Apologies for the lack of illustrations in this chapter. The only thing I could think to draw is well beyond my skill set.

I can't promise I'll be able to do it but if there's something from this chapter you want to see drawn, let me know ... Or maybe find an actual artist to outsource it to. (Good luck with that. 😜)

Want to see the inside of the book I shared last blog update? Here it is! ⬇️⬇️⬇️

As far as I'm concerned, the second scene in this chapter is where things start to get fun in this story. So for the handful of folks who've made it through all the requisite establishing stuff and are sticking with me, thank you. Your reward? Now we start playing! 😈

Cherri staggered through the front door of the hotel, dripping wet. “It is so fucking hot out there today!” she gasped, swiping the sweat from her ample chest.

Angel Dust grinned at her in greeting. “How hot is it?”

“It’s so hot that a hooker offered to blow on me for an extra fifty bucks.”

“You take her up on the offer?” Angel asked.

“You know it,” Cherri said through her laughter.

Grace smirked. “Eh, I’m sure it's no worse than that one summer we had in Phoenix … or the spring break I took in Miami.”

“I think today would be a perfect day to make use of that new pool,” Angel suggested. He glanced at Grace. “Charlie make you a swimsuit with all that wardrobe when you first came here?”

A clear invitation to join them without straight up inviting her. She didn’t decline, instead gasping, “Hey! You said ‘came’ without a moan!”

Angel countered, “And you didn’t answer my question.”

“If the hotel has a pool, I’m sure she made me a swimsuit.”

“And if not, you can always borrow one of mine,” he offered. Now it wasn’t so much an unasked invitation as it was an assumption she’d join.

Grace assumed Angel’s idea of a swimsuit would be the garment equivalent of a Cat’s Cradle. Though she may have been settling in, Grace had no interest in revealing that much of herself to any of the hotel residents.

Well … maybe Lucifer … although he wasn’t anywhere to be seen that day. Luckily for everyone, except probably the boys who seemed to enjoy watching drama unfold. Grace, however, didn’t relish putting on another performance for them.

They went to their respective rooms to change and Grace was beyond relieved to find a few swimsuits in her drawers. She picked the most modest of the bunch—a hot pink one-piece with cut-outs on either side at the waist—and threw a pastel pink sarong over it before scrutinizing herself in the mirror. 

Charlie’s clothing design wasn’t half bad; Grace appreciated that the princess had taken her tastes into account.

She met up with Cherri and Angel Dust in the hall outside her room. Judging by the skimpiness of Cherri’s string bikini, it had come from Angel’s wardrobe. Regardless, Cherri seemed perfectly comfortable in it.

Then again, if I was shaped like her, I’d parade myself around like that, too.

The three headed out to the pool, passing the bar where Alastor was chatting with Husk. They both paused their conversation to watch the trio walk by. Alastor was smiling as always, but for once his mouth was closed, a single cute little fang poking out from his overbite.

Grace glanced away quickly.

Alastor and Husk had some form of relationship. They talked. If Grace ever had any hope of figuring out why Alastor brought her here, Husk was probably her best bet in getting any answers.

By the time they reached the pool, Grace was, for some inexplicable reason, aflame. She jumped right into the water without first testing it and swam a few laps before emerging and hanging on the edge beside Cherri and Angel Dust.

“How are you liking it here?” Cherri asked her. “Looks like you’re finally settling in.”

Grace shrugged. “As far as Hell goes, it’s probably the best we can do.” She rested her cheek against her forearm. “Getting to know everyone has been really helpful in making me feel welcome.”

“Well you’re pretty entertaining, yourself,” Angel Dust said with a wink. He especially seemed to love hearing about her sexcapades. 

“Can I … ask … something?” Grace said, regretting it before either of her companions replied. No backing down now.

Angel said, “Yeah of course.”

And yet she hesitated. How to make this sound like I’m not fishing for info? Because she was doing just that even if she didn’t want to admit it to herself. “What’s up with Alastor?”

Cherri muttered under her breath, “Not his dick.”

“You wish!” Angel laughed and splashed her in the face.

“No, you wish, Angie! You’ve been barking up that limp tree since you first met him!”

Grace didn’t appreciate the response. “C’mon, guys, I’m being serious!” Give me something to work with!

“Do you really … not know anything about him?” Cherri asked.

Grace shook her head silently.

“Do you really want to know anything about him?” Angel Dust teased.

Grace frowned. “I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t wanna know!”

Cherri and Angel exchanged glances. Angel dipped under the surface of the water and came back up, shaking his head and spraying water all over. 

This reluctance they had to answer Grace’s question concerned her.

“I’m sure you already know he’s one of Pentagram City’s Demon Overlords,” Angel began.

“Yep.” A demon Overlord wanted me here. Grace filed that little tidbit away to panic about later.

“There are lots of rumors about him. Like that when he first appeared in Hell, he made a name for himself by killing and devouring Overlords who’d been in power for thousands of years.”

Grace swallowed hard and remained silent.

“He’s also known as the Radio Demon because he would broadcast the screams of the souls he’d tear apart.”

