Lost Reaper

Book 2: Reaper's Ascension

by Shelley Russell Nolan

Genres: Paranormal; Urban Fantasy; Occult & Supernatural

Synopsis

The first dead body I ever saw was my own

For twenty-five year old Tyler Morgan, being murdered was easy. Easy in comparison with working for the Grim Reaper.

Jonathon Grimm may have brought her back from the dead in exchange for working as a reaper for her home town, Easton, but she has to find his lost reaper before she can enjoy her second chance at life.

Only ... the lost reaper isn't actually lost. He has a new body, a new life, and no intention of turning himself in.

He could be anyone – the intriguing detective, Sam Lockwood: the handsome, wealthy Chris Bradbury; or the serial killer stalking the women of Easton. Women who bear an uncanny resemblance to Tyler. And what is the ancient secret that has motivated Grimm to choose Tyler for such morbid work?

As the killer closes in and Grimm's deadline draws closer, Tyler discovers she is fighting a much bigger threat than the Grim Reaper and time is running out for everyone.

A fast-paced, supernatural thriller, Lost Reaper will appeal to male and female readers alike with its combination of great storytelling, action and romance.

Release date: July 25, 2019

Print pages: 286

Sample

Chapter One

The petrol bowsers stood idle as I pulled in to the service station. Old and rundown, with “Out of Order” signs on half the pumps, most people bypassed it in favour of the bright and gleaming service stations closer to the centre of town. But it was the only one in Easton that sold my favourite peppermints, Oddfellows, so I was a regular customer. I’d cut short my usual Thursday night study session at the university library, unable to deny my cravings any longer.

A cool wind snaked around my ankles as I got out of the car and I shivered, rubbing the goose bumps that appeared on my arms. The fluorescent light over the entrance flickered, doing little to dispel the shadows in the carpark. I headed for the door as a truck pulled into the drive-through behind me, the rumble of its engine making my ears vibrate.

Inside the service station, I took a breath to clear the scent of diesel. After I’d ransacked the lolly stand, I went to the wooden counter and placed the peppermints in front of the elderly owner with a sheepish smile. He’d teased me before about my Oddfellows fetish and I expected more of the same as he rang up the sale on a cash register I suspected was even older than he was.

I heard the scrape of the main door as it opened and closed behind me. The owner slid his eyes towards the door and then glanced back at me—a scurrying glance like a mouse aware he’s been seen by the hawk. I had enough time to read the terror and desperation in his faded blue eyes before he clutched his chest and collapsed behind the counter.

A heavy weight dropped onto my shoulder, fingers digging into my collar bone, spinning me around. I reeled and caught a flash of scuffed work boots and denim jeans marked with black grease. My hands shook as I gazed into the eyes of the man who stood before me.

Blood dripped down the side of his face as he struggled to open his mouth.

‘Run,’ he said, spittle spraying his lips.

Movement exploded from behind him. I caught a glimpse of a dark figure and tried to run, but the dark figure lunged for me, grabbing my hair, twisting the long strands around his fist.

He swung me around until I stood face to face with him. Then he shoved a large knife into my stomach. Pain tore through me. I screamed, dropping my money and keys as I clawed at him, clutching at his clothes. He slammed his head into mine. Pain exploded through my nose and eyes. I sagged, only his grip on my hair keeping me standing.

I heard a sickening sucking sound as he withdrew the knife from my stomach. Waves of agony flooded my body. I screamed again. He stabbed me in the chest, the impact punching away my voice. I gasped, staring into eyes as brown as mine. All I could hear was my own panting as he lowered me to the floor.

Fire blazed in my midsection. My scalp throbbed where he had ripped away the hair. My mind drifted with the pain. I fought against its pull. I had to stay awake. I had to get away. I struggled to get up but he put a knee on my chest, pushing me back to the floor. Then he used the tip of the bloody knife to brush my long fringe out of my eyes.

His face was pale, covered with mottled blotches like bruised fruit, unnatural, freaky, like one of the zombies in the horror movies my boyfriend Logan insisted I watch with him.

Zombies weren’t real, couldn’t be real, but this monster was.

No emotion lit his dead eyes as he gripped the knife with both hands and brought it down.

Pain engulfed me, radiating outwards, burning through my body, scouring the air from my lungs, and smothering my screams. His weight shifted and he leaned over me, pushing the knife in deeper. Pain vanished as darkness swallowed me whole.

