To Catch a Treat (4 page)

I got there before Neal. Billi and I were chatting in the reception area, since she'd let the rest of the staff except the overnight crew leave. As I held Biscuit in my lap, we talked over ideas for promoting my baking businesses more and holding those adoption events there.

When the outside door opened, we looked up from where we'd been leaning against the reception desk. “Hi, Neal,” I said. “Hi, Janelle.” I quickly introduced her to Billi.

“Nice to meet you,” Janelle said, but her voice was soft and sounded confused. “But—I'm not sure why Neal brought me here.” She turned to look up at my brother's face. They were holding hands and he was beaming with pride, as if their visit to the shelter had been his idea—and as if it were over already and had gone as well as I hoped it would.

“Carrie has something to show us,” was his nebulous response.

SomeONE to show
, I thought, but didn't contradict him. Sure, this could be a big mistake, considering Janelle's attitude about her missing dog.

I hoped not.

I put Biscuit into the enclosed reception area. “That's right,” I said. “This way.”

We walked through the small dog building, and it was as noisy as before. The pups had had some time to rest their vocal chords, I supposed. I smiled sadly as we passed Sweetie.

Then we entered the building where the larger dogs were housed. “Here we are.” But before we continued, I decided it was time to give Janelle an explanation. “I hope I'm not entirely wrong about this.”

But I was worried that I was. Her attractive face seemed pale, and I thought I saw as much pain as before in her large blue eyes.

Was this a big, bad blunder? Well, I had to follow through now, even if so. But I hoped that if she was a good match with my brother, she wouldn't hold this against him if she just ended up feeling more hurt.

“Come on.” I gestured to her. “There's someone I want you to meet.”

Rightly or wrongly, I was hoping that Janelle would fall for one of the Labs here and adopt him, to help her get over the loss of her own missing dog. As a dog lover myself, I knew that a new dog wouldn't be a replacement, but having one around might lessen the agony of loss.

I took the lead, with Janelle following and Neal and Billi at the end of our line. I stopped a few kennels down, where the two Labs, black and gold, were inside.

Janelle quickly stood beside me. The black Lab immediately started hurling himself toward the mesh gate, jumping and falling and jumping again. He made a crying sound from deep in his throat.

Janelle knelt on the concrete floor outside the kennel run and thrust her fingers inside. The dog started licking at them crazily, still making the frantic noises.

Janelle watched and crooned, too. And then she looked up
toward where I still stood trying to figure this out—and thinking that, somehow, I already had.

“It's Go,” Janelle whispered.

six

How was that possible?
From what I'd understood, Janelle's dog had been stolen in LA. She had decided to come up here, to Knobcone Heights, to try to get away from her sorrow, although she'd seemed unsuccessful at staving off her depression … before.

But now, she'd found her missing dog. Or it certainly seemed that way.

Billi had opened the kennel door and blocked Go's roommate inside, then closed it again. Now Janelle sat on the room's cement floor, laughing and crying as the black Lab jumped all over her and licked her face. The dog, too, made whining noises. They were communicating so loudly that I easily heard the two of them over the usual kennel barks.

I looked at Neal, who was watching Janelle and the dog with a huge smile on his face. He turned to face me. “I knew you were one great sister,” he said, “but how on earth did you do this?”

“I wish I could take credit for it,” I said, “but I can't. Like I told you on the phone, my hope was to help Janelle heal by introducing her to another dog she might want to adopt.”

“This is a whole lot more than that,” my bro said, coming up to me and hugging me closely to his side.

The smile I aimed at him was far from smug. It was more wry than anything. I aimed it next toward Billi, who now stood beside us, also watching the emotional reunion. “Do you know how this dog got here?” I asked her. “Did he come from another shelter, or—”

“One of my staff said he was wandering in the alley behind the shelter just this morning. They brought him in and checked for an ID tag or microchip to try to reunite him with his owner. Apparently he was chipped, but our scanner couldn't capture the information. Then, as a matter of course, we had the dog checked out at your vet clinic before taking him in here. He got a clean bill of health, but their scanner couldn't grab the data, either.”

I'd never heard of that happening before, but it suggested there was something wrong with the chip, not the two scanners.

“So there's no official way of confirming this is Janelle's Go?” I asked. What if this was all an act on Janelle's part?

Although I didn't know why she would do such a thing, or how she could have gotten the dog to mirror her excitement. She didn't appear to have any treats, and it sure looked to me as if the Lab was as thrilled to see her as she was to see him.

“Not really,” Billi said, “although I'd suggest you look at the records at your clinic. Maybe there's something about scars, or other things we could ask Janelle about that would be unique to her dog.”

“I'll do that,” I said.

We all headed toward the reception area. Billi gave Janelle a leash to borrow. Clearly, Billi was going to allow Janelle to take this dog with her, whether or not he was actually Go.

