I kind of hate that she’s October’s aunt.
Crossing off Fisherman’s Wharf from my list of options, I turn towards its rival bar. The Drunk Pelican.
The door needs a fresh coat of paint.
The d and c are tilted and practically falling off the shitty hand-painted sign. And I’m allowed to call it shitty, since it’s my handiwork. My dad enlisted me for the job after the last sign fell off from rot.
A part of me will always love this little shithole of a pub.
The other part despises its very existence.
The Drunk Pelican is the cause of a lot of my problems.
Yet, I’m about to walk through those doors. Against better judgment—probably. Definitely. I inhale a breath, taking in the fresh air.
I’m here to see the guy who called me from across the country, begging me to come home. Parry DiNapoli should be inside these doors. There really is no turning back now.
CHAPTER 3
Zoey Durand
The Drunk Pelican hasn’t changed one bit. I could’ve taken a photograph six years ago, and it’d be a replica of what I’m staring at today.
Torn vinyl booths, graffiti-covered walls, an old jukebox, and Christmas lights that eternally dangle from the ceiling all add to its shabby allure.
Unsurprisingly, it’s also empty.
I guess not much has really changed.
When the door sways closed behind me, the little bells jingle. I wince at the sound. It’s loud enough that I feel like a blowhorn announced my arrival. On the list of people I don’t want to see, Brian Durand’s ass is parked near the top. To be honest, I don’t even know if he’s here.
He took over the pub when our dad ditched this place to become a mariner, working mostly as a deckhand. I don’t expect to see my dad. The Great Lakes shipping season has already started, so it’s more likely he’s on some lake freighter right now.
But Brian…my brother is uptight and relentless enough that he’s still probably spending every hour of the day at the Pelican. Trying to keep this shithole afloat.
Then again, six years is a long time for me to be away, and it’s not like I kept tabs on my brothers. The only person I stayed in contact with was October, and even then, she wouldn’t talk about my family. At my request.
I tried my best to cut out the things that would make me miss home. To make it hurt less being in Chicago.
Don’t ask me why I couldn’t cut her.
I shuffle further into the pub and carry my suitcase so it doesn’t skid noisily on the floor.
“I’ll be with you in a second!” someone calls from behind the kitchen doors.
I recognize the deep smokiness of that voice immediately—the kind that sounds sensual and like a come-on, even when he’s just talking about rainstorms and sailing conditions.
Definitely not Brian, who just sounds like a pissed crab caught in a net.
All the worries from earlier today start to leave. My muscles loosen, and I set my suitcase on the ground.
Pots and pans clank together before the kitchen door swings open. Parry’s eyes meet mine, and he freezes in the doorway. The door swings back and hits his ass. The impact stumbles him, and the tray of glass beer steins drops out of his hands.
Glass shatters violently on the floor. I flinch.
He doesn’t make a move to clean the mess. His bottomless, seafoam green eyes survey me like he’s seeing a ghost.
I can’t take my eyes off him.
Parry DiNapoli used to be one of the hottest people who graced Mistpoint High. Older than me (graduated before I attended), his beauty was another legend whispered in the hallways. Olive skin, sun-kissed golden-blond hair, lean muscles, and carved jawline.
He’s all of those things still. Even his hair has the silk and charm of those 90s California surfers. Tucked behind his ears. Skirting his neck.
He’s never surfed, as far as I know, but if I ever went searching for Parry growing up, nine times out of ten he’d be on the lake underneath the bright sun and likely cleaning a local’s sailboat for an extra buck.
But now—now I’m stuck on the new thing on his face. The scar that slices down the left side. Thick, puffy, distinctive—it begins at his forehead, cuts through the edge of his eyebrow, and descends to the base of his jaw.
What happened to him?
I’ve missed six years.
That invasive thought wreaks havoc in my head. I’ve missed so much. I left, but everyone else I cared about stayed. Everyone I went to high school with or who attended school with my brothers—they’ve most likely already been through some kind of misfortune.
Shit, Parry is thirty now.
He’s my brother Colt’s childhood best friend.
And even though Parry is six years older than me, he’s been close like family. There were times I’d rather run to Parry than to Colt. His edges aren’t as serrated, and his diehard loyalty to town scum like us, Durands, is questionable on his part—but revered on mine. I always looked up to Parry as someone to aspire to be like.
To maintain good morals, a good heart, and be someone to trust. Someone to depend on.
Did not exactly achieve those Parry DiNapoli levels of dependability. I ransacked and murdered that part. I haven’t been dependable for anything since I left.
But I’m here now.
And I can’t get over the time lost and his scar.
My chest rises and falls heavily. “Parry—”
“You came.” His surprise is unmistakable.
My brows knit together, confused. “Of course I came. You called. Don’t you remember?”
He lets out a long breath. “Yeah…but…” His smoky voice tapers off like he’s considering his words carefully, and he rubs the back of his neck. “I didn’t think you’d come back. No one ever does.”
“For Colt,” I say my brother’s name. “I’d come back.”
He nods strongly. “I’m glad you did.” He grabs a towel and bends down to the broken glass. “Scared the shit out of me though. Could have texted, you know?” He smiles, the movement pulling the scar.
I try not to stare, but he’s inspecting me head-to-toe too.
Through his eyes, I’ve gone from eighteen to twenty-four in a blink. How different do I really appear? I swallow my feelings and manage to say, “I haven’t texted you in six years. Didn’t want to break the cycle.”
He tosses some broken glass and cracked steins back into the tray.
I step closer to help.
He whips his head up. “Zoey, do-do-doon’tttt!” he stutters, his voice caught in the t. Frustration crests his brow, but fear and something more forceful and protective are clearer.
I stop cold, feet away from the broken glass.
Parry has had a stutter ever since his parents died. As the story goes, his nature-loving mom and dad camped at Edge of the World one night. The primitive campground, located among a wooded cliffside in Mistpoint, is home to urban werewolf legends and a lot of wildlife. Bears, wolves, foxes.
Don’t go camping at Edge of the World on a full moon, locals will tell out-of-towners, hoping to entice them into the Supernatural Oddities shop. Just to spend money in our shabby tourist traps.
The only supernatural thing here is October Brambilla’s catlike balance. Perfectly agile. Never trips. Never falters. Quick and swift with soft hands that’ve caught me before.