Total pages in book: 122
Estimated words: 124140 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 621(@200wpm)___ 497(@250wpm)___ 414(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 124140 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 621(@200wpm)___ 497(@250wpm)___ 414(@300wpm)
And Cat needs to get his attention.
Because Alejandro De Leon might have information about how her father died. And why her mother disappeared.
Only problem is . . . the closer she gets to him, the more he draws her in.
And when he claims her, she doesn’t exactly want to tell him no.
No one tells Alejandro De Leon no.
Certainly not a tiny, sassy girl with no sense of self-preservation.
When she walks into a room with the deadliest men in the city, her fate is sealed.
She would be his.
He’d be her lover, her Dom, her Daddy.
But could he ever give her his heart?
Please check the triggers!
It’s going to be a wild ride. This is book one in Cat and Alejandro’s story, but it will not end in a cliffhanger and can be read on its own.
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
PROLOGUE
Four years ago
“I’m not leaving.”
Cat folded her arms and gave her friends a firm look. They could say what they wanted. But no argument was going to sway her. She was staying here—with them.
Her family.
“What? You’re going to stay here and let the Deity take you as his next wife? Is that what you want?” Sampson demanded.
She shivered as she remembered the Deity calling her to his office the day after her birthday and his big announcement. The way he’d looked at her. With hunger. With ownership. She could still feel his hands grabbing her arms.
She glanced down at them. It felt like she should be bruised, but his touch hadn’t been punishing as he’d laid out her future in stark terms.
“Sampson!” Maeve scolded. She was sitting between him and Jenner on the wooden floor. They were all crowded into the tree house. It was their safe place in the Camp.
She’d never understood why Mama moved them here. But whenever Cat asked her, she’d just get this scared look on her face and tell Cat that this place was safe.
Or it had been until the Deity announced that Cat was to be his next wife. Wife number five.
Nausea bubbled in her tummy and she placed her hand over it. There were only two ways to get out of her marriage to the Deity.
Leave or die.
And she didn’t want to do either.
“It’s the truth, Maeve,” Sampson said with a frown. He was always so serious and protective of the rest of them. But more so now that Cat had just turned sixteen.
The age at which all girls who were part of the Children of the Divine were expected to marry.
Lucky her, she got to marry the leader of the cult. The biggest, creepiest asshole out of all of them.
Cat swallowed heavily.
“You have to go, Cat,” Immy said in her sweet voice. She was tucked in between Jenner and Abe, her slight frame dwarfed by them.
What would happen when Maeve turned sixteen? Then Immy? Who would he give them to? Sampson and Jenner’s dad? Isaiah’s dad?
It was sick.
It was wrong.
And she had to help them.
“You can’t marry him, Cat,” Isaiah said quietly, his eyes haunted. He was leaning against the wall, his foot tapping nervously. “He’ll hurt you.”
Cat swallowed heavily. She didn’t want to marry him. But she also didn’t want to leave the six of them.
“Fine, I’ll go. But I’m coming back for you guys,” she promised fiercely. That was the only reason she’d go.
Because it might be the only way she could save them all.
“Good,” Sampson said briskly. He reached into his pocket and drew out some cash. “Here, we all contributed.” He tried to hand the money over.
“What? No. I can’t take that.” Cash was scarce and hard to come by at the Camp. Everything they earned was given to the Deity, and in turn, he was supposed to use it to take care of them. His reasoning was that it freed them from financial burden and meant they had more time to worship the Divine.
Cat knew, though, that most of the people who lived at the Camp were working their butt off and barely had anything to their name. They were fed and clothed, but that was about it.
Although if you were higher up the hierarchy, you seemed to get better perks. Sampson and Jenner’s dad was a Sentinel and so they lived in an actual house, rather than a shack like pretty much everyone else.
Cat’s mama was older when she joined the cult, and because she was no longer considered good breeding stock, she hadn’t had to marry one of the men. Of course, that meant they were pretty low on the totem pole, though. The place they lived in should have been condemned a long time ago.
“You can and you will,” Sampson ordered. He was so bossy.
Cat glared at him. If she ever fell in love, it would be with an easygoing man. One that never tried to tell her what to do.
A man who’d let her do whatever she wanted when she wanted.
“You’ll need it, Cat,” Jenner told her seriously. He looked tired. Like the weight of the world was on his shoulders. This was so unfair. They were teenagers. Why should they have to worry about all this crap?
“You can use it to get far away from here. You said your mom has friends you guys can go stay with, right?” Maeve asked. She chewed on her thumbnail.
“Yeah. That’s what she said. How will we get away, though?” she asked.
The Camp was isolated. They could probably walk into town, but how long would they have until people started noticing that they were missing?
“Don’t worry,” Isaiah told her. “We’ve got a distraction planned for midnight. You guys just be ready to sneak away. Get to St Ives and then jump on a bus out of here.”