Grim Reunion
An Aisling Grimlock Mystery Book Four
Amanda M. Lee
WinchesterShaw Publications
Contents
Copyright
1. One
2. Two
3. Three
4. Four
5. Five
6. Six
7. Seven
8. Eight
9. Nine
10. Ten
11. Eleven
12. Twelve
13. Thirteen
14. Fourteen
15. Fifteen
16. Sixteen
17. Seventeen
18. Eighteen
19. Nineteen
20. Twenty
21. Twenty-One
22. Twenty-Two
23. Twenty-Three
24. Twenty-Four
25. Twenty-Five
26. Twenty-Six
27. Twenty-Seven
28. Twenty-Eight
29. Twenty-Nine
30. Thirty
31. Thirty-One
32. Thirty-Two
Mail List
Acknowledgments
Books by Amanda M. Lee
Copyright © 2016 by Amanda M. Lee
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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1
One
“Hi, Mom.”
The words felt alien as they rolled off the tip of my tongue. I hadn’t uttered them since I was a teenager. I hadn’t seen the woman standing before me in a decade. She looked … different.
Sure, I knew “dying” in a fire and spending the intervening years fighting off wraiths and trying to survive would take a toll, but she didn’t resemble the mother I knew. She was a stranger … in more ways than one.
“Hello, Aisling.” Mom’s greeting was simple – and annoying. Couldn’t she think of a better opening? “Aisling, Aisling, Aisling,” she intoned.
That’s me, Aisling Grimlock. I’m the snarkiest grim reaper in the Midwest. That means I ferry souls to the hereafter once their physical bodies give out, and sometimes I even do it in a professional manner.
I joined the family business months ago and have seen nothing but strange things since – including the Bub, the talking gargoyle who loitered around the hem of Mom’s skirt making faces as I tried to wrap my head around the uncomfortable situation. He looked like a rubber monster. He also had a filthy mind and sharp tongue – not literally, mind you, because that would be gross. This shouldn’t be weird. Well, other than the obvious it shouldn’t be weird to me, I mean.
“You don’t look surprised to see me,” Mom said, moon light reflecting off the sharp planes of her face. “I knew you would be the first to figure it out.”
Lily Grimlock was a great mother. She reined in her unruly brood and made them toe the line on good and bad days, even though the only thing they usually wanted to do with their feet was kick a sibling. This woman wasn’t Lily Grimlock, I reminded myself. Through no fault of her own, she had become something else.
“We should’ve figured it out sooner,” I said, gripping my hands together. Seriously? Could this conversation get any more surreal? “We should’ve questioned things. We should have done something other than wallowing in grief. We didn’t. I’m … sorry.”
The apology was beyond lame, yet I had no idea what else to say.
“I’m not sure how you think this is your fault, Aisling, but you didn’t do this,” Mom offered, her voice gravelly. “You were a child.”
“I was a teenager,” I corrected. “I knew better.”
“You were still too young to take the world on your shoulders and fix everything. Given your age, it was beyond your abilities.”
“I’ve been an adult for quite some time, though,” I countered. “Well, if you ask Dad, I’m not really an adult. I’m a little girl playing adult games in his book, but that’s another conversation.”
Was I babbling?
“I’m an adult, though, and had we really thought about what happened to you that night … had we given all of the inconsistencies serious thought … we might’ve been able to help you before it was too late,” I continued. “For that I’m truly sorry.”
“I see you still like to talk when you’re nervous,” Mom said, casting a tight-lipped grimace. “It was cute when you were younger.”
“But not now.” The rogue reaper who approached me at an area sports bar weeks before stared me down. I had no idea what he was doing with my mother, and part of me didn’t care. Okay, that’s not true. I still want to kick him in his special place.
“Who are you?” I asked, focusing on the reaper.
“He’s an associate of mine,” Mom replied, brushing off my question as if I’d merely asked about the weather. “It doesn’t matter who he is.”
“Then why did you bring him to my father’s house?” I asked, casting a quick glance over my shoulder to make sure Dad or one of my four brothers hadn’t wandered out to see what I was doing. Only hours before a group of wraiths led by another reaping family – the Grimponds – attacked our home. The reaper council sent soldiers to head them off, and the Grimponds were in custody to answer for kidnapping my mother after her purported “death” a decade ago. I thought that was the worst thing I would have to deal with today.
I was wrong.
“He’s something of a … bodyguard,” Mom answered. “That’s all you need to know.”
The ghostly blue moonlight glinted off Mom’s hair, highlighting the gray. When she “died” her hair was black and lush. Now it was almost completely devoid of color and looked dry as straw. Apparently dying is murder on your looks, because Mom’s previously porcelain complexion was now bleached white. It looked as if her skin had been stretched, a few veins showing despite the distance between us. It was devoid of wrinkles – which would make any woman her age happy – but she didn’t look entirely human. She might be able to pass with a lot of makeup, though. I would have to get my best friend Jerry on that. Well, maybe.
