.” More loudly, but still in not much more than a whisper, she added, “I must be able to talk with your sister.”
He took her hand and guided her through a dark section of the street. “About what?”
“A friend of hers I need to meet.” Zoe wished she could read people when she touched them as she could with objects. She savored his warm flesh around her fingers, but she couldn’t be distracted the way she was when his vision sucked her in and then spit her out all hot and bothered.
Drakon turned toward her, his face impassive. “Which friend?”
“I don’t want to say here.”
He laughed icily. “Who do you think is listening?”
Something moved in the shadows.
“Look out!” Zoe yelled as four men burst from the darkness.
She ducked under a knife, but the man’s fist caught her on the temple. Everything contracted before her eyes. She blinked and kicked her attacker’s knee. He shrieked and collapsed. An arm snaked around her neck. Jerked back, she saw Drakon fighting off another man. The fourth sat against a wall, blood gushing from his nose and mouth.
“Halt!” her captor called. “Halt, or I will break her neck.”
“I don’t think so,” Zoe said through clenched teeth.
Her foot slammed down on his instep as her elbow drove into his gut. He grunted, and she rammed her elbow into his groin. His howl rose to a pitch that hurt her ears. He fell toward her, clutching his crotch. She brought her foot up against his head. He fell to the ground and was still.
Zoe smiled when Drakon drove the last man’s head against a wall. He slid down it, unconscious. The bloodied man tried to get up, but Drakon sent him to the ground with a single blow. He bent over the man and picked up something.
Or did he? Zoe’s vision blurred each time she blinked. She had to struggle to focus.
“Where did you learn to fight like that?” Drakon asked, shaking his hand as he walked over to her.
“I have two older brothers,” she said. That wasn’t a lie.
“Are you hurt?”
“I’m fine.” That was a lie. “You?”
“My knuckles got bruised on their hard heads.” He brought her mouth toward his. “Want to kiss it and make me feel better?”
Instead
of answering, she stood on tiptoe and slanted her mouth under his. She was astonished when his kiss was slow and deep, seeking the delight awaiting them. When his tongue outlined her lips with moist flame, she curved her hand along his face.
“Ouch,” he muttered against her lips.
Zoe tilted his face toward the light from a torch down the street. “You’re going to have a black eye. We need to get something cold on it before it starts swelling.”
“Something cold is not you, because you are on fire in my arms.” Drakon ran his fingers along her arm.
Drakon cursed when he realized the slight motion was too much for Zoe. She wobbled, her knees buckling. He scooped her into his arms. Her head lolled against his shoulder.
“You said you were not injured, Zoe.”
“Only my head. I’ll be fine.”
“I can see that.” He gave a wry grin that he hoped covered his dismay. It was his task to protect her, and he had left her to deal with two men on her own. Thank Olympus, she had good fighting skills. His head almost burst with questions of who she was and where she had come from.
He silenced them when one of their attackers groaned. The man didn’t regain his senses, but he and Zoe must be gone before the ambushers woke.
Drakon carried her along the street, watching for another attack. He could not help noticing how she seemed to have been made to be in his arms, because she was softest where he was hardest.
He turned down a narrow alley and opened his door. Carrying her inside, he crossed the courtyard and its small pool where he sought Poseidon’s visions and guidance.
He went into a room beyond the pool. “Stay here tonight.”
Zoe unlocked her arms from around his shoulders when he set her on a low cot. She leaned back against the wall while he lit the lamp.
“Your face is swollen,” she said. “Do you have something cold to put on your cheek?”
“It will be fine by the morrow. You need to rest.”
“I’ll be fine tomorrow, too.”
“Good, but tonight, rest.” He opened the wooden chest decorated with scenes from Poseidon’s life and conquests. He took out two items. “Here is oil and a strigil for the morning.”
She winced, but nodded because she recognized the word strigil from her pre-mission briefings. The Greeks didn’t bathe often as the Romans did. Instead, they covered their bodies with olive oil and used a curved stick called a stirgil to scrape the oil off. When the oil came off, it took any surface dirt with it. “Thank you…for—saving me.”
“Poseidon gave me the duty of defending you against what lurks within shadows, and I will do that.” He turned to the door. “If you need anything, just ask.”
He hoped she would say: You. But her green eyes were dull with pain. She stretched out on the bed, gathering the pillow under her head. Her eyes closed, then popped open.
“Drakon, this is your bed! Where will you sleep?” she asked.
He longed to say “with you,” but he restrained himself because he wanted their first time to be wonderful, not dimmed with aches. Pulling a wool blanket over her, Drakon went to the pool. He sat and stared at the water as he reached into his belt and pulled out a leather purse he had taken from one of the ambushers. Opening it, he poured silver coins into his hand. He whistled lowly. Someone had paid those men a lot of money to attack them.
Why?
He cleared his mind with the prayer he used each time he opened himself to Poseidon’s voice, then waited. An image appeared. A woman wearing an odd outfit the color of olives. Her clothes emphasized her full breasts and nicely rounded hips. The top closed along the front instead of at the shoulders, and the lower half revealed the woman’s legs below the knee. Her very nice legs.
She turned, but he already knew she was Zoe. He recognized the set of her shoulders and her proud uplifted chin. The soul-deep hunger that had plagued him since the first time she’d appeared in his visions pierced him.
