Thanksgiving in Bull Creek

4. Chapter One

Chapter One

Eve Hartlow just sat there and smiled, basking in the love of her friends and the excitement of the event. This was all for her. People gathered to bathe her in love and gifts and to tell her how lucky she was to find someone as amazing as Arlin. Even her mother had arrived two days ago to help her get ready for the wedding that no one thought would ever come to be.

She had to admit, she was worried when her mother, Judy, said she wanted to come down to Bull Creek because of the way things went two years ago when Kyle used her mother to find Eve and try to drag her back to Willow Vale. Yet, her mother, a shy and simple woman who seemed stuck in a time long ago, just smiled and doted on her daughter, sitting beside her and oooing and ahhing over every package Eve opened. It felt good to have her there, to have her as a major part of the ceremony. Since moving to Bull Creek, Eve had avoided visiting her mother, not wanting to leave the sanctuary of the small village, afraid to venture too far out into the world because she knew what the world held, and she didn’t much care for it. Arlin had taught her differently over the past two years, had eased her back out into the larger cities surrounding them. Even so, she hated to go too far. Bull Creek was safe. Bull Creek was home. She preferred home.

“Are you going to open it or just try to guess what’s inside?” Alanna Bradbury teased as she nudged Eve with a slight bump of her shoulder. “We still have a ton of gifts to get through.”

The others who filled Alanna’s small cabin all cheered and urged Eve to continue opening gifts as they lifted glasses of wine or bottles of beer into the air.

Eve giggled as she nodded, apologizing for getting lost in the moment, so to speak. She couldn’t help it, though. These people were her friends, and while she knew she would do anything for them, she also knew they would do anything for her. And many of them had.

“Are you crying?” Adira asked, leaning over and placing a hand on Eve’s knee. “Baby, what’s wrong?”

Eve gave a weak shrug. “Sorry, I guess it’s just a little overwhelming.” She glanced around at the small gathering of ladies. Adira and Alanna sat closest to her, along with her mother, and then there was Winnie, Lainie in her deputy’s uniform because she was still on duty, Noel, Brianna, Ash, Maureen Mondor holding a flask of whiskey, and Sade and Deedra Darrion, the newest witches in their small community. So many loving people had never surrounded her before, and she couldn’t help the overwhelming feeling it gave her. “I’m just so glad everyone could make it.”

Adira squeezed her knee. “Sweetie, we wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

“Now, keep opening presents before Josh and the other men come barging in here and ruin a good time,” Alanna teased.

Brianna giggled. “Yeah, I’m not sure how safe it was leaving Wes and Jake to handle the bar on their own without a mediator.” She turned to Noel, the third in the town’s triad, and nodded. “We may have a mess on our hands when we get back.”

“What is it this time?” Eve asked, glad to have the attention off her if even for a couple of minutes.

Noel sighed. “Thanksgiving is getting closer, and you know how Jake gets as the holidays creep up on us.”

“And how Wes doesn’t get,” Brianna said with a chuckle.

Noel nodded. “Yeah, Jake’s all, ‘Let’s do this and that,’ and Wes is like, ‘Leave my bar the hell alone’.” She shook her head. “I like June and August. Nothing really happens in those months.”

The other ladies in the room just laughed, most nodding their heads, having been privy to the men’s constant bickering in the past.

Eve laughed as well, clutching the brightly colored package in her hand as she did. Then she turned to Alanna, one brow c****d. “Is Josh planning anything for the holidays? He is in charge of those still, right?”

“What’s there to be in charge of?” Maureen groused as she lowered her flask to her lap again. “You cook a turkey and everyone eats and then sleeps. It’s the perfect holiday. Not a lot of fuss, just a bunch of food, and then an abundance of napping.”

Alanna rolled her eyes at the older witch. “It’s Josh. He could make a fuss out of Washington’s birthday if given half the chance, probably with busts of the president as decorations.”

“Hey, he could do a reenactment of Valley Forge or something,” Lainie said, grinning.

“Don’t even suggest it,” Alanna warned.

“Didn’t a lot of of his men die at Valley Forge?” Adira asked, her brows pinched.

“Yeah, mostly from diseases,” Alanna replied. “And it was freezing and people starved. So, let’s not give Josh any ideas, all right? Who really wants to celebrate that?”

Eve laughed again as she ripped the paper off the package, drawing everyone’s attention back to her. Opening the box, she felt the blush color her cheeks as she reached in and pulled out an extremely see-through nightie.

Catcalls and whistles filled the cabin, as well as more laughter.

“I can see straight through it,” Eve exclaimed, clamping her hand over her mouth.

Her mother giggled. “The fun part is when he takes it off.”

“Mother!” Eve cried out.

“Nope,” Maureen said with a shake of her head. “The fun part starts once it’s off.” She winked over at Eve’s mother, who simply grinned and nodded.

Eve felt her blush deepen as she decided it probably wasn’t a good idea to bring her mother to her bridal shower. She quickly stuffed the lingerie back into the box and tried to shove it to the side, but Alanna wouldn’t let her off that easily.

Instead, Alana grabbed the box, trying to open it again. “Are you sure you don’t want to try it on, just to make sure it fits? I mean, we wouldn’t want Arlin disappointed on his wedding night, right?”

“Trust me,” Eve hissed as she yanked the box out of her friend’s hands. “He won’t be disappointed.”

“Oh, really?” Her mother said, leaning back and studying her daughter as if seeing her for the first time. “Something you care to share with us?”

“No, mother,” Eve said, her embarrassment growing. “There’s nothing I wish to share. Now, let’s just keep opening packages, shall we?”

