SUNNY PAUSED IN the middle of the road and sucked in breaths of fresh, rich-smelling air. “What better way to spend Saturday morning than hiking, am I right?” she said to her friend Kaitlyn.
“I can think of better ways,” Kaitlyn said, and giggled. “Like watching the sunrise cuddled up with Marcus Cunningham.”
“Come on.” Sunny rolled her eyes. “Let’s head this way and forget about your new hot squeeze.”
“He’s hard to forget!” And Kaitlyn proceeded to rhapsodize about the latest boy on her list of conquests.
Sunny was glad for her, mostly. Kait had gone through some terrible things in middle school, and had been treated badly by a few of the boys in town. With the help of Sunny and another friend, she’d gotten over it and the boys had been thoroughly punished. Now, Kaitlyn was happy and, as Mom said, “healthily boy crazy.”
Even Mom thought it was normal to be obsessed with boys at her age. Well, too bad. Sunny had other things to do, and most of the boys she knew were dumb.
Speaking of boys...a few minutes later they passed the Blue House, and Sunny reflexively glanced over, just in time to see a flash at the window. Interesting. Did Caden have nothing else to do but spy on people from his hiding place? Come to think of it, probably not. It must be boring to be cooped up all day, hiding out from whatever he was hiding from at home.
Sunny and Kaitlyn kept going, and soon they were at the hiking trail that led off their little peninsula and into the woods. The ground was a mix of sand and dead leaves, and some of the trees sported tiny, pale green sprouts. The trail started out wide and then branched off into several narrower ones. Sunny was hoping she could get Kaitlyn to go a few miles.
“This is great,” Kaitlyn said, waving her fancy watch. “I’ll get in so many steps!”
Sunny blew out a sigh. “Can’t you just do something for fun, instead of worrying about it being exercise or making you thin?”
“This is fun,” Kaitlyn said, and hugged her. “And it’s getting me fit to hike with Marcus, because he’s, like, super outdoorsy.”
“As long as I can help with Marcus,” Sunny said, and immediately regretted her snotty tone. She didn’t even know Marcus, beyond to say hi. Maybe he was an amazing human being. And Kaitlyn was a good friend, even if she was in an annoying phase. “Seriously, I’m glad you came.”
They hiked for a while, and Kait asked Sunny about her mom, and her classes, and the school trip to DC, which had been cut short when some of the kids had been caught smoking pot. That had been a disappointment, but it would be rescheduled, and meanwhile, she was just glad Kait had agreed to do something else fun.
The sun rose higher, and with as fast as they were moving, Sunny was sweating and hot. The sound of frogs and crickets, and the rippling waters of a small creek beside them, cleared Sunny’s head. She loved being outdoors.
A high-pitched yelp made them both spin toward a big pine. There was a little movement and a flash of reddish-brown fur.
Fox or dog? Sunny rushed over, Kaitlyn behind her. It was the dog she’d seen before, the dog that had been bleeding, only now it was lying on the ground, struggling to move. Short hair, muscular, some white markings on its chest. A pit bull mix, most likely.
Its brown eyes were cloudy with pain and Sunny’s heart nearly broke. “I’ve seen this dog before,” she said as she knelt near it. “Someone dropped it off near...” She broke off, realizing she shouldn’t tell Kaitlyn about the Blue House and its occupant. “Near Victory Cottage. It was bleeding then.”
The dog, a medium-sized, short-haired beauty, snarled when she reached out her hand.
“Don’t touch it,” Kaitlyn said. “Dad says all animals will bite when they’re hurt.”
Sunny studied the creature’s back, keeping a safe distance. “It’s got a big cut.”
“Its ear is torn, too.” Kaitlyn pulled out her phone. “No service. We should go get help—my dad or the vet.”
“Or the police,” Sunny said. “I think someone did this to her.” There were too many wounds in odd places. Maybe the dog had been hurt before and gotten attacked by a predator in its weakness.
“Come on!” Kaitlyn started backing away toward the path. “Let’s get help.”
Sunny bit her lip. “I don’t want to leave her. You go.”
Kaitlyn hesitated, then squatted down and studied the dog. “Okay. I will. Be careful.” Kaitlyn jogged back the way they’d come.
Sunny sat down near the dog and slowly stretched out a hand to it. It strained toward her, then pulled back. She could see its ribs.
“Hey, be careful.” The male voice startled her, and the dog yelped and struggled, trying to get to its feet.
Sunny turned and there was Caden, just a few feet away. “What are you doing here? Did you follow us?”
“I come out this way a lot,” he said, which wasn’t really an answer. He knelt down, a safe distance from the dog, and it stopped struggling and subsided back down with a sigh. “Maybe give her some water.”
Sunny wished she’d thought of that. She pulled a water bottle out of her day pack, hesitated, and then poured the water into her cupped hand and extended it to the dog. From this angle, she could see that it was a female.
“I didn’t mean in your hand! You’re gonna get bit,” Caden warned.
