John Henry Frasier grinned when his wife bent to kiss his cheek, and then continued counting the coins stacked in his palm. “Thirty-three…” His thick, gray brows drew together in a moment of forgetfulness. “Or was that thirty-four?”

“Twenty-nine,” his wife called over her shoulder, untying her apron behind her back as she left him.

“Twenty-nine?” He shook his head and drew out a long sigh. “’Twas another slow day in the tavern.”

“I know, but soon the festivities in England will be over and our patrons will return.”

He glanced up from his small bundle and smiled at his wife’s generous rump swaying beneath her skirts while she climbed the stairs to their rooms above the small tavern. What would he do without his Millie, always reminding him of brighter things?

“Come to bed now, John. ’Tis late.”

“In a moment, my love. Let me wallow in my poverty.”

She laughed from the second landing, setting his poor memory to ruin once again. “You never wallow, John. Don’t forget to lock up,” she added, disappearing around a corner.

“Aye. Now where was I?” He plucked a coin up in his beefy fingers and gave it a thoughtful look. “Thirty-four, thirty…” He stopped counting when a gust of cool night air swept his silver hair over his forehead.

“My apologies,” he said, turning in his chair toward the door. “We are closed.”

The figure framing the doorway sent an even icier chill down his spine. The patron made no motion to suggest he heard John’s words, but slowly stepped aside to allow four men behind him to enter.

John stood up and shoved his coins into the pocket of his apron. “I’ve only a few coin if you mean to rob me.”

A low chuckle came from the doorway as the figure stepped into the soft light of the tavern. John narrowed his eyes, getting a better look at the man. He wore breeches and a coat that hung well past his knees. A wide-brimmed hat shadowed half his face, but his eyes flickered a pale gray in the firelight.

“Do I look like a thief, old man?” The voice rumbled from someplace deep within his wide chest. “My comrades and I have been on the road for many days and we could use some strong ale to heat our blood.”

John eyed the other four cautiously, hoping the man spoke true, for they were all too big to fight off, even with the heavy stick he kept propped in the corner.

The jingle of coins coming from the doorway drew his attention. The man held up a small pouch and shook it again before he tossed it to John. “Five cups of your best ale. Or better yet, make it whisky. I’ve always wanted to taste what is claimed to be the finest brew in the three kingdoms.” He sauntered into the tavern, his coattails swaying around his boots. When he reached John, his lips curled into a thin smile. “That is, unless you refuse to take my gold?”

“Gold?” John’s eyes widened, as did his grin. “Why, I wouldn’t dream of sending thirsty men away. Have a seat. Have a seat.” He gestured to all of them, even pulling out a chair himself. “I have just the thing for good gentlemen such as yourselves, brewed it myself.” He swept his fingers through his thinning hair and smoothed the wrinkles from his apron. “Make yourselves at home while I fetch your drinks.”

What good fortune! Oh, wait until Millie heard of this. He kissed the pouch and shoved it into his pocket with the rest of his coins. Gold! He stopped suddenly on his way to the cellar, plucked the pouch back out, untied it and looked inside, then closed his eyes and kissed the thin leather again.

He returned to his generous patrons a short time later and set down a tray carrying five cups and a dark brown bottle of his very best whisky on the table before them. “Prepare to have your palates enchanted, gentlemen,” he said, pouring their drinks.

He watched, smiling from one ear to the other while the man who paid him removed his hat and raised his cup to his friends.

“To the Prince.”

“You mean the King, aye?” John asked, still grinning.

“No, I mean the Prince.” The man brought the cup to his lips. He took a sip, then looked up at John. “You speak the truth, Tavernier, I’ve never tasted anything so fine.”

John couldn’t be happier and bowed his thanks, listening to the soft jingle coming from his pocket. “There is plenty more.”

“This will suffice.”

John cast his eyes around the table at the others. They remained silent and stoic and none of them looked at him. Tucking the tray under his arm, he scratched his temple. “You’re not from here.”

Those cool gray eyes slid to him. “Why do you say that?”

“Your speech, it has a peculiar sound to it. Like nothing I’ve heard before.”

“Tell me, old man.” The patron set down his cup and turned to look directly at him. “Has a lady stopped here seeking food or shelter? She is my master’s wife and has fled without a trace. She might have been alone. Perhaps donned in a nun’s robes?”

“A nun? Traveling alone?” John chuckled softly and rested his hand on his belly, then stopped and quirked his brow. “I saw no nun, but I did see horsemen. I didn’t think anything about it at the time, men have been riding toward England for the past fortnight, but now that you mention a nun…”

“Yes?” The patron set down his drink slowly and narrowed his eyes on John.

“Well, the horsemen were riding the other way, toward the Abbey.”

The stranger rose to his feet and swooped toward him like a hawk that had just spotted its prey. “Abbey? Where?”

