The Highlander's Forbidden Bride Read Online Free PDF

the odd angle of his head when he had fallen asleep. With barely any sleep last night, he should have known he would doze off, but he supposed he had dozed feeling safer that he sat right outside her door.
    Then he realized what had woken him, and shaking his cloak, now covered with more than a dusting of snow, he stood and scooped up thepuppy, who had returned to scratch at the cottage door.
    “Why bother when she’s not interested,” he asked the little pup, and got a lick on the nose.
    “Damn,” he said, suddenly realizing his foolish mistake, and plopped the pup on the ground. Then, without knocking, he opened the door and rushed in.
    The pup scurried past him and into the outstretched arms of the woman who bent down to scoop him up.
    “Where is she?” he asked the woman who was basically around the same size as Carissa.
    “I do not know,” she said pleasantly.
    Ronan turned and stormed out of the cottage. There was only one person who would know the truth. He headed with angry strides to Bethane’s cottage.
    The door opened before he touched the handle.
    “I was just coming to see if you would care to join me for the noon meal,” Bethane said with her usual glowing smile.
    “Where is she?” he demanded, wanting answers not pleasantries.
    “Come in out of the cold. You need some warmth and nourishment.” She stepped aside for him to enter.
    Her words held wisdom, since he realized he had slept far longer than he had thought, and his empty stomach was reacting to the delicious scents drifting from her cottage. Reluctantly, he entered.
    “Eat, and we will talk,” Bethane offered as she slipped his cloak off his shoulders and draped it over the back of the rocking chair near the hearth.
    Ronan didn’t argue. One thing he had learned during his capture was that when food was offered, you should eat, for you never knew when next you would.
    Ronan broke off a chunk of dark bread while Bethane ladled a good portion of meat-and-barley stew into a bowl, then placed it in front of him. She filled a bowl for herself from the cauldron in the hearth and joined him at the table.
    “You tricked me,” he said, pouring himself a tankard of hot cider from the pitcher on the table.
    “I did nothing.”
    Ronan ate another spoonful before responding. “You helped her.”
    “Everyone helps each other here. I thought you realized that.”
    “If they knew her as I do, they would shun her,” he said angrily.
    “Most came here because they have been shunned.”
    “You defend her?” Ronan asked, anger still edging his voice.
    “I defend all who seek help and healing.”
    “Healing?” he asked incredulously. “Carissa inflicts pain and feels none herself. She is cold and heartless and deserves not an ounce of sympathy. And if she thinks she can escape me, she’s wrong. I will find her.”
    “I have no doubt you will.”
    Ronan shook his head. “Then why bother to help her?”
    “I cannot, nor would I, stop people from traveling their own paths. I did not stop you when last you were here.”
    “I had to leave,” he insisted.
    “You were not yet healed.”
    “I had no choice.”
    “I believe Carissa felt the same,” Bethane said.
    “You cannot compare us,” he argued. “I left to save a life. She left to save her own. And the longer I debate this with you, the greater distance she puts from me.”
    “Then you will be leaving?”
    “After I gather the provisions I will need,” he said.
    “Take whatever you need, but be aware that a severe winter storm approaches, and you will need shelter.”
    “I would hope to find Carissa before then, but if not…there is that cottage the mercenary brought me to when first you tended me.”
    Bethane nodded with a smile. “And it remains stocked with provisions, but what if Carissa isn’t traveling in that direction.”
    “She would not return from where she came, there is no help for her there; therefore, she would seek a new route to take, and that path would