Rebel (18 page)

This time there was no lightning bolt between them, just a faint sizzle when his skin touched hers, absorbed quickly into his own flesh. She didn’t wake. She was bone tired, he could feel it, and she settled against him easily, as if she belonged in his arms. She smelled like lilies of the valley, sweet and innocent, and he wondered what she’d taste like. He carried her into his bedroom and set her down on the bed, waiting for her to open her eyes and scream bloody murder. She didn’t. Even when he settled down beside her, she didn’t erupt in rage.

What she did startled him even more. She opened her eyes sleepily when he gently pulled her into his arms. “You’re a very bad man,” she murmured, resting her head on his shoulder as he tucked her against him.

He smiled in the darkness. “I’m a very bad angel.”

But she was already asleep again, trusting him when her defenses had vanished. She was even more vulnerable than he’d thought, and he felt a pang of worry. Someone could come in and rip her bruised heart to pieces. He didn’t want to let that happen.

Maybe he could toughen her up a bit without destroying her. She had a role to play, an important one, and it was too late to change course. The seer was becoming more reliable, which changed things once more. She would repeat whatever he planted in her fertile brain, and he had to gauge whether the Fallen would be in a receptive mood or a disbelieving one before he decided how to use her. If everyone believed the lies he was pushing through her, it would work just as well. Leaving the Fallen open to the chaos he was bringing.

She would be distraught at being used like that, he knew. She would hate him for doing it.

Maybe it would destroy her. He would take her gift, her body, even her love, and use them to his advantage, then walk away. If there were another way to do it, he would. He’d grown . . . fond of her,
he admitted. That suspicious way she had of looking at him, the confused, erotic thoughts she didn’t understand. The strange, inexplicable shocks that sparked between them when he touched her.

He liked the way she looked after the Source, her friendships with the other women, the way she stood up to Raziel. In all, she was an estimable woman, much more than she realized. He wished she were going to come out the better for having been used by him. He doubted it.

She settled so peacefully in his arms, and he found that for once he was growing tired as well. Angels didn’t need much sleep, and he had trained himself to make do on even less than the usual. But in the comfortable bed, with Martha in his arms, he almost thought he might fall asleep.

Which was even stranger. When he did sleep, it was never with a woman in his bed, much less in his arms. He tended to thrash around, kick the covers off, toss the pillows to the ground, and end up facing the foot of the bed.

He didn’t feel the slightest bit restless. He almost felt . . . peaceful. He could feel her heartbeat, slow, steady. Feel the soft puff of her breath against his neck. The heat of her body against his, soft and pliant. He lowered his head to rest against hers—and slept.

I
WOKE SUDDENLY, IN A PANIC.
I
HAD
no idea where I was. I pushed myself up in the strange bed, dazed, disoriented from my heavy sleep, and I was frightened. Someone was coming, someone bad, and I had to protect the children.

I snapped out of it, alert. It had been a long time since there had been children to worry about. Thirteen years, in fact. I was in Sheol, I was safe. No one could harm me here, no one—

I heard the shower in the background, and I realized with distant shock where I was. In Cain’s bed.

How had I gotten here? I looked down at my body in horror, concentrating, trying to sense whether it was different, whether he’d . . . whether we’d . . .

The shower stopped before I could gather my senses and run, and a moment later Cain strolled
out of the bathroom, a towel low around his narrow hips, and I swallowed.

All angels are beautiful. It’s an essential part of the job description, and I had quickly grown inured to it. I wasn’t inured to Cain.

He wasn’t as tall as some of the others, less noticeably muscular. His body was thin and lithe, covered with smooth, golden skin. And that old biblical quote came back to me: “Behold, my brother Esau is a hairy man, and I am a smooth man.” Jacob had been a trickster, a liar, and a thief. I doubted this man was any different.

He stood there looking at me, hands on those slim hips, a twist of a smile at his mouth. “What are you thinking about so fiercely?”

“The Old Testament,” I answered with absolute truth.

He threw back his head and laughed. “You’re a wonder, Miss Mary,” he said. And he pulled off his towel.

