Ruin (Rhodes #1) by Rina Kent

                             “We were never free back then. We were trained dogs to murder.” And did she say... bored? My gaze looms over Mae’s neckline, her plump lips, her thick strands, and her small smile as she pats Silver. I’m anything but bored. In fact, I don’t remember the last time a human being peeked my interest in such an obsessive way.

                             Not since the withering memories with Uncle.

                             “Do you mean to tell me you’re free now?” I can imagine Celeste clicking her tongue.

                             “No.” I bore my eyes into Mae’s, drowning into their softness. “But I have a reason to want so.”





                             Chapter Eighteen

                             Mae



                             I miss Aaron’s voice. It’s like a distant sweet song I want to hear again but can’t. I learnt to stop searching for it like I learnt to kill my rosy expectations for Arthur’s redemption. Both will never lighten my life. I’m forever subjugated to this darkness. This is my choice. I can’t blame it on anyone but myself. I could’ve said no. I could’ve ran away, but I was too blinded by loving Arthur that I ignored his cruelty. All until his atrocious deeds slapped me in the face. Then Aaron came, and any chance I had of escaping this place vanished in thin air. I couldn’t take him and run. Arthur would’ve never allowed me to snatch his heir away. If I file for a divorce and go to court, his power will crush my father’s and he will never let me see my child again. He’ll raise him into a worse monster than he is and I’ll lose both of them for good.

                             But even if I got the chance, would I really leave Arthur? Could I?



                             I turn the page in search of the answer but there’s only another entry a few days after, talking about her pretentious mother-in-law.

                             Dammit. Was Aaron the only reason his mother stayed with his tyrant father? If no, then what type of love would allow such extremes? It’s both confusing and fascinating.

                             Based on other entries, Aaron’s mother knew all about her husband’s horrible deeds, but ignored them. She said it helped her cope with her reality, yet from her heavily-scarred emotions, they seem to weigh on her more than she likes to admit. She says she loves her son, but she’s happier when he’s with his uncle rather than with her.

                             A horrible thought comes to mind. What if she hated Aaron for being the reason behind her enclosure in this place?

                             I close the journal with a loud whack. Reading bits and pieces about Aaron’s miserable childhood always leaves me with a foul taste. The more I read, the tighter my stomach twists at his mother’s dark sense of sacrifice and her odd relationship with her husband.

                             I should’ve not retrieved the journal. Yet, when Aaron took me to the room I occupied to get my clothes, I couldn’t help but slip it under my baggy pullover.

                             Despite having Aaron with me, I wanted out of that room as soon as possible. Being there triggered the rotten memories of that man.

                             After our first horse ride a week ago, Aaron was kind enough to move me to my current room. Although smaller than the other one, it’s similarly decorated with beige and brown patterns like a vintage hotel room I couldn’t afford. I stand beside the window, immediately lost in the foreshadowed forest in the distance. The thought of a person— or a family— owning such a large, seemingly endless property is mesmerising. Dad told me about his colleagues from old and new money, but this is beyond anything I’ve imagined.

                             I retrieve my sketchbook and charcoal pencil and allow my muse to shape the trees in the distance. The gloom adds a mystical, yet a shadowy hue to the shapes of trees.