Page 2 of Call of A Eagle

My job. My savings. My apartment. I’d put in countless job applications, but nothing came through. My savings dried up as a result, and I’d had no choice but to come back to Crescent Creek and live with Granny.

It was sort of a win-win, though.

Granny’s health wasn’t what it once was. At ninety-two, getting around had become more difficult, and moving her from her beloved cabin in the woods to a nursing home wasn’t an option. She needed help managing the small herbal remedy business she ran online, and I needed a place to stay. Out of all the places I could go, this was the perfect fit.

At least, that was what I kept telling myself.

It was different from the life I’d imagined for myself, but I was slowly accepting that.

“Chin up, buttercup,” Granny said. “Things will get better soon. Change helps us grow, and you, my dear, have been dealt a whole lot of change lately. Good things are coming for you. I can feel it.”

Her words soothed my fragile heart like a healing balm.

I loved this woman. She always knew what to say to make me feel better, and her words never failed to make me smile.

“Thanks.”

Granny winked and gave me a slight nod. “Are you coming inside for lunch?”

“Soon. I want to finish this section,” I replied, sinking my fingers back into the soil. “But if you’re making sandwiches again, I’ll need a bigger bribe to take a break.”

“Bribe? How about I don’t tell the plants you curse them the second you walk away and we call it even?” she shot back.

“Deal.” I laughed.

While I had been complaining about the state of the garden beds a lot lately, it was only because I felt overwhelmed by the amount of work that was needed to get them back in order.

This city-girl-for-the-past-three-years was no longer used to the work.

Taming the ten oversized garden beds scattered around the yard would take me forever on my own. Granny insisted they were fine as they were, claiming she could still identify the herbs among the tangle of weeds, but I couldn’t work with that. I needed order, structure, and organization.

I needed garden beds that didn’t resemble jungles.

After finishing thinning out the patch of basil plants, I stood and brushed the dirt from my knees. My gaze swept over the garden bed, and a frown pulled at my lips. Despite my effort, I’d barely made a dent in the overgrowth.

“Honestly, Mother Earth, I think you’re winning this battle,” I muttered before heading to the porch.

The truth was, I was stretched thin.

Managing everything here mostly on my own, given Granny’s health and her limited mobility—not to mention her stubbornness—I was learning there weren’t enough hours in theday. While I didn’t mind the work, I knew I couldn’t handle it all myself.

Which was why I’d decided to hire help.

The thought made me anxious. I wasn’t used to relying on others for things. Call me independent, or a control freak, but I had issues trusting others to do things the way I wanted them done.

Always had.

As I stepped inside, I made my way to the kitchen where Granny stood, setting our sandwiches on a plate.

I glanced at my watch and frowned. “Well, I hoped the landscaping guy would be by early this morning to look at the garden beds and see if he was up for helping with them,” I said. “Brody from the hardware store mentioned he was reliable, but I’m starting to doubt him.”

“Maybe he’s busy.” Granny shrugged. “Brody, on the other hand? He’s a bit of a flirt.” She grinned.

I chuckled. “You would know about flirting, wouldn’t you?”

Even though Brody was closer to my age than hers, I knew Granny could be a handful sometimes. Honestly, I wouldn’t have put it past her to be the one flirting out of the two of them while she was in the hardware store buying birdseed.

“Of course, it’s how I got your grandfather to marry me,” she said, her grin growing.

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