Rebel Read Online Free Page A

calm, and he bit back a smile.
    “And if we’re late?”
    She looked at him. She’d avoided meeting his gaze at first, and he wondered why. Maybe she simply had good sense in recognizing a predator when one homed in on her. Or maybe she actually had had a premonition about him. But now she was looking at him full-on, as if in doing so she could prove he had no effect on her.
    Poor baby. He was just beginning.
    He hadn’t decided whether she’d be his partner in crime or not. He’d yet to see what else Sheol provided nowadays. He’d been thrown a curve—he’d had no idea that Azazel had stepped down from his place as leader of the Fallen. He would have to adjust, but he was good at that. The best plans were fluid, responding to change, and Martha the seer might be just the right sort of change. If he took someone’s bonded mate, the shit would really hit the fan in a most satisfactory manner, but he wasn’t convinced that was his best approach. Not that he believed in either the sanctity or even the existence of those bonds. But the Fallen and their mates did, which lay at the core of the chaos he intended to bring down on their heads.
    He smiled down at the girl, at his most charming, but she surveyed him stonily, and he stepped back without letting the full length of his body touch hers. He couldn’t afford to waste time, but he would besmart not to rush a decision this important. Thomas’s widow seemed soft and quiet and malleable. She might easily bore him.
    “You’ll need to lead the way, Mary,” he said, and waited for her to correct him again.
    She didn’t, and he silently applauded her. That’s it, my girl. Fight back. There’s only so much the Fallen can protect you from. Sooner or later you’re going to need to grow up and protect yourself.
    She pushed away from the wall, carefully avoiding him. The loose white clothes matched what most of the others in Sheol wore, cult uniforms for the original cult, and it amused him. She moved past him, and she smelled like lilies of the valley. Of course she did—something sweet and innocent and untouched—and right then he decided that even if he ended up choosing someone else as his unwitting accomplice, he was still going to strip those baggy white clothes off Martha and fuck her the way she needed to be fucked.
    Because he remembered Thomas. Thomas had been created an old man, gentle and unassuming. If that was all Martha had ever had in bed, she was in for a happy surprise. He wouldn’t leave without giving it to her.
    He heard the rumble of anxious conversations the moment they reached the hallway, and he smiled to himself. The Fallen were in an uproar at hisunexpected return, as they should be. He fell back, letting Martha lead him into the large chamber that held a goodly portion of the Fallen and a select few of their wives, presumably including the new Source. Azazel was glaring at him, and Cain assessed the woman at his side. High-and-mighty Azazel had married the Lilith of ancient lore, part demon, part patron saint of womankind. She regarded Cain stonily, and he decided a demon would be a good match for a tight-ass like Azazel. He turned to face the new Alpha.
    Raziel sat at the head of the massive table, as befitted the new leader, with a soft, pretty woman by his side. And then Cain froze, though he knew he gave nothing away.
    The woman next to Raziel, presumably his wife and the Source for the current batch of mateless Fallen, was noticeably pregnant. Which was flat-out impossible.
    He wondered whether she’d simply carried a healthy plumpness to an extreme. But that, while not as surprising, was just as unlikely. Once the Fallen brought their wives to Sheol, the women stayed relatively the same shape and size, aging very slowly. But no one, no one, could possibly be pregnant.
    Again, this changed the situation. He needed the Fallen to believe in the impossible, to throw out their preconceptions. A pregnant Source was the first