Centurion's Honor (Imperial Desires, Book One) by Nadia Aidan

unwise that she’d waited so long to tell him.
    His next statement said as much.
    “I wish you would have told me sooner.” He seemed so earnest and as she peered up at him she could almost feel the concern and affection he harbored for her. Knowing her stepson as she did, she should have also realized such a feeling was to be fleeting.
    “Unfortunately you have waited too late to come to me. The tax is due in a week and with my own debts due, and the last harvest so poor, I am afraid I cannot extend myself on such short notice.”
    She’d expected as much from him, so she pinched her lips to stop the snappish retort that threatened to come out. She pulled her hands from his and stood. “It would seem then that my visit is at an end—”
    “Possibly.” She did not mistake the deadly purpose in his gaze. “Or if maybe you would be willing to discuss the elevation of my position here as I have tried to discuss with you many times before, I could perhaps be persuaded to search other accounts for another source of funds.”
    By elevating his position, Quintus meant to say, she would relinquish any claim she had as regent, because she was the only person who stood in his way of ruling the province with absolute authority. But Anan could never, she would never do such a thing. Siga was her home, and no matter the hard times that had been set upon her, she would never abandon her homeland to Quintus’ absolute rule.
    Her hands fisted at her sides, angry that he would even suggest such a thing at a time like this, and the growl of fury that ripped through the room could have been hers, but when Quintus stole a quick, wary look over the top of her head, she suspected it was one of the centurions behind her. The deep, feral sound made her think it was Cassius, for certain.
    “I already knew my suggestion would be met with resistance from you, but now it would seem your guards are in agreement as well. How interesting.” Quintus’ eyes hardened as his attention remained riveted on the soldiers at her back.
    In her mind, Anan regarded Quintus as a feeble, sniveling coward, but in truth he was none of those things. His father had been a soldier and he’d been reared with discipline, the ferocity of a true Roman soldier.
    Anan liked to make him out to be weak and foolish, but Quintus was neither.
    She simply hated him because of who he was and because he’d won. He’d vowed to rule over a domain that was rightfully hers and now he did.
    He regarded Cassius and Titus from over her shoulder before settling his contemptuous gaze on her once again. “It all makes sense now, why they are so protective of you.” She tensed at the smug gleam in his knowing eyes. “You would let common soldiers touch you? How beneath you, stepmother.”
    The derision hung heavy in Quintus’ voice and she recognized the dark look in his eyes. She’d hurled insults at his mother for so easily lying with the enemy to advance her position, while Anan herself had resisted to the very end to even agree to wed Maximinius. Her disdain for Romans was well known, but now it would seem she welcomed the touch of not one but two of them. And Quintus’ loathing gaze called her the hypocrite that she was.
    Anan did not answer to Quintus and she refused to entertain such a discussion with him, so she tried to sidestep him, but he grasped her arm before she could pass. Titus and Cassius immediately closed in, but they would only intervene if he sought to harm her.
    That was not Quintus’ intent, at least, not physically. Quintus sought to injure her with words.
    “Have you fucked them?”
    She jerked against him, her glare hard. “That is none of your business.”
    He lifted his nose and sniffed the air. “You’ve fucked them.” He flung her arm away. “You smell of sweat and dirty sex.”
    Before she could stop herself, she struck him with her open palm, the sharp crack ripping through the air.
    She stared at him, horrified. Since Quintus had matured