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CHAPTER 1

THE WINDOW BLINDS were half open, slashing the morning light to ribbons and flinging them into my face. Am I late for work? My phone was on the nightstand, and I picked it up to read the time. No. I had just over an hour to eat, dress, play.

I turned to hug my husband, but he wasn’t there. Lying beside me in the bed was Julie, our five-year-old little girl, clutching her plush stuffed cow she’d named Mrs. Mooey Milkington.

“Hey,” I said, hugging her, “you’re not Joe.”

“Nope,” she said, laughing at me.

“Is he making breakfast?”

“No, Mommy. He had to go out.”

“Out where?” I asked her.

“He took the car,” she said.

Yes, I love her with all my heart, but this complicated daughter of ours is smart as well as so damned cute, she gets away with maddening behavior—all the time.

“Julie, this is what we cops call ‘pulling teeth.’ Just tell me where Dad went and why. Please.”

“Huh? What does ‘pulling teeth’ mean?”

“‘Pulling teeth’ means someone is saying as little as possible about what they know, so the other person must really work hard to get their little girl to tell.”

“Ohhhhh,” she said. “So, you want me to say that Daddy took Martha to the vet and he’ll bring breakfast home after?”

Talk of my elderly border collie, Martha, and her veterinarian in the same sentence turned my heart into a fist. I’ve known Martha longer than I’ve known Joe. I’d adopted her from a dog rescue, and it had been love at first sight for both of us. Lately, I’d been consciously ignoring signs of her aging, of her mortality.

I was scared, but I had to ask.

“Why did Daddy take her to the vet, Julie?”

“I’m not pulling your teeth, Mommy. Daddy didn’t say why. He just picked Martha up and said he was taking her down to the car.”

“Okay. That sounds … I’m sorry.”

“Sorry for what?” Julie asked me.

“For— grrrrr —snapping at you. Okay, we’ve got to get dressed and eat something, then I’m taking you to the school bus.”

“I don’t know what to wear,” Julie said, bouncing out of bed and running for her room.