 

Chapter Two

I opened my eyes and found myself somewhere else, looking through a window at my body on the service station floor. Blood coated the front of my T-shirt, darkening the cloth. My caramel-coloured skin was pale, heart-shaped face slack, long black hair matted with blood.

I put a hand on my chest. My heart beat faster and faster. It should have reassured me, but I couldn’t ignore the evidence of my own eyes.

I was dead.

I clutched my stomach and found my ruined clothes had been replaced by a long white gown, the silken fabric soft and cool against my body. My feet were bare but I could feel nothing beneath my toes. Around me was a dark void, the only light coming from the room where a horrible scene was playing out.

Behind the counter, the owner had pulled himself to his feet and was frantically pushing buttons on an ancient telephone, gnarled hands shaking, horror etched on his face when his call wouldn’t connect.

To the left of my body, the man who’d tried to give me a chance to escape slumped at the end of the aisle closest to the counter. He struggled to his knees, oblivious of the monster standing over him.

I heard the knife thud home and wanted to turn away but my body seized up. Helpless, I watched the owner scramble out from behind the counter, making for a door marked ‘Staff Only’. The monster got to his feet and stalked after him, whistling as he prepared to kill again.

I sobbed, hands covering my mouth, tears streaming down my face.

‘It doesn’t have to end this way, Tyler.’

I dropped my hands and spun around.

A man shrouded in mist appeared out of the darkness, the light from the service station creating shadows that cloaked his features as he glided towards me.

The mist flowed around him like a living thing, keeping his shape indistinct until he stood in front of me. Then it parted. He was tall, gaunt, dressed in a stylish black suit and a long cape, the angles of his face so sharp they would cut any who dared touch him. His eyes were black and cold, and I shivered as he stared at me.

‘What… who are you?’ Tendrils of mist crept towards me and wrapped around my feet, twining their way up my body and pinning my arms to my sides.

My breathing came in gasps as I struggled against the mist but it only tightened its grip. Wispy fingers touched my face, tasting me, tasting my fear. Then the man waved his hand and the mist retreated.

‘My name is Jonathon Grimm, and I have a proposition for you.’

‘A proposition?’ My gaze darted around the void, seeking something, anything, to explain what was happening to me. The black expanse ridiculed my hopes, reflecting back an empty nothingness as goose pimples skittered across my body.

‘Agree to work for me and I will bring you back to life.’

‘You can do that?’ I drew in a shaky breath. ‘Why me?’

Grimm stared at me, no expression on his face. ‘I have my reasons.’

I heard muffled screams coming from the service station’s staffroom. My stomach heaved, and I struggled to comprehend what he was offering me. ‘What kind of work are you talking about?’

Jonathon Grimm waved his hand and the disturbing noises cut off. ‘One of my reapers has become lost, entangled in the body of a soul due to be reaped. I need you to find him and bring him home.’

‘Reapers?’ I stared at him. He’d said his name was Jonathon Grimm. ‘You’re the Grim Reaper?’

‘You sound doubtful, but I assure you I am who I say I am.’

‘I don’t understand,’ I said, stumbling over my words. ‘I thought the Grim Reaper was a skeletal figure in a hooded cloak.’ I waved a shaking hand at his clothes. ‘You look like an undertaker in one of those old British movies.’

His wintry gaze focused on me. ‘That is one of my aspects, but I thought you would be more comfortable with this.’ He waved a hand over his body. ‘It seems I was mistaken.’

The mist burst into movement, rushing towards me, thickening, choking me. I waved my hands in front of my face, desperate to keep the damp, cold tendrils away. The mist resisted, but for a brief second I caught a glimpse of what lurked behind the unnatural fog.

I opened my mouth to scream and the blackness surrounding us swallowed the sound. I couldn’t stop screaming and if the mist hadn’t ensnared me, holding me upright, I would have dropped to my knees and cowered before his terrible figure.

Abnormally tall, stretched past anything resembling human, he loomed over me, his cloak billowing around him revealing the skeletal frame hidden within the voluminous cloth. One hand held his scythe, and the other stretched towards me bringing a cold so intense it burned my nose. Tears streamed down my face.

I gasped for air but the mist had become like a blanket, suffocating me, ramming its way down my throat. I clawed at my neck, desperate to clear my airway. I was going to die, but I was already dead so that wasn’t possible.

