Chapter 1
I heard the puppy before I saw him.
His nails tapped across the living-room floor as I came home from school. He skidded around the corner of the sofa, a blue collar jingling at his neck, and stopped at my shoes.
For one confused second, I thought he belonged to a neighbor.
Then Ava called, “Milo! Come here!”
The puppy raced back to her. Caleb sat beside her on the rug, smiling as Milo tried to climb into his lap. Vanessa was on the sofa, filming them with her phone.
Nobody had heard me come in except the dog.
I looked past them to the corner beside the fireplace.
Bruno’s bed was there.
His blanket was gone.
I checked the hook by the front door. His red leash was gone, too.
Bruno always came to meet me, even when he was half asleep. He would get to his feet slowly now that he was older, then hurry the last few steps as if I might leave before he reached me.
I dropped my backpack.
“Where’s Bruno?”
Vanessa lowered her phone. Caleb stopped playing with the puppy.
“I found him another home,” Vanessa said.
I waited for her to explain. She didn’t.
“You gave him away?”
“He needs more attention than we can give him.”
“I walk him every morning and after school.”
“Caleb and Ava have wanted a puppy for ages.”
Milo tugged at Caleb’s sleeve. I looked at his blue collar, then at the bare corner by the fireplace.
“Bruno was my dog.”
“And Milo is theirs,” Vanessa said.
Caleb’s smile vanished.
“Mom, I told you not to get rid of Bruno.”
“Stay out of this, Caleb.”
He looked down. Ava held the puppy against her chest so tightly that he wriggled to get comfortable.
I had known Bruno since I was six. My dad brought him home the summer after my mother died. He was a clumsy brown puppy with paws too big for his body, and I named him before Dad could finish saying we should think about it.
For years, I told Bruno things I couldn’t tell anyone else.
After my first week at a new school, he slept outside my door. When Dad traveled, Bruno waited with me by the window at night. Even lately, when it felt easier to stay in my room than sit with the rest of the family, he followed me upstairs.
I had been at school all day. Bruno had been home.
“You should have told me,” I said.
Vanessa sighed. “I knew you’d react like this.”
“Where is he? I want to call whoever has him.”
“I said he has another home.”
“What’s their number?”
Vanessa picked up her phone again. “Nia, take your shoes off the rug.”
I hadn’t moved from the doorway.
I bent to untie them because my hands needed something to do. One lace slipped through my fingers. I could feel Ava watching me.
“You promised he could stay,” I said.
“I promised we’d discuss what was best for him.”
Dad and I had discussed Bruno’s age at the vet’s office the month before. He had stiff joints, but the vet said his heart sounded good. I gave him medicine with breakfast and helped him up the back steps when he needed it.
Vanessa had complained about the medicine costing money. Dad told her he would pay for it. I thought that settled the matter.
Milo trotted over and sniffed my hand. He was warm and curious. I couldn’t bring myself to pet him.
A car door shut outside.
Ava looked toward the window. “Daddy’s home!”
The front door opened, and Dad stepped in with his travel bag. He wasn’t due back until tomorrow. He smiled as Caleb ran to hug him, then caught Ava in his other arm.
“Surprise,” he said.
Milo barked. Dad glanced down.
“Who’s this?”
“His name is Milo,” Ava said, though she sounded less excited now.
Dad set down his bag. He saw my backpack on the floor and looked up at me.
His smile faded.
Then he turned toward the fireplace.
“Where’s Bruno?”
Vanessa rose from the sofa. “I found a place for him. He was getting to be too much for this house.”
Dad looked at her, then at me.
“She took him while I was at school,” I said.
“You didn’t talk to Nia?” Dad asked.
“She would never have agreed.”
“And you didn’t talk to me?”
“You’ve been away all week.”
Dad’s voice stayed level, but I saw him tighten his grip on the handle of his bag.
“Tell us where he is.”
Ava shifted Milo in her arms.
“Dad,” she whispered.
Vanessa turned to her. “You can take him into the kitchen, Ava.”
Ava stayed where she was.
“Mom didn’t give Bruno to another family.”
“Ava,” Vanessa said.
Dad crouched so he could see Ava’s face. “Where did she take him?”
Ava pointed at the coffee table. A magazine lay over a folded piece of paper.
Dad lifted it. I moved close enough to read the heading.
ANIMAL SURRENDER FORM.
For a moment, the words refused to make sense.
“He’s at a shelter?” I asked.
Vanessa said, “They’ll find him a good home.”
Dad read down the page. His eyes stopped at a line halfway through. He read it again, slower.
“Why does it say Nia requested this?”
“I had to fill out the form,” Vanessa said.
“I never asked you to take him anywhere.”
Dad turned the page toward me. Under reason for surrender, someone had written my name. Beside it were words about my safety.
My throat closed.
Ava’s eyes filled with tears.
“Dad, there’s something else Mom told them about Nia.”
Vanessa took a step toward her.
“That’s enough.”
Dad stood between them, the paper still in his hand.