John mopped his forehead with his sweaty palm. Something about the stranger had gone so terribly cold and threatening. Even the air seemed to pulse with foreboding around him. “Old Courlochcraig in Ayrshire,” John said and darted his eyes toward the stairs. No need to fear, he reassured himself. He’d dealt with mercenaries before. He would serve them, tell them what they wanted, if he could, and then see them out the door.

The patron moved closer; his genial smile returned.

“You’ve been most helpful,” he said and turned to one of his men. “Maarten, ride south and collect the rest of my men who left us at our last stop. Tell them their search is over and bring them with you to Ayrshire. I will meet you there.”

John was about to let himself breathe again when the patron stopped and set his gaze upward.

“Are there rooms above stairs?”

“Only mine, and I’m afraid I’m quite weary. If you wouldn’t mind finishing your…”

“You would not be untruthful to me, would you, my friend?” The patron slipped his arm around John’s shoulder. His breath sluiced warm down John’s neck. “Not after I paid you so handsomely.”

“Of course not.”

“Who is in the room?”

“Only… only my wife, Millie, good sir.”

“I believe you,” the patron said gently against his ear.

John did not see the flash of the dagger that sank into his belly, but he felt it. His mouth opened when he looked down at the blood soaking through his apron and his gold spilling to the freshly swept floor. He wanted to scream. He thought he did. The patron was still close, watching him as John’s last gurgled breath left his body.

Admiral Gilles yanked his dagger from the Tavernier’s stomach and set his eyes on the stairs as the old man crumpled in a heap at his feet. Pushing the body away with his boot, he ordered Hendrick to collect his gold and wait for him with the others outside while he searched the room above.

“Millie?” he called, turning the hilt of his dagger around in his fingers. “Are you alone?”

“I don’t think she understands the propensity for evil running through Gilles’s veins.”

Asher stood with Rob and Colin by the banks of Loch Awe just south of Kildun Castle. Despite the laughter coming from the water’s edge, or, it would seem, because of it, the captain raked his fingers through his hair.

Rob couldn’t keep himself from smiling when Davina, crouched beside Finn while they washed their hands, splashed the lad in the face instead. She had changed much since he’d plucked her from the flames. In fact, it seemed the farther away they rode from England, the better her moods became, and his, as well. Her prayers were filled with thanks and every day her laughter rang out like music filling the meadows and glens as they rode through them. Rob loved the sound of it and the way it made her eyes dance. He would have liked to be the cause of her joy, but he had trouble giving himself over to meaningless pleasures like chasing grouse or hiding behind trees while she tried to find him. He wondered if her heart had been this light at St. Christopher’s and if she had enchanted Asher’s men with her graceful movements and the tinkling melody of her mirth the way she did with his. She seemed most alive, though, when she talked about the new king and his determination to stand for what he believed in—a topic Colin, at least, never grew weary of discussing with her late every night when they thought everyone else was asleep. Still, there were times when she spoke to no one, withdrawing into herself to a place that still haunted her eyes. “She understands evil well enough, Asher,” Rob told the captain without severing his gaze from Davina. “I think she still dreams of the massacre at St. Christopher’s.”

“No, she is forgetting. She doesn’t know him.”

“And ye do?” Rob asked, turning to him. He almost wished Asher had remained uninterested in him. The man fretted like a woman with a dozen bairns and no way to feed them. And for some reason, which Rob suspected had to do with Asher making Davina happy, he was trying his hardest to make friends with Rob.

“I know enough,” Edward said. “The man is called ‘de Duivel,’ for mercy’s sake.”

“My faither was called the same thing fer many years. Now there’s a man ye should fear.”

“Bloody right,” Colin agreed, then shouted to Davina. “Look out behind ye!”

She screamed with laughter when Will, sneaking up behind her, snatched her up in his arms and held her over the water.

“I swear on my sword I’m goin’ to beat him senseless one of these days,” Rob growled, halfheartedly.

“A single strike ought to do it.” Colin smirked and winked at him before he too was lured away by the laughter coming from the loch.

“By the way”—Edward cast his anxious gaze around the sparse tree line behind them—“you are aware that we’re on Campbell land, are you not? They don’t take kindly to Highlanders.”

Rob ground his jaw and prayed for patience. “My mother is a Campbell, dinna’ fear. We will be safe here tonight.”

But the captain wasn’t listening. “God protect us,” he muttered, looking suitably horrified at Colin tackling Finn. “I fear this noise will alert the dead.”

Rob was about to turn and ask him how in bloody hell he had attained the rank of captain when he feared a man so much that the sound of laughter could make him tremble in his boots, but Davina broke away from her captor and came rushing toward him, capturing his attention instead.