But their mutual reactions were convincing me, more and more, that this was really Janelle's missing dog.

Since the receptionist had left for the day, Billi extracted the usual adoption paperwork from the office files. I didn't pay a lot of attention, since Biscuit dashed over to me, then headed in the direction of the other dog in the room to greet him, too. The dog who was probably Go had seemed just fine with the other Lab in their kennel, but I wanted to keep a close eye on him with my smaller, more energetic pup.

I clipped Biscuit's leash on her but let her stay close, at least for now, to the dog who was apparently Janelle's. Fortunately, after trading nose and butt sniffs, they both settled down. Go did not appear inclined to attack Biscuit, and of course my little girl wasn't about to hurt anyone either.

As we stood there, a few straggler daytime staff members entered the room to log out, and Billi told them that the Lab was leaving for a new home already that evening, which wouldn't have been permitted so quickly under other circumstances in case the dog's owner showed up. Since Janelle was apparently that owner, it worked this time. Everyone seemed delighted.

Billi then handed the paperwork to Janelle, along with a pen, and gestured toward a table and chair near the door. “I'd like you to fill this out. I understand that this appears to be your dog—we named him Boomer, by the way, but we always say adopters can change the pets' names, and this time it's clear what he responds to. In any event, since we started our own file on him, it'll be cleaner just to act as if he's another adoption. If it turns out you're mistaken and the real owner shows up, though, you'll be agreeing here to bring Go back.”

“He's definitely my dog,” Janelle said, “but I'll sign this so I can take him now.”

That also meant Billi would collect information such as Janelle's home address and phone number. That might be handy to have.

Of course, if Janelle was just making things up for some unfathomable reason, she'd fake her data like everything else. I couldn't figure out why she'd be doing that, though. And Neal still seemed so interested in her that I could only hope that not only was she for real, but so was what had happened here with the dog she was calling Go.

A coincidence? If so, it was a huge one. I still couldn't figure out how a dog stolen in LA could wind up here, in a town his owner was randomly visiting.

My mind kept circling those questions as Neal knelt to play with Go. I stood off to the side with Biscuit and Billi while Janelle filled out the forms.

“What's really going on here?” Billi asked quietly.

I couldn't brainstorm with her now, with Janelle around, so I merely said, “I hope to figure that out.” But since I in fact felt sure this couldn't be a coincidence, and I hoped it wasn't some kind of weird game Janelle was playing, I wasn't surprised when my thoughts came to rest on the two people Janelle knew from LA who'd shown up here around the same time as she had.

She seemed very friendly with Delma. That didn't mean Delma hadn't played a really nasty prank on her buddy Janelle.

But was the more likely candidate for stealing the dog and bringing him here Ada? Janelle had met her at dog parks. And something had seemed strange in their brief contact I'd observed.

Still, why would a member of the clearly wealthy Arnist family steal anything—unless there was something behind the theft that I simply couldn't see? And bring the dog here? Why? Was Janelle lying about everything? Or was my imagination just coming up with ideas that had no basis in any kind of reality?

And no matter who it was who'd brought Go to this town, why hadn't that person hung onto him? Even a really smart dog like a Lab wouldn't have known to come to the town's only animal shelter to be taken care of. T
herefore, a person, maybe the dognapper, had to be involved.

“Here we are.” Janelle sounded thrilled as she stood and handed the completed forms to Billi. “Can Go and I leave?”

Billi, now standing closer to Janelle, skimmed the paperwork. “It looks in order, I think. Is that your cell phone number?” She pointed to the page.

“Yes,” Janelle said.

“Good. I'll be able to get in touch with you if I have any questions.”

“Definitely.” Janelle again knelt and hugged the dog—who was now, and possibly previously, known as Go. “Come on, boy. We're out of here.” She looked toward Neal. “Can you drive us to my hotel?”

“Absolutely,” he said. “Let's go.”

At the door, with Go by her side leaning against her leg, Janelle turned back. “Carrie, I can't thank you enough. Or you either, Billi. Look—I just want to spend some alone-time with Go tonight, but why don't you all meet me at the resort's bar about this time tomorrow? I'll buy you all drinks. Maybe everyone in the bar—although I … well, never mind. I'm just so excited. Will you meet us there?”

I'd probably buy my own drink and some others', too, since I'd gathered that professional photographer Janelle wasn't exactly wealthy and was paying, at the least, a hotel bill to stay here. But I wanted to learn as much as I could about the situation. And so I said, “Sure. I'll see you tomorrow.”

I actually saw her much sooner the next day than I'd anticipated. Go, too.

