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Daume looked at her, dubious, and for a split second, Andrew thought Daume might just be dense enough to accept her lame explanation.

Still, he knew he had to do something before it all tumbled down on them, so he decided to take action.

He stormed over to Josephine, bent down in front of her, and tossed her up over one broad shoulder like a sack of grain.

“She comes with me,” he said angrily. “No wench is going to bite me and get away with it. And I’ll only pay one hundred marks for her. She’s not worth anything more.”

Daume found his wits and his mouth. “Two hundred marks!” he roared. “No less!”

Andrew could sense a fight coming. He looked at Thane and knew the man was ready; he could see it in Thane’s body language.

The two men were quite a bit larger than the gypsies, but the man-to-man comparison was at least seven to one.

If Sully came on cue, then the ratio would be cut in half.

But his primary concern was getting Josephine to safety before any blows were dealt.

He motioned to Thane, who was at his side quickly.

With a bit more care, he handed Josephine to his second.

“To the woods,” he growled.

Thane understood. Andrew meant get her the hell out of here before she got caught in the middle of a fight. As Thane moved quickly away from the growing hostility, Andrew squared off with the short, fat gypsy. He smiled threateningly.

“The whore goes with me either way,” he said in a tone that made the hair on Daume’s neck stand on end. “One hundred marks or nothing. The choice is yours.”

Daume’s face flushed. “How dare you steal from me?” he sputtered. “I graciously open my camp to you, give you food and drink, and you have the gall to steal from me! I ought to cut your heart out!”

Andrew’s smile faded and he glared at the man. It didn’t take long before some fool made the first move, so Andrew flew into action. He caught the man square in the face with a backhanded fist, sending him sprawling. After that, the whole camp was moving in on Andrew.

Just inside the edge of the trees, Thane deposited Josephine with Sully, who quickly cut off her leather bindings. Thane barely had time to look back over the clearing just to see Andrew throw the first blow.

“Damnation!”

Thane took off at a dead run, heading back into the clearing to help Andrew. Sully forgot about Josephine for the moment, looking to see where Thane was heading in such a hurry.

“God Bones…” he muttered.

Now, Sully went barreling after Thane, rushing out to help Andrew fight off men who were clearly trying to kill him.

Still in the thicket, Josephine pulled way the leather bindings and rubbed her wrists as she stood up, watching Andrew, Thane, and Sully in a vicious fight with several gypsies and feeling a good deal of concern for their safety.

They’d come to save her, but at what cost?

Three of them against the entire camp? They risked themselves to rescue her.

She couldn’t let one or more of them come to harm.

She had to help them.

Josephine knew how to fight. She wasn’t a weak female, by any means.

Quickly, she looked around for a weapon and her gaze came to rest on a small log on the floor of the forest, right at her feet.

It had broken branches at the top of it, like spikes, and she picked it up without hesitation.

Wielding it with two hands, she charged back into the clearing.

She was going to kill those slimy sons-of-whores for laying a hand on her and then she was going to find that little bitch and retrieve her mother’s necklace.

There was vengeance in her heart this day.

As Josephine entered the clearing with the wood held high, she never gave a second thought to her own well-being. All she could think of was Andrew, Sully, and Thane, and the fight they were facing because of her.

Quickly, she engaged one man and one woman, people who charged at her.

But she faked them both out, turning one way but swinging another, just as Sully had taught her.

She brought the log down on the man’s skull, quickly disabling him, while she used the same motion to slam the woman in the face.

As the woman ran off screaming, Josephine began swinging her club in a frenzy.

It was a nasty fight from the beginning, unfortunate because neither Andrew nor Sully realized Josephine had entered the fray.

In fact, Andrew had his own problems at the moment; a screeching woman hung on his neck as he traded blows with a big, hairy man.

The man, due to Andrew’s human cargo, was able to land a good blow to Andrew’s ribs, but as he closed in for a more devastating blow, Andrew turned around and thrust the woman on him as he pried her arms from his neck.

Kicking and yelling, the two went down in a pile and Andrew moved on.