Well, that would explain all the creepy-ass radio shit he pulled on me. She caught herself before admitting, If you’re trying to scare me, it’s working. They didn’t need to know that. Undoubtedly the teasing would be relentless and the last thing she needed was Alastor getting wind of her opinions. And she was sure he knew whatever they did. And then some.

“Now, ya gotta take some of that story with a grain of salt,” Cherri pointed out. “Where did you first hear it, Angie?”

Angel muttered, “Mimzy.” The disdain was clear in his expression for whoever this ‘Mimzy’ was. Grace didn’t like her on principle. “So who knows how much of it is true. Although …”

Grace’s eyebrow jumped up. “Although?”

“I did see him literally tear those loan sharks to shreds,” Angel reminisced, “and he definitely enjoyed every moment of it before he ate them.”

“He ate them.”

Angel Dust nodded. “He ate them, and he was giddy and hysterical while psychologically torturing—” He stopped, casting a wary glance at Cherri. “Never mind that.”

Cherri frowned at him.

What in the actual fuck could Alastor possibly want with me? She could see no way of fitting into his afterlife if any of this was true. And so Grace wanted to arm herself with as much information as she could find.

“Where did he come from? When did he die?”

“What’s with all the sudden interest in Alastor?” Angel asked.

“It’s not obsession,” Grace said a bit more defensively than she intended, quickly following with, “Knowledge is power.” And this may be the only power I ever have over him. She felt like she’d need all the power she could get to protect herself from him.

“We didn’t call it obsession.” Angel’s eyes narrowed. “Anyway, Alastor has been a bit of a mystery since he came here to help Charlie with her hotel. Some folks think he was the Axeman of New Orleans.”

“Oh, no shit!” Grace breathed. “My grampa told me about that guy!” Which then gave her a vague estimation of both the Radio Demon’s age and origin—if there was any truth to that story. “That letter he allegedly wrote to the local newspaper was completely unhinged!” And seemed to fit with the behavior of the demon skulking in the shadows of the hotel.

“There was a letter?”

“I don’t recall much about it, to be honest. It was very … theatric. It addressed the audience as ‘mortals’ and mocked the police investigation. And—he said he was very fond of jazz. That anyone playing it in their homes would be spared his wrath.”

“Mimzy did say the way to Alastor’s heart was through whiskey and jazz,” Angel said thoughtfully.

Cherri looked at him incredulously. “Mimzy said that.”

“I’m paraphrasing ‘cuz the way she said it was stupid.”

“Everything about her is stupid. Seems the stupidest thing to me is implying there’s a way to something we all know Alastor doesn’t even possess.”

“Oh come on, you don’t really believe that Axeman bullshit, do you?” Angel teased.

The Axeman had been real, whether or not the deranged letter was. Those people who were murdered were very definitely, undeniably and irreversibly murdered. 

Cherri countered, “Alastor doesn’t need to have been the Axeman to still have been a serial killer. It’s not like the two things are mutually exclusive.”

“You guys,” Grace said, dropping her voice and speaking through clenched teeth. “Change the subject, change the subject.” She needn’t see Alastor to know he had stepped out onto the veranda.

Angel Dust gawked at her. “How the fuck do you do that?”

Could nobody else feel the air change when he was nearby? That gave her even less to like about him. She wondered if Angel Dust would believe her if she claimed that dik-diks had eyes on the back of their heads. “I’m sorry to dip out on you, but … I gotta go.”

Grace swam to the shallow end of the pool and hurried out, swiping the towel and her sarong from the rattan lounge chair before sprinting by Alastor, keeping her gaze trained on the deck at her feet.

The hotel was quiet; it seemed the other residents were out and about their daily business by the time Grace emerged from her overnight coma. She helped herself to some cereal and took her breakfast into the dining room.

Sitting there alone at the far end of the table was Alastor, reading a newspaper while sipping from a mug that stated in bold typeface, “OH DEER.” At the moment, he looked at peace. Fluffy and non-threatening. 

His ears actually look kinda soft.

She stared, holding her breath. Maybe he hadn’t noticed her. When Grace took a step back to find a different place to eat, his left ear swiveled toward her. Shit!

Without looking up, he greeted her: “Don’t think I can’t tell you’ve been avoiding me.”

“I’m not avoiding you,” Grace replied on impulse.

Alastor glanced at her over the edge of the paper without raising his head. Threat, menace, terror, sinister, nightmare, danger danger danger!

“I was just passing through.” And the moment she said it, she realized how incredibly stupid it was. The dining room was a cul-de-sac. 

“Lying is unbecoming on you, Little Fawn.”

Little Fawn.

For a pounded heartbeat, Grace thought she’d fainted, standing upright and with her eyes wide open. Blood raged in her cheeks, her ears, flooding into her neck and chest. That level of familiarity brought to light a remarkable fury within her. “Don’t you dare call me that.”

He repeated, his voice as poised as ever, smiling as if nothing ever bothered him: “It couldn’t be more obvious that you’re avoiding me.”