“What did she tell them?”
Chapter 2
Ava looked at me instead of Dad.
“She told the lady you hurt Bruno.”
I gripped the back of the nearest chair.
“What?”
“She said you scared him,” Ava whispered. “She said you got angry and made him bite you.”
Vanessa’s face hardened. “Ava misunderstood.”
“I was there.”
“You were playing with your brother.”
“I heard you,” Ava said.
Milo wriggled in her arms. Caleb gently took him and carried him to the rug. Ava’s hands were free now, but she held them close to her chest.
Dad looked down at the surrender form. I could see more writing beneath the line about my safety. Vanessa had reported that Bruno had bitten me that morning.
That morning, he had eaten his breakfast beside my feet. I’d hidden his medicine in a spoonful of peanut butter and laughed when he licked the spoon clean. Before I left, he had followed me to the door.
“He never bit me,” I said.
“I told them you didn’t need medical attention,” Vanessa replied.
Dad stared at her. “You invented a bite?”
“I needed them to accept him. They were full.”
I felt sick. “What did they do to him because you said that?”
Nobody answered.
Dad took out his phone and found the shelter’s number on the paper. The recording said it closed at five. It was already past six.
“There’s an after-hours number,” he said, reading the form more closely.
He dialed it. I stood beside him while it rang.
A woman answered. Dad gave her Bruno’s intake number and explained that the surrender information was false. She asked who he was. He told her he owned Bruno and that the dog had been taken without his consent.
I could hear only his side of the call.
“Yes. I have his vet records.”
“No, he has no bite history.”
“He was surrendered today.”
Dad’s eyes met mine. He listened for a long moment.
“When can we get him?”
He put the call on speaker.
The woman introduced herself as Ms. Romero. She said Bruno was safe at the shelter for the night. Staff would review the report in the morning, and Dad could come when they opened. They would need proof that Bruno belonged to our family.
“What does the bite report mean for him?” I asked.
Ms. Romero paused. She told us they had separated him from the other dogs while they assessed what had been reported. She couldn’t decide anything over the phone, but she would add Dad’s call to his file immediately.
“May I speak to someone tonight?” Dad asked.
“The staff member who handled his intake has gone home. I’ll leave a message for the morning team. Please bring everything you have.”
When the call ended, I realized I had been holding my breath.
“He’s there,” Dad said. “We know where he is.”
I wanted to believe that was enough. I could still see Bruno following Vanessa’s car, thinking he was going somewhere and coming back with her.
“I want to go now.”
“I know. We’ll be there when they open.”
Vanessa reached for the paper. Dad moved it out of her reach.
“You don’t understand how hard it’s been,” she said. “Bruno has accidents. He barks when the puppy sellers come by. I do everything while you travel.”
“You bought Milo before Bruno was gone?” Dad asked.
She looked away. That answered him.
Caleb stepped forward. “Mom showed us pictures of Milo last week.”
Dad’s face changed.
“You planned this.”
“I planned to make the younger two happy.”
“And you told the shelter Nia hurt her dog.”
Vanessa folded her arms. “I said Bruno had become unpredictable around her.”
“That isn’t true,” I said.
She looked straight at me. “You know he growled when I tried to move him.”
“He was asleep in his bed. You grabbed his collar.”
Dad turned to me. “When did that happen?”
“Last Tuesday. I told her to leave him alone.”
“I was trying to clean,” Vanessa said.
I remembered Bruno lifting his head, confused and stiff. I had knelt beside him until he settled. Vanessa had walked away saying I treated that dog better than anyone in the house.
Dad asked Caleb and Ava to take Milo into the kitchen. Caleb went, but Ava stayed by the doorway.
“Is Bruno in trouble because I didn’t say anything sooner?” she asked.
Dad knelt beside her. “You told us as soon as I got here.”
“I wanted to tell Nia when she came in. Mom said to let her see Milo first.”
My stomach twisted. Vanessa had wanted me to find the empty bed myself.
Dad told Ava she could go with Caleb. This time she did.
I watched Vanessa pick up her phone from the sofa. She glanced at the screen, then slipped it into her pocket.
“Who are you calling?” Dad asked.
“No one.”
He didn’t press her. He turned to me.
“Get Bruno’s records and anything that shows he’s yours. Photos, his tag number, the vet paperwork.”
I went upstairs. Bruno’s food bowl was gone from my room. His toys had disappeared from the basket under my desk.
I opened the drawer where I kept his adoption papers. They weren’t there.
I checked beneath my school books, then inside my closet. Nothing.
Dad came up when he heard me pulling drawers out.
“The papers are gone,” I said.
“We’ll get the vet records.”
“She took everything.”
“We have years of pictures. We’ll start there.”
On my bed lay one thing Vanessa had missed: a small photograph of me at six, asleep on the floor with Bruno’s head on my arm.
I handed it to Dad.
He sat beside me and looked at it for a long time.
Then his phone rang.
It was Ms. Romero.
