’Til Grim’s Light
A Grim Awakening Novel
Book Two
By Michelle Gross
’Til Grim’s Light
copyright © 2016 by Michelle Gross
All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Cover Artwork –© 2016 L.J. Anderson of Mayhem Cover Creations
Stock Photography–© 2016 tverdohlib @ stock.adobe.com
Dear Readers,
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
’Til Death We Meet Again
Author’s Note
Melanie met the monster she feared most and survived—but at a cost.
A life was lost. And one became two.
Now that Killian was no longer Grim Reaper; he was back to being an incubus demon. And if waiting for demons to attack weren’t enough on a girl, being around him while his pheromones were slipping—planting dirty thoughts inside her head—was enough to make anyone question their sanity.
But her dirty mind and trying to stay alive weren’t the only thing she had to worry about. The Vessel had awakened inside her. She needed to figure out what it was and why there was suddenly a voice inside her head.
Soon, Melanie was questioning everything, wondering… all the while spiraling down a path toward Grim and Killian, discovering her own feelings.
Then came the question: What if they were wrong about the Vessel?
Dear Readers,
When I first started writing Melanie’s story, I always knew I wanted it to be dark, touch base with some things that might make people feel uncomfortable. I even considered writing it differently, but that thought lasted all of one second. So, I wrote it exactly how I wanted to.
Which is why I’m writing this short letter to you all.
For the most part, I don’t think this story is dark—at times, yeah. I liked to think it’s filled with adventure and epic love (in the making), while adding all the cheesy and swoon worthy weirdness that I love.
I wanted Melanie to be real. I wanted her to question things—herself and make mistakes and continue to do so because let’s face it: We all made stupid choices at some point in our lives and I’m pretty sure I still do on a regular basis.
Let’s just say the story is different—unique, while having all the qualities we love: action, romance, horrible bad guys, and sexy hunks that want to keep you safe.
Read this book with an open mind—again, this is not everyone’s cup of tea.
It’s best to leave that pesky thing we call reality somewhere else and dive on in.
Thanks for reading,
Michelle Gross
Prologue
Almost three thousand years ago in the depths of the Underworld...
I rubbed my hands together, anticipation coating my forehead. What the bloody hell was going on? The moment I stepped through the portal and entered the City of the Dead I knew something big was happening. The place was a giant ball of excitement. The streets were crowded and jammed, demons traveled the streets of every kind. My own emotions were tapping into everyone's, making me skittish. Someone—or thing bumped and slapped into my back. I whirled around to see what it was.
Banshee.
Lovely creature, she was. My demon traits kicked in the moment my eyes found the exposed top of her cleavage. Her green eyes caught me staring and an appreciated smile swept over her face. I tipped my head back with a smirk. My body drummed with excitement—the need my body required seemed to flare to life as my gaze dropped down to the curve of her hips leading to her backside.
“Incubus demon.” Her eyes studied me with curiosity. It was no surprise. All females knew of incubus demons. Some loved us, some hated us. It was all according on how an incubus used their power of seduction.
“What gave it away?” I didn't have to see my face to know that my eyes had turned liquid black. I leaned closer, the busy street rustled around us, but my instinct was now focused on her. Desire rushed through my veins, the need to fuck her, not know her became my priority. I couldn't even remember the reason I came to the city. She bumped into me by mistake, but now she knew just as well as I, we were leaving together.
“Oh, I'm not sure.” She pretended to be thinking, tilting her neck to the side. “You mean the fact that the enticing scent of sex you carry on your skin isn't enough to prove what you are? All incubi are easy to spot, just look for the most sexually charged men in the city that are handsome and built like a sex god.” She gave me an appreciative glance from head to toe before she grabbed my belt buckle and looped a finger into my jeans. I gave her a sinful smile. She knew she was playing with fire but she didn't care. She wanted what only an incubus demon could give. Wicked, hot sex.
“Say, incubus, are you going to appear in my dreams tonight?” she purred, sounding hopeful. Incubus demons could do either one of two things. Slip into a person's dreams and steal from their pleasure there or go about it the ole’ natural way. Fucking. I was always for the second, to me, it always felt wrong to invade someone's dreams.
“I don't do the dream world, banshee. I like to be hands on.” She liked my answer from the slight increase of her breathing. A sick knot twisted in my stomach as a wave of need flared in my loins. The battle of not wanting to do something and needing to crashed into me. I hated what I was.
Every day I lived as a sex demon was a curse.
Being a sex junkie wasn't all it was cracked up to be. It was fun at first, don't get me wrong. The release was always good but after a while, it just wasn't anymore. When I realized I stopped doing something because I wanted to, and instead did it because of my genetics, took the fun right out of it.