“I’m pretty sure I need to know a lot more than that,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest. Most girls would burst into tears and run into their mother’s arms upon finding out she was alive after years of mourning. I’m not most girls.
“What do you need to know?” Mom asked, her expression never changing. It was almost as if she was putting up with my questions for lack of anything better to do.
“Well, for starters, what happened to you in the fire?”
“The roof caved in and I don’t remember anything after that,” Mom replied. “I woke in the Grimpond home. I was in and out of consciousness for days. Then I slept more than I was aware for weeks. It took me months to realize that I was a prisoner in Fox’s home.”
We’d already figured all of that out. “What about Genevieve Toth?” I asked, referring to a centuries-old witch who survived by sucking the life essence of others. She died months earlier, ultimately setting me on the path to finding my mother.
“Genevieve … saved me,” Mom answered. “It’s complicated.”
“We don’t have time for this,” the rogue reaper said, keeping his voice low. “You’re exposed here. We have to get under cover.”
Mom ignored him. “I know you probably want answers for everything, but I don’t believe anything I say is going to satisfy that rampant curiosity of yours, Aisling,” she said. “The story takes time to tell. The nuances … are hard to grasp.�
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Did she just insinuate I was too stupid to understand what she went through? “That sounds like a steaming pile of crap if I’ve ever heard one,” I challenged. “I know what happened to you. Lying about won’t help anyone.”
“You’ve got charm coming out of your wazoo, girl,” Bub said, shaking his head. I was still getting used to the idea of talking gargoyles, so I toyed with the idea of gagging him. Wait, do gargoyles bite? “You owe your mother some respect. She is your mother, after all.”
“No one asked you anything,” I shot back.
“Aisling doesn’t owe me anything,” Mom said. “I’m only the woman who gave birth to her after eighteen hours of labor. Two babies at once, in fact. It was something of a miracle. Apparently that doesn’t earn respect, though.”
I narrowed my eyes, irritated. She looked like my mother – well, kind of – but the mannerisms were different. “You can play all of the games you want, but I’m not joining your team until I have the answers I’m seeking,” I said. “This is … not normal. There’s no proper way to respond to all of this. I’m doing the best I can.”
“It wasn’t meant as a dig, Aisling,” Mom sighed. I remembered that sigh. It was enough to cause my heart to roll. She whipped it out whenever any of my brothers and I got into it and things turned loud, which was pretty much every day in the Grimlock house. “No one is trying to force you into doing anything. Although … I don’t suppose we could go inside and talk, could we? I’d love to see everyone else.”
There was no way that was going to happen. “No.”
Mom was taken aback. “No?”
“What are you doing here?” I asked, frustration bubbling up. “You died when I was a teenager. You were held against your will for some of the time since then, but then you and Genevieve escaped. I don’t pretend to know what your time with her was like, but she’s been dead for months. If she kept you captive, you escaped long before showing up here.”
“And?” Mom prodded.
“Why?”
“Why what?” Mom’s face was the picture of innocence, if innocence had vein problems, that is. Seriously, what is up with that?
“Where have you been, Mom?” I asked. “Where did you go when you escaped with Genevieve? Did she keep you against your will? Were you friends? Did you know how she survived for so long? Is that what kept you alive? Are you a wraith like she was?
“Granted, she was a high-functioning wraith, but she was still a wraith,” I continued. “Is that how you survived? Did you suck souls from other people? Is that how you’re still alive? Are you still doing it? Do you plan to continue doing it?” I was out of breath.
Bub’s eyes widened. “That was a mouthful, girl.”
“It certainly was,” Mom said, brushing down the front of her dress. “I’m not sure … .”
“You’re not sure about what?” I prodded. “Are you not sure you want to get into the gritty details because I’m too slow to understand them?”
Mom frowned. It was the first genuine expression she’d mustered since walking into the back yard of Grimlock Manor and proving a theory that had been eating at me for months. “I never said you were slow, Aisling,” she said. “It’s just … it’s very complicated.”
Did she just insinuate I was stupid a second time?
“The things that happened to me aren’t things I like to dwell on,” Mom continued. “I’m sure you can understand that. There’s no need to spend hours dissecting every little thing that occurred in the past when I’m here to look forward to the future.”
“I’m pretty sure my brain is too tiny to understand that,” I shot back.
“Aisling, you’ve always been petulant, but this is not why I came here,” Mom said. “I came to see you and your brothers. I came to see my old home. I came to see your father.”
My father? This would break him. I had no intention of keeping Mom’s arrival to myself – especially because keeping the secret of her potential existence almost cost me my brothers recently – but I wasn’t going to roll over and show this … woman … my belly either. For some reason, I felt she would rip my guts out if given the chance. What? I’m not being dramatic. Considering how she may have been surviving, that’s a very real possibility.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said.
