ELEVENTH GRAVE IN MOONLIGHT (Charley Davidson #11) by Darynda Jones
Grim Reaper Charley Davidson is back in the eleventh installment of Darynda Jones’ New York Times bestselling paranormal series.
A
typical day in the life of Charley Davidson involves cheating husbands,
missing people, errant wives, philandering business owners, and oh
yeah...demons, hell hounds, evil gods, and dead people. Lots and lots of
dead people. As a part time Private Investigator and full-time Grim
Reaper, Charley has to balance the good, the bad, the undead, and those
who want her dead. In this eleventh installment, Charley is learning to
make peace with the fact that she is a goddess with all kinds of power
and that her own daughter has been born to save the world from total
destruction. But the forces of hell are determined to see Charley
banished forever to the darkest corners of another dimension. With the
son of Satan himself as her husband and world-rocking lover, maybe
Charley can find a way to have her happily ever after after all.
EXCERPTS
1
Lord, help me be the sort of person my psychiatrist medicates me to be.
—T-SHIRT
I
lay on a psychiatrist’s couch, a couch I’d named Alexander Skarsgård
the moment my gaze landed on its buttery curves and wide back, and
wondered if I should tell Dr. Mayfield about the dead kid scurrying
across her ceiling. Probably not.
She
crossed her legs—the psychiatrist, not the kid, who was male—and gave
me her most practiced smile. “And that’s why you’re here?”
I
bolted upright, appalled. “Heavens, no. I’m totally over the whole evil
stepmother thing. I just thought, you know, full disclosure and all.
FYI, I had an evil stepmother.”
“Had?”
“She died.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No worries. She had an ugly demon inside of her at the time.”
“I see.”
“Wait, no, that was her outfit. The demon wasn’t that ugly.”
“Ah.”
“No, seriously, her outfit was hideous.”
“Perhaps
we should get back to the fact that you’re the grim reaper?” She pushed
plastic-framed glasses up a slender nose. Thankfully, it was hers.
“Oh,
right.” I relaxed again, falling back into Alexander’s arms. “I pretty
much have the reaper thing down. It’s the godly part of me I’m
struggling with.”
“The
godly part.” She bent her head to write something in her notebook. She
was quite lovely. Dark hair. Huge brown eyes. Wide mouth. And young. Too
young to be analyzing me. How much life experience could she possibly
have?
“Yes. Ever since I found out I was a god, I’ve felt a little off balance. I think I’m having one of those identity crisises.”
“So, you’re a god?”
“Wait. What’s the plural of crisis?” When she didn’t answer, I glanced back at her.
She’d
stopped writing and was looking at me again, her expression mildly
expectant. And ever so slightly taxed. She was trying to decide if I was
playing her. I wasn’t, but I could hardly blame her for thinking that.
Dealing with delusions of grandeur was probably an everyday aspect of
her life. Trying to sort out the legit from the cons.
When she continued to stare, I said, “I’m sorry, what was the question?”
“You’re a god?”
“Oh,
that. Yes, but to quote a very popular movie, I’m a god, not the God.” I
snorted. Bill Murray was so awesome. “Did I forget to mention that?”
“Then you’re not the grim reaper?”
“Oh,
no, I’m that, too. I volunteered. Kind of. Long story. Anyway, I
thought you could hypnotize me. You know, give me a full-access pass to
my pre-birth memories so I won’t be blindsided again.”
“Blindsided?”
“Yes. That’s why I’m here. Because my sister refuses to do regressive therapy with me, and—”
“Your sister?”
“Dr. Gemma Davidson?” The shrink-wrap community couldn’t have been very big. Surely she knew my sister.
“Dr. Davidson is your sister?”
“Is that a problem?”
“Not for me.”
“Fantabulous.”
I rubbed my hands together. “Okay, so, you know how you’re going
through life, remembering everything that ever happened to you since the
moment you were born—”
“You remember the moment you were born?”
“—and
suddenly someone says, ‘Hey, remember that time we singed our eyebrows
lighting that bowling alley on fire?’ only at first you don’t remember
singeing your eyebrows while lighting a bowling alley on fire, but then
you think about it and it suddenly comes to you? You totally remember
singeing your eyebrows while lighting a bowling alley on fire?”
She blinked several times, then wrenched out a “Sure.”
“It’s like that. I remember being a god, but not totally. Like parts of my celestial life have been erased from my memory.”
“Your celestial life.”
“Right. Before I became human? I think I have a glitch.”
“It’s … possible, I suppose.”
