1 PAWsible Suspects Read Online Free PDF

hid me. I tried not to stand out in any way. I wore thrift store clothes. I took care of my house just enough not to have the county threaten to condemn the property. I hid behind sloppy and uncared for, thinking that a low profile would keep me safe. If I didn’t stand out – like Susan had, I wouldn’t be targeted for any crime or any unhappy occurrence.
    The few days after I was on the news for solving that murder were some of the most frightening of my life. I’d broken my mediocrity rule and gone so far out of the way to be noticed that I couldn’t sleep for days. I retreated back into my private world following those events. I established a business of talking to animals, but it was definitely outside of the public eye. It wasn’t until my mother had asked for help that I’d even bothered to work on a criminal case again.
    And here I was now, feeling even more exposed because some overzealous detective had decided to snoop into my life. I took a deep breath. Two things were clear. One, I had to solve this case fast so that I could step out of any spotlight headed my way, and two, I wanted to solve this case to show that detective that I wasn’t a fake, even if in reality I was one. Revenge for her indiscretion would make me feel somewhat better.
    That meant that I had to spend a few hours with Della, getting to know her. Bruno had made her feel at home, so I was able to observe more of her personality. Removed from the stress of strangers and loud noises, she was a remarkably calm Scottie girl. Typically, female Scotties are stubborn, but she seemed flexible to her circumstances and fairly friendly. I imagine that Ruby’s constant attention had made her more companionable than some Scotties, who could be extremely aloof.
    I wondered if the person who had taken Ruby knew Della. In watching her at Ida’s house, she’d been timid around strangers or people she didn’t know well. She would not have barked or growled at a stranger; she would have run. Since I’d found her hiding, I went with that assumption.
    I thought about Perry, the other Scottie. He had to be somewhere, and if the police were to be believed, he’d been hurt in whatever had gone down at the house. I watched Della play with Bruno. Only two scenarios came to mind. The first was that Perry had been hurt in whatever had happened at the house and had been taken away to be treated, most likely to a vet or animal hospital. This scenario indicated that Perry was not the main objective of the person who took him. The poor guy had just been in the wrong place at the wrong time, and someone had taken him to get help afterwards.
    The second is that Perry had been removed because someone wanted this particular dog. I discounted that theory immediately. Della was from the same breeder and only two years younger than her mate. So if the perpetrators had wanted one, why not the other? The pair were remarkably similar, according to my mother, so the only difference I could see was the dog’s gender. Since Della and Perry had never had any litters, my guess was that he’d been fixed. So it wasn’t for their bloodline.
    Since my second scenario seemed very implausible, I decided to go with the vet or animal hospital possibility. I pulled up a list of vets and animal hospitals from Google and started down the list.
    On my tenth try, I struck pay dirt. The vet had a Scottie on the premises that matched my description. A stranger had come in with the dog this morning. He’d given his name as John Smith, paid several hundred in cash to help and board the Scottie. The Scottie had a bad gash on his left hind leg, which might have been a knife or some other sharp object puncturing the skin. I asked if I could stop by and look at the dog.
    The tech told me that identification might be impossible. The dog had come in with no collar, no tags, and no identifying marks. It was a brindle Scottie with no tell-tale markings. I suspected that Ruby had micro-chipped the