Chapter 16
“The…turkeys?” I ask.
But then I remember Nick saying something about them—
It’s the turkeys you will learn to fear.
As if on cue, I hear the distinctive sound of a turkey gobble. The big birds round the corner with the confidence and lethality of a phalanx of mafia bosses. One huge tom turkey, two more husky gobblers that seriously look like his lieutenants, and at least twenty gurgling ladies.
I have only ever encountered turkeys wrapped in plastic and removed from the freezer to defrost in an aluminum pan.
But let me tell you now that a male turkey is about four feet tall and four feet wide, and when his eyes lock on you and his face furiously engorges with blood and he runs right at you with his wings flapping madly, your brain will tell you you’re living in the velociraptor scene of Jurassic Park.
“What do we do?” I shout, because it seems like a reasonable time to shout.
“Run!” Shelby shouts back, and then two grown women are hauling ass to escape a bunch of bloodthirsty gobbling brown dinosaurs.
I can hear them clucking and calling, hear the clicking of their awful talons, imagine the rasp of their beaks as they charge behind us.
“Faster!” Maggie shrieks from the backpack, which really gets me moving. A turkey might hurt me a little, but one could outright kill her. This could be the beginning of the world’s most expensive and tragic turducken.
We’re almost to the street corner when the passenger-side door of a parked truck flies open, blocking the sidewalk.
“Get in!” someone says, and Shelby doesn’t hesitate. She pushes me up into the waiting truck, and I don’t even think about who or what is inside it. I dive in and scoot over with the backpack in my lap, only to find myself on a bench seat, pressed up against…
Hunter Blakely.
Shelby slams the door, and something hot and wet slurps up the side of my face and into my ear. It’s the black Lab I noticed when Hunter was driving away from the alley, and I can already hear his tail thumping.
“Hello to you, too,” I say, reaching back to rub the dog’s sleek black head.
“Bongo, c’mon,” Hunter says. “Give the poor girl a break.”
The dog immediately backs off, although I can hear his feet tapping excitedly on the black leather back seat.
I’m turning back to thank Hunter when something splats against the window—a turkey, trying to get inside. Then another and another, battering the door with their massive bodies.
“They’re aggressive re-nesters—it’s like a second mating season for the hormonally imbalanced,” Hunter explains, as if this excuses it.
“Those dang Coves wouldn’t let us in at the toy store,” Shelby complains, fixing her hair in the mirror.
A turkey jumps up on the hood of the truck—one of the smaller females, thank goodness.
Another one lands in the bed. Hunter turns and reaches past me to slide the back window shut, and my face is smashed nearly into his armpit.
It’s not nearly as horrible as it sounds.
His deodorant smells like rain in a forest, and once the window is closed, he leaves his arm along the back of the seat, almost sort of around me.
Our eyes meet for a brief, electric moment, and my heartbeat kicks up as I fight the urge to snuggle into him.
“Gotta be careful,” he says, resettling—but not moving his arm. “Some of the smaller ones might actually make it inside, and I wouldn’t want you to get pecked to death.”
At the word peck, I can only think about his lips. They’re so close—
“Get out of this truck right now!” Maggie screeches from the backpack in my lap. “You will not consort with Blakelys!”
“There are worse ways to go,” I murmur, leaning into him.
“The turkey gang seems like it’s bigger this summer,” Shelby says. “You good, Rhea?”
Nearly crushed against Hunter?
Somehow I will find the tools to survive.
“She’ll be fine when she’s out of this ding-dang truck!” Since her grandma voice in my head isn’t doing any good, Maggie screams incoherently in her parrot voice and bashes herself against the screen.
“I’m good, and you’re only hurting yourself, Doris,” I say.
Behind us, Bongo is on full alert and trying to climb over the bench seat but seems more curious than murderous.
“Sorry about her. Parrot brains are actually quite large compared to other animals, but they’re still just about the size of a gumball, and sometimes she forgets she has one.
” I pat the backpack. “It’s safer in here, honey.
There’s a dog in back. And we don’t shout at the people who just saved our lives. ”
The turkeys aren’t leaving, though—they’re all over the truck now. There are three on the hood, several on the piles of wood in the bed, and judging by the scratchy thumps overhead, at least two making gobbling love on the roof.
“I need to get driving if I don’t want to spend the rest of my day washing turkey shit off someone else’s lumber. Is there somewhere I can drop y’all off?”
