Read Online Passion and Plaid - Her Highland Hero (Scottish Historical Romance) by Anya Karin - Free Book Online Page B

Lynne started laughing.
    “Ach! That’s the truth of it. I was distracted! I
couldna think of anything but Kenna, of her smile, of that flaming, red hair
and those bright lips that I so love to kiss.”
    “Do you hear this John? Do you?” Lynne said. “This
is how you talk to a woman. Best learn of it.” She gave him a squeeze and
giggled at his squirming.
    “I think most men could learn something from the
way Mister Gavin talks. And how he looks, and those arms,” Olga said in a very
serious voice.
    “R – right, right, thank you Olga,” Gavin said,
chuckling. “But there it is. I left the sheriff in the stables and when I went
to take him food the next morning and get the equipment ready for travel, he’d
gone.”
    “If only he knew he’d never see the money,” Rodrigo
said with a sneer. “That lying bastard would do anything to save his own skin.”
    “Aye,” Gavin said. “As I was riding here, I made
up my mind that the sheriff was going to pay his promised debt. Not sure how to
force him to do that, exactly, but something will occur to me. And that’s why
I’m here, too. I came to fetch him and drag him back north. We canna leave
Mornay’s Cl- Mornay’s yet.” He winked at John. “But it’s still my intention to
deliver the sheriff to Glasgow for trial when we can.”
    “If it’s the sheriff you want, we can take you to
him,” Ben said. “He’s been on his best behavior. He’s in Edinburgh.”
    “Aye, John told me you saw him.”
    “For a fact, we did. He was pissed-drunk and
screaming at some tavern keeper,” Ben said.
    “Sounds like Alan.” Gavin nodded. “Though all the
same, I’m not sure if we should. I mean if I should – go and get him.”
    “The man must be made to answer for his crimes,
Gavin,” John said, his voice short. “Blood, sweat and tears we shed to stop him
the first time, we canna just let him go.”
    “Aye, but I find myself wondering if it’s worth
it, or if he’s made such a laughingstock of himself that his own shame is good
enough.”
    John clicked his teeth and Lynne scowled.
    “You canna be serious, Gavin Macgregor,” she said.
“I can see in your eyes that you’re longing for your lady love, but just wait a
tick. You’ve spent your whole life without her, no?”
    “Aye, I have, but-”
    “You’ve got a hitch in your heart what can only be
filled by Kenna. But you’ve also got a duty. If you’re not willing to fight for
what you know to be right, then who will be? I ask you that.”
    “It’s just...I know you’re right Lynne. I know it
in my bones, in my heart. Being away from her though, it hurts.”
    “My friend,” Rodrigo said, coming close and
gripping Gavin’s shoulder. “Do you know how long I was away from Elena? When
the sheriff hired me?”
    “No, I-”
    “We were married when I was nineteen and she just
past seventeen. There was no...no money, no house, nothing. We barely ate. And
so I went to war. Or I thought it was war, but the Prussians decided not to
fight. So instead I sat, what seemed to be a thousand-thousand miles from her,”
he tilted his head to Elena, “for three years. Then I was with her again for
three months before I answered our friend Sheriff Alan’s call for hired
bodyguards. Three more years, Gavin, passed until I was able to bring
her here, and even then I saw her only on the rare occasions that I had the
good luck to see her.”
    Gavin looked down to see Elena’s hands wrapped so
tightly around her husband’s arm that God himself couldn’t pull them apart, he
imagined.
    “I’m sorry,” he said. “I forgot myself.”
    “It’s not your fault,” Rodrigo said with a smart
smile. “We can’t help our hearts. We can only make sure they don’t get the best
of us, is all.”
    “Yes. Good point. I...suppose I’m going to
Edinburgh, then, to retrieve our catch. I know this isn’t the way you all
expected to hear from me, and I wish it wasn’t so. I wish that the first you
heard from me