Jason strode through the winter chill toward the guards’ barracks at the palace of the governor. Menelaus had invited them all to dine with him there, and he had agreed to come. With every step, however, he wished he were home. Good as it would be to see his friends, it would be better still to lounge beside Abigail and watch their babe move under his hand. To talk with his father, listen to the stories his mother told.
His friends did not appreciate his dedication to his home life, he knew. Perhaps they saw what he had come to realize: that affection for Abigail had turned into love. They did not approve. But how could he resist? He had been fond of her to begin with, but seeing her smiling, laughing, beaming with adoration for the child he had planted within her . . . it proved an irresistible tug on his heart. She loved their babe. Surely love for him would follow.
He pulled open the door to the barracks and was greeted with a blast of heat and raucous laughter. No, he did not miss the revelries of his companions. Did not miss Rome. Would it be so bad to give up those dreams? If he stayed here in Jerusalem, married Abigail, then perhaps she would finally let him past the last barrier of her heart. Perhaps she would forgive him for all he had taken from her if he gave her that.
“There he is!” Menelaus sloshed wine into a chalice and thrust it at him the moment he closed the door behind him. “Sit, drink away the chill. I only wish I had a few wenches to help keep us warm.”
The others laughed and raised their cups in salute. Apidius downed his in a single gulp that made him shiver in what looked like pleasure. “It has grown colder than I would like. But perhaps it will grow colder still and freeze the rebels out of the hills, eh?”
Titus snorted from his couch near the fire. “Do not bet on it, my friend. Desperate men feel no cold.”
“I do not like what I have been hearing about Barabbas’s band.” Jason set his cup down so he could shrug out of his cloak, then took a seat beside Lentulus. “If Oedipus and the Cyclops taught me anything, it was that a man with no name cannot be trusted. Come now–‘Son of a father’? How are we to call out for help and claim it is such a man tormenting us? Our fellows would laugh.”
Lentulus’s smile held no amusement. “It is a clever name. And he has proven himself to be a clever man, always evading us though everyone knows he is a murderer, a rebel, and a thief.”
“He will be caught,” Menelaus declared. “And that is the final word on him. This is an eve for forgetting our duties, my friends. If we are going to speak of unpleasantries, let us speak of our own.” He turned smiling eyes on Apidius. “Have you heard from Drusilla?”
Apidius sent his friend a mock scowl. “Yes, and your lack of faith in my betrothed is appalling. She is well and anxious to be reunited. If I am not transferred closer to Rome within a year, her parents have agreed to bring her here, and we will be married.”
“Well then.” Titus raised his drink once more. “To Drusilla the faithful! May she bear our friend many sons!” The others echoed the toast, making Apidius blush.
“And how is your woman, Jason?” Lentulus turned to him with a hint of smile. “I imagine she grows larger by the day.”
Jason swirled his wine without taking a drink. Her smile flashed before his mind’s eye. “She is in good spirits.”
Meleaus laughed. “He speaks of spirits because it is all she has left at this point. Her figure is gone, likely never to return. Let us see how he brags of his Venus when she is fat and stooping and nursing a babe.”
“Yes, Jason, we should all go into town later. You are surely in need of a woman you can get your arms around.” Titus flashed a wicked grin.
“Abigail satisfies me.” Jason put his cup aside altogether.
His simple certitude called a halt to the laughter. The other four fell silent and all stared at him.
“By the gods,” Titus muttered, “he has fallen in love with her.”
“Jason.” Menelaus leaned forward, face intent. “I thought we had agreed that it was unwise to take so much interest in the slave and her child.”
He folded his arms across his chest “You all did. I did not.”
Apidius tossed his hand into the air. “It is hopeless, though. The child is a bastard.”
Jason steepled his fingers and met none of their gazes. “Not if I marry her.”
A silence, swirling with undercurrents of fire, rushed the room in a gust, then fled again in the face of the explosion.
“You cannot!” Menelaus and Titus roared together.
“Think of your career,” the Roman demanded.
“And your future,” the Greek added.
“It is unthinkable, Jason.” Titus was so agitated he thrust himself from his seat and took to pacing. “You are accepted in Rome only because your father is Roman. If you went through with this–”