Uh. No, not completely smooth. He was trying to unsettle me, and I was trying hard not to be unsettled, but it was getting more and more difficult. I managed to let my eyes drift over him with limpid disinterest, tucking my unwilling observances into the back of my mind for further examination later on. Then again, my gaze was the only limpid thing in the room.

I waited until he pulled his jeans on. “What am I doing in your bed?”

“You fell asleep while I was talking to you. I can’t say I was flattered—I’m not used to women passing out from sheer boredom.”

“I was tired,” I said defensively. “That still doesn’t explain what I’m doing in your bed.”

“You were curled up in that chair in practically the fetal position. If I’d left you like that, you would have woken up stiff and aching, or you might have fallen out of the chair and woken
me
up.”

“Oh, heaven forbid!” I said. “That still doesn’t explain why I’m in your bed.”

He shrugged, bringing my eyes to his bare shoulders. I liked them. A lot. They weren’t massive like Metatron’s, or as bulky as Thomas’s had been. He was lean and slightly bony beneath all that smooth flesh. “I was going to put you in your own bed, but mine was closer and you were a handful. I was too lazy to go that far.”

I was anything but a handful. I was too short and, apart from considering my ass and thighs too generous, I knew I was normal size. Which meant I was relatively light—and angels were very, very strong.

“You didn’t do anything, did you?” I asked suspiciously.

He grinned at me. “What do you think, sweetheart? Did I leave anything between your legs?”

“Don’t be disgusting.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Disgusting, is it? You don’t like sex?”

I’d given too much away. “Not with you.”

He held very still for a moment, and suddenly I realized my danger. I was sitting in the middle of his bed, alone, at the very end of the big house, and he was only half-dressed. And then he started toward me.

I should have run. Should have scrambled off the bed and out the door before he could catch me. If he even wanted to catch me. I didn’t move.

We had excellent beds in Sheol. The mattress didn’t even dip when he knelt in front of me. “Oh, really?” he said mildly enough. “Let me prove you wrong.”

He pulled me against him, against all that smooth, hard flesh, and I could feel the strange tingling washing over my body. I should have struggled—but he was much stronger than me; my best bet was to hold perfectly still, prove myself unmoved. Yes, that was the ticket. He could touch me, he could do anything he wanted to me, and it wouldn’t matter. I could let go, let him . . .

I was fooling myself. I could let go and let him do what
I
wanted. I wanted him. I had chosen a life of peaceful, comfortable celibacy after Thomas, and I wanted this man so much I was burning with it. And he knew it.

“Don’t,” I whispered as his hands slid up my arms. They were bare, and the feel of his skin against mine made my womb clench with sudden longing. The body I had lived with all my life, the body I trusted, was betraying me.

He smiled at me, his face so close I could see the dark striations in his silver eyes. “Can’t,” he said. And then his mouth closed over mine.

The kiss was a wonder. He’d kissed me hard, back in that deserted room, hard and deep and demanding, and I’d been ready to do anything for him. This was soft, slow, a teasing seduction, nibbling at my lips, nipping, tugging at them until I opened for the lazy, languorous sweep of his tongue. He drew my body up against his, and my breasts were tight, almost painful against the soft cotton of my dress, soft cotton that was too thick, in the way. I wanted it off, I wanted to lie naked against him, I wanted him inside me, pushing, surging, shuddering while I held him. I wanted my too-vivid dreams to be reality. His hand slid up to cup one breast, his fingers playing with the nipple through the damnable fabric, teasing, tugging, and I wanted his mouth on me there, sucking, pulling.

He pushed me back against the sheets, gently, and I went willingly enough, not fighting. He levered himself on top of me, pushing my legs apart with his to lie between them, and I could feel the hardness of
his erection against my sex. “Don’t?” he whispered, mocking me, as his hand started to slide beneath the long skirt.

I fought then, a small struggle, but he held still, looking down at me out of slumberous eyes. “I don’t want my clothes off.” The minute the words were out of my mouth, I realized I’d given him permission of sorts. I hadn’t said “Get the hell off me” or “I really don’t want you.” I’d been resisting so long.

I’d been dried-up and dead for so long. I wanted life. I wanted more.

