Page 19 of Chasing Caine
Samantha had dragged me behind her at most of the significant stops, but here she was going in near-blind. It was an active research and conservation area, blocked off to the public, so the photos we’d looked at on the train from Sorrento were all she knew.
My heart galloped at the prospect of showing her my project. Every time I’d visited since I arrived on Tuesday, I’d glared around the space, angry at it for tearing me away from her. But now, I had her hand in mine, and she would love this.
I put an arm out to stop Mario from going in first. “I want to take her to the room alone. Give us fifteen minutes?”
“Only fifteen?” He waggled his eyebrows, while she rolled her eyes so dramatically I couldn’t do anything but laugh.
I opened the gate to let her through, ushering her across the earthen floor of the ancient storage room. “To stabilize the edges of the city’s excavation, they’ve been clearing new areas at the perimeter. This space was exposed generations ago, but when they inched back the dirt and rock, they found the garden walls and then the Mars and Venus fresco. Its condition was so good, they finished unearthing the entire building, calling it Casa di Marte, or the House of Mars.”
She frowned and raised an eyebrow.
“Scusa, bella, I know I don’t have to translate.”
We continued through an open doorway, exposed at the back of the storage room, leading us into what was once a garden. Newly excavated, it was only a dirt surface. But the paleobotanists had found it a treasure trove, taking casts of the root systems preserved after the volcanic eruption nearly two millennia ago. They planned to identify—and perhaps someday reproduce—the garden’s original layout.
Low, painted walls surrounded the garden, and columns of various heights stood sentry at its corners and midpoints. Before the city’s destruction, the area would have been open to the sky, an oasis for the owners alone.
I hurried her along as she tried to stop and inspect the images of flowers and vines decorating the first walls. She had to see the special frescoes before anything else.
From the garden, we passed into the atrium, where the temporary roof structure began. Few ceiling and upper floors remained within Pompeii, so tall scaffolding was erected to hold sheets of corrugated metal high above. It would protect the precious walls until we had them stabilized and prepared for the elements.
Finally, we passed into the tricilium, the formal dining room which my team would work on for the next four months. It was only fifteen feet wide and long, but the completeness of the paintings was as breathtaking as the woman beside me.
The main decorative frescoes through most of the Casa di Marte alternated in ochre and crimson, with top and bottom borders in blacks and whites. But this room was more artistic, more a showcase of the family’s limited wealth, with Pompeian Fourth Style panels designed to look like dozens of paintings embedded in the wall. Images resembling alcoves lined the top, containing well-dressed men and women, with marbled panels along the bottom to evoke the designs of Ancient Ptolemaic Egypt. Intricate frames surrounded each piece.
Dust from hiding beneath a layer of ash for almost two thousand years washed the colors out, but when we finished with the room, the frescoes would shine.
She let go of my hand and walked closer to the wall on the right. Seven feet of plaster remained. Above that, the decorated wall hadn’t survived, revealing the stone structure behind it. What had it looked like before Vesuvio claimed it?
On the wall, Mars, the Roman god of war, stood naked, save for a red cloak. To his left, the pale Venus, goddess of love, with an orange fabric draped around her lower half. To his right, their son, Cupid, held Mars’s spear and shield. There were other elements to the fresco and many cracks and missing pieces, but it was in remarkable condition, the reds and golds the most vibrant.
“Wow,” she breathed.
I gestured to the northern wall, which was in the worst state, only five feet of plaster covering the wall, one foot of stone extending above it. The latrine behind was visible over the wall. “Cupid on the hunt. From what remains, they suspect this was originally very similar to one—”
“From the House of the Deer in Herculaneum.”
Her memory for artwork was astounding. All I could do was chuckle. “Good thing Mario’s not here to see you finish my explanations, as well.”
She turned around to me with the same beaming smile she’d sported most of the day, even when we were shopping for the single pair of shorts, shirt, and shoes she agreed to pick up in Sorrento. She moved to the western wall. “And the last one. Perseus presenting the Medusa’s head to Minerva.”
“If it were my decision, I would have called this Casa di Minerva.” The background was pale blue sky with white clouds, a smudge of green trees behind them. The pegasus off to the side, and mighty Perseus with his winged feet holding the monster’s head up to the goddess.
Minerva was the glory of this domus and no one could tell me any differently. A faded orchid-pink stola pooled at her waist and draped to the floor, the flowing dress a marked contrast to her plumed helmet and golden spear. A large crack ran between the two figures, and the plaster of the wall only extended a foot above their heads. But she was magnificent.
“Perseus is the big hero. Why not after him?” Samantha stood two feet from the ancient fresco, hand outstretched, seemingly battling her desire to touch it. A braid confined her hair, the shorts revealed her long toned legs, and the fitted T-shirt skimmed her subtle curves. She stole my breath away, doing nothing more than standing still.
“Minerva was the Roman goddess of wisdom and strategic warfare, among other things. She was tall, strong, and fierce.” I crossed the distance to my Samantha, wrapping my arms around her waist, resting my head on her shoulder. The scent of my soap on her skin was not enough to overpower the faint scent of citrus. “And beautiful. Every day I came here, I looked at her and all I saw was you.”
She wrapped her arms over my forearms, pressing her cheek against mine.
“I would look at Perseus, offering this gift to the goddess who helped him slay the monster. I would think how my memories of you from college helped me get through many difficult times. And over the last month, getting to know you has helped me push past even more.”
She turned around in my arms, brow furrowed. Perhaps this was too soon after we’d made up. Only one day. But it had been a day of tremendous intimacy, despite its premature end. And now, we had enough privacy that she would listen and hear me.
“In my heart, this room is you. If we must be apart for the next four months—”
She placed a finger on my mouth, shaking her head slightly. Jaw clenched, she swallowed hard.