The Wolf and the Highlander (Highland Wishes) by Jessi Gage Read Free Book Online Page A

sense of it. ’Twas no more than a lilting rumble of meaningless syllables.
    She sat up, clutching the skins around her. “I must be half asleep. Could you say it again?”
    He spoke again, this time more urgently, and it made as little sense as what he’d said a moment ago. He kept trying to tell her things, and she kept not understanding.
    They stared at each other. Outside one of the windows, a pair of squirrels chattered, having a meaningful conversation while she and Riggs stared at each other with furrowed brows.
    Before her nap, they’d understood each other perfectly. Now, it seemed, they spoke different languages. What had changed?
    Riggs looked all around the cabin, as if he’d had a similar thought. His gaze landed on the fire dancing happily in the grate. His eyes widened with alarm.
    Muttering unintelligible things, he dashed to the hearth and grabbed a set of tongs. A quick reach into the flames produced somat that looked like charred fabric. The blackened heap dropped to the hearth. Riggs poked through it with the tongs, then with his fingers as the fabric cooled. Odd, some bits were faded blue, like her overdress. And a scrap of sooty linen looked suspiciously like her linen shift.
    She searched the hearth for the bundle of clothing he’d instructed her to leave there, finding nothing but the flask and flint box she never traveled without. Och, he didn’t. He wouldn’t.
    “You burned my dress!” She threw off the skins and hoisted herself out of bed. Her legs cramped. Cursing them, she fell back on the furs.
    Using the tongs, Riggs plunked something he’d pulled from the fabric into a bucket of water , which emitted a hiss. After a moment, he reached into the water and withdrew the object. His large hand obscured her view, so she couldn’t identify it. Whatever ’twas, it caused a look of wonder to pass over his face.
    “What is it?” Her voice sounded angry, betraying the pain she was trying to ease with her kneading hands. Damn her legs.
    Riggs met her eyes, then looked down to her massaging hands. His gaze darkened. “Let me,” he said, and she understood him.
    He knelt by the bed, took one of her hands, and placed in it the amethyst gem Gravois had given her. It was hot as a cake from the oven. She rolled it between her fingers so no one bit of her skin got burned. It must magically allow people of different tongues to understand each other.
    “That barmy tink.”
    “What’s a barmy tink?”
    She became aware of Riggs’s strong fingers kneading her most painful spot, below her left knee. He was touching her beneath the nightshirt. Learning how deformed she was.
    She swatted his hand away and tucked the shirt tight around her legs. “You vowed you wouldna touch me.”
    Hurt flashed in his eyes. He hid it by rising with a grunt and turning away.
    She remembered his tusk wound, now hidden by fresh trews, and regretted her harsh words. He’d only been trying to help, not taking liberties as he had before. Though to be fair, she’d been the one to bring that jar close to her breasts, kenning full well his hand had still been holding it.
    “A barmy tink is an interfering, mysterious man who gives magical stones to maidens in distress and fills their heads with foolish talk of destinies. I’m sorry. You were only trying to help. But I doona like my legs being touched.”
    He inclined his head in a nod, not looking at her. His face was in profile. He had a strong nose, straight and masculine in its broadness. Firelight danced over his beard, making it shine like the richest sable. Saints above, he was an attractive man.
    “My apologies, ” he said.
    “Best you keep to your word and no’ touch me at all.”
    “Of course, lady.”
    “And cease calling me lady.”
    His eyes glinted at that. It seemed there was one command he didn’t intend to obey.
     
    * * * *
     
    Riggs stoked the fire and glanced at Anya over his shoulder. She sat on his pallet, pale and small in his shirt. She’d