He was turning to see what had become of Sully and Thane when a man jumped out at him, but Andrew threw a punch that sent the man to the ground.

As he pushed his way through the writhing crowd, he was growing amused.

The gypsies, for some reason, were fighting each other more than they were fighting the enemy.

Apparently, the excitement of a fight was all they needed.

It was bedlam.

But his humor vanished when he caught sight of a purple dress.

Josephine was swinging her log at men’s heads, pounding those who came too close to her, and Andrew felt a surge of panic at the sight.

God’s Bones, she was in the middle of this fray!

But even as he began pushing people out of the way on his quest to get to her, he came to realize that this was no ordinary woman in a fight.

He knew she’d wielded a sword for Torridon but that didn’t have an impact on him until this moment.

She was fearless in her fight. He could see that in an instant. Her bravery was beyond compare. What was it he’d told her? That she no longer had to protect her fortress? He could see now that it had been a mistake for him to say that. Clearly, she was at home in a fight.

His respect, and his attraction, grew.

Oblivious to the fact that Andrew had her in his sights, Josephine was beating the brains out of a man until someone grabbed her club.

Furious, and frightened, she looked up to see that Andrew had a hold of it.

He was fixed on her, but before he could say a word, two men rushing at him from the crowd.

Josephine saw them coming.

“Andrew!” she cried. “Behind you!”

Instinctively, Andrew’s fists balled up and he swung to his right, catching one man in the stomach as the other man managed to hook an arm around Andrew’s neck and pull him to the ground. While the first man lay gasping in the dirt, Andrew wrestled with the other man, trying to dislodge him.

The gypsy was furiously throwing his fists about and Andrew was doing no more than fending him off, trying not to get hit in the face. Weary of grappling with the man, Andrew brought up a knee and caught the man in the crotch. With a scream, the man rolled off.

Staggering to his feet, Andrew went to Josephine, who still stood grasping the log with white knuckles. He grabbed her firmly by the upper arms.

“What are you doing here?” he demanded. “You were to stay out of sight!”

“I came to help!” she said breathlessly. “You three were grossly outnumbered!”

Andrew caught movement in the forest and looked up. A look of satisfaction crossed his face.

“Not anymore,” he said flatly. “Help has arrived.”

Josephine turned around, seeing her men spilling out through the trees towards them.

She let out a sigh of relief and turned back to Andrew, but several feet to her right, she could see Sully pounding the hell out of the burly gypsy.

The man had sense enough to roll away from Sully’s merciless fists but when he came around again, he was grasping a wicked-looking dagger.

“Nay!” she breathed, and broke away from Andrew. “Sully, watch out! ”

Andrew reached out to grab her, but she was fast on her feet and halfway to Sully by the time Andrew started after her. But she was too late; Sully took the dagger in his upper arm and Josephine screamed, dropping the log and rushing for him as he stumbled backwards.

Andrew intercepted the gypsy before he could move on Sully again.

His rock-like fist caught the gypsy in the jaw and the man’s head snapped sideways, but he didn’t go down.

Andrew’s other fist pummeled him again and the man’s head jerked in the opposite direction, with blood and spit flying everywhere.

Still, he did not go down, but he was weaving dangerously.

With the final blow, Andrew brought up a huge booted leg and kicked the man right in his soft belly.

He went down like a stone.

Andrew ripped the dagger from the man’s hand and tossed it away, far away, before turning to Josephine and Sully. Sully was on his feet, watching the approach of the Torridon army as Josephine wrapped his bleeding arm with a strip of purple wool from her surcote.

“It is not too deep,” she announced to Andrew. “A few stitches and he shall be as good as new.”

Andrew nodded, watching her grimace as she tore the wool and tied it tightly.

She seemed greatly concerned for Sully, which spurred Andrew oddly.

She was showing concern for another man and, somehow, he didn’t like that.

Not even though it was Sully. Not a man prone to jealousy, he refused to admit that he might actually be feeling some.

Impossible! He’d never felt jealousy with regard to a woman in his life and he wasn’t about to start now.

Still… it would be nice for her to show him the same concern, too.