“I mean, who knows? I might already have a way to defeat a malevolent god that’s loose on this plane and not even realize it.”
“A malevolent god?”
“The malevolentest.”
“And he’s loose on this plane?”
“Yes.
And trust me when I say you do not want him here. He takes his death
and destruction very seriously. And he has zero respect for human life.”
“Mmm.” She nodded and went back to taking notes.
“Zero,”
I added for emphasis, making an O with my fingers. Then I waited. She
had a lot to write down. When she kept at it long enough to outline a
novel, I filled the silence with, “It’s funny. My husband thought it
would be pointless to come here.”
She laid her pen across her notepad and gave me her full attention. “Tell me about him.”
“My husband?”
“Yes.” Her voice was very soothing. Like elevator music. Or summer rain. Or Darvocet. “How’s your relationship?”
“How much time do we have?” I snorted, cracking myself up.
My
husband, a.k.a. Reyes Alexander Farrow, didn’t find my joke as funny as
I did. It happened. I felt him before I saw him. His heat brushed
across my skin. Sank into me. Saturated my clothes and hair and even
warmed the cool gold band on my ring finger.
As
he passed over me, all darkness and billowing smoke, he paused to
whisper sweet nothings in my ear. I barely heard him over the rushing of
my own blood. Whatever he said made my nether regions clench in
anticipation. Then he continued on his journey, materializing on the
other side of the room where he stood in a corner to watch from afar.
Ish.
“Just kidding,” I said as his eyes glistened in the low light. “He’s kind of awesome. He’s from down under.”
“Australia?”
“Hell.”
His
eyes narrowed, but any threats he may have been trying to hurl my way
were nulled and voided by the smirk playing about his sensual mouth. He
crossed his arms at his wide chest and leaned back into a corner to
observe my goings-on.
He’d
been doing that a lot lately. Popping in to check up on me. It could
have had something to do with the fact that I had waged war with not one
god but two. The malevolent one and the Good One. The Big Guy upstairs.
I
decided to ignore my husband to the best of my abilities. I was here on
a job. If I couldn’t stay focused despite being bombarded with the most
delicious distraction this side of the Flame Nebula, I was no better
than a gumshoe-for-hire PI.
Oh, wait. I was a gumshoe-for-hire PI. Which would explain the job I was currently on. It paid the bills. Sometimes.
“Okay, let’s get back to your husband. You mean he’s from hell metaphorically?”
I
refocused on the good doctor. “Oh, no. Quite literally. Technically,
he’s a god, too, but he was tricked by two other gods—one of which I’ve
already trapped in a hell dimension and the other of which I’m currently
trying to trap and/or horribly maim—and handed over to Lucifer, who
created his only son out of the god’s energy.”
She frowned and squinted her eyes like she was trying to imagine it all.
“Okay,
so, basically, you take the energy of a surly god”—I held up an index
finger to demonstrate—“toss in some fire and brimstone”—I wiggled my
other fingers around said index—“top that with a little sin”—I pretended
to sprinkle sin over the mixture—“whisk for five minutes, and voilà.” I
flared my fingers as though I’d just done a magic trick. “Rey’aziel
incarnate.”
When
Reyes scowled at me, I fought the urge to giggle. Nothing like having
your entire existence boiled down to its basest elements.
“Rey’aziel?” Dr. Mayfield asked.
I
bounced back to her. “Sorry. Reyes Farrow. My husband. You know, I used
to think explaining the particulars of my less-than-ordinary life to a
total stranger would be difficult, but this hasn’t been bad. I was born
the grim reaper: check. I was still learning about my abilities when I
found out that I had once been a god with my own dimension: check. I’m
married to the son of Satan, a.k.a. Reyes Alexander Farrow, who we
recently found out is also a god, through no fault of his own: check. My
stepmother was a hell-bitch extraordinaire: check. Somehow that seems
important in this situation. And there is yet another god, a malevolent
one, on this plane who is in cahoots with Reyes’s dad and wants to kill
our daughter, whom we had to send away to keep safe.” I beamed at her,
purposely ignoring the pang in my chest at the reminder that my daughter
had to be sent away from me just to be safe. Just to have the barest
glimmer of hope to live. “This has not been bad at all.”
When
it looked like Dr. Mayfield was going to try to refute something I’d
said, I raised a hand to stop her. “I know what you’re going to say.