Even now, as the wave of both pleasure and need hit me, I only felt numb... but it wasn't something I could ignore.
No.
Incubi craved—needed the pleasure of sex. Hence, why I called us sex junkies. It was impossible to ignore a female. It was a torment, a sick, conflicting emotion that I would never be able to control. Incubi could never fall in love. It was impossible to be with just one female. Our train of thought would never let us focus on just one.
Thirty years of life and I was starting to accept the fact that I would always be alone. Never alone in bed but that wasn't the alone I meant. The loneliness that crept into my chest. That empty ache that would stay there because no one would ever be able to get close enough to reach it.
“He's here!” Voices echoed through the streets, demons pushed and shoved. I was being bumped and smacked into more than I could stand. I was too big for anyone to move me in their hurry, but my eyes still flared every time I was touched.
“What the hell is going on?” I muttered as I raked my hand through my hair in aggravation. I watched as everyone scattered toward the middle of the city.
“Oh,
you don't know?” the banshee asked, surprised. I gave her an impatient glare for her to give me an explanation when she just stood there. “Some powerful entity entered the city. Rumors say he has come to find a demon to merge with.”
I turned myself around to where the demons gathered and waited. An entity? Powerful beings, each made for a certain purpose. I moved forward, going with the crowd, suddenly interested. Compelled to get a look for myself. I had never seen one before and most of the time, you didn't want to come across one. But, if one was searching for another half to make him whole… that was worth checking out.
I pushed through demons of all sorts, it was shoulder to shoulder—or tentacle—or worse, it was all according to what I bumped into. Before I reached the opened, circular part of the street to see what all the fuss was about, the city went silent. Everyone stopped and looked ahead in amazement. Murmurs, gasps, and awe's exploded around me.
Then it was like being hit with a heart attack, my heart screamed. My body surged head to toe with untamed energy, sparking a pulse of something knowing and new in me. I stood still for a second in the busy street. A pull, one that had me pushing and shoving through the demons—not caring that I was knocking some down. A tight squeeze clamped over my entire being. I clawed at my chest for air, the need I felt now was stronger than the need for sex.
I didn't even know why; I just knew I needed to be where everyone was staring. For the first time in my useless life, I felt a connection. Something was waiting for me. I felt it. I sensed it all throughout my body.
And finally, the opening came into view. I stepped on into where no one else would go. I stopped and simply looked at the entity several feet in front of me. Blue light, that of life, hummed around his tall skeleton frame. A black cloak wrapped around him and a hood rested over his skull. His clothes were even dark underneath the cloak. I liked his style. It felt like a reflection of my own dark soul, except I never wore a cloak.
Grim Reaper's eyeless sockets met mine as if he recognized me. That sense of knowing came to life in my chest, as if I somehow knew him too. I stared like the rest of the demons. His eyes never left mine.
I was struck with amazement. That was a normal reaction when seeing an entity such as Grim. He was known as the balancer. He balanced life and death. Good and bad. He was the symbol of death. He was Death. He stood as the most powerful besides that of God and Satan. He wasn't conceived; he was made.
He was an entity made by God. The other three entities were made by Satan.
And he was searching for a demon to merge with? It didn't seem possible. Demons spoke of him enough for me to know that he never merged with anyone. He had once tried in the past and never went through with it.
He stepped closer. My body hummed with excitement and power all over again. I took a step forward to meet him. Someway, somehow, I realized what had been wrong all my life. I was never born whole, but I finally would be. I relaxed some more and took another step. I never trembled in his presence—I welcomed it. I only felt like I was standing in the presence of myself that had been missing long before my birth.
“Grim Reaper,” I called to him, knowing that I too would go by that name.
His hand extended out between us, causing a ripple of shock through the demons.
“He's chosen someone to merge with!”
“And it's an incubus demon of all demons.”
“I can't believe it!”
I heard the demons around us, but I ignored them all. I brought my hand out to his.
“Wait, Killian!” I recognized that voice and turned my head around to see Marcus running toward us.
“Marcus?” I squinted, confused. My thoughts were foggy with the need to become Grim.
“Don't do it,” he pleaded. His blond hair fell out of his ponytail as he ran. Then as soon as his eyes left mine they went to Grim. “Merge with me instead. I am a far better choice. Killian doesn't have what it takes.” I looked at my friend for more than ten years and glared. What the hell was he doing?
Marcus's hand latched onto Grim's already extended one. He gripped Grim’s hand anxiously as he looked at him. Grim's skull swiveled around to look at Marcus. Something twisted in my gut, a nasty horrible feeling. Marcus was an incubus demon like I was. Would he choose him instead of me?
The thought didn't last.
Grim was here for me. I just knew.
