Bones Omnibus by Mark Wheaton

acceptable’? This is my house, man! My little sister’s in there!”
    “We sent officers door to door. No one answered here.”
    “Yeah, because she was probably scared shitless. Then you’ve got us waiting down there…”
    “You couldn’t call?”
    There was a silence before Ken’s voice replied, “Phone’s disconnected.”
    “Well, that’s too bad, then,” said the cop, sounding triumphant. “You have a good night now.”
    Keys jangled in the door. A second later, it swung open, light pouring in from the hall as Trey and Ken quickly entered.
    “Man, fuck that guy,” Trey snarled. “He doesn’t know I know he lives over there off Lenox.”
    “Oh, and what’re you going to do about it?” Ken scoffed. “Go over and pretend you don’t smell like a beer can with thirty roaches stuffed in it? He’d run you in so fast, you’d be crying.”
    Trey straightened up a little before rolling his eyes.
    “Better than smelling like a grocery store dumpster. Rotten cabbage, rotten carrots, sour milk…”
    That’s when Trey’s gaze traveled over to the couch and met Bones’s.
    “Oh,
shit
!” Trey shrieked.
    He grabbed the front doorknob, but Ken had already set the door chain.
    “Fuck, man!” he shouted.
    Ken stared at the dog and realized there wasn’t something right about it. He figured any other dog would leap to its feet and confront Trey. Dogs reacted to fear, right? But this one only sat there looking at Trey like he was just the latest attraction.
    “Hold up, Trey. I don’t think he’s dangerous.”
    As if looking for the perfect way to punctuate Ken’s assessment, Bones farted. Trey stared at the shepherd with incredulity before turning to Ken.
    “I’m still way high, right?”
    “What’s going on?” Becca said in a too-sleepy-to-be-fully-awake voice as she walked into the living room.
    “Becca! There’s a dog!”
    Becca eyed Bones, giving him a quick pat on the snout.
    “How’d you get out of the bathroom, Bones?”
    Bones seemed to know exactly what she was referring to and glanced backward at the bathroom without comment. Becca turned back to her brothers.
    “Cops shot up the whole hallway going after Mister what’s-his-name who’s always having ‘relatives’ stay with him,” she explained matter-of-factly. “Got a couple of the neighbors, too.”
    “Yeah, we saw. They took the cops down with him.”
    “No, that wasn’t them,” Becca claimed. “I heard the bullets. The cops came in, there was shooting, lots of noise, lots of machine guns, but then there was just that one coming up from behind them –
bang, bang, bang, bang
.”
    Ken saw the look in Becca’s eyes and shook his head.
    “No way. You’re not going down that road again, are you? Please say you’re not. When are you going to stop this?”
    “When are you going to believe me?” Becca countered. “You saw Mrs. Fowler’s apartment door open?”
    “Yeah,” Ken replied, realizing he had.
    “He was in there with her this time,” Becca explained. “You know how she’s always saying she got this gun. Well, here it is.”
    Becca went over and plucked the gun from its hiding place in the silverware drawer.
    “Where’d you get that?” Trey said, grabbing it away from her.
    “Bounced up to our doorstep after she got done killing all the police,” Becca intoned. “Smell it.”
    Ken took the gun from Trey. Even without inhaling, he could tell from the heft that those were spent cartridges in the cylinder.
    “Jesus,” Ken said. “Why the hell did you pick it up?”
    Becca shrugged, even though she knew the answer.
    “I was scared. I knew he was out there in the hall somewhere just looking at me. Then this dog showed up and I figured it was going to be okay.”
    “Fuck, you stole a gun
and
a police dog?” Trey scoffed, checking out Bones’s harness. “They’re going to put you away for this!”
    Becca walked over until she was only a few inches from Trey’s face.
    “You can laugh at me all you