Instinctively, Rob opened his arms to her, pleased that she sought protection from him rather than Asher. He caught her up in one arm and with the other stretched out before him, palm open, stopped Will, who had been in hot pursuit, dead in his tracks. His cousin went down like a felled tree, clutching his nose, blood already seeping through his fingers.

Immediately, Rob bent to help him. He hadn’t meant to hit him in the face, but Will ran straight into his hand. “Och, hell, is it broken?” he asked as he hauled his cousin to his feet.

Still clamped in his other arm, Davina wriggled to be free then gave his chest a firm slap. “How could you do that to him?”

Rob angled his head at her, surprised by the flash of anger in her blue eyes.

“He was only having some sport with me!”

If she was trying to make him feel worse than he already did, she should have said anything but that.

She shoved his arm off her and went directly to Will. “Oh, you poor thing,” she cooed like a wife whose husband had just returned from battle. “Sit back down and keep your head tilted forward.”

Rob rolled his eyes heavenward. Hell, ’twas just a bloody nose. Will had received worse than that training with him. When he looked at Davina again, she was glaring at him. Her cheeks were flushed, her nostrils flared, and her damp hair fell in wild disarray around her shoulders. Hell, she was bonnie.

“What is the matter with you?” she charged. “All you do is frown at everyone. You never just enjoy yourself. Why, you’re no fun at all!”

Before he could reply, she whirled on her heel, fanning her long tresses in a wide arc around her, and stormed off to the water’s edge.

He followed her, determined to set her straight. There were many things he enjoyed, like working up a good sweat on the practice field, and raiding, and playing chess. He liked playing chess.

“Davina, I—”

“What happened to Will?” Finn disengaged himself from Colin and stared at the man milking his wound like a lass.

“Robert punched him in the face for chasing the lady,” Edward informed him.

Rob glowered at him over his shoulder. “I didna’ punch him, and why the hell are ye right behind me?”

“Of course, now he’s going to bite off Edward’s head,” Davina practically hissed while she soaked some reeds in the water.

“Mayhap our rogue cousin will have more sense now, aye, brother?”

Rob met Colin’s knowing gaze and then closed his eyes. He knew how it looked. He didn’t like Will or Asher giving Davina so much attention, but it didn’t mean he wished his best friend harm. Or did he? What the hell was happening to him? Davina was to blame, of course; his wee fairy goddess who enchanted all the men around her. He moved aside when she shoved past him on her way back to Will.

“I think ye should—”

“Shut up, Finn,” Rob said, and set off after her again. When he reached her, he waited while she wiped Will’s face with the wet reeds, patient even when his cousin slipped him a furtive smile from the corner of his mouth. Rob wouldn’t be baited.

“Poor Will,” Davina soothed, giving Will’s nose a thorough looking over. “I do not think it’s broken.”

“’Twouldn’t be the first time if it was.” Rob only meant to ease her worry. He realized too late that it was a mistake.

“By your hand?” Davina straightened, wiping her hands on her gown, and gaped at him.

“Nae, not by me. I… I only meant…” Rob clenched his jaw. Why in blazes was he stumbling over his words? He could admit when he was wrong—though such occasions rarely arose. Mostly because he never acted rashly. He was usually patient, deliberate, never truly letting anything disturb his calm. But that had all changed since he’d met Davina. He could blame his brooding disposition of late on a dozen things, but he knew she was the cause. He wanted her. Despite the danger she might or might not bring to his clan, despite her promises to God, he wanted her, and not being able to have her was winding him up tighter than a bowstring. He barely recognized himself and he didn’t like it. He looked down at his cousin. “I didna’ mean to strike ye,” he said, trying to make amends.

Still clutching his nose, Will—who’d faced his share of sword-swinging Highlanders bent on cutting off a limb, expelled a withering sigh. “’Tis understandable, cousin. I know how ye frown upon games.” He finally let go of his nose and rose, as good as new, to his feet. “But mayhap with her, ’tis more than that, aye?” He winked and strolled off with a victorious grin on his face.

Rob fought the urge to fling his cousin into Loch Awe.

“You frown upon games?” Davina looked more stricken than when Will’s face crunched under his hand. “And why would it be more than that with me? Is it my happiness that makes you angry, Rob?”

Och, hell, he didn’t want her to think that. He reached for her hand to stop her when she moved to walk away from him. “Davina, I…” He looked up and scowled at finding Asher and Finn standing close by, watching and listening to what he had to say. “I wish to speak to ye. Alone.” He held out his arm to stop the captain when he moved toward them. Asher skidded to a halt, careful not to make contact with Rob’s palm.

“Stay here.” Rob softened the edge in his voice, sympathetic, though he hated to admit it, to what drove the captain to follow her, for he was just as pitiful. “She’ll be safe with me.”

Edward cut Davina a hesitant look, and then nodded and watched in silence while Rob lifted her to his saddle, leaped up behind her, then trotted off toward the woods beyond the campsite.