I sighed at the memory. “I must warn you, I’m not an experienced drinker.”
“Then that, my dear, will make tonight all the more fun.”
On my way back to Gramps, I stopped at Mina’s Diner to pick up minestrone and baked bread, then returned to heat it up over the gas stove as Casper sat on the window sill, eyeing the broken birdhouse hanging from the garage eave, his green and blue eyes searching for life.
In Gramps’ room, his sagging jowls vibrated, and his eyes popped open when I walked in with the tray of food and tea. “Freya,” he whispered as the moon cast slivers of dimming light through his dusty window over the bed, outlining the silhouette of his thin legs and boney knees. His brown eyes shifted from recognition to doubt to disappointment to the undeniable pain at the memory of a father losing his only daughter. The darkness swept across his face like a broom sweeping away all fragments of light from his past. A clean and tidy floor of truth, and his features turned cold. “Moonshine,” he grumbled.
“Maybe I should stay home tonight.” I dragged the dinner tray stand closer to the bed and set down the plate of food.
Gramps sat up, and a cough caught in his chest. He turned on his side until it ceased, his lips trembling in the aftermath. “I’d rather yah go.”
“Gramps…”
For twenty-four years, Gramps had been trapped in a house he’d never considered a home—alone—and the emptiness had slowly clawed away at the rest of him. I didn’t blame him either. The Morgan house had a way of creeping over your skin, pushing anyone into a madness. Or maybe it was the town.
I’d learned his wife, my late grandmother, died when my mother was born, and it seemed history had repeated itself when I came into the world, my mother dying in child birth as well. Milo had said the Norse Woods Coven cast both my mother and Gramps out of the Westside after my mother married my father, a man from Sacred Sea, forcing them both to move into my father’s family home off the coast—the Morgan property.
“I don’t have tha energy ta argue with yah. Just go.” Gramps swung his legs over the edge and refused to look at me, keeping his gaze outside the window. Silence filled the awkward space between us as his hand shook, lifting the spoon and scooping it into the soup.
Monday stood outside the doors of Voodoos with another girl, passing a lit cigarette back and forth. Her eyes widened when I pulled into the parking lot under a buzzing street light, and she stubbed the butt against the brick wall of the building, the two of them heading over.
“Fable, Fallon, Fallon, Fable,” Monday introduced, and her eyes snapped to me. “What. A. Mouthful. Quick, let’s go inside, it’s gettin’ chilly out here.” She was already sparkly-eyed with a glistening smile, leaning to one side as she strolled across the parking lot in a flowy skirt to match her flaming-red hair.
When Monday turned her back to us, Fable held up three fingers, indicating she’d already had one too many with an easy smile.
Naturally wavy, golden-brown locks hung down to Fable’s waist, bouncing off her maroon leather crop top. She had a witchery beauty about her, like a Victoria Secret model on the runway. The kind of beauty you were allowed to gawk at, slowly putting you into a trance until it suddenly hit you all at once, and you weren’t quite sure how much time had passed—the bewitching beauty kind.
The doors opened to Voodoos, turning the outside cold to dust. It was dim and dark with masculine details and a nostalgic vibe. All the tables were occupied, and regulars lined the stools around the bar. A haunting twist to “Black Hole Sun” played by a band on the stage. The eerie and penetrating female voice slithered in the air as I looked around the bar, waiting by the door.
Across the room, the Hollow Heathens were gathered around a pool table.
Three sets of eyes pinned to me, and my gaze circled their stares until it met Julian’s. He was there, leaning against a brick wall with a pool stick in one hand, a drink in the other. His hair was black and glossy, yet thick and disorderly. In all black, even the black mask covering his face, his chrome-colored eyes zoned in on me from across the room. The chill from his stare was like a hit of menthol, cooling my insides and freezing me in this spot. The music dropped into the background of his stare, and my entire body felt like a single pulse, thumping in hard-hitting beats.
I didn’t know why, but my foot stepped forward, wanting to go to him. Then Monday wrapped her fingers around my arm, yanking me in the opposite direction.
“Meet my friends,” I think she said between the words of the song drifting. One of the Heathens smacked Julian’s chest when he tore his eyes away.
Monday wedged the two of us between people at the bar, and she cleared a spot in the corner. “You already know Milo. This is Ivy and Maverick, and the rest should be here soon.” She snapped her fingers high in the air to get the bartender’s attention.
Milo threw up a thumb and raised a brow from down the bar, wordlessly making sure it was okay between us after what had happened with the article. I nodded. Forgiveness always came easy to me. I’d seen what holding grudges could do, how it ate away at the souls of the spirits who’d visited me.
Ivy had shiny black hair cropped at the shoulders and bangs cut evenly across her forehead. She was tucked inside Maverick’s arm, paying me no attention. Monday explained she was one of the three Sullivan sisters, along with Fable and Adora. Maverick lifted his head in a careless greeting, shaggy blond hair and a private school upbringing style about him.
“Ignore them,” Monday whispered. “Maverick’s just cranky the other guys aren’t here yet and the Heathens are.”
The bartender chuckled as he turned, wearing the same black mask as the other Hollow Heathens. I glanced back to the pool table, counting three Heathens, so this must have been the fourth.
The bartender leaned over the bar, gripped the edge, and winked at a sour-faced Maverick.
Maverick shook his blond head and grabbed his glass, emptying it. “I’m going outside. The place reeks of a dead body, and I need fresh air,” he stood and slid the glass down the bar, then turned to Ivy, “You guys coming?” Ivy and Milo both agreed, and the three took off toward the doors behind us.
“See what I mean?” Monday sighed.
An impala skull hung high over the shelves of liquor bottles on the back wall of the bar, its long brown horns twisting up, the skull similar to Julian’s.
“What can I get ya?” the bartender asked, and all that stared back was a pair of golden eyes like the eyes of a dragon. A bit of curiosity stirred inside them as he studied my features.
“She’ll have what I’m having,” Fable interjected. A long pause passed as the Heathen’s eyes dragged from mine to Fable’s, and he pushed off the bar and walked away. Fable’s face fell, and Monday twisted her neck to deliver a warning glare. Fable waved her hand dismissively. “Don’t look at me like that.”
“He’s one of them?” I questioned in a whisper.
“Yeah, Phoenix Wildes,” Monday leaned closer, “He owns the bar and can’t turn us away. I think it drives him crazy.”
“Why come at all if you know you’re not welcome?”
“It’s slim pickins’ around here. There’s one bar aside from the Portside Pearl on the coast, not many places to hang out on a Friday night.” She shrugged and pulled away when Phoenix returned, dropping a drink in front of me.