The summons came after nightfall. I was already in bed, but I rose and dressed quickly, going with the messenger back to the Vatican. I was somewhat puzzled. Of late Cesare arranged ahead of time for me to come to him, rather than wait until such a late hour to summon me from my bed and to his.
When I arrived, we spoke little. We made love vigorously as ever, but something was troubling him. He seemed distant, even as he moved inside me. Afterward he lay still, holding me tightly, before he withdrew and sat on the edge of the bed, running his fingers through his hair.
“Cesare,” I said softly, sitting up. “Is something wrong?”
He laughed shortly, a weak, dark sound. “Either everything has gone wrong, or everything has gone right.”
“What do you mean?” I moved closer to him.
“It is nothing I would burden you with. It is better if you do not know.”
His tone was cool, yet underneath it I detected a note of concern. He truly thought I was better off not knowing whatever it was that was troubling him.
With a creeping sense of confidence, I felt certain I could persuade him to tell me, whatever it was; that I could persuade him to tell me anything. As I had told Isabella, my relationship with Cesare Borgia could never be anything more than this, could never exist beyond the four walls of his sumptuous bedchamber. Yet whatever this was was more than simply sex, more than lust, more than the need for physical release. He enjoyed my company, not just my body. He did not merely fuck me and send me away; I spent the better part of the night in his arms. And that, perhaps far more than anything else, was something I would never have dreamed could come to pass.
My fingers were nearly touching his skin, close enough to feel the heat of his body, when I stopped myself from touching him.
I knew the rumors about Cesare Borgia, about what kind of man he was and what he was capable of. I knew what kind of power he wielded, and the ways in which he had influenced the politics of the Italian peninsula and all her nations. But more than that, I knew things beyond the rumors, things that the gossips hadn’t even guessed at.
So whatever this was, whatever had happened this night that he sought to protect me from … did I truly want to know?
I lowered my hand to my lap. I did not. I did not want to know.
As though sensing my withdrawal, he said, “You may go,” his tone even more distant than before. “I shall not be good company this night.”
I rose from the bed and dressed quickly, donning my cloak even in the summer heat. I moved to the door and looked back at him. He had not moved. “May God give you good night,” I said softly.
“God or the devil shall see me through this night, and I know not which,” he said. I hesitated for a moment and simply slipped out the door to return to my room.