But the dog sniffed the water and then took a couple of laps, then a couple more. Sunny refilled her hand and the dog drank thirstily. “I wonder how long she’s been here? And what might have happened?” She glanced at Caden.
He shook his head. “People are crazy.”
“You think someone did this to her?”
He shrugged. “I’ve seen animals killed by other animals, and they don’t look like her. If another animal hurt her to that extent, it would probably have done it for food, and...” He trailed off.
“And she’d be dead and half eaten,” Sunny finished. Slowly and carefully, she refilled her hand once more and let the dog drink. “But it doesn’t look like something a human would do, does it? And anyway, why? Why would anyone do that?”
Caden shook his head. “My mom used to volunteer at a shelter. She came home with all kinds of stories.”
Sunny tilted her head to one side. “You said you can’t live at home now. But your mom sounds nice, if she worked for a shelter.”
He rolled his eyes. “Her charitable activities never last longer than a couple of weeks,” he said. He nodded toward the dog. “See if you can pet her.”
That was an obvious change of subject. Was Caden in trouble, so much that he’d gotten kicked out of his house?
The dog whined, and Sunny leaned forward and carefully rubbed her neck, taking the opportunity to study the torn ear.
Voices and the sound of bushwhacking warned of Kaitlyn’s approach, and sure enough, she came into view. With her was her father and a police officer they knew, Trey Harrison.
“There they are!” Kaitlyn sounded out of breath. She led her father over to them, and he knelt and tilted back his head, squinting a little. He was mostly but not entirely blind, and he was good with dogs.
“Did you see anyone else around here when you found the dog?” Trey asked.
Sunny looked toward Caden, but he was gone, and she gulped. How could he be gone? He must have taken off the minute they’d heard the others.
“Nobody else was here,” Kaitlyn said, relieving Sunny of the need to answer.
“Is its tail docked? Ears?” Kaitlyn’s dad, Mr. Martin, asked.
Kaitlyn leaned one way, trying to see the dog’s tail.
Sunny leaned forward again, studying its ears. The dog cringed away, quivering, probably scared of the newcomers. “It just has regular ears, I think,” she said. “Small and flopping over a little.”
“Tail’s docked,” Kaitlyn announced.
Trey knelt down beside Drew. “You’re thinking dogfighting?”
“Just asking what we’d ask back in Baltimore,” Mr. Martin said. That was where he and Kaitlyn and the rest of their family had lived before, back when he’d been a police officer. “We had some problems with it.”
Trey shook his head, frowning. “I’ve heard of problems with dogfighting around here, but I’ve never seen direct evidence.” He studied the dog, holding his hand out for it to sniff, and surprisingly, the little creature allowed it. “This doesn’t look like much of a fighting dog, though.”
“You think someone abused the animal?” Kaitlyn’s dad asked, his voice going flat.
Sunny’s heart was pounding now. Should she tell them that Caden had been here? Could he have abused the dog and then made up the story about his mom to cover it up?
But she didn’t think so. She’d be able to tell if he were that much of a jerk. He’d seemed interested in the dog’s welfare.
“Could be abuse,” Trey said. He pulled out a leash. “Could be something else. I’m going to put this on her and we’ll take her up to the pound.”
“No,” Sunny said.
Trey, Mr. Martin and Kaitlyn all turned toward her. “What do you mean, no?” Kaitlyn’s dad asked.
“No pound for this girl,” she said. “I’m taking her home to stay with my mom and me.”
“NO WAY CAN we keep her.” Bisky set down her grocery bags, parked her hands on her hips, and looked at two pairs of puppy-dog eyes, one pair belonging to a pitiful-looking medium-sized dog, and the other pair to Sunny. They were huddled together in the middle of her kitchen floor. “She needs veterinary care that’s going to be really expensive, and even if she can get healthy, she’s going to have a lot of issues.”
Sunny cradled the dog closer. The white towel she was using to hold it—one of Bisky’s new ones, of course—was dotted with blood. “They were gonna take her to the pound, Mom.”
“The pound would have the means to deal with a dog like that.” Bisky knelt to look at the dog more closely. “What happened to her, anyway?”
“We don’t know, but Kaitlyn and her dad think somebody abused her. That, or she was in a dogfight. Like, a professional one, you know? We found her in the woods.”
Bisky drew in a breath to reiterate that no, they couldn’t take this project on, when there was a pounding on the screen door. “Open up! Police!”
Since the door was open, Bisky heard another officer’s comment. “Don’t come on strong like that when you’re just asking questions in the community! Hey, Bisky, you in there?”
She rose to her feet and went to open the door. “Sure am. Hey, Evan. Jimmy.”
“Mind if we come in and ask a few questions?” Evan stepped in front of Jimmy as if making sure he didn’t open his fool mouth again.
“Not if you grab a couple of those grocery bags outta my truck,” she said, “since my kid is too busy to help her mom.”
“That’s not our job—” Jimmy started to say.
“No problem,” Evan interrupted. “Jimmy will bring them right in.”
Bisky smiled a little as she let Evan in the house, then held the door for the blustering and complaining Jimmy Colerain. “What’s up, gentlemen?”