And, yes, technically being the son of Satan, among other things, makes
my husband an iffy prospect.” I shot him a grin. “But he was a god
first. The God Jehovah’s little brother, in fact, and I like to think
that that part of him, the good part, is stronger than the evil part
that emerged when he was forged in the fires of sin and raised by demons
in a hell dimension. Though,” I said, scooting closer, “the minute you
get a load of him, your first thoughts will definitely be the carnal
kind, if you know what I mean.” I gave her a conspiratorial wink. When
she only stared, I added, “Boy’s hot.”
Reyes dipped his head, trying to hide a grin, as the doctor picked up her pen and started outlining again.
“Nice T-shirt,” Reyes said to me. Apparently, no one else in the room could hear him.
I
was wearing my I LIKE IT WHEN MY PSYCHIATRIST PLAYS WITH MY MARBLES
T-shirt. It was either that or my EXCUSE ME WHILE I FREUDIAN SLIP INTO
SOMETHING MORE COMFORTABLE pajama top, but I didn’t feel that wearing
pajamas to a shrink session would send the right message. I was a
professional, after all. Also, I’d gotten mustard on it and had to
change.
The
kid on the ceiling had stopped moving. He was gawking at the ol’ ball
and chain commanding the room from the corner pocket. That happened a
lot when Reyes was around.
I nailed him with a fake scowl. I was on an assignment, after all.
“We need to talk,” he said.
Uh-oh.
Nothing good ever came out of a conversation that started with “We need
to talk.” I mouthed, “Later,” and shooed him away while the doctor took
a few more notes.
He
laughed softly, and for a split moment, the doctor lost her focus and
let her gaze dart, just for a second, over her shoulder.
He
winked, the saucy flirt, and dematerialized, leaving me alone with my
psychiatrist again. I was pretty sure he’d been breaking a few HIPAA
laws by being there, anyway.
“Did you hear something?” she asked.
“You
mean besides the thunderous and devastating ramifications if I can’t
figure out how to take this god down and he completes his mission?”
“Yes. Besides that.”
“If
I could just get all my memories back … I know there’s something
hidden, something important that will tell me how to deal with him. Like
it’s on the tip of my tongue, only with more of a brain analogy.”
“Okay. So, why does your sister refuse to do regressive therapy with you? Besides the obvious?”
“Oh,
that whole ethical dilemma thing on account of her being my sister and
all? Yeah, well, she’s afraid it will bring out some strange new power
in me and I’ll accidently blow Albuquerque off the face of the planet.
Which is ridonculous.” I snorted and rolled my eyes. “I can totally
control my powers now.”
She took more notes.
“Most of the time.”
She continued to write.
“I don’t think the ‘Lumpy’s Taco Hut incident’ should count. That place was an eyesore. People should be thanking me.”
She offered me her attention once again. “Lumpy’s Taco Hut? That was you?”
Shit.
I forgot that whole thing was still under investigation. “Pfft, no.”
Thank Reyes’s Brother, Lumpy’s had been closed due to code violations at
the time and no one was hurt.
“Ah.” She shut her notebook. “Is there anything else you want to share? Anything you think I should be aware of?”
“No.” I shook my head in thought. “Not especially. Unless you count the fact that I’m going to take over the world.”
“The whole thing?”
“Well, I’m going to try to take over the world.”
“And you feel you’re prepared for world domination?”
I lifted a noncommittal shoulder. “I’m taking a business class.”
“Good for you.” She opened up her notebook again and jotted down a few more ideas.
“I told Jehovah, through his archangel Michael, of course, that I was going to do it, too.”
“Take over the world?”
It sounded silly when she said it out loud, but I could hardly turn back now. “Yes.”
“And how did He take that?”
“Not
well, but you don’t know what He did. He created an entire hell
dimension just to lock my husband inside and throw away the key. Though
we weren’t married at the time. This was a few thousand years ago.”
Ever
since informing Michael of my plans, God had sent a legion of His
minions to follow my every move. They were like the heavenly version of
the Secret Service. I’d threatened, and, for some reason only they knew
of, they’d taken it seriously. But why? I was angry when I said it—and I
certainly meant it—but that doesn’t explain why they would take me
seriously. Unless I was a real threat.
Hell.
Yes.
“So, God talks to you?”
I snapped back to reality. “Oh, no. Not directly.”
“Right. He talks to you through His archangel, Michael.” She wrote down every word as she said it.
“Yeah.
Kind of old-school, if you ask me, what with today’s technology. You
know, I thought psychiatrists just sort of listened while the patient
talked. You’re gonna run out of ink there, missy.” I laughed nervously.
She gave me a patient smile. “I have more pens in my desk.”
“Gotcha.”
“So, God is upset because you threatened to take over His world?”
“That’s the word on the street.”