“But you sounded a little too confident there,” her mother pressed, a mischievous twinkle in her blue eyes. “I mean, these are your friends, right? You don’t have secrets from your friends, do you?”

“Oh, look, a bright pink box,” Eve said, reaching for the next gift.

The others laughed. “Chicken,” Alanna said as she wrote down the name of the gift giver so they could send thank yous later.

“You know it,” Eve agreed as she ripped the next gift open.

This time, she pulled out a small leather journal with sunflowers etched in the corner with a fancy pen. “It’s beautiful.”

“I knew you’d get plenty of things for your house or, um, the bedroom,” her mother said. “I wanted you to have something just for you. You told me when you moved here that you wanted to write your book. I haven’t heard much about it over the last couple of years, but I thought this might be fun for you to write your thoughts down.”

Eve smiled over at her mother. “It’s beautiful. Thank you.”

Her mother nodded once, a softness glistening in her eyes.

The party continued, bouncing back and forth between opening gifts, nibbling finger foods that the others all brought, and drinking Willow Blaze, an alcoholic drink that Jake made for shifters with the help of the only male witch in Bull Creek, Xavier. Now there was finally a drink strong enough to give a shifter a buzz without them having to drink the entire bottle. Of course, they kept it away from Eve’s mother, along with the fact that they were all shifters, something Eve had never confided to her mother. She never saw the point. At the time, it wasn’t like her mother would ever visit her in Bull Creek. Then Arlin had to go and propose, guaranteeing that her mother would, indeed, be around Eve’s supernatural friends. Hopefully, there would be no incidents like when Noel’s mother arrived in Bull Creek over two years ago. Circumstances forced Noel to shift in front of her mother when The Order of Wardens took the woman captive. Not exactly the best introduction into the world of shifters. Eve would not allow her mother to find out that way, but she had yet mustered the courage to tell her mother the truth of what she was now—a tiger shifter.

“I need a break,” Eve said as she leaned back after opening another sexy nightie. Was this party for her or for Arlin, she wondered as she stared at the stack of lingerie.

“Too much sexy?” Lainie asked as she pointed to the stack of clothes. “You can’t really blame us. After all, you already have everything you need to set up a house.”

“There. Open that one.” Maureen pointed to a box at the edge of the table. “I guarantee it’s not some flimsy piece of cloth that you’ll only wear for a minute.”

Eve stared at the older woman for a moment, not sure whether or not to trust her. Maureen had a cantankerous side, and one could never tell what would come out of the woman.

Well, she needed to open her all her gifts. She might as well get it over with.

Opening the box, she stared at several items positioned within white packing tissue. “This looks interesting.” She pulled out a pouch of potpourri, taking a whiff as she held it to her nose. “Nice.” She set it to the side and then reached back in to pull out the rest of the contents: a pack of herbal tea, a tube of bath salts, a candle, a garnet stone, a cedar smudge stick, and a sheet of paper with what appeared to be instructions. “What is all this?” she asked as she raked her gaze up and down the paper.

“It’s all the ingredients you need to perform a winter cleansing ritual.” Maureen replied. “And the instructions on how to carry it out.”

“A ritual?” Eve’s mother asked, staring at the things Eve pulled out of the box, and Eve closed her eyes for a moment as she took a deep breath. They had almost made it through the evening with nothing supernatural being said. Eve’s mother then turned to Maureen, the two women almost the same age. “For cleansing, you say? Cleansing for what?”

Maureen shrugged, her arm dangling over the side of the recliner, a flask dangling from her fingers. “One should never go into a marriage carrying the baggage of everything that went before. The cleansing ceremony will wash all that away.”

Her mother stared at the box, and Eve could tell the woman wanted to ask more questions. She kept them to herself, however, for which Eve was thankful.

“Thank you,” she said, lifting the box in the air slightly before handing it to Alanna, who had been keeping track of the gifts and who gave them to her.

When Eve looked around, she realized there was only one gift left, and this one had come by mail. She reached for the box sitting on the table, but when she looked to see who the package was from, there was no return address. She felt her brows pinch together in her confusion. “That’s odd.” She glanced over at her mother. “Did you know of anyone sending a gift?”

Her mother shook her head. “Not that I’m aware of. Kitty Wolcott might have sent something, since she couldn’t make it, but I would think that would be for the actual wedding, not the bridal shower.” She gave a small shrug of her shoulders, looking just as confused as Eve felt. “Perhaps there’s a small note inside telling you who it’s from.”

Eve ripped the box open, only to find another box inside, this one wrapped in bright orange paper with a black ribbon tied around it. “Curiousier and curiousier.” She pulled the wrapped package out, setting the cardboard box to the side. Lifting the gift into the air, she searched the outside for a note, but found nothing. She glanced over at Alanna, who had the box it came in near her. “Is there a note inside?”

Alanna glanced into the open box, but only shook her head. “It’s empty.”

Eve giggled. “Well, who doesn’t love a good mystery?”

Shrugging, she ripped into the package, dropping the colorful paper at her feet. A white box rested inside, and she quickly opened the lid.

And stared, her heart racing.

“What is it?” her mother asked, leaning closer in her attempt to peer inside the box.

Eve glanced at Alanna and then over to Lainie. She opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out. Instead, she reached inside the box and pulled out a ceramic tiger curled up inside a cage of iron bars. A note rested on top, which caused her blood to run cold.

“I promised there would be no escape,” Eve read out loud.

Her mother reached out and took the gift in her hands. “Now, this is a strange gift.”