He smiled down at me, a lazy, sweet smile, and shook his head. “I want to see your body.”

“You don’t need to,” I said stubbornly. “Just go ahead and do it. You can pull up my skirts and get on with it. I don’t mind.”

For a moment he didn’t say anything, his face a blank. And then he began to laugh, rolling off me to lie on the mattress beside me, roaring.

All my desire vanished, and I sat up, offended, relieved. I had almost made a very big mistake. I scrambled off the bed, and he didn’t bother to stop me. His laughter was slowly dying, but there were tears of amusement in his mesmerizing eyes, and I stopped by the door, looking at him in annoyance. “I’m glad I could entertain you,” I said stiffly. “I think I can manage this investigation on my own from now on.”

I half expected him to surge off the bed and pull me back, but he simply laughed again. “Darling Martha, you enchant me,” he said. “I was just temporarily blown away by the depth of your passion.”

I wanted to snarl, when I’d thought I had perfect control of my temper. He really did bring out the worst in me. I couldn’t think of anything to say, so I went with an old standby. “Whatever.”

He laughed again, and if he had been closer I would have hit him. “I’m going to talk to a couple of people you’ve already discounted, just to see if I agree. In the meantime, why don’t you find out if the Source remembers anything else? Rachel as well. And when you come back tonight, bring all your copious, cross-referenced lists.”

“What part of me managing the investigation on my own didn’t you understand?” I said crossly. “I don’t need you.”

His laughter faded, all amusement vanished, but the look in his eyes was unexpectedly full of a promise I didn’t want to face. “Oh, yes you do, sweetheart.”

H
E COULD DROWN HER,
M
ETATRON
thought as he walked along the beach. Thomas’s widow was very fond of the water, but she was only a mortal, after all. She could drown as easily as any human. It might be difficult, though. If he held her under, the healing power of the ocean could move through his touch to her, and there was a chance she’d be invulnerable as well. He’d never quite understood how the water worked, how it had brought him back from death but decimated Uriel’s army, and he didn’t trust it.

She seldom left the compound except to swim. Poison, though hard to procure, was the easiest to use, but the very idea disgusted him. He was a man of action, and poison was the weapon of weaklings. Besides, it was too variable—he’d mistimed the sleeping draft with the Source. He couldn’t afford to fail again.

Breaking her neck and passing it off as a fall was clearly his best choice. If he killed her before throwing her in the water, it would appear she’d slipped and hit her head. It would be a sad accident, but no one would really mind. She was a widow, a useless appendage in the society of Sheol.

He could fly back to the house the moment he got rid of her, and it might be days, weeks, before her body was discovered. There would be nothing to tie him to her death. Cain would be annoyed if he found out Metatron was to blame, but that could be handled. Metatron shrugged. Cain would simply have to adjust his plans accordingly. A quiet little woman could hardly be that important in the complex scheme of things.

Once she was gone, there would be no one to interfere. Even Cain would eventually agree it was for the best.

“Metatron!”

He was a warrior—he never showed surprise, was never startled, though it took all his training not to jump when Cain’s voice slashed through his thoughts.

He turned. Everything about Cain annoyed him—his cleverness, his speed, the way he mocked everything and everyone. But Metatron needed him too much to get rid of him. “Cain,” he acknowledged in an even voice.

“You promised you wouldn’t kill anyone.” Cain’s voice was calm, almost meditative. Metatron had the good sense not to trust it.

“I have kept my promise,” he said slowly. So far.

“I wouldn’t call what you did to the Source keeping your promise.”

Metatron considered this carefully. Should he lie, swear he’d had nothing to do with it? He wasn’t a facile liar, not like Cain, who could weave so many stories he made Metatron’s head spin.

“I kept my promise.”

“Are you trying to convince me someone else was responsible for drugging the Source?”

“No.”

Cain’s eyes narrowed. “You feel like explaining?”

“I agreed I wouldn’t kill anyone. The spawn growing inside of the Source isn’t someone. It’s evil. She would have survived the loss, but the entire company of Sheol would have been thrown into sorrow and disarray. Those who needed to partake of her blood would feel that sorrow magnified, and therefore they’d be easier to destroy.”