“Are you worried?”
“Not especially.”
“Fair enough. Let’s get back to these powers. What do you plan to do with them?”
“Excuse me?”
“Your powers. I mean, surely you’re going to use them for good?”
I
got the sneaking suspicion she was humoring me. I was good with that. I
threw an arm over my face. “There’s so much, you know? So much I could
do. I could cure cancer. I could end famine. I could stop all wars and
bring absolute peace to the world.”
“And why don’t you?”
I
lowered my arm slowly. “I’m still kind of figuring the whole thing out.
I’m saying I could do all those things. Not that I know how.”
“That would be difficult.”
“That
and I think that’s why the angels are here. Not, like, in this room,
but all around me. Following me. Watching me. I don’t think He wants me
to do any of those things.”
“And why wouldn’t He?”
“Autonomy.”
When she raised her brows in question, I explained. “That was the deal.
After that whole Adam and Eve fiasco—Eve got screwed, by the way—that
was the deal. He gave humans complete autonomy. Earth is ours, and it’s
up to us to help our fellow man or harm him. To heal ourselves. To do
good things. No matter your religion, no matter your beliefs, the lesson
is the same: be kind.”
I fought the urge to add another word to the end of that statement.
I lost. “Rewind.”
Damn it. I sucked at fighting. Urges or otherwise.
“It’s a good message,” she said when she came back to me, a microsecond before she started writing again.
“It is. And I have to tell you something else.”
“I’m all ears.”
I
released a lengthy sigh and fessed up. “The whole regressive therapy
thing? That’s actually secondary to the real reason I’m here.”
“Which is?”
I
dropped my feet over Mr. Skarsgård and sat up to look her in the eye.
Or the part in her hair. Either way, I wanted to study her reaction
since I couldn’t feel her emotions. “Dr. Mayfield?”
“Hmm?” she said without looking up.
I
cleared my throat and steeled myself. It had to be done. She needed to
know the truth. To accept the things she could not change, so the prayer
went, and there was definitely no changing this. Without further ado, I
said softly, “I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but you died two
years ago.”
She kept writing. “Mm-hmm. And you can see me because…?”
“I’m the—”
“—grim reaper. Right. Oh, and a god, no less.”
Wow. I sat back. She took that really well. Either that or she didn’t believe me.
Nah.
I
bit my lip while she continued to take notes, but my attention span was
only so long. “So, yeah, I’ve been hired, in a manner of speaking, by
the new leaser of this office. He’s been experiencing strange events.
Just the usual stuff. Cold spots. Magazines moving from one corner on a
table to another. Pictures falling off the walls.”
“I see. And he hired you because he thinks the place is haunted.”
“Actually,
no. He thinks the landlord wants him to break the lease to use the
office for his new juicing business, which is dumb because this would be
a horrible location for a juice bar. But he thinks the landlord is
trying to scare him off. To frighten him away. To send him fleeing in
terror. In a word, he thinks he’s being punked.”
“But you disagree?”
“I do.”
“You think it’s really haunted?”
“Yes, I do. And I have to admit, at first, I thought it was you.”
“Naturally.”
“’Cause you’re dead and all.”
“But you’ve changed your mind?” She had yet to look up at me.
“Yes. I’m pretty sure it’s that kid crawling around your ceiling.”
She
stopped writing, but she didn’t want to bite. I could see it in her
expression. She looked at me at last. Eyed me a long moment. Probably
wondered if she should give in. If she should feed my delusions by
looking up. After a lengthy struggle in which I lost focus and
contemplated the origins of marshmallows—seriously, what mad genius came
up with that delicacy?—she slowly raised her lashes and looked toward
the ceiling.
Thankfully,
only I could hear her earsplitting screams. She dropped her pen and
pad, fell to the ground, and crab-crawled backwards. In heels and a
pencil skirt, no less. I was impressed.
In
her defense, the kid crawling on her ceiling looked a little like that
monochrome girl who crawled out of a television set in a horror movie I
once watched about an hour before a DOA popped into my bedroom, wanting
me to tell his wife where the insurance papers were, only the kid was a
he. A he who looked about ten years old, with long black hair and a
shiny black cape. An odd fashion choice for a boy of any age. And from
any era.
The good doctor cowered in a corner, the look of horror on her face both sad and strangely amusing.
“Dr. Mayfield,” I said, easing toward her with my palms patting the air. “It’s okay. He’s perfectly harmless.”
Of course, the second I said it, the little shit landed on my shoulders and sank his teeth into my neck.
Copyright © 2017 by Darynda Jones
