Digging to Hell (The Gravedigger Series Book 3)

by Willie E. Dalton

  I saw the hint of smile at the corner of his mouth. He moved toward me. “Welcome back,” he said. I knew he saw my eyes, because as he said “back,” his voice dropped and the touch of his smile was gone.

  I held my breath as I waited for him to say something else, but he didn’t. There was a soft grunting noise as he looked me over, but he said nothing about my change. He did ask, “Are you really back?”

  I swallowed. “If you’ll have me.”

  He narrowed his eyes at me and was quiet. Billy walked in closer now, and he didn’t hide his surprise when he saw my eyes.

  “Holy shit, Hel! You turned? You’re a vampire now?” He was inches from my face, inspecting me like a strange bug.

  “I had a good reason,” I told him.

  “Do you want your old house back?” Soren ignored all of the vampire talk.

  “If it’s available.”

  “Of course, I just thought you might need something bigger if you weren’t coming alone,” he said. Such a subtle way to ask a tricky question.

  “I’m coming alone,” I said. Dammit, I didn’t have a good way to ask him if Eira was still around—unless I decided to be obvious.

  “How is Eira?” I asked. I decided I was OK with obvious.

  Billy grinned and made a whistling sound as he walked away from the two of us, giving us the illusion of privacy.

  Soren turned a little red and looked away for a moment. “Eira is gone. She decided to follow Loki and spend her afterlife away from me. We remembered our life together very differently. I couldn’t keep apologizing for things I didn’t remember doing, and she couldn’t forgive me. And by the same token, she wasn’t the woman I remembered either. I’m not sure where we lost each other, but it was irreparable,” he said.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, and meant it. “You didn’t want to choose another afterlife?”

  “After all this time?” he laughed. “No, this is my eternity: this is home for me. Where is your Raphael?”

  I was getting really tired of hearing him called that. “We weren’t the same people as before either,” I said, and left it at that, for now.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, but I don’t think he meant the words as much as I had.

  I continued with my bluntness. “Where does this leave us? Am I back to just working under you, or is there more?”

  “What do you want?” he asked.

  I watched his hand flex around the handle of his shovel, and saw the muscles tense all through his upper body. In that instant, I missed the feeling of his strong hands on my body, and hated that I’d spent recent hours in bed with Raphael.

  “If I’m being shamelessly honest, I want you to scoop me up and take me to bed and fuck me until I can’t walk,” I told him.

  Soren tried to play it cool, but ended up laughing, and nervously stroking his beard and rubbing the back of his neck.

  I continued, “But I have a few things to handle first—and I wasn’t sure if me being a vampire was a deal breaker for us.”

  Soren stepped in close to me, and I thought he was going to kiss me or touch me, but he didn’t. “You’ve taught this old Viking a lot of things: like the fact that not all vampires are bad. And if you told Billy you had a good reason for turning, then you did. So go take care of your business, and get back here so I can carry you into that house and fuck you senseless.”

  “Yes, sir,” I smiled, and turned to start back toward the Quarter. “Oh,” I paused, turning back to him and trying to look very innocent and apologetic, “I think I lost my shovel and flashlight when I went into Hell.”

  “Hmm,” Soren grunted. “Well then, you will have to be punished.” He stared at me without even a smirk.

  His words and the sound of his voice ran straight to things low in my body, and I was more than ready to hurry back here.

  But first, back to the Quarter.

  Everyone was back now, vampires included… well, everyone except for Grace. I was betting she was still at the boutique, or out with Melinoe. Maybe once my drama was finished, I could worry more about her choices.

  Andreas and Boude had filled Ray in on my change, and how it had come to be.

  Ray came up and hugged me, and said exactly what I needed to hear. “You made a good choice, Hel. I know it was a hard decision, and I’m proud of you for doing what you felt was right.”

  Tears stung my eyes as I tried to keep my composure. “You don’t think less of me for giving up my soul? You don’t think I’m damned, or something?” I didn’t even know I was so worried about these things until I heard myself asking him.

  His eyes were so kind and full of sincerity. He kissed me on the forehead and pulled me into a hug. “You will always be my little girl. I will never believe you could be damned or damaged. I couldn’t be prouder of you.”

  I thought of all the things he taught me through the years, and how good he had been to me. He’d never raised his voice or acted like I had been a disappointment in any way. He never resented choosing to be my “dad.” I might have been Loki’s daughter, but Ray was my dad—and for all the misery I had been through, I’d have done it again.

  “I love you so much, and I’m so happy you’re here,” I said with my face still buried against his shirt.

  “I love you too,” he said, and pulled back so that we would be at an appropriate distance to talk.

  “I got to talk to someone at the Assignment Hall,” he said.

