Page 76 of A Scot on the Rocks

Olivia kept her attention on a table of onions. “They’re watching the carts.”

Jamie didn’t react. “Aye.”

“The tall one checks every loaded one coming from the south. The other watches people leaving and taking the upper road.”

That earned the smallest turn of his head, and Olivia continued studying onions as though nothing more interesting existed in Scotland.

“The short one has been holding the same handful of barley for nearly a minute and hasn’t looked at it once.”

Jamie coughed into his fist.

She looked at him. “Are you laughing?”

“I’m appreciating the useful education provided by Boston public houses.”

The taller man turned slightly, and Jamie picked up an onion. Olivia followed his lead and took another while the merchant at the stall looked between them.

“Three for a penny.”

Jamie nodded as though this had been their destination all along.

Olivia lowered her voice. “Don’t look toward the upper road again.”

His hand paused over the onions. “I wasna.”

“You were about to.”

Jamie selected another onion. “Was I?”

“You keep checking the places you don’t want other people to notice.”

The man behind the stall was now watching them with increasing interest, so Olivia smiled brightly at him. “These are lovely onions. We’ll take six.” Jamie dug two pennies from Morag’s market money and paid before the merchant could wonder why they’d spent so long discussing vegetables.

They walked away, Jamie waiting until a cart rattled between them and the suspicious men before speaking.

“We didna need onions.”

“We needed a reason to stand there.”

“We had a reason. The onions.”

His mouth twitched, and Olivia kept walking. “If they were watching you, leaving immediately after noticing them would have been obvious.”

A girl of perhaps eight came running from between two stalls before they could leave the square entirely and caught Jamie by the sleeve. “Morag asks if ye remembered the thread.”

Jamie closed his eyes briefly. “I did.”

The girl held out her hand.

He looked into the basket, shifted the bread, herbs, salt, ribbon, carved cup, unnecessary onions, and finally found the small packet of thread tucked at the very bottom. The girl accepted it gravely along with the rest of the items she tucked into her little basket. Much to Olivia’s amusement, the kid skipped through the lane, braids flying behind her.

They left the busiest part of the village and started uphill toward Dunarraidh, the market noise gradually giving way to wind, sheep, and the creak of the basket handle against Jamie’s arm. A fine mist had begun again, soft enough that Olivia didn’t bother raising her hood.

For a while she concentrated on managing her skirts around the worst patches of mud, though her thoughts remained behind in the market with the young carver, the cooper, the baker asking about her husband, and the herb seller giving her thyme for grief.

Jamie glanced toward her. “Ye’ve gone quiet.”

Olivia stepped over a rut and gathered the skirt higher before letting it fall again. “Everyone knows everyone else’s business. They knew all about me before I even set foot in the market.”