Chapter 20 Bourbon and Curses
That evening was spent with Ursula and Eloise playing cards, drinking cocktails and eating honey butter popcorn while they laughed and listened to music and fell back into step with each other.
They were three rounds into a game of hand and foot when the doorbell chimed and Casper unfolded his lanky body to bark at the intruder.
"One of the girls?" Eloise guessed as they both made their way to the front door.
"We should probably call them to talk over everything going on," Ursula said, then smiled at Eloise. "But maybe tomorrow."
Eloise nudged her shoulder with her own. "You're such a softy cheeseball and I love it."
When Ursula opened the door both women looked up, up, up and tilted their heads in a synchronized routine.
The man standing there must have been over six feet, five inches tall.
He had a rugged handsomeness and somehow was making a mustache look attractive.
But what put them on edge was what he was wearing; a police uniform.
"Officer," Ursula said. "Sorry, I don't think we've met."
He nodded his head politely. "I take it you're Ursula Cambridge and Eloise Willow?"
"We are."
"I'm Chief Landry. Nice to meet you. Could we have a chat?"
"Is this a friendly get-to-know-the-new-Chief chat?" Eloise asked with a raised eyebrow to which he carefully kept his face blank. The atmosphere took on a sharp edge, the air catching a chill they both felt. Eloise caught the smell of snowflakes and clean air before a winter storm.
"Afraid not."
"Let's sit on the porch," Ursula said. "Can I get you anything? Water, tea, honey butter popcorn?"
"An old fashioned?" Eloise added.
His face, again, remained blank but Eloise swore she saw his mustache twitch the slightest.
"No thank you, ma'am. I'm right as rain."
"Where are you from, Chief?" Ursula asked as they took seats on the wicker furniture.
Before he could answer Casper barked from inside the house and then jumped up against the large window causing them all to turn and look at the goofy face pressed against the glass with Sulphur's feline head next to his paws.
"Do you have a wolf inside the house, Miss Cambridge?"
The chief's face was lined with concern with a sprinkle of curiosity.
"No, he's a dog. An Irish Wolfhound. And harmless.
He would actually invite an intruder in and show them where anything valuable is if they gave him enough pets," she joked, her laughter nervous and when she looked at Eloise's wide-eyed stare, she cleared her throat.
"But I mean, don't spread the word." More silence. "Sorry. How can we help you?"
He made the chair he was sitting in look tiny as he clasped his hands and leaned forward.
"Listen, I'm not from around here," he said, and the drawl in his voice gave away that he was from somewhere south.
"But there are some odd happenings going on and with each and every one of them, your names and a few others are brought up.
Now, I am not one to listen to every whisper the wind carries my way, but when the wind always carries the same whisper with the same names?
I tend to take notice. And when a journalist writes compelling articles concerning those names and this house with its history," his large hands lift and he shrugs.
"Well now, I had to come look into it myself. "
"Chief Landry," Eloise leaned forward. "I know there are odd things being said about us, and written about us, but we have not done anything odd."
"Were you involved in an incident concerning a candidate running for mayor recently? A Rob Sandis?"
Ursula looked at Eloise who kept her face blank and her body language calm.
"Not at all involved in anything peculiar concerning Rob Sandis," she replied easily. And truthfully, because she wasn't yet in town and she had never met the man. Ursula wondered if the chief knew that.
He opened his mouth to say something but the crunching of tires on gravel and dirt drew their attention. Out of an old Bronco popped Jen, Kelsea, Crystal and Tilly, all carrying something.
"Oh my, we are interrupting," Crystal said as she stood on the top step of the porch, her tone implying she knew that they would be and she didn't feel any regret. She was holding a bunch of red begonias in a brown paper cone. Ursula frowned slightly at the sight.
"No problem. This is the new chief," she said sweeping a hand to where the man was now standing.
"Ladies. I'm Chief Landry."
At the mention of his title all women visibly stiffened, though each tried to hide it in various mannerisms.
"Well, if we'd known we would have such a handsome guest we would have brought something other than lemon drop pie, like," Jen pursed her lips and shrugged, "meat. Or beer. Sausage links."
The large, stoic chief nodded slowly at her and Tilly nervously shouted, "She's a lesbian!"
All eyes turned to her in surprise, some in humor as Eloise and Kelsea tried to hold in laughter at her outburst.