“We need to talk to your daughter.” Jimmy thumped the grocery bags down on the kitchen table, probably breaking Bisky’s eggs.
Bisky stiffened. No way was she letting this pair take an aggressive tone toward her daughter. She stepped between the officers and the spot where Sunny and the dog sat now; they’d shifted to the corner of the kitchen, and Sunny’s back was against the wall.
“If you don’t mind, that is,” Evan said. He was relatively new in town, but he seemed like a sensible person, wanting to connect with the locals and help in any way he could.
Jimmy Colerain, on the other hand, had grown up here, and while he was only a part-time cop, probably one of the chief’s projects, he had an inflated sense of his own importance.
“What do you want to talk to Sunny about?” She kept her arms crossed and stared Jimmy down. Sometimes, it was nice to be a bigger and taller woman.
“That abused dog there,” Jimmy said.
Evan glared at Jimmy, then smiled apologetically at Bisky. “We’d like to talk to her a little more about what she saw and heard.”
“And it takes two of you? Do you think she did something to the dog? Because I’m looking at a girl who had the courage to help a poor wounded creature, and I don’t see why you need to come in here acting threatening.”
Evan cleared his throat. “There are two of us because Jimmy’s getting some mentoring about how to talk to members of the community,” he said evenly. “He won’t be participating from here on out, just watching. Isn’t that right.” He looked at Jimmy.
The younger man’s face reddened.
Evan continued to stare him down.
“Yeah, that’s right,” Jimmy said finally.
“You can ask her a few questions,” Bisky said to Evan, “if that’s okay with her. What do you think, Sunny?”
“It’s fine, Mom.” Don’t embarrass me was the implied subtext, which meant that Sunny was comfortable with the basic situation.
“We wanted to know if she saw anyone else hanging around where the dog was found, or heard anything.” Evan knelt down beside Sunny and looked at the dog, shaking his head. “We’d sure like to catch whoever did this to an innocent dog.”
Sunny shook her head rapidly. “No, we didn’t see anyone.”
Bisky frowned. She knew her daughter, and Sunny had said that too fast. She was hiding something.
“No other teenagers?” Evan asked. Maybe he’d heard the lie in her voice, too.
“Some of the dock kids?” Jimmy said from his station by the door.
Bisky glared at him.
“C’mon,” he said, “Y’all skin muskrats for fun.”
Bisky tensed and glanced over at Sunny. She wanted to give Jimmy a piece of her mind, but she didn’t want to embarrass Sunny or set a bad example.
“Shut up, Colerain,” Evan said.
“Well, it’s the truth! Y’all do skin muskrats.”
Bisky opened her mouth to chew him out. This was exactly why the dock kids struggled.
Sunny cleared her throat. “Y’all,” she said from the floor, drawing out the word for emphasis, “y’all eat hamburgers. Do you know about conditions in slaughterhouses? Because I can give you some details if you’d like. Show you a video, although it’s pretty graphic. It might upset you, but it might also make you wonder who’s really into abusing animals.”
Evan winced, and Jimmy reddened, and Bisky smiled. That’s my girl.
There was another knock at the door, and Bisky turned to see William there.
“Come on in,” she said. “Join the fun. We’re suspected of abusing animals now.”
“What?” He looked from Jimmy to Evan.
“Because of how we supposedly skin muskrats for fun,” Sunny explained. She was stroking the dog’s head now.
“That’s a cultural thing!” William frowned.
“You’ll have to tell me about that some day.” Evan looked from William to Bisky. He sounded genuinely interested.
William drew himself up to his full height, which meant that his head was practically scraping the ceiling. “I’m sure there’s a demonstration you could attend, or a book you could read on the subject,” he said to Evan. All of a sudden, he sounded like the professor he was, and he also sounded like he was scolding a student. Why, she couldn’t fathom.
“Right. Well, I’ll just ask Sunny a couple more questions.” Evan settled into a sitting position and petted the dog some more. “Tell me again about the spot where you found her,” he said to Sunny. “Do you know of anyone who hangs around that area? Any particular reason you went hiking there today?”
As Sunny denied knowledge of anything, Bisky was again conscious that her daughter was hiding something. She didn’t suspect Sunny of hurting the dog herself. No way would Sunny have anything to do with abusing an animal, Bisky would stake her life on that. But as a mother, she could see that Sunny wasn’t telling the whole story.
“We’ll continue to investigate,” Evan said, standing. “If you think of anything, let us know right away. We don’t want anyone mistreating animals in this community.”
Jimmy let out some kind of snort under his breath. Evan frowned, and the police officers left. Evan started scolding the younger officer as soon as they got outside.
“We’re keeping this dog,” Sunny said when the officers’ car started up and they drove away.
Bisky frowned. William shrugged.
The last thing Bisky wanted in her house, as her responsibility, was an abused dog. She wasn’t the type of parent who had trouble saying no, either.
But when she looked at Sunny’s face, she blew out a breath. “This is probably a big mistake,” she said, “but we’ll give the dog a home for now.”