Page 8 of Shadow of Fury
“If you’re going to puke, do it the other direction, please.” Logan blew out a breath from all but carrying the big man half a block.
Dominic didn’t respond and Logan let him be.
They sat together on the bench for a long time in total silence. Long enough that Logan noticed there were no cars on the road coming and going. Long enough that he realized nobody else was walking up and down the street. They seemed to be the only people out and about and it was barely past sunset.
Despite Shadow Pines being a small town, it had never been the kind that rolled up the welcome mat at dark.
When Logan was a kid there was always something going on in town. The parks would be lit up with little league games or music would be rolling out of the auditorium from a concert recital. There had been festivals and street performances nearly every weekend and even if there wasn’t some official reason to celebrate, there had typically been people just out and about running errands after work, visiting friends, or having dinner. Now everything was quiet and dark, shut-up and shut-down, and it had the eerie feeling of a ghost town, just like Dominic had said back at the bar.
Dominic finally sat back upright and blew out a long breath.
“You okay?” Logan shot him a concerned look.
“Yeah. I think I’m okay now. The cool air helped.”
“You sound a little less tanked, so that’s good.”
“Sorry about that, your old man just…”
Logan held up a hand, “You don’t have to explain anything to me. Believe me, I get it.”
Dominic scrubbed a hand over his face and groaned, “Damn, it's good to see you again. I just wish it wasn’t like this.”
“Like what?”
“You came back thinking you could bury that bastard and start fresh only to find him still upright. You must’ve wanted to bash my face in when you figured it out.”
Logan’s lips quirked, “The idea crossed my mind before I realized what he’d done. I blame him. Not you.”
“You probably thought you were coming home to inherit the pack you left behind but, it’s not the same as you remember.”
“I’m starting to see that.”
“You have no idea.” Dominic’s eyes were less hazy but still sad. “Come on, walk me home and I’ll show you what I mean.”
“Okay.” Logan shot his vehicle a meaningful look, “Is it safe to leave it here?”
Dominic snorted, “Maybe you are starting to figure out this place has changed. That’s not a question you would’ve even had to ask before, huh?”
“Dom?”
“Leave it. It’ll be fine. Come on.”
Dominic headed up the street and Logan dutifully fell into step beside him. When Logan had driven through town on his way to the Kemp estate earlier, he’d thought Shadow Pines looked unchanged but up close like this, he realized just how wrong he had been. Sure, most of the stores still had the same awnings and signage up, but behind the glass storefronts, many of them were gutted down to the studs.
“Remember the Smiths used to run the little pharmacy and corner store there.” Dominic pointed to one of the large empty spaces. “They left about six months ago.”
“Where’d they go?”
“Same place everyone else went I suppose, off to other packs, other states.” Dominic shrugged. “One day, they were here. The next, they were gone. There was a sign taped to the door one morning saying they were closed. Eventually someone broke in, looted the place, probably made a small fortune selling off the prescription painkillers, but we never caught the person, but I’ll admit no one ever looked all that hard either.”
“Why not?”
Dominic shot him a bored look, “Because by then, nobody really cared anymore.”
“I take it the Smiths weren’t the first to leave in the middle of the night?”
“Not the first. Not the last.” Dominic pointed around, “The Andersen family shut down the sports and outdoors store and got the hell out of Dodge. The flower shop shuttered when the Rose family left. The Coffmans, the Johnsons, the Stephens, all gone. More too. Those are just the ones that ran shops here in town.”