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“We'll need to talk to everyone who works here,” Tonica said.

Nora raised her hand hesitantly. “I thought maybe you should pretend to be prospective donors, so you have an excuse to poke around and ask questions without having to, you know, explain why, or make anyone suspicious? Asking about how we do things, stuff like that, things a donor would want to know, too.”

Ginny nodded at Nora. “That's not a bad idea. We could be doing the scout work for someone with money, maybe.” They'd have to tell fewer lies that way: she did research, after all. “I could have suggested this place to them, because it's where I found Georgie.”

She saw Tonica roll his eyes discreetly—obviously, he thought she'd end up walking out with another animal. She considered the thought of a fluffy kitten, or a round-bellied puppy, and then steeled herself against it. She liked animals, yeah, but she wasn't a pet person: she was a
Georgie
person.

“I will also need access to your employee records, anything you can give me,” she added. Tonica could talk all he wanted about reading a person, getting vibes, whatever it was he did in bartender-confessor mode, but when money was missing, the easiest way to find the culprit was to see
who had access to the money, which meant job descriptions that couldn't be fudged.

And then she'd do a little tech-fishing and see who
needed
money.

Her partner coughed once, delicately, to get their attention, then spoke directly to Este. “Are you sure that you don't want to get the cops involved in this?”

Ginny glared at Tonica—this was their job; would he please stop harping about bringing in the cops, please?—but Este's reaction was far more effective.

“No. No police. Official attention is . . . no.” That was definitive, confirming Nora's reaction the day before. “All I want is to find out who is responsible, so I can fire them.”

“But whoever it is, they're stealing from you,” he pointed out. “I know that you're concerned about how that might look to outside organizations, but simply taking steps to stop the thief isn't—”

“Any negative publicity hurts the shelter,” Este said firmly, cutting him off. “We had to fight to get permits in the first place—my God, the politics because we didn't have the right background, didn't know the right people—and then we had to fight to get our funding, and even now a whisper of bad press could do real damage. This is our dream: I won't let anything damage it.”

Even, clearly, if that meant letting a thief go free.

Ginny could see that Tonica thought that the older woman was an idiot, but if she could tell that logic wasn't going to change Este's mind, Tonica should certainly know that, too. The woman might be right, or not—Ginny
thought that surely one bad egg couldn't ruin everything, especially if the potential scandal was handled promptly—but what mattered was what she, Este, believed.

“Everything having to do with fund-raising is perception based,” Nora said, backing up Este's reaction, so she either believed it, too, or wasn't going to rock the boat. Probably both. “And we have to consider the disruption the police might cause. Would people be willing to come down here and adopt, if there was an open investigation? Would the local merchants let us use their storefronts for open house days? And what if the IRS decided that there might be other problems and brought us in for an audit? We can't afford any of that, even squeaky-clean.”

The stammering girl who had approached Ginny in the bar disappeared under the smooth flow of logic. Suddenly, Ginny could see why Este had trusted Nora with such a delicate job, and why she had accepted Nora's hiring them without too much fuss.

“But if you—”

There was a low rumbling noise, vaguely familiar, although Ginny couldn't place it right away. Este looked down at her desk, and then scooped up the cell phone that had been vibrating against the wooden surface. She looked at the display and her mouth pursed in annoyance, then she made an elegant gesture with her free hand that clearly meant that they should leave so she could take this call in private.

Nora nodded and crooked her fingers at Ginny and Tonica, indicating that they should follow her back out.
As the door closed behind them, leaving them in the now-more-noisy bullpen area, the younger woman shook her head. “Probably a creditor. I wish, you know, that she would let someone else handle those calls. Este's lovely, inside, I mean, and I think the world of her, but she's a peacemaker and world-saver at heart. I mean, even for around here, she's crunchy-granola.”

“Should we wait for her to finish?” Tonica asked, while Ginny looked around, realizing that the increased noise was coming from a news report coming from one of the laptops, now flipped open. There was a coffee mug next to it, and a half-eaten sandwich, but no human in sight.

“No,” their client said. “Este's given her approval, however grudging. Better to get on with it before she changes her mind.” Nora smiled faintly. “First thing you learn, managing this place: keep moving forward, because the moment you stop, that's when everything has the chance to go wrong.”

*  *  *

“What happened?”

Este Snyder listened to the other voice babble for a moment, her expression still serene, but her eyes hooded. Habit, to shield what she was thinking, or feeling. Especially feeling. Too much was happening at once, and only her to juggle it.

“Again? And the security cameras didn't catch anything? Lovely. We pay them, why? No, don't do anything yet. I want to see for myself.”

She ended the call and placed the phone in her pocket. Leaving her office, she headed not for the main hall but the side entrance marked
EMERGENCY
. No alarm sounded, and she stepped outside into a narrow paved alley, blocked on the other side by a chain-link fence easily a foot taller than she. The alley ran along the length of the building and led to a small parking lot, and the direct entrance to the clinic. The man who had called her was standing there, staring at the wall.

“Their usual games, I see,” she said, and the calm tone she had used when talking to Nora was replaced with a cold edge of fury.

“Yeah.” He nodded at the graffiti that was scrawled across the wall and indicated where it trailed off onto the pavement as well. “They left the cars alone, thankfully. But the paint's sticky this time.”

“I