Was there something worse than being dead?

The mist swirled before my eyes, making it impossible to see. Then it released me and I slumped to my knees. And there stood Jonathon Grimm, in his creepy undertaker outfit. He leaned over me and I flinched. Those thin lips formed a tight smile and his glacial eyes glowed.

The cold retreated. I sucked air into my lungs as fast as I could in case he stole my breath away again. I scrambled to my feet, hoping that would be the last time I ever got to see him change into his other form.

‘Do you accept my offer?’

I nodded, and kept nodding, despite the effort my hands were putting in to keep my head still. The cold fire burning in his gaze made me think there were worse things than dying and maybe I’d find out what those were if I turned him down.

‘What do I have to do?’ I asked, anxious to get as far away from Grimm as possible. At the same time, what he offered drew me in.

‘After your… resurrection, you will begin searching for my lost reaper.’

Resurrection. The way he said it made me squirm, like a dirty word that should never be spoken in polite company. But I pushed aside my unease. ‘How am I supposed to find this guy? You said he got tangled up in someone else’s body. Do you have any idea what he even looks like?’

‘Looks are immaterial. You will be drawn to him, and he to you. Each reaper is given an assigned reaping ground and Easton belonged to Ash. That is where the body he has been caught up in will be found. Find it and release him. That’s all you have to do, other than acting as his replacement.’

I gave a start. ‘As in… you want me to be a reaper?’ A shiver swept over me at the thought of being around dead bodies on a regular basis. ‘I don’t even know what a reaper does.’

‘They act as a conduit between life and death, drawing the soul out of the dying body and allowing it to come here, to the Underworld, where the souls remain until it is time for them to be reborn.’

‘But how am I supposed—’

He glared at me. ‘If you want to be resurrected it needs to be done now, before rigour sets in and your body is irreparably damaged.’

I wanted to say I’d rather stay dead than work for him. But I’d barely begun to live my life, taking the first steps towards getting everything I ever wanted. As for the questions crowding my brain, there’d be time to find answers once he’d resurrected me.

‘I’ll do it.’ Easton wasn’t a big city. If I got lucky I wouldn’t have to do any reaping. As soon as I found Ash, he could have his job back.

‘When you find Ash,’ said Grimm, ‘you will reap his soul immediately. Then you will be free to resume your life, as long as you have fulfilled your obligation as novice reaper for this town.’

‘I said I’d do it, be a reaper. Tell me what I have to do, zap me back to life or whatever you plan on doing, and I’ll get to work,’ I said, the words tumbling out, hoping he didn’t notice the way my lips trembled.

He waved his hand and the mist thickened, encasing us in a cocoon. Then he moved forward, hands outstretched. Only these were the skeletal hands of a reaper, reaching for my neck. I backed away, desperate to avoid his grasp. But the mist snapped around me, a gossamer prison trapping me as effectively as steel bars.

Grimm touched me with deathly cold fingers, my skin cringing as he gripped my neck with both hands. I froze as he scoured my body with a cold so extreme it stopped my heart beating. I screamed; every molecule of my being shattered into a thousand pieces. My vision went black.

Surely this was hell.

 

Chapter Three

I opened my eyes and gaped.

I stood beside a glistening puddle of my own blood, back in the service station; a blank space where my body once lay. Still dressed in the long white gown, the cracked linoleum floor cold beneath my bare feet, I ran my hands over the soft material of the dress. My heart pounded, the body housing it whole, unharmed. Blood pumped its way through veins grown sluggish from inaction and for a moment I couldn’t move as my muscles struggled to remember how to work.

I was alive, but for how much longer?

I spun around. The monster roamed inside the service station, somewhere. I tuned out the drumming of my pulse and listened.

At first all I could hear were gasps as my lungs sucked in air. I slowed my breathing, concentrating on making my body believe the oxygen supply would not be cut off at any moment. A door slammed in the staffroom and what focus I’d gained fled. I fell to my knees, fighting for breath, desperate to calm myself and ward off the blackness threatening to sweep me into oblivion.

Get up. I had to get up. I clambered to my feet. I had to get out of there before the man who’d murdered me got a chance to do it all over again. Even as the thought formed, the door to the staffroom opened.

I put one hand to my chest and shivered when my fingertips grazed something so cold it almost burned. A heavy necklace with a large centrepiece stretched across my collarbones. Grimm must have put it on me when he’d grabbed me around the neck.