“We’re headed to lunch at MacGillicuddy’s,” Shelby says, “if you want to join us.”
But the weird thing is that she doesn’t sound flirtatious at all. I wonder if maybe she’s known him all her life, or they’re related, or maybe she’s not into dudes, because I’m just barely touching this man my grandmother doesn’t want me to talk to and every atom in my body is at full salute.
Hunter nods and looks back to the bed of the truck. “I’ve got an appointment, but I’ll drop y’all off. Buckle up. I’m gonna give these turkeys a ride.”
I lift my hip so Shelby can buckle, then shuffle around looking for my seat belt.
The middle seat of the bench is smaller, and I brush Hunter’s shoulder as I buckle in.
I’m almost sorry I don’t have to dig under his butt to find my own seat-belt latch.
His arm is no longer around me; he’s all business now, hands at ten and two.
As soon as my seat belt clicks, he commands Bongo to lie down and then hits the gas.
The truck erupts out of its parking spot, sending turkeys literally flying.
The air is full of angry brown feathers as Hunter hits the brakes and lays on the horn, scattering birds everywhere in a gobbling tornado.
I notice he’s careful not to hit any of the turkeys or run them over, but they have definitely moved from predator to prey, yelping at each other as they try to find someplace to roost that isn’t moving and honking.
I’m surprised that Bongo isn’t barking up a storm, but he’s lying behind us, calm and silent.
After a few staccato stops and starts as we escape the turkey flock, we’re finally free and driving around the square.
Shelby asks Hunter if he’s coming to the Chamber meeting, and he says he’s not sure, and she tells him he absolutely has to, and he asks what she’s bringing.
When she tells him she’s bringing monster cookies, he reluctantly agrees to attend.
And then he’s pulling up in front of the restaurant, which looks like a treehouse.
Shelby and I anxiously scan the area for any rogue turkeys, but it seems safe.
“Thanks for saving us,” I say, and Shelby adds, “Sorry for being a bother.”
Hunter smiles down at me. “No bother. It’d be more work cleaning your turkey-stripped carcasses off the square, if I’m honest.”
“Aw, that’s sweet,” I say. “Because if you thought otherwise, I’d have a bone to pick.”
His eyes light up. “Well, that remains to be seen.”
“I could really only suggest that you carrion, then.”
“Oh my God, please stop making death puns,” Shelby wails. “I’m gonna lose my appetite.”
“Someone’s maintaining a stiff upper lip.”
“The turkeys can have you—you turkeys!” Shelby says as she unbuckles and hops out.
Hunter and I grin at each other like idiots for a minute before Shelby sighs dramatically. I unbuckle, whisper “You’d better text me!” and slide down out of the truck.
Maggie is already berating me before Hunter is even out of the parking lot.
“I don’t care what anybody tells you, that boy is not your friend! None of the Blakelys are!”
“So he’s a Blakely,” I say as Shelby and I head for the front steps. “They’re magic, too, right?”
Shelby stops and looks around, making sure we’re alone; I guess nobody likes the feeling of choking on their own magical spit.
“They are. Or they were. Joyce used to be the most powerful witch of the older generation, and then there’s our moms and their generation, but our generation is kind of a mess.
Neither of the King girls seem to have powers at all, same with Nick and Nathan.
Colonel’s side of the Gooch family tree is a bust. To be honest, the witch thing is kinda dying off. ”
“Maggie said—” I start, then break off. I can’t tell anyone what Maggie said, because they all think she’s dead. “That is, I heard most of the young folks keep moving away?”
Shelby nods. “People are having fewer babies these days, there aren’t that many jobs in the area, and kids want to go to better colleges.” She leans closer. “And over the last couple of years, some folks just…lost most of their magic. Like the Blakelys. And the Malcolms. And the Halls.”
“Lost their magic?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know much about it, and I don’t know why mine still works. Like I said, the older folks think it’s tacky to talk about. But I heard…” She nibbles at her lip. “I heard your grandmother might have had something to do with it?”
“I did hear folks were mad at her,” I start. “And I’ve been wondering why.”
Maggie’s voice in my head is flustered. “It’s all lies. People just want someone to blame. I told you: Shelby is a flibbertigibbet.”
“So what’s the dating scene like around here?” I ask, changing tack. “Did you and Hunter ever—”
Shelby laughs as she walks toward the restaurant steps, her UGGs crunching in the gravel.