It was early in the morning, seven o'clock. I had just opened the Barkery, and Dinah was in Icing getting it ready to open, too. I was placing some of that day's newly baked dog treats in the glass-fronted display case when I saw the front door open and heard one of the door chimes ring. It was Janelle who entered, with Go on a leash.

Biscuit was already in her large, open-topped crate in a corner of the room. She stood up on her hind legs and woofed her greeting. At the same time, I maneuvered out from behind the display case to greet them, too.

“Hi,” I said. “Welcome to Barkery and Biscuits. Is it okay to give Go a sample treat?”

“Definitely. I'm planning on buying him some treats. Spoiling him all over again.” Janelle smiled hugely. She wore jeans and the same purple athletic shoes I'd seen her in before. Her T-shirt was also purple and said
Knobcone Heights
, clearly a souvenir of her visit here. But what really looked different about her was how real that smile on her pretty face appeared. It was wide and relaxed and suggested she was ready to break into laughter if anyone around her said something that even hinted of a joke.

Apparently, finding Go had been a really good thing for her. I could understand that.

Her light brown hair wafted about her face as if she'd been in a breeze. Or maybe Go and she had run here.

“I assume you'd like a treat, too,” I told her after retrieving a carob and peanut butter biscuit for Go from inside the refrigerated case. “How about an apple scone next door?”

“I'd love that,” she said.

I was glad to see her and wondered if I could get her talking. Last night, after driving Go and Janelle to their hotel, Neal had come back to our place rather dejected. He was delighted that Janelle had found her dog and was clearly feeling better, but he was also worried that now that she was no longer depressed, she might decide there was no reason to stay in Knobcone Heights.

No reason to get to know him better.

Could I help? I doubted it. I didn't fully trust Janelle or the situation, and yet I really liked how happy she was to be apparently reunited with her dog—and wanting to spoil him. Plus, I'd hated to see my brother's dismay when his prior relationship hadn't seemed to lead anywhere. Might this one?

Certainly only if they could see each other frequently. That meant staying in the same town. And if Janelle was here for a while, maybe I could figure out what had really happened with Go.

Now I moved back out from behind the counter and handed Go most of the biscuit. The large black Lab scarfed it down, then looked up at me with big, dark eyes that seemed to plead for more. I just laughed and patted his head, but then I walked over to give my Biscuit the rest of that biscuit so she wouldn't feel jealous.

“This place is every bit as charming as I thought it would be,” Janelle said, her eyes moving from the glass-fronted case containing multiple kinds of fresh dog treats, to the wall shelves behind it where filled dog-cookie jars were stored, to Biscuit's enclosure area. Then she scanned the few tables and chairs on the decorative blue-tile floor.

I just smiled with pride. “Before we go into Icing on the Cake, we can hook Go's leash to Biscuit's enclosure. Dogs are more than welcome here in the Barkery, but not in the human bakery.”

“Sounds great.”

I took the end of Go's leash and looped it around the hook at the outside of Biscuit's crate, then led Janelle into Icing.

Dinah was there, scrubbing down the wall shelves that contained jars of human cookies. The layout of Icing was a mirror image of the Barkery. When Dinah turned around, I introduced her to Janelle.

“Dinah's been around here longer than I have,” I said. “She worked here in Icing when it was the whole shop, and now she's my full-time helper.”

“That sounds wonderful.” Something in Janelle's tone grabbed my attention. She was looking around Icing the same way as she had the Barkery, appearing not only interested but wistful. Her next words confirmed what I'd been sensing. “I'd love to work someplace like this.”

Really? I'd thought she was a photographer.

But did that pay enough to support her and a medium-sized dog? Plus, even though she'd apparently only been in town a short while, could she keep up with whatever photography commitments she had while vacationing here?

If I hired her in my shops, that meant she'd stay in town a bit longer, perhaps get to know Neal better. Was that a good thing?

And would I really get a better feel for what had gone on with Go?

Although I had Frida and Vicky on staff now, I actually had been thinking about trying to recruit another part-timer. But did I know Janelle well enough to offer her a job?

And how would Neal feel about it? I imagined he'd be delighted, since it would provide Janelle a tie to Knobcone Heights. Not that she couldn't unravel it immediately, should she so choose.

Even so, I impulsively decided to ask him about it. I didn't know if Janelle could cook, let alone bake, but we tended to use many of the recipes over and over so I figured she could learn.

“Dinah, would you please give Janelle one of our apple scones? I need to go in the back and make a quick call.”

“Sure.” As my assistant opened the back of the display case, I slipped around the counter and through the door into the kitchen. There, I hurried to my tiny office at the rear of the Icing end of the kitchen, closed the door, and called Neal.

“What's up, Carrie?” he asked almost immediately. His voice was low, so I figured he was on duty behind the resort's check-in desk.

I told him, asking whether he had any idea if Janelle could handle a part-time job like this, once she was instructed on the basics.