Fall From Grace (Slater #1) Read Online Free Page B

if she had met him or knew him somehow.  Laura could never place him though and the few times that she had tried to talk to her mother about him, she was cut off and told that he was nobody but the devil himself.
    Laura didn’t know that her father had gone to gaol, until she was much older.  Her mother had said that her father should have been hanged, but the judge had gone easy on him because he was defending his child.  But that day he saved Laura’s life and it was the last time she ever saw or heard from her father again.  She had been left with the rumours of the rich people in the town that called her mother a whore, saying that she had gotten pregnant to an unknown traveller.  But Laura knew the truth, her father was a hero and those people’s words couldn’t hurt her. 
    As she walked back to her home, after being with Porter again, it hurt her to know that his father would never allow him to be with her, she was just a poor peasant girl, with no father. She was nothing but destined to be a dirty scrubber all her life.  She felt that Porter hadn’t shared his father’s opinion.  But she couldn’t expect him to go against his father’s wishes of going to join the seminary.
    Porter’s father was Richard and his mother Hannah.  Richard was the deacon for the local parish and held good standing in the township.  Laura knew that Porter’s activities with her would cause him great embarrassment, so their affair would be in secret, never in the open.  Porter would have to marry within his class.  One which Laura wasn’t a part of.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chapter Six
    The following day, Laura went into the woods, into their clearing in hope to glimpse Porter.  She waited for him to come, but he didn’t arrive at their spot.  Laura swallowed the disappointment that welled in her belly as she headed down the path towards the town for her mother.  She stood at the market purchasing the grains her mother had sent her for when she caught the commotion behind her.  It was a gaggle of girls, their dresses an array of glorious colours and materials.  The girls hair were pulled up in all sorts of do’s that Laura could only imagine doing with hers, their faces even wore rouge and colour on their lips.  She stood watching as they fussed over someone.  As the women moved she caught a glimpse of Porter and his older brother Cole being swarmed by the painted women.
    Porter looked up from the woman that hung off his arm and caught Laura’s eye.  The look that passed his eye was unreadable, but she couldn’t tear her gaze away from his.  The girl that was hanging off his arm followed his stare and smirked at Laura.  Suddenly the girl moved forward towards where Laura stood.  Nervously, Laura smoothed her skirts around her thighs, running her fingers down through her dirty blonde hair.  The girl stepped closer to where Laura stood and pity filled her face.
    “Oh hello peasant girl” the girl spoke.
    Laura smiled and lowered her eyes.  The girl reached into her white purse that hung off the crook of her arm. When Laura looked back up at the girl, she noticed Porter had joined by her side.  His eyes never wavering from Laura’s.
    “Hello Porter” Laura spoke to him, smiling lightly.
    He smiled a wide smile at her, but when the girl that he stood with snapped her head towards him and back at Laura, she could see the vehemence in the girls face. The girls face began to stain red and her eyes narrowed.
    “Do not speak to him” she spat at Laura.
    The girl pulled her hand out of her purse and threw some coins into Laura’s face, before she turned on her heel and stomped back towards the other women, towing Porter behind her.  Porter turned to look at Laura again, she refused to meet his eyes, hurt filled her heart as she realised that she was nothing more than a body to keep him warm, a body that he could release with.  She turned away and ran to the path, as the tears