My legs were stiff as I shuffled towards the sliding doors, my hands automatically searching for my keys in the pocket of the jeans I no longer wore. I’d never be able to outrun him on foot. Even if my legs were working properly, in this part of town I had nowhere to run to.

Before my world had been bathed in blood I’d been at the counter with the keys in my hand. They had to be on the floor near where I had died.

My movements became more fluid as I edged towards the counter. When I crept past the end of the aisle where the dead trucker had fallen I averted my gaze. I had only a fragile grip on reality; I did not want to test it.

The closer I got to the counter, the easier it became to breathe. I was going to make it.

The monster had no reason to know I’d been resurrected. I tiptoed the remaining few feet and scooped the keys up off the floor, careful not to let them jingle. I skirted the pool of my own blood and made for the doors.

The thing that had murdered me stepped out of an aisle in front of me, knife held loosely in his right hand.

I shuddered, caught by the blank expression on his mottled face.

He looked even more like a zombie now, nightmare brought to life.

The flesh on his cheeks had begun to split and dark red blood oozed out of the cracks. Blood covered the front of his jacket and had turned his jeans black. He held out his left hand, palm up. Fingers coated in blood, nails caked with it, his gesture all the more grotesque when he curled his fingers, gesturing for me to come to him.

I shook my head, backing away, eyes going to the knife he’d stabbed me with. His mouth curved into a smile, though the blank stare never changed. He lunged forward and I bolted down the aisle to my left, vaulting over the dead trucker. Something metal hit the shelf beside my head. He’d thrown the knife.

I hit the end of the aisle and immediately twisted into the next one along. This led straight towards the doors and I forced my legs to move even faster as I ran for my life. My long hair let me down. I was wrenched backward and screamed at the pain in my scalp as he threw me up against the magazine stand to the right of the doorway. His hands let go of my hair, only to latch around my neck.

I kicked and punched him, desperate to get away, but he ignored my efforts and squeezed my throat hard, so hard I choked and gagged as my lungs screamed for air.

Snap.

I came to, back in the Underworld, Grimm looming over me.

‘You’re no use to me dead.’

I started to shake, fists clenched, wanting to smack the sneer off his face. ‘What the hell did you think was going to happen? You sent me back without a weapon or anything. That thing is twice my size and obviously crazy. You want me to live, give me something to work with.’

‘You’re a reaper. You don’t need a weapon.’

I stared at him. ‘You mean… I could reap his soul?’

‘That is what reapers do.’

I couldn’t get my head around it. Everything was happening so fast. One minute I was dead, then alive, and then dead again. I needed to think it through, but no amount of time would make this experience seem sensible. I’d fallen into a nightmare where to escape I would have to reap the soul of the monster who’d murdered me and two others.

I took a deep breath. ‘What do I have to do?’

Grimm came forward and this time I didn’t flinch as his bony fingers hovered below my neck. ‘To draw out a soul you must place one hand here and the other on your necklace. You will feel heat as the soul responds to your touch.’

I nodded, not trusting myself to speak.

Grimm stepped back. ‘There’ll be no more second chances.’

I glared at him, hating him for putting me through this, hating myself for wanting to live so badly I let him do it.

He came at me again, skeletal hands grabbing my neck. But this time I did not scream. Rage towards Grimm filled me, burning away the cold as I took the first breath of my new life.

I launched myself at the monster that had killed me twice.

He stood beside the overturned magazine stand, his back to me. I gripped the necklace in one hand and reached for him with the other. He was taller than me so I aimed high, latching on to the base of his neck.

The second I touched him the necklace started to pulse, giving off heat. Warmth bloomed below my hand and it increased as his soul responded to my call. He spun around, eyes wide, and slumped to his knees in front of me, mouth open in a silent scream. His back arched, like a man who’d received an electric shock, and his body shook violently. Dribble fell from his mouth and his eyes bulged as I pulled my hand away and drew the soul out of his body.

I wanted to stop; I really did. I came so close to breaking the connection, letting his soul slip from my fingers. It dangled in the air in front of me, an entrancing bubble of light, with a core the size of an orange, like a tiny sun. A thin ribbon of light stretched from the soul to the body, anchoring it in place.

