The Money Bird (An Animals in Focus Mystery) by Sheila Webster Boneham Page B

Papers to grade.” He sat on the bed and kissed me again. His face was in shadow, so I couldn’t read his expression, but I felt as if he were sitting on my chest rather than beside me. “Besides, you’re sleepy and I’m wide awake, so I may as well go do something useful and let you sleep.” He ran a feather-light finger down my cheek. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
    I heard the baby gate pop open, and Tom’s soft “Drake, here.” Then Jay was on the bed beside me, shoving his head into my hand and flipping himself over for a belly rub. When I heard Tom’s car start, I wrapped my arms around my dog, buried my face in his ruff, and tried to go to sleep. I didn’t have much luck.
    fourteen

    I hadn’t planned to take a day off from the veterinary photo shoot, and if I had, I wouldn’t have chosen to spend it nursing a sore backside and trying not to sit too hard, but there I was. By morning the drugs had all worn off, leaving me sore and less than euphoric. My left buttock was swollen and felt like the demon Tiffany was poking it with a hot little pitchfork.
    I tried to explain to Jay that I really wasn’t up to our morning constitutional, but he danced around my feet and grinned at the leash hanging by the door until he convinced me to pull on a pair of loose-fitting yoga pants and a baggy Eeyore tee. I ran a comb through my hair and checked for smeared mascara under my eyes. Why spend time on my appearance when I’d be sweaty and windblown in twenty minutes? Jay’s front paws tapped a routine around me that would put Gene Kelly to shame and, as I pulled the laces on my Asics tight, his muzzle darted in under my face and slurped my chin.
    Mr. Hostetler was sitting on his front steps across the street. Paco, his Chihuahua, stood at the end of his leash, and Mr. Hostetler’s grandson, Tyler, knelt next to Paco with a brush in his hand. Paco yipped once and his companions waved. Jay and I walked over to say hello.
    “Mrs. Janet,” asked Tyler, his little forehead wrinkled up, “are you okay?”
    “Sure, Tyler. Why?” I had forgotten for the moment that Tyler was at the veterinary office the day before.
    “The veterinarian said that little girl bit you.”
    Mr. Hostetler reached out to pet Jay, who was exchanging a mutual sniff with Paco, and said, “I hope it wasn’t a bad bite.”
    I smiled at Tyler and said, “You heard right, Tyler. She bit me, but I’m okay.”
    He cocked his head and asked, “But why?”
    I wanted to say because she’s a little monster, but Tyler was asking a serious question and I wasn’t at all sure I had a serious answer for him. I was afraid I would let him down when I said, “I don’t really know, Tyler.”
    He shrugged and said, “Okay.” He turned to pet Jay, and said, “I’m combing Paco.”
    A few minutes of small talk later, Jay and I took our leave.
    We usually walk the eastern end of the River Greenway where it skirts the slow brown Maumee from Maysville Road east toward New Haven, but once I was buckled into my van I decided to head downtown. I parked on Vermont and we walked through Lakeside Park, starting among the tea and shrub roses that mingle north of the massive white pergola. Spent and unpruned blossoms drooped among buds and flowers in calming pastels, welcoming yellows, playful oranges, passionate reds. We crossed under the stout vine-covered columns of the pergola and scurried down the western steps of twin staircases to a brick-and-concrete walk. Jay expressed mild interest in a little spaniel mix who was cooling off in one of the two round pools aligned with the long rectangular reflecting pool, and the riot of yellows, oranges, reds and whites bubbling out of concrete pots along our path made my heart smile.
    The cring-cring-cring of a bicycle bell burst through the hum of traffic and twitter of birds, and a lavender bike with fluorescent pink tails streaming from its handlebars caught up and wobbled past. Brown pigtails set high on the sides of