“And why not?” the rogue reaper challenged. “This is her house, too.”
“No, this was Lily Grimlock’s house,” I argued. “I’m not sure you’re Lily Grimlock. I’m sorry.”
“I don’t believe you have a say in this matter, Aisling,” Mom said, edging a foot forward. “Perhaps we should ask your father. How does that sound?”
That sounded terrible. “I … .”
“It’s okay, Aisling.”
I felt my father’s tall figure move in behind me, his hand resting on my shoulder. Cormack Grimlock is an intimidating man, never one to turn from a fight. On a normal day his presence would comfort me – except when he’s yelling at me, which is quite often – but I could feel his fingers trembling as they tightened around my shoulder.
“Cormack,” Mom said, her voice jumping an octave. “I can’t believe it’s you.”
“Lily,” Dad said. He didn’t move toward the woman who bore him five children, instead opting to remain in a protective stance next to me. “What are you doing here?”
“That’s not the greeting I expected,” Mom said, taken aback. “I thought you would be happy to see me.”
Dad looked torn. “I am happier to see you than you could ever imagine,” he said, choosing his words carefully. “I’m so … sorry. What happened to you was my fault. I should’ve looked at the fire more closely. I should’ve done … almost anything but what I did.”
“That’s behind us now,” Mom soothed. “We should talk. We have a lot to talk about.”
Dad shifted a sidelong look in my direction. “What have you two been talking about?”
“Mom says what happened to her is too complicated for me to understand,” I supplied. “She doesn’t want to dwell on it.” I didn’t want to hurt my father, but he knew as well as I did that the person standing in the middle of his back yard was not the woman who went out to collect a soul one day and never returned. “Then she wanted to come into the house, but I didn’t think that was a good idea.”
“Probably not,” Dad agreed, pursing his lips.
“I don’t understand, Cormack,” Mom said, holding her hands palms up. It was almost as if she was pleading, yet that’s not the way it felt. “I thought we could spend some time together as a family. You know, catch up on everyone’s lives. That’s all I want.”
“I understand that this is hard for you, Lily,” Dad said. “It’s hard for all of us. Just this afternoon, for example, we found out that Fox Grimpond held you in his house after we thought you were dead. His plans for you were … awful.”
“Then what’s the problem?” Mom prodded.
“The problem is I have five children who mourned their mother,” Dad answered. “They know you survived the fire now, and they’re dealing with it. I’m still their father, though. I need to protect them … even if it is from their mother.”
“I don’t need to be protected, Dad,” I reminded him.
Mom shot me a grateful smile. “That’s my girl.”
“That doesn’t mean I want you in this house,” I said, snapping my attention to Mom. “You seem to want everything without giving anything, Mom. That’s not how it works in this family. That’s not how it ever worked. Maybe you’ve … forgotten.
“I know you’ve been loitering around the area for some time,” I continued. “Duke Fontaine told me you were plotting against me. You can’t waltz back into this house and think things are going to be how they were before without telling us what we want to know.”
Mom’s face twisted, and for a moment her expression was grotesque. It was frightening. “You seem to want things to be your way without compromise,” Mom challenged. “That’s not how this
family works either.”
“I’m willing to compromise,” I countered. “As soon as you tell us … what … you are.”
“I’m your mother.”
“You’re not my mother,” I argued. “You’re something different. I’m not saying we couldn’t work with whatever it is you’re dealing with, but you owe us answers. Trust is earned, not given.”
“And that’s my girl,” Dad said, shifting his arm over my shoulders. “Lily, I will never be able to apologize enough for what has happened. I just can’t welcome you back in this home with open arms, though.
“You probably did some things to survive that … are beyond words,” he continued. “You could very well be a threat to my family. You’re not the person you used to be. Until you’re ready to tell us what happened, and where things stand now, you’re not welcome here.”
“But … .” Mom scowled, her dark eyes flashing as they landed on me. “You always did manage to wrap your father around your finger, didn’t you?”
I involuntarily shrank back at her expression, but Dad’s arm was soothing as it tightened around me.
“She’ll always be able to wrap me around her finger,” Dad said. “She’s not my only child, though. There are four others in that house, and I won’t risk any of them because you don’t want to answer questions or explain your actions. It’s not just their lives, Lily – although that’s my primary concern. It’s their hearts, too.
“Do you have any idea what these kids have been through over the past decade?” he continued. “I will not allow you back into this house without knowing why you’re here. You didn’t run back to us when you escaped. I can tell just by looking at you that it’s not family love that brought you back. You want something else. Perhaps you need something else, I don’t know.”
“And what do you think I want?” Mom asked, frustrated. “This is still my family.”
“But they’re my responsibility,” Dad said. “Don’t come back here until you’re willing to tell us what happened and how things stand. We’re not living with more secrets. Not again.”
Grim Reunion (Aisling Grimlock Book 4) Page 1
