Rescued from Ruin Read Online Free Page A

Reverend and a low growl rolled through the gangly puppy.
    Well, no more, his father spat. You killed the one person I loved most in this world, then turned my brother and sister against me. You have no idea how it feels to lose so much, but you will when I take away something you love. He focused on Reverend and raised the poker over his head.
    No! Randall rushed at his father, catching the poker just as his father brought it down, the hard metal slamming into his palm and sending a bolt of pain through his shoulder. He tried to wrench the iron from his father’s hand, but the old man held on tight, fighting with a strength fuelled by hate. Reverend’s sharp barks pierced the room as Randall shoved his father against the wall, his other arm across his chest, pinning him like a wild animal until his father’s fingers finally opened and the poker clattered to the floor.
    I hate you. You killed her, he hissed before the deep lines of his face softened, his jaw sagged open and his body slumped forward on to Randall’s chest.
    Randall struggled to hold his father’s limp weight as he lowered him to the floor, then knelt next to him, panic replacing his anger as he patted his face, trying to rouse him. Father? Father?
    A faint gurgle filled his father’s throat before his eyes focused on Randall’s. Reverend whimpered behind him, as if he, too, sensed what was coming.
    Father, forgive me, Randall pleaded.
    You aren’t worthy— he slurred before his head dropped forward and he slumped to the side.
    The room went quiet, punctuated by the crackling of the fire and Reverend’s panting.
    Randall rose, stumbling backwards before gripping a table to steady himself. Reverend came to sit beside him and he dropped his hand on the dog’s soft head. I didn’t mean to hurt him, I didn’t mean to— kill him.
    A gust of wind blew a fury of raindrops against the window, startling Randall. He couldn’t stay here. He had to get help, to tell Aunt Ella and Uncle Edmund.
    The poker lay on the floor next to the wrinkled edge of the rug. With a trembling hand, he picked it up and returned it to the holder. With the toe of one boot, he straightened the rug, careful not to look at the dark figure near the white wall. Then he turned and left, Reverend trotting beside him out into the icy rain.
    * * *
    Randall opened his eyes and knelt down next to Reverend, rubbing the dog’s back, struggling to calm the guilt tearing through him. He’d walked through the freezing rain back to the manor, then stood dripping and shivering as he’d told Aunt Ella he’d come home to find his father collapsed. The doctor had said it was his father’s heart that had killed him. Randall had never told anyone the truth, except Cecelia.
    His hands stopped rubbing Reverend and the dog licked his fingers, eager for more. Randall noticed with a twinge of sadness the grey fur around Reverend’s black muzzle. ‘I wonder if you’d remember her.’
    ‘Did you say something, my lord?’ Mr Joshua asked.
    ‘No, nothing.’
    The small clock on the side table chimed a quarter past twelve.
    ‘Will you be going out again tonight, my lord?’
    ‘Perhaps.’ Randall stood, shaking off the memories, but the old emotions hovered around him, faint and fading like the waking end of a dream: vulnerability, uncertainty, innocence, regret. In the end, he’d driven Cecelia away, too horrified by what he’d done to keep close the one person who knew his secret. His father had never forgiven him. Would Cecelia have forgiven him back then? He’d never had the courage to ask her.
    ‘Keeping such hours, society will think you’ve gone respectable,’ Mr Joshua joked, ‘then every matron with a marriageable daughter will be here at the door. I’ll have so many cards stacked up we won’t need kindling all winter.’
    Randall frowned, hearing the truth in his jest. No, he wasn’t going to spend the night wallowing in the past like his father used to do. Those days were far