“Nope. I think we’re cousins twice removed or something, and I’ve known him all my life.
I’m more into the big, burly outdoorsy type, you know?
Give me a bushy beard and some camo and a freezer full of meat, and I’m good.
Hunter is not a hunter. He was always kind of a nerd, to be honest.”
I internally sigh in relief, and we step into MacGillicuddy’s and wait to be seated.
On the way to the table, Shelby stops at the bar to talk to two dark-haired women who must be sisters.
The bartender looks like she could crush a watermelon with her thighs while mixing a martini, and the younger one in the waitress apron looks like she’s barely out of high school.
“Rhea Wolfe, this is Cash and Keelie King,” Shelby says, pointing first to the bartender, then to the waitress.
“I’m so glad we’ve got somebody new for Craft Night!” Keelie practically squeals, and I realize that I absolutely have no choice but to be there now because making her sad would be the equivalent of kicking a kitten.
“Do you go to Craft Night, too?” I ask Cash.
She winces. “No, but my boyfriend does. The only thing I craft is cocktails. Shelby says you’re from here originally?”
“My family is, but I’ve never been here before.”
“How are you liking it?” Cash leans in. “Because I left for five years, and it’s definitely different, being in such a small town again.”
“Definitely different definitely covers it. The hardest part is being away from my sisters. They’re still in Alabama, and we’re very close.”
Cash throws a fond glance at her sister. “I feel that. But, hey, you’ve managed to land in a special place. You’ll find your feet quick.”
The hairs on the back of my neck rise and my shoulders hunch up, and that’s when I feel a dog’s growl deep in my chest.
“Peach Pit, what’s the matter with you?” Cash says firmly, looking directly behind me.
“She smells a stranger,” a new voice says.
I turn stiffly and find a short woman with big bleached-blond hair and a penchant for rhinestones. Beside her a chestnut-colored pit bull stands, staring at my backpack with her hackles up.
“What’s in the bag, new girl?” the woman asks, looking me up and down.
I want to sink into the floor as I slowly hold it up. “A cockatoo?”
“The sign by the door just says no raccoons,” Shelby says helpfully. “So I figured a cockatoo wouldn’t be a problem? Right, Farrah?”
“You brought a cockatoo into a bar,” the woman begins, like she can’t believe it. “And don’t tell me it’s an emotional support cockatoo, because I don’t see a little red vest.”
The tension is weirdly high, so I raise the backpack, and Maggie unhelpfully shouts, “Shipoopi!”
“Yep, you caught me. I’m Rhea, and this is my pet cockatoo, Doris, and she gets upset if she’s left alone for too long in a new place and shreds everything I own and then plucks herself bald. But if her being here is a problem, then I’ll apologize and get out of your hair.”
“You’re Maggie Kirkwood’s granddaughter,” the blond woman says. “Right?” But she’s looking at Maggie when she asks it.
“You know damn well she is,” Maggie mutters. “Stop giving the poor girl a heart attack.”
The blond woman laughs, and it’s then I know she can hear Maggie, too. “I can’t fault you, honey. The sign doesn’t say anything about cockatoos. Peach, this is a friend. Settle on down.”
The pit bull exhales, her hackles go down, and she gives a tentative wag.
“So we’re okay?” I ask.
Peach Pit bustles over to me, her whole body wagging now. She looks like an entirely different dog when she’s not about to attack. I tentatively reach one hand down to stroke her flat, silky head, holding my backpack out of reach with the other, just in case she changes her mind about Maggie.
“We’re good. Always nice to see a new face in town.” The woman glances at my bag and smirks. “And old friends are always welcome. I’m Farrah MacGillicuddy, owner of MacGillicuddy’s.”
I shake her hand, and it’s like grabbing an iron girder covered in jangling bracelets and rings.
“You’ll be at Chamber, right?” Farrah asks.
“Chamber of Commerce meeting,” Shelby fills in for me. “Since you’re the new owner of the Video Emporium, you kinda have to.”
“Then I guess I’ll be there.”
Farrah finally releases my hand, and I want to rub my aching bones.
Shelby and I sit, Keelie brings us menus, and from then on, it’s a perfectly normal lunch, outside of the pit bull that has decided to happily lie down on my feet. The food is surprisingly good, and Keelie is a great waitress, and Maggie mostly shuts up when I give her some fresh fruit to peck at.
As for the Chamber of Commerce and all that entails, that’s a problem for future Rhea.