The Viscount and the Virgin Read Online Free Page B

in Staffordshire, when she had some useful sewing to do. She had made all her brothers’ shirts, hemmed miles of linen and darned thou sands of socks. And she had not minded that at all. Particularly not when one of the boys came to read aloud to her while she did it.
    Her mind flew back to the days when she and her mother would sit with the mending basket, by the fire in the cluttered little parlour of the Brambles. And just as she was recalling how the boys would lounge like so many over grown puppies around their feet, her uncle’s butler, Bedworth, stunned her by opening the door and intoning, ‘Captain Alaric Bredon.’
    While Imogen was still reeling from the coincidence of having the butler announcing a visitor with a name so like that of the boys she was thinking of, Bedworth opened the door a little wider, and she saw, just beyond his portly figure, in the scarlet jacket with the yellow reveres and cuffs of his regiment, his shako held under one arm, and a broad grin creasing his weather-beaten face, her oldest—and favourite—step brother.
    â€˜Rick!’ she squealed, leaping to her feet, scattering her silks, tambour and pincushion in all directions.
    Captain Bredon met her halfway across the room, dropping his shako as he spread his arms wide to sweep her into his embrace.
    â€˜Midge!’ he laughed, lifting her off her feet and twirling her round as she flung her arms round his neck.
    â€˜Oh, Rick, c-can it really be you?’ She was so happy to see him. It was absurd to find tears streaming down her face.
    â€˜When did you get back to En-England?’ she hiccupped. He had missed his father’s funeral. The letter in forming him of Hugh Bredon’s death had not caught up with him for several weeks. She had hoped he might have been permitted time to come home, but his commanding officer had thought pushing Bonaparte’s troops back into France had been far more important. ‘You have Nick there,’ he had written back to her. ‘Trust him to do what is best for you. After all, he is the legal brains of the family.’
    And Nick had dealt with everything with extreme punctiliousness. But, oh, how she wished Rick had been there on that day when she had felt as though she had lost everything at a stroke!
    Now that he was here, she found herself burying her face in his shoulder, letting go of all the grief she had bottled up for so long.
    â€˜Rick, Rick,’ she sobbed. ‘I have m-missed you so much.’
    â€˜Imogen!’ shrieked her aunt, preventing Rick from making any reply. ‘Have you lost all sense of decorum?’
    â€˜But this is Rick, ma’am, Rick, my brother—’
    â€˜I had gathered that,’ her aunt snapped. ‘But that is no excuse for indulging in such unseemly behaviour! And as for you, young man, I will thank you to put my niece down!’
    Rick did so with alacrity. He had just tugged his jacket back into place and taken a breath as though to tender an apology for offending his hostess, when they all heard a carriage drawing up outside.
    Lady Callandar flew to the window, said a rather un lady like word, then rounded on Imogen and Rick.
    â€˜Up to your room, this instant!’ she barked at Imogen. ‘And as for you—’ she swooped on Captain Bredon’s shako and thrust it into his hands ‘—out! Now! No arguments!’
    Imogen had caught a glimpse of the carriage when her aunt had twitched back the curtains, and she recognized Lord Keddinton’s crest on the door panel. The very last people she wished to face, in her present state, were Penelope and Charlotte Veryan. Hitching her skirts up in one hand, while dashing tears from her face with the other, she ran from the room and up the stairs.
    She heard booted feet echo on the hall’s marbled tiles, then Rick’s bewildered cry of ‘Midge?’
    She turned and looked down. Rick had one foot on the bottom step, as