When their eyes locked, the scene shifted to his vision. She stood in the agora, her back to him. The shadow skulked toward her, like Poseidon’s son Orion hunting in the night sky.
Drakon tried to shout her name. He was mute. He must protect her. He ran toward the shadow. But Zoe halted him by throwing her arms around him. At her bold kiss, he grew hard. Her hands were everywhere, loosening his tunic, stroking him as her mouth caressed his, before following the same path as her fingers. She suckled and teased and sent shudders of ecstasy through him. At the moment of his ultimate pleasure, he called out her name.
He opened his eyes to look at her beautiful face, but the shadow had crept over them. Pain stiffened her mouth. She spasmed, fighting the shadow. Life vanished from her eyes. She rose to her feet and walked toward the core of the darkness. He gave chase, but she was gone.
He had lost her to the hideous dark. Poseidon had sent him the warning vision, and Drakon had failed to keep her safe. He had lost her.
“Drakon?”
At Zoe’s whispered question, Drakon looked up and saw her standing in the doorway.
“Are you all right?” she asked. “I heard you shout my name.”
His voice must have escaped his vision. That never had occurred before. He had no idea what it meant. “I am fine.” He crossed the courtyard to where she swayed.
Drakon guided her back to bed. But as he watched her settle down, he wondered how she’d entered his vision? Had she really been with him?
He could not ask because she was again asleep. He kissed her cheek, aching with the need for her. The real Zoe. Then, drawing a linen curtain over the door, he walked to the pool. He would find a way to keep the shadow from her.
Chapter Six
Zoe woke with a headache. Getting up, she saw a bottle of oil and what looked the strigil on the carved chest. She grimaced. She wasn’t going to cover herself in oil, and then use the miniscythe to scrape it and dirt off. Remembering the pool in the courtyard, she wondered where she could find a bucket. She added soap and a fluffy towel to her list of top ten things for Time Raiders to pack.
From beyond the house’s walls, Zoe could hear the city waking. Scents of herbs and spices, some she couldn’t identify, wafted past the linen curtain across the doorway.
A wrinkled, gray-haired woman who introduced herself as Korinna brought her a plate of bread and figs for breakfast. With it was a goblet of water. Zoe ate the food, then used most of the water to freshen up.
With food in her stomach, she pushed aside the curtain so she could look for Drakon. She didn’t have to go far.
He sat by the pool, staring into it as if he’d never seen water before. She put her hands on his shoulders and massaged his tight muscles while she waited for him to look up.
One minute passed, then five, then ten. Finally, a sigh rushed through him, and he gave her a weary smile. The fist print on his face was turning a variety of deep blues and purples.
“Have you been out here all night?” Zoe asked.
“I need answers.”
She knelt beside him. “I know. Me, too.” She paused, then said, “Thank you for helping me fight off those goons.” Did goons translate into ancient Greek?
It must have because Drakon gave her a boyish smile. “I suspect you could have handled them on your own.” His smile faded as he reached within his belt. “One of them carried this.”
He held out a small battered pouch. Opening it, he began to drop the silver coins into her hand.
Zoe gave them back. “Let me see the bag.”
He handed it to her.
She closed her hands around it and closed her eyes. A tingle, not unlike when she’d traveled through time, rushed to her fingertips. Within her mind, a face took form. She gasped when she recognized the white-bearded man.
“Archippos!” She almost dropped the bag.
“What of him?” asked Drakon.
“This bag is his.”
“How do you know?”
Zoe drew in a deep breath, then let it sift between h
er teeth. She didn’t like speaking of her psychic ability, especially since it had betrayed her. But Drakon knew she was a seer.
After she explained, Drakon asked, “Is that how you knew about Charis’s new son?”
“Yes. She held your scrying bowl during her labor. Her essence was still on it.”
“Is that how you entered my vision?”
Zoe hated the blush burning her cheeks when she thought of what she’d experienced. “I don’t know.”
“Nor do I, but I know Archippos would never send killers after us. He is a man of standing in Athens, a respected voice heeded in the agora.” He clenched his fists on his knees. “He cares so much about his sailors that he wants me to protect them on the fickle seas.”
“But, Drakon, I can feel him.”
“Only him?”
Zoe hesitated as she ran her fingers over the bag again. Archippos’s face reappeared in her mind along with several others. She recognized a guest at the naming ceremony. Another was a man who’d attacked them. She didn’t know the others.
“No,” she said, “but I believe he held it longest, because his face is the clearest to me.”
“You believe? You are not sure?”
His words were like a slap across her face.
He leaned forward. “Zoe, I sense that you distrust your ability. I can help you refine it.”
“I don’t want to refine it.”
“I have learned to trust my gift. I can teach you what you need to know.” He put up his hands to enfold hers. “Just open yourself to me.”
“No!” She stood. “I dared to believe my ability was infallible, then I made a mistake.”
“Everyone makes mistakes,” he said as he got up.
“Not like this. I cost an innocent man his freedom.”
“How?”
She waved aside his question. “Does it matter? I saw what I thought was the truth, and I never questioned it even though I believed in my heart that he was not guilty. He went to prison.”
Drakon shook his head. “I do not understand. Did you testify against him?”
The Greek Lover Page 3
