A Feral Darkness by Doranna Durgin Page B

thought. Like all the PePP volunteers, Sammi was grateful for the adoption days allowed by Pets!—but it didn't make her blind to the way Roger managed his people.
           "You see," Brenna said. "People hear about these things here. We watch out for one another."
           "We do," Sammi said, quite aware that she was playing a role in a larger conversation that she didn't understand, but willing to team with Brenna to do it.
           Again, amusement flickered across Gil's face, settling at one side of his mouth. The side with the split lip. "I'll keep that in mind," he said, and left the room—but somehow left some trace of his attitude behind.
           It kept Sammi silent and thoughtful. Brenna gave it an internal scowl and jumped up to prowl the offerings of the snack machine, thinking hard about chocolate. She was still prowling when Sammi spoke up. "Who was that? Why don't you like him?"
           "Because he doesn't like me," Brenna said, which was indeed what it basically boiled down to. Judging her and Elizabeth simply because of the way they might—or might not, given that he'd never seen them—handle dogs.
           "Something didn't like him ," Sammi said. "Car accident?"
           "Fight, I'm betting," Brenna said, thinking of how similar Russell had looked and moved the time several high school rivals had teamed up to put some hurt on him. Not truly to damage him...just to make a point.
           A very hard point.
           Brenna sat on the corner of the table, struggling with the cellophane on the brownie she had just rescued from the depths of the machine. "Anyway, I am being careful about the dog pack. Not even going out at night. At least I don't have anyone leasing the barn right now...though I ought to try to get someone in there this spring." She broke off a piece of brownie, popped it into her mouth, and spoke around it. "Is it true? That no one's actually seen any of the dogs?"
           Sammi hesitated, long enough for Brenna to sift through her own recollection of news briefs on the radio, to and from work. Someone had found a mauled cat on the edge of their property and the wounds were determined to be dog-inflicted. Someone else had found a small mutt in the woods edging a farmer's field. But had anyone seen the pack? Had anyone seen even a single dog?
           Gil Masera knew something, that was for sure.
           Or he thought he knew something.
           "No," Sammi finally said, picking at the tab opener of her soda. She looked up at Brenna. "But plenty of people have seen what they've done . We've got PePP members out in your area right now—someone found another dead dog last night, a little Jack Russell mix. Some of us volunteered to look for signs of the pack. And Janean is at Lakeridge right now with a second dog—this one's alive. It's hurt, but alive. It'll go through quarantine, and if the owner hasn't shown up, we'll take it on till it heals and place it." She gave Brenna a dark look. "It used to be a real pretty little Sheltie mix. So don't tell me those dogs aren't out there somewhere. And don't you get careless about them."
           Brenna held up both hands. "Like I said, Sunny's crated." Never mind explaining Druid, who was crated right along with the hound but had disdained the bone Brenna had left him; his stare had bored into her back as she'd left the house, sending the certain message that he was supposed to be coming with her, regardless of where she was headed. "And I'm not going out after dark, at least not until this whole dog pack thing is sorted out or broken up or whatever."
           "Well, good," Sammi said, mollified. She took a swig of her soda while Brenna chewed the brownie—mostly cardboard, but her body seemed to think it was getting chocolate—and said, "Tell me again who that was?"
           It took Brenna a moment, since she hadn't said anything on the subject in the first