  I dried my eyes and said, “Oh? What did they say?”

  “Well, you know I was in process to be reincarnated when that door opened up.”

  Fear made my shoulders tighten. “Are they sending you back?”

  “I didn’t have anything in my file against me, so they agreed that I could stay here if I wanted, and take on a job,” he said.

  I was getting anxious, and wanted him to get to the point. “Are you going to? Will you stay?” I asked.

  “Part of me wants to experience everything I can, alive or dead. So I asked if I could stay a while, and go on to my next life whenever I’m ready…” he paused again, “and they said I could! So I hope you don’t mind having me around a while,” he grinned.

  Relief washed over me, and I playfully slapped him on the shoulder. “Don’t scare me like that! So what job are you taking on? Do you want to be a reaper?” I asked him.

  Ray put his hands in his pockets and smiled while shaking his head. “No, I think I had my fill of digging in the dirt while I was alive. I told them I’d run one of the little shops in town—a furniture place I think it was. I’ve never done anything like that before.”

  I smiled at him. I loved that he still wanted to do new things and gain knowledge. Me? I’d probably be happy digging forever, on one side of the grave or the other.

  “Yes, yes, this is all very heart-warming, but is everything back to normal now? Can I please go back to my own place, and stay there?” Andreas asked, in his oh-so-special way.

  “Yes, Andreas, you can go home: all of us can,” I told him.

  Boude nodded in understanding. “Are you out of your soul contract, so to speak?”

  I smiled, “I am.”

  “Bravo!” Andreas cheered. “It worked out well for you and me, since now I don’t have to listen to you go on and on about how ‘precious’ souls are.”

  I rolled my eyes at him. “I am still grateful to you and Boude for turning me.”

  Boude gave a gracious bow, and Andreas looked entirely too pleased with himself.

  Raphael had been quiet through all of this. It was Ray who finally turned to him and asked, “What did they tell you at the Assignment Hall?”

  “They apologized for the mistake of me getting abandoned in Hell, so I’m free to choose any job, living quarters, or other afterlife that I want to go to,” he said, but he didn’t sound happy about it.

  “So what will you choose?” Boude asked.

  Raphael answered Boude, but looked at me. “I’m not sure yet.”

  We both knew
a talk was imminent.

  Ray sensed the tension in the room and interjected, “My job comes with a nice apartment right above it! I get a good view of everything.”

  “That’s great,” we all told him.

  “Well then, since we are no longer in the throes of a crisis, I am going home. I will see all of you… at some point.” His suitcases were packed and waiting by the door. To be such a vibrant character, Andreas certainly needed a lot of alone-time.

  Boude looked around at everyone. “I wouldn’t mind taking off as well. Does anyone need anything before I go?”

  When no one said anything, Boude went to collect his things and left as well.

  “It feels weird here with fewer people,” I said.

  “I agree. Big houses just aren’t meant to be empty,” Ray said. “Let’s get our things and head back into town. I’m sure I can go ahead and take the apartment, and you two can stay with me if you need to.”

  I knew staying with Ray was not my plan for us, but I didn’t want to be here any longer either. “Sure, we can head back.”

  None of us had much to take, but I did get the few snacks we had left to take home or give to Ray. No sense in it going to waste. Does food here even spoil? I hadn’t thought about it before.

  Raphael and I walked Ray to his apartment, and we all agreed it was a nice place in a pretty part of the city. We left him to get settled and told him we’d check on him later.

  I was so happy he was staying my heart could just burst. And then, looking at Raphael and wondering if I was about to break his heart, hurt mine. Can a heart be that happy, and that broken at the same time?

  Raphael let me lead as we weaved up and down the streets. I stopped when we came to the fountain in the square. I sat down on the edge of the fountain and let my fingers play in the water.

  The fountain wasn’t intimidating to me anymore; it was just water and metal. The sun wasn’t shining, so it’s magical properties weren’t active.

  Raphael sat next to me, and I told him about the fountain: how it was the only place in the underworld where you could check on the living, but only when the sun was shining, which was a very rare occurrence. I told him about me rushing to get here the first time I saw the sun, just so I could get a glimpse of him. I told him how devastated I had been over what I saw.

  He took my hand in his, and I said, “Raphael, I have never felt love for anyone like the love I felt for you. For the short time we knew each other, for me to fall that hard and be that obsessed—it was insane.”

  “I guess now that you know it wasn’t your own feelings about me, it makes more sense,” he said.

  “I don’t believe it was all a trick. I can’t believe that I could be that deeply fooled. I am forever happy that I felt that way over you. I don’t think many people ever experience love on that level. I’m just sorry you were dragged into my mess.”

  He didn’t reply.

  “Did you love me like that? Was it an all-consuming, can’t-breathe-without-me kind of love?” I asked because I was genuinely curious.

