1
CLEMENTINE
My worst daysalways end in thunderstorms.
Another bolt of lightning cracks across the sky, and I flinch, fingers strangling my steering wheel as I carefully navigate through the heavy rain. My headlights push past the droplets in an attempt to illuminate the once-familiar roads of this small town.
A whine from the backseat tugs at my attention.
“It’s okay, buddy. We’ll find him soon.” Without removing my eyes from the road, I reach back to give my pup a reassuring scratch, trying not to let out my own sound of distress when the move shoots fiery pain through my side.
My dog’s warm tongue licks my wrist, giving me what comfort he can. He’s not upset by the storm, but we’ve been together long enough for him to tell when I’m anxious. And my anxiety, in turn, always sets him on edge.
I’ve tried to keep my agitation from growing, but my body hurts, and I can’t find my brother. We’ve made two stops so far, and no sign of him. My shattered phone isn’t helping any.
I’ve got one more idea. Normally, I wouldn’t bother, but I’m desperate.
The turn for the parking lot is barely visible in the deluge. I clock it just in time, pulling into the half-full lot at a careful crawl.
A neon sign lights the falling rain and my windshield, the purple glow letting me know I’ve found the right place.
Local Brew.
2
GRIFFITH
I should have knownafter the first crack of thunder that my night wouldn’t be an easy one.
Not that thunderstorms in north Georgia are uncommon in the late spring. We always have a handful roll through each season, bringing chest-rattling booms and buckets of rain that raise the level of Lake Galen. But I would swear the storms also bring out the oddities.
“Dogs ain’t allowed in your bar, I thought,” Gregor says with the touch of a slur that tells me I need to cut the old wolf off.
The previous owner of this bar—formerly Tipsy Howls, now called Local Brew—had a bad habit of over-serving patrons, especially one from the pack. Money was money to him, and he always claimed saying no to a fellow werewolf was disloyal.
But me? I want this bar to be a place where townsfolk come for fun and community. Not to drown their sorrows. Though I’m happy to lend a sympathetic ear if someone is having a bad run of it. I just won’t be serving enough to fully numb them to the world.
“Not unless they fit in a purse,” I agree, thoughts going to Delta, a local dragon who has an anxious Chihuahua I’ve allowed past the front doors a time or two because the small creature is too pathetic to turn away. The dog, not the woman.
“Then what’s that beast doing in here?” Gregor grumbles, his bushy brows so low that I can’t see his eyes.
But I follow the direction his head is pointed and find a sight I wish I could blink away.
Tall, pale, and dripping water from her blonde hair, which forms a puddle around her sneakers.
Trouble standing in the open door of my bar.
Clementine Divos.
Anyone else who left Folk Haven and stayed away for nine years I might have trouble recognizing, especially when they were only eighteen when they got gone. But not Clementine.
Not when her older brother likes to regularly shove his phone under my nose, showing off another selfie his wayward sibling sent him. For the life of me, I don’t know how Carl can be so proud of the girl who made his life miserable. But he’s forgiving like that.
I’m so overwhelmed by the first in-person sighting of her in close to a decade that I almost miss the intruder at her side.
A dog. A huge fucking maybe that’s actually a bear of a dog. The thing is shaggy with a midnight-black coat. And every inch of that fur is damp from the storm outside.
The brute is going to stink up my whole bar.
