Free To Love a Highlander by Sue-Ellen Welfonder Page A

doorway to the kitchen and then the fire burning low in the grate.
    Roag leaned back in his chair, lifting his arms to hook his fingers behind his neck. “Lady Mirabelle scorched you once years ago.” The humor left his face, the flicker of sympathy in his eyes annoying Sorley more than his devilry. “Dinnae let a second mistake turn into something that will fry you to a crisp. That lass—”
    “What mistake?” Sorley’s tone was his lowest, his most deadly.
    Unimpressed, Roag raised his arms over his head and cracked his knuckles. “Allowing her into your bedchamber, that’s what. A fool would know you thought she’d leap into your embrace, now that all the court ladies adore you.” Helowered his arms and shook his head. “A shame; from the way she left so soon, it was clear she wanted none of you.
    “Now if she’d been with me…” He let the words tail off, his levity returning. “I’d have shown her—”
    “Hold your tongue is what you’ll do.” Sorley was on him in a beat, leaning across the table, his hands braced on the well-scrubbed surface. “Dinnae push me too far,” he warned. “Have done with such prattle and tell me why you’re following me about. And speak plain. I can see your lies at a hundred paces. This close, they’re as conspicuous as a three-eyed troll.”
    “You wound me.” Roag clapped a hand to his heart.
    “Nae, I ken you.”
    Before Roag could respond, a deep voice boomed behind them, “And I ken there’s a fine north wind blowing this morn.”
    On hearing the secret Fenris greeting, both men turned to see William Wyldes striding toward them, carrying two brimming cups of ale.
    “Is there indeed?” Sorley lifted a brow when the innkeeper stopped before the table.
    “Aye, and it’ll worsen before the day is o’er,” Wyldes gave the required answer, letting Sorley and Roag know they could speak freely, the inn hiding no one with peeled ears and, worse, a flapping tongue.
    “I also ken, as should you, that I dinnae allow fighting in my public room.” The innkeeper plunked down the ale cups and then planted his hands on his hips. A big man, he equaled Sorley and Roag in height and muscle, but had a shock of unruly auburn hair that he wore tied back at his nape. His beard was just as bushy and wild, and he had light blue eyes that always smiled. And although he kept the Red Lion ruckus-free, there was no man better to have at your side in a fight.
    Just now he looked Sorley and Roag up and down. “You ken the rules,” he reminded them. “No brawling. Unless”—he winked—“it’s a fight I start myself.”
    “Understood.” Sorley clapped him on the shoulder and then pulled back a chair, reaching for one of the ale cups after he took a seat. “I’ll just call on our long friendship and ask you to take a swing at this bastard.” He turned a significant look on Roag. “I’ll do the rest.”
    “Try and you’ll meet the cutting edge of my sword.” Roag tossed back his ale and slapped the empty cup on the table. “The blade already has your name on it.”
    “As mine carries yours.” Sorley glared at him.
    Wyldes laughed. “Someday the two of you will kill each other. When it happens”—he grabbed an ale jug from another table and refilled Roag’s cup—“I’ll be filling my purse taking wagers, not jumping into the fray. If I did that, I’d be obliged to have done with both of you and then wouldn’t the King be after me?”
    “True enough.” Sorley took a healthy gulp of his own ale, secretly annoyed that Roag also held a place in the King’s graces. “Though I cannae believe our good Robert set Roag on my tail this morn.
    “He has other reasons for making a nuisance of himself.” Sorley glanced at him, sure of it. “He thinks I’m hoping to bed a gently bred lady.”
    “Are you?” Wyldes looked amused. “I’d no’ bet on it.”
    “Rightly so.” Sorley lifted his cup in salute. “Here’s to a man who kens me well.”
    “Let’s