Grim jerked his hand away from Marcus's. “Move demon, you're interrupting me.” His eyeless expression went back to me. I stared back and knew everything about him felt right. This was right. Suddenly the chance to be something other than an incubus demon was possible. I would never be controlled by desire.
I moved my hand between us and Grim took it. “Two shall become one,” he spoke. To me. To Marcus. To everyone.
Then cries erupted around us. I caught sight of another entity appearing next to us. The entity was frightening as he stepped in front of Marcus who was on his knees, crumbled up in anger. His face was red with rage.
But I could no longer focus on the two. My vision blurred when Grim tightened his hand. I felt his thoughts drifting into mine as my view of Marcus and the entity came back into focus.
I looked at the entity knowing exactly who he was.
Fear.
Grim's thoughts continued to echo into mine.
Enemy.
I was glaring at the entity before I even knew I was. Hatred rose up in my chest as I watched him. Fear offered his hand to Marcus. Something flickered in the depths of Marcus's eyes. A second later, he grabbed the clawed hand Fear offered.
I looked back to Grim who was waiting for me. He nodded as if to let me know what was happening.
Pain tore through my chest, slowly stretching out all over my body. I clenched my teeth but was unable to move my body or yell out in pain. We stood locked together by our hand as wave after wave of agony tore through my body.
After what felt like an endless torture, my body became slack and something told me that I needed to move into Grim. I listened to that instinct and stepped into Grim just as he did me.
Power like nothing I could have imagined before licked over my skin and teased me of what we—I now wielded.
I flexed my fingers and hands before straightening my shoulders and standing tall. A cocky smile played out on my face as I watched the demons’ eyes travel over me. They had all witnessed the merge. My body left Grim's state and became flesh. I gave my hands another look of amazement. My smile only grew.
I was Killian: The Grim Reaper.
Chapter One
The cold blast of wind ruffled my hair out of place. A sign that fall was finally here. I let the wind chill me to the bone because I felt numb anyway. Next to me, Tess held my hand and squeezed tight, her eyes red and wet with tears. I gave her hand a gentle tug to let her know we still had each other. Not that it could help us right now. My own tears were dried out after three days of endless crying.
Today, I could barely feel a thing.
I glanced down at my black shirt and dress pants, the only thing I owned that seemed fitting to wear to a funeral. My eyes were on the preacher. I saw his mouth move, but I couldn't hear a thing he was saying. There was more crying next to me. It was Tess or her mom. Or both. I didn't know. I wouldn't look.
I could only stare at the closed coffin. If only I could talk to him one more time... I would tell him how much he always meant to me before things got crazy.
The preacher must have finished up because people began to walk up to the coffin. They would place a single rose or flower of some sort on his coffin. Some would say something comforting and others would rub their hands across the coffin as if they were touching his body for the last time.
Tess released my hand and walked forth, her face crumbled with grief as she lay a single white rose on the coffin. She gazed down at the coffin. A smile crept against her lips for a moment like she was suddenly remembering something happy before it turned to tears.
I looked away, it wa
s too much. I felt my own emotions threatening to come to life.
I never walked up to the coffin. I just kept telling myself it didn't matter now. He was already dead. What I thought now didn't matter because he would never know.
It wasn't until the coffin lowered and Ryan's body sunk to the ground that I fully grasped the loss of losing him. I grabbed my neck, unable to breathe as all the emotions came back full force. I inhaled and the tears fell like a waterfall.
Ryan was dead. It wasn't real. Yes, it was.
And it was all my fault.
All because I was Melanie Rose. I saw ghosts because Fear—a powerful entity—marked me as a child so that my soul would belong to him when I died. All because I carried the Vessel inside of me. A power I still knew nothing about. Then there was Killian. Grim freaking Reaper who stormed into my life claiming to protect me and turned my whole world upside down. Now because of Fear, Killian and Grim were no longer one person but two. My brain was still trying to wrap around that one.
I hadn't seen or heard from either of them since the night Grim dropped me off, which was four nights ago. I showered that night and went to bed beaten and bruised with four hideous claw marks slashed across my chest.
Only when I woke, the marks were gone. So were the rest of my aches and pains. Which meant Grim had come back some time that night to heal me while I was sleeping. A part of me had hoped it was Killian that healed me but that wasn't possible. He was barely breathing when we left him.
But, I didn't get a chance to wonder about those two before I woke to a phone call that would change everything. Ryan Jones. My best friend—secret crush since the day Fear attacked me when I was nine, died.
I never said a word at his funeral. Even now, on the drive home, I was speechless. Even Alex chose not to speak. Mom was the one that finally broke the silence. “He's in a better place now.” And wasn't that what they all say? I clenched my fists. I stared out of the window as the trees and mountains went by in a blur. The green of summer was gone, replaced with the many shades of fall.
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