Katie's Hope (Rhyn Trilogy, Book Two) Read Online Free PDF Page B

allowing Toby to pull her down the hall to the dining
chamber, which had yet to fill up. She braced herself for the
resentful looks and whispered insults she was glad Toby was too
young to understand. They made their way unscathed through the
dining room to their own little corner, where Toby’s favorite food
combination of mac-n-cheese and French toast waited for him on the
table.
    She couldn’t eat, feeling more stressed than
she had in the past three weeks. Sasha was somewhere in the castle,
and Gabriel was gone. She’d cracked the door to her heart for Rhyn
to shove his foot in the door and now needed to close, lock, and
deadbolt it closed again.
    I do love him, she admitted
silently.
     
     

Chapter Two
     
    In Hell, the Immortal Jade, formerly the most
trusted lieutenant to the leader of the Council That Was Seven,
looked around his new bedchamber with a shiver. It was a posh room
for Hell, carved of smooth ebony stone that was characteristic of
all the buildings in Hell. The room consisted of a massive bed with
black bedding and white pillows, a wardrobe and trunks, and yawning
windows to the sky that light never touched.
    “This was Sasha’s bedchamber,” a demon said
from the doorway. “You will be comfortable here. It has many
Immortal comforts we care nothing for.”
    I care nothing for this either, Jade
thought. The demon closed the door-- one of the Immortal comforts,
for there were no doors in Hell-- and left him to wonder how many
men and women Sasha had in the bed before him. He’d only spent one
night there last month before Sasha flung him to the side in favor
of a demoness.
    Like Kris had flung him aside to make way for
a mortal. His sense of loss was so deep, he thought it’d kill him
some nights. He’d done what anyone would do: he’d found a way to
get even with one of the men who hurt him. He might even get rid of
both of them!
    A sound from a trunk in the corner drew
Jade’s attention. Surprised, he crossed to it and opened it. The
woman’s face was hidden behind a mass of blonde hair, but he
recognized the hot pink fingernails instantly.
    “Iliana?” he asked. She stilled. He pulled
her gently from the trunk and untied her. She was shaking and
bloodied, and the bindings left deep marks around her wrists. She
pulled off the gag.
    “Did Kris send you for me?” she whispered,
her gaze darting around. “Did the demons see you?”
    “I didn’t know you were gone,” he admitted.
“What happened?”
    “They caught me when I went through the
shadow world and brought me here, to Sasha.” He didn’t have to ask
what Sasha did to her when her pretty blue eyes flared with white
rage and then filled with tears. “Where is he? I want to kill
him!”
    “He’s not-- ”
    “No matter, we need to escape. Come on,
Jade!”
    He watched her stride to the door without
following, heart heavy at what Kris’s lieutenant and his colleague
of a few decades would soon discover. She stopped at the door and
turned to him.
    “Jade, come on!”
    “I can’t go with you, Iliana,” he whispered.
“I’m here by choice.”
    Surprise, then disbelief, crossed her
features. “Oh, God, Jade, what did you do?”
    “I took care of Sasha,” he said somewhat
defensively. “I deserve better than how he treated me. How Kris
treated me.”
    “You betrayed us.”
    “No, I didn’t cross that line! I’m just here
… there’s just two people who I want to avenge myself on!” he said.
“I’m not going to hurt anyone else!”
    “Anyone else? You can’t destroy Kris. It’s
like beheading the Council!”
    “You don’t understand. You wouldn’t
understand.”
    She crossed to him, furious. “You are a
traitor of the worst kind. I will kill you now, before you hurt
anyone!”
    He blocked her first punch but not her
second. Light exploded into his thoughts. He’d tried to reason with
her, to tell her what happened. She didn’t listen. She was as cold
as Kris! Maybe she wanted Kris, too. He’d seen the