  “You intrigued me. You were unlike any woman I had ever met, and I did find myself falling for you pretty quickly. I had experienced so much death and loss; I was lonely, and trying to find ways to cope, and you were the first person to make me OK after all of that,” he told me.

  I smiled. “I’m glad I could do that for you. It wasn’t the same though, was it? You didn’t have the same ache for me that I did for you. You weren’t madly in love with me.”

  “No,” he answered. “But when you were killed, I fell into a horrible place. I believed that I was cursed, and that anyone I cared for was going to die or leave me.”

  “I could understand that,” I agreed.

  He went on, “And then I didn’t know what I was doing after I died, or where I was supposed to be. When you showed up in Hell, I just couldn’t believe it, and the fact that you had missed me, and came specifically to save me…” he touched my face, and I leaned into his palm, “that’s when I fell in love with you.”

  “You need a fresh start,” I said. “Someone who isn’t always going to be somehow involved with so much death. My destiny might have changed, but digging graves and reaping souls is still what I want to do. I don’t think you really want to be involved in that forever.”

  “You don’t feel the same anymore, do you?” he asked.

  “I understand why I did at the time, but I’ve changed a lot—and I don’t want you to love me just because I saved you. You deserve so much more than that.” An idea came to me. “Go to the Assignment Hall and ask Margaret to look up the file of your friend, Stephanie. Maybe you can find her!”

  “I can do that?” Raphael asked.

  “It might not work, but you can ask,” I urged.

  Hope sparked in his so-blue eyes, and I wished with everything in me that he found her.

  We both stood up, and he hugged me. “I guess this is it,” he said.

  “If you leave this underworld, you better come say goodbye,” I ordered.

  “Of course,” he said.

  I watched him walk away, and tried not to let myself feel too much about all of it, because I didn’t know what I was supposed to feel. I just tried to picture him happy.

  The last thing I had to take care of before getting back to the fields of dead was stopping in the shop to see Grace. It seemed like so much had happened since I had been turned, I couldn't believe I hadn’t filled her in.

  I walked up behind her as she was hanging a shirt back on a rack, and surprised her.

  She immediately burst into tears, and wrapped her arms around me. “Andreas told me you were fine after I got Boude, but I saw you almost die!”

  “I’m fine! Thank you for getting Boude for us. I’m sure that was difficult,” I told her.

  She waved her hand like it was no big deal, but I knew it must’ve been awkward.

  “So what all has happened since then?” Grace asked me.

  “A lot. We need hours to catch up, but the big things are that Raphael and I didn’t work out, I don’t have to rule the underworld, and I’m going home to Soren and the fields. Oh, and Ray is staying,” I smiled.

  Grace looked at me in disbelief. “Too much. Like, I can’t even begin to process some of what you said. It’s all good, though, right? We’re happy about all of this?”

  “Yes. It’s still a lot for me to process myself, but we’re happy. How are things with you and Melinoe?”

  Grace adjusted the red bandana she had in her hair, and straightened her eye patch in the dressing room mirror. She let out a breath. “She’s intense, and dark, and so much fun.”

  “Are we happy?” I asked her.

  “Yes... I mean I don’t know what’s happening between us, but right now it’s exciting, and very good,” Grace said.

  “Good. Come by sometime soon and we’ll go hunting together,” I suggested.

  Grace actually jumped up and down and clapped her hands together like a little kid. “YES!” she squealed. “That would be amazing.”

  I hugged her again, and headed towards the fields.

  As the brown dirt and gray sky met in the most boring horizon ever, I was giddy to get back to what I loved: my friends, my work, simple days of digging in the dirt and helping souls move forward.

  Soren saw me walking towards him, and smiled at me. He scooped me up, just like he had promised, and carried me towards my house.

  “Everything is just like you left it,” he told me as he opened the door.

  I didn’t know if Soren was my forever person—forever could change on a dime. He was my right now person, and maybe that was even better, because I understood how easily all of this could disappear.

  His steel gray eyes looked into mine as he laid me on the bed and kissed me. I almost missed this—almost let it all slip through my fingers.

  To Hell with destiny, I was doing things my way.

  Want to be the first to have a sneak peek at my new books, giveaways, and
free Kindle downloads?

  Join my mailing list!

  https://mailchi.mp/fa5e03851766/williedalton

  WILLIE E. DALTON is a full-time writer at her home in Duffield, Va. She is the author of Three Witches in a Small Town, The Dark Side of the Woods, and The Gravedigger series. When she is isn’t writing, Willie is an active volunteer for the local cat rescue “Appalachian Feline Friends.”

  To learn more about Willie and her books,

  follow her on social media:

  www.authorwilliedalton.com