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Grandma’s pub back home wasn’t so different, though it had better ventilation and lighting. There as well as here, conversations dipped whenever the door opened, then climbed again once the newcomer had been identified, while the women exchanged news over their mending without missing who’d been drinking or gambling too much.

Jamie moved beside her and touched the back of her arm, heat from his touch soaking through her gown to her skin, just long enough to guide her around a bench jutting into the narrow aisle.

“Mind your skirts, lass. Ye’re about to take out that man’s ale.”

“I am minding them.” Olivia caught the blue wool just before it swept a cup from a stool, then glanced back to see him grinning. “Not one word.”

Jamie laughed and steered her toward a table near the hearth, but they hadn’t gone three steps before someone called his name from the far end of the room.

Finlay sat with two of the men Olivia recognized from the still, their coats hung near the fire and there was an impressive collection of empty plates and cups between them. Alasdair was there too, looking as though he’d been dragged out against his better judgment. Finlay lifted his cup in greeting.

“Jamie, bring the lass over when Mairi’s finished feeding ye. We want to hear the tale about how Alasdair was wrong about the water.”

“Leave the lass out of it,” Alasdair grumbled. “I’m perfectly satisfied with my own opinion.”

“That’s the trouble with your opinions,” Finlay told him. “There’s never room for another.”

Olivia grinned as Jamie shook his head and guided her toward Mairi’s table. The men had returned to their argument before she sat down, which felt encouragingly familiar. Grandma Bennett’s regulars could spend an entire evening arguing about the best way to park outside the pub, even though none of them intended to move his car.

A broad-shouldered woman with red hair was pouring ale from a stoneware jug. Copper curls escaped her linen cap, freckles crossed her cheeks, and flour dusted the forearms she’d bared to the elbow. At her table a woman rocked a sleeping baby while another repaired a torn sleeve, watching Jamie over her needle.

“This is Mairi,” Jamie said as he pulled the end of a bench away from the table so Olivia could sit.

Mairi looked at Olivia, then at Jamie, then back again with the leisurely satisfaction of a woman who senses entertainment. “So this is the Boston widow.”

“Apparently.” Olivia gathered her skirts and sat while Jamie took the space beside her.

“He’s been talking about ye.”

“I have no’,” Jamie protested as Mairi ignored him. “He said your boots were well made, your whisky nose was better than Alasdair’s, and ye made him laugh.”

Olivia turned toward him. “I think you’re rather obsessed with my shoes.”

“The workmanship is remarkable.”

The woman with the mending snorted.

Mairi pushed a platter of bread, cheese, smoked fish, and pickled onions toward Olivia. “Have a bite while supper finishes cooking. Morag will have my hide if she hears I let ye sit hungry.”

Not needing to be told twice, Olivia dug in. “Does Morag supervise every meal in the glen?”

“Only the ones she’s no’ eating.”

Jamie settled beside her with the ease of a man who belonged here. An older man slapped his shoulder on the way to the hearth, and a boy stole a slice of cheese from his plate. Jamie caught him by the back of his coat, reclaimed half, then released him with the rest. Nobody treated Jamie as anyone particularly important, yet half the room seemed happy he’d arrived.

As the room grew busier, Olivia slipped into the habits she’d learned at Grandma Bennett’s bar.

She noticed which tables wanted another jug, who was arguing for the pleasure of it, and which men were beginning to take offense where none had been intended. The regulars were easy enough to spot. Two strangers near the door were another matter, both wearing travel-stained coats and watching the room with the proprietary air of men who’d paid for ale and expected the establishment to belong to them until they finished it.

Mairi brought out supper on wooden plates, a generous helping of mutton with onions and mashed turnips, along with ale. Olivia had just broken a piece of bread to mop up the gravy when the taller stranger came toward their table, his companion a step behind.

He addressed Jamie first, speaking Gaelic, with a smile that made her think of the men Grandma used to escort out the door before they could convince themselves they’d been wronged. Jamie answered pleasantly enough, but his green eyes had gone dark. Finlay stopped talking at the other end of the room, and Alasdair turned on his bench.

The stranger glanced at Olivia and said something else in Gaelic. Several nearby conversations faltered. A woman with a baby looked down at her lap, while Mairi set the ale jug on the table rather more firmly than necessary.

Olivia looked from one face to another. “Was that about me?”

“Aye,” Jamie said. His voice had lost its usual easy warmth.