The Viscount Returns Read Online Free PDF

out the plan for the night by heart. It had been scripted in her mind for some time and at the darkest moments over the years it had been the only thing that kept her going with the hope that things would one day be better. “Sprout will be holding my hand, dressed in Roberts’s childhood best as a link from one generation to the next. When Robert sees me standing in the doorway he will be struck dumb and then when his eyes fall onto Sprout, he will realize who he is before I even say anything. Dropping to his knees he will take my hand in one of his and Sprout’s in his other, kissing them both. Then I will say, Sprout, this is your father and, Robert, this is your heir.” Closing her eyes, she watched her dream play out. “Then he will lift Sprout with one arm and take me in the other before kissing me home.”
    Eyes damp with the emotion she’d held back for eight years, Ruth tried to give the lady the encouraging warmth that Fiona needed, but Ruth could not. She had seen the young man who had returned with Robert and had been present to help nurse the Lady these past eight years through the heavy cloak of her despair. She feared what would be left of her if he fled again.
    “The danger in dreams is that they can crush us when they are detoured,” Ruth warned her and prayed that Fiona would pay heed to her words, but unlike Fiona, Ruth was too practical to depend on dreams and fantasies and instead she knew her place was to be the backbone for the lost souls that she now saw in her charge.

Chapter 3
     
     
     
    “Tell me, boy, how is your mother?” Scooping up water in a dish, Robert tried to wash away the frustrations and fears of the past few hours in the warm hip bath. The hot water felt good on his raw hands after so many hours of riding, but the disturbing reaction he had had to his wife and their first encounter in eight years left a knot in his gut that wouldn’t leave him in peace. “It has been so many years since I have seen her.”
    He could not ignore the ill-fitting in the boy’s clothes or his ragged appearance. He was tall for his age, but no doubt this shirt once belonged to a grown man and his trousers were patched in several places. Perhaps pieces all left over from his father’s youth. Whoever that man may be. One of the local farmers? He thought to himself. Or a local tradesman in one of the new village stores that he had ridden past earlier this day?
    “My mother, sir?” The boy looked up at him from the door, holding an empty bucket in his hand and the door handle in his other. “Why did you not ask her yourself today when you saw her?”
    He was distracted from hearing young Sprout’s question when a knock came at the bed chamber door. He called out for whomever it was to enter. Water sloshed when he saw Allen enter washed and refreshed. He had felt disquieted since his return and hoped that Allen could vanquish those unwanted feelings.
    “Well, hello there, Sprout. Nice to see you again.” Ruffling the boy’s head, Allen advanced cautiously into the room. Wise to the ways of the world, he did not risk Robert’s reputation to the tattling of servants’ tongues by showing too much ease in his friend’s naked presence.
    A bit on edge and hesitated to meet his friend’s eyes, Robert could not miss Allen’s uneasiness. Turning to Sprout to help remedy his concern by eliminating it completely, instead Allen turned shy eyes from Robert’s naked body emerging from the water.
    “Young Sprout, might you run off and tell the lady of the house that we will be down shortly to dine?”
    “Of course, sir.” The boy nodded his head and ran from the room, eager to perform the slightest request by the master.
    “Oh, and Sprout,” Robert called out, stopping the boy at the doorway. “Take this.” He tossed the boy a few shiny coins from his saddle bag. “And ask your mother to purchase some decent clothes. No house boy of mine should be dressed in such a way.” He looked at the boy