Highland Sinner Read Online Free PDF Page A

idiot. It was only good sense, good defense, not to be caught out alone again. He could not allow his enemy to catch him again. Next time he might not be so lucky as to wake up and slip away before someone caught him lying next to a dead woman.
    He inwardly winced. That sounded callous, a selfish concern only for his own safety. Unfortunately, he had to be that cold despite his possible culpability in the death of Clara and any other woman who may yet follow her to her grave. If he ended up blamed for Clara’s murder or any that may follow, the real killer would slip away unpunished. Tormand was determined to make the man pay for what had been done to Clara and, he prayed, before the beast could do that to any other woman.
    There was also a deep need within him to know why. Tormand knew a lot of that need was because of the guilt he could not shake. He might be able to ease some of it if he learned why this man hated him so much. And, Tormand thought, possibly hated the women he had bedded. Clara’s beauty had been utterly destroyed; even her lovely hair hacked off. There had been anger and hatred behind that attack, yet that made no sense. Sad to say, he could not think of any man, lover or husband, who had revealed any feelings for Clara that were so deep they would cause such an insane rage.
    “Scowling like a stern father willnae change my mind,” said Simon. “Ye are nay a fool, Tormand. Ye ken verra weel the need to ne’er be alone until this madmon is caught and hanged.”
    Yanked free of his thoughts by Simon’s words, Tormand sighed. “Aye, I see the wisdom of it, but that doesnae mean I must like it.”
    “Celibacy willnae kill ye, but this enemy of yours will.”
    “Celibacy?” Tormand had no intention of admitting that he had been celibate for several months, if only because he did not wish to study the reasons why too closely. “ Jesu , I think I might prefer hanging.”
    “Idiot.”
    “Mayhap, but the need for a guard wasnae really why I was scowling. I suddenly thought that, weel, the way Clara was butchered seemed to reveal a fury, a hatred, and I could think of no one who felt so strongly about her. Sad to say. If the plan was to brand me a killer of women, such butchery wasnae really necessary.” When Simon just stared at him for several moments, Tormand actually shifted a little uneasily in his seat. “’Twas just a thought.”
    “A good thought. One that I should have had myself.” Simon muttered a curse. “Aye, there was fury and hatred in that butchery, one that was aimed directly at all that made Clara beautiful and desirable.”
    “It could still have been torture to gain information,” said Walter, although his expression revealed his own doubts about that.
    Simon nodded. “It could be, but, truly, Clara would have told him, or them, anything about anyone at the first touch of the knife. Everything she knew would have tumbled from her lips after one lock of her hair was cut off. Clara was vain beyond words. Her beauty was all to her. And, I still believe she was gagged through it all, which just strengthens my belief that this was not done to get information.”
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    “So we still have nothing.” Tormand stared into his empty tankard and resisted the urge to fill it up again.
    “Nay, we have a murder that someone was determined to blame on you,” Simon replied. “That appears to point toward some enemy of yours nay matter how often I study it.”
    “Could it not also point to some enemy of Ranald’s? What could be more humiliating to a mon than to have it so publicly seen that his wife was bedded and then slaughtered in their marriage bed?”
    “Clara was too weel kenned as a whore for that to matter. Aye, and Ranald’s mistress is weel kenned.
    Nay, all were aware that neither wife nor husband honored their vows in that marriage.” Simon stood up.
    “Are ye coming with me to see if we