I started to release my grip on the necklace but then a wave of intense pleasure hit me. Every nerve ending in my body feasted on the power of his soul, a drunken orgy of sensation. I laughed and skipped out of the way as his body crumbled to the floor. Then I reached out and cupped his soul in both hands, severing its connection with his body.

Pain lashed me, fire-tipped claws tearing into my flesh. I shrieked and collapsed to the floor, twisting and contorting as I sought to relieve the torment. But nothing helped. It was like being burned alive and flayed all at the same time. Then it stopped. Shudders racked my body and I curled into a foetal position until the tremors ceased.

I got to my knees with the killer’s soul still clutched in my hands. Its light grew dim, blackened around the edges, and my first instinct was to toss it away. But another part of me remembered the ecstasy that had overwhelmed me when I had ripped it out of his body, and my fingers tightened around it.

My legs shook as I got to my feet. I looked out the service station window. Grimm stood on the other side, the Underworld at his back.

‘Did I… did I do it wrong?’

‘That was a perfect extraction.’

‘But the pain? I thought I was going to die.’

‘The punishment for reaping a soul before its due date is severe, but killing you would serve no purpose.’

‘I don’t understand. Why would you punish me? You told me to do it.’

‘I said you could do it, not that you should. Now you have a total of two thousand souls to reap before I can release you from your contract.’

‘Two thousand souls?’ I shook my head. ‘What are you talking about?’

‘Novice reapers are given a quota of one thousand souls to start with and the penalty for an unauthorised reaping is also one thousand.’

‘You never said anything about a soul quota or penalties.’

‘You never asked. But you did promise to honour your obligation as reaper. You have one week to find Ash for me. Fail and I’ll revoke your resurrection and offer the job to the next person to die. You can still fill your quota if you’re dead. Give me that soul. Any legitimate souls you reap can be stored in your necklace, until it is time for you to hand them over.’

Numb, unable to process how stupid I had been, I handed the soul through the window into the Underworld and watched as it drifted from my hand to Grimm’s. His face lit up with unseemly delight when he touched it, eyes rolling back in his head, body shuddering with pleasure. He started to moan and my stomach heaved. I fell to my knees and threw up on the floor.

Stomach empty, hollow, I wiped my mouth with the back of one hand, holding back tears when I spotted my keys among the wreckage of the magazine stand. I scooped them up and pulled myself to my feet. I stumbled out of the service station, unlocked my car and slid inside.

I cried; my whole body shaking as emotion after emotion rocked me. Disgust for the pleasure Grimm had evidently experienced when he’d taken the soul from me, shame because my body ached to feel it again. I flushed, trembling, a low moan escaping my lips. Would it be the same if I tasted another forbidden soul? Oh God, how could I even think of doing it again?

The roar of a truck, speeding past on the highway, shook my Corolla and broke me out of my misery. I couldn’t stay here. Sooner or later another customer would pull into the service station and I did not want to be there when they did. I couldn’t explain to myself what had happened; trying to make the police understand would be hopeless.

I put the key in the ignition, started the car and then headed for home, desperately wanting to be in familiar surrounds. I needed a hot shower to wash away the filth attached to every particle of my body. Then I wanted to crawl into bed, hug my pillow, and cry myself to sleep.

As I drove, one hand crept up to my neck, touching the necklace Grimm had placed there. It weighed heavily on my throat, rising and falling with every breath I took. My breathing sped up and I gripped the steering wheel, hands shaking.

I pulled over two blocks from home and put both hands around the chain, wrenching it downward, the links digging into my flesh. My fingers searched for a clasp, but couldn’t find one. The chain encircled my neck so closely I had no hope of getting it off over my head and the links were too strong for me to break.

I snarled and let go. I’d get rid of it as soon as I could find a pair of side-cutters. Logan would have some in the toolbox he carried in the back of his Holden. I’d call him as soon as I got home. He’d know what to do.

Thinking about Logan, the way his mouth curled when he smiled and the mesmerising dimples in both cheeks, lightened my heart. While I wasn’t ready to dance for joy, a tiny kernel of optimism started to burn in my belly.

There had to be a way to break Grimm’s control, and I would find it. I couldn’t trust him. He would do whatever it took to get what he wanted. I had to be as ruthless. I would find this Ash and work as a reaper for now, even if the thought of taking another soul made me nauseous. I didn’t have the luxury of being squeamish, not if I wanted to live.

But I would never stop looking for a way to be free.