Tilly, standing there in a red polka dot dress and her long black hair with violet ends curled loosely and holding a bottle of honey wine looked shocked at her own outburst. "I mean, she doesn't know what to do with men."
Jen's head went to one side and one of her toned arms popped a hand on her hip as she looked at Tilly. Tilly gave her a sheepish look and mouthed an apology to which Jen shook her head and rolled her eyes with a smile on her face.
The chief was watching Tilly with an almost bemused look, and when Tilly apologized softly he cleared from his throat what sounded like laughter held back.
"I'll need you ladies to stay in town. And I may come around with more questions. Again, I and the SPD are not accusing ya'll of anything." He looked around at all of them and added a scary, "Yet."
He tipped his head and said appropriate goodbyes before he stopped his steady stride and said in a low voice to Tilly, "I love lemon drop pie.
" Then the large man got into his SPD truck and left the six women looking around at each other in bewilderment.
He'd left behind a certain feeling all of them were trying to distinguish.
"How did you guys know to come?" Ursula asked.
"Have you seen the paper?" Jen asked.
"And we knew you made up because the wind smelled like butter. And," Crystal lifted her head a little and sniffed. "Honey?"
"Carol Weatherby did a number on us, and you two specifically," Kelsea said handing over the black and white paper.
Ursula took it and Eloise pressed next to her as they read. Shocked looks took over both of their faces and gasps and whispered curses were exclaimed at exactly the same time by both.
"She's not serious. The town can't kick us out," Eloise said. "Right?"
"No way that's a thing," Ursula agreed.
"No, not legally," Jen said with a wariness in her voice. "But they can make you or all of us the town pariahs and treat you so terribly that you don't step foot in town."
"Which is kind of like getting kicked out," Tilly added. "So, I brought wine." She lifted up the bottle. This one had a dark golden color to it. "Honey peach."
"And I brought lemon drop pie," Kelsea said with a smile that didn't say happiness.
"We're going to need something stronger than wine," Eloise said, a heaviness suddenly weighing her down.
"And what's with the flowers of warning?" Ursula nodded to the flowers deceptively wrapped in beautiful brown paper.
"We all got a bouquet of these beauties on our front porches today," Crystal said. And they all knew what the flowers meant. So lovely were the small red buds but so loud was their meaning. They were a warning. A threat.
Eloise lifted the bouquet to her nose and pulled back sharply at the smell of copper and gasoline.
"And something else," Tilly hedged with a wariness on her face and a look around the other three women. "Someone left us a note about a strange visitor from Florida here to get revenge on Eloise."
Eloise froze. Ursula looked at her and immediately put her arm around her, pulling her stiff body into hers.
When Eloise didn't say anything, Ursula's eyes connected with hers in a silent conversation.
Eloise nodded and Ursula urged everyone to take a seat and the moment the last woman sat, the three candles on the coffee table made a poof and spitting sound then suddenly lit, their flickering flames like a beckoning to settle in.
"I love how strange this house is," Jen said.
"We've successfully hexed people, we sense when something is going on with each other, and all smelled the same honey butter an hour ago." Tilly's voice was calm and she made eye contact with all of them. "I think it's safe to say that we are strange."
Ursula then told them about the man from Eloise's past while Eloise sat silently, staring at the candles, a ghost in her mind and her body still stiff. Her right hand was in her pocket, fingers stroking the two items she kept there as she fought off the ghost.
"Ladies, I think it's time," Crystal announced once Ursula finished.
They all shared looks, secrets had been stored in each of these women, dusted with a little magic. They gathered what they needed and then Kelsea and Jen kneeled in front of a very still Eloise.
"Honey, we're going to go to the graveyard. Do you want to come?" Jen's voice was smooth, calm.
Eloise looked at her blankly, her thoughts not there with them. "What?" she asked, blinking confusion from her eyes.
"Hey, Little Mermaid. We're going to go hex the sonofabitch. You in?"
And then she was there, present with them again. Her eyes blinked once, twice and then she shook her head upsetting the cobwebs and demons. She looked at the drink in her hand, took a fortifying sip and then said, "Yeah. Let's do some witchy shit."
"That's my girl," Jen said as they helped her up.
Drinks were made by Crystal, her careful hand stirring each old fashioned with blackberry syrup and blackberries soaked in Eloise's favorite spicy bourbon.