Grace clutched the bowl between her hands. “Well do you blame me?”

He blinked. “What have I done to you to deserve that?”

“How much time have you got?”

His smile shifted into something that looked eerily genuine. “Eternity, my dear. Same as you.”

She recounted the stories she’d heard about him, adding in her own observations for good measure.

He scoffed. “Oh, please! Only some of that’s true.”

Grace set her bowl on the table, pressing her palms into it and leaning forward although she was at the far end of the dining room from him. “The fact that any of it’s true is horrific!”

Alastor laid the newspaper down, putting the mug down beside it. He folded his hands together, addressing her with a wicked twinkle in his eyes. “You’re not exactly a paragon of virtue, now, are you, Grace Bedgood?”

She broke out in gooseflesh, her mouth falling open with a quiet exhalation.

“At least give me the same chance you’ve afforded the other sinners here before you decide you hate me.”

Grace scowled. “Don’t put words in my mouth.”

He lifted an eyebrow, his stare weighing on her.

She added for what she felt was good measure, “I … don’t hate you.”

“You don’t like me.”

Her heart raced. Would she ever get used to that feeling now that she was experiencing it again? “What reasons do I have to like you?”

Alastor shrugged and replied simply, “I brought you here.”

The words slipped out before she could stop herself. “Shut up!”

Though he continued to smile, his eyes flashed. “Apologize.”

“Bite me!” Oh for fuck’s sake, stop, Grace! How stupid are you?

His eyes widened, his grin widened. His eyebrows shot up. If Grace had to assign an emotion to that face, it would have been ‘exhilarated.’ 

And that was how she discovered she could still get palpitations even when dead and in Hell. After all this time.

Alastor replied, “You don’t mean that.”

Grace blinked, leaning back. Was his radio filter off just now? “What?”

“What?” he echoed instantly, the voice filter on as if maybe she’d only imagined it off.

It occurred to her in that moment who Alastor reminded her of: He was just like that sleep paralysis demon who had haunted her in life for years.

Ohhhhh shit. That explained—well, not everything. The Radio Demon was terrifying enough based on his own merits, but that sure explained a lot of her initial feelings toward him.

“If you don’t hate me,” he continued, dropping her gaze in favor of the newspaper, “and you’re not avoiding me, you’ll join me for breakfast.” Alastor motioned to the seat nearest him.

You’re not giving me much choice now, are you, asshole? Well, of course she had her free will, but if she took her bowl of cereal elsewhere, it would do nothing but justify his opinion. And Lucifer’s nuts, she did not want to prove him right. So Grace pulled out the chair beside herself and plopped into it, stuffing a spoonful of soggy cereal into her mouth and chewing it angrily while staring him down. How’s this for hate and avoidance, you burgundy bogeyman?

He said nothing more. This was clearly some twisted game for him—it was apparent he was getting a kick out of making her miserable—and he was testing her willingness to play.

The ensuing silence was uncomfortable enough to make her want to die all over again.

Grace lost this challenge, finally saying, “You were a killer.”

Resemblance to her sleep paralysis demon aside, she wanted nothing to do with him inherently; she’d spent her lifetime trying to save lives and comfort the injured and the infirm. He was appalling. Is appalling.

“Was. Am.” He said it just the same way he’d order an appetizer at a restaurant or comment on pleasant weather.

And now he was making conversation akin to pulling teeth without sedation. Her voice softer than she wished, Grace asked, “Why?”

“Why does anyone do anything? Power. Control. Boredom.” He cleared his throat. “So now you tell me: What are your aspirations?”

Grace blinked, swallowing her last bite of cereal in a painful lump. “What do you mean?”

“What do you want to do with your afterlife? Be an Overlord?”

She laughed despite herself, his suggestion was just that outrageous. “No! Why?”

“For the same motives a serial killer might have. Power. Control. Boredom.” 

Grace bit her lip to keep from laughing, quickly covering her mouth to hide her smile.

“Are you seeking redemption?”

A laugh slipped out within a scoff. “Believe it: there's no redeeming me.”

“Surely you must want something. Everyone wants something.”

“What’s it to you?” she challenged.

He chuckled wickedly, the sound sending a chill right through her body. It was far deeper than his radio-filtered voice led her to expect. “It’s all just entertainment to me, sweetheart.”

“I want—” Grace hesitated, weighing the pros and cons of answering. She knew he’d just make her miserable if she didn’t give him what he wanted. So she wrung her hand, snapping her fingers to try to recall the phrase. “Oh, what’s it called? I want ‘Scary Dog Privilege.’”

He looked at her, arching a single eyebrow in question.

“Security,” she clarified. “Safety. I’m just … so …” She sighed, “tired … of being at everyone else’s mercy.” Go ahead: find entertainment in that, you monster!

Alastor grinned. How that was any different from his standard smiles, Grace would never know—but he was unmistakably grinning. “Oh, I’m sure in time we could come to some sort of an arrangement.”

And now Grace was suitably petrified.

Chapter 4: Grace Under Pressure

Chapter 6: Hell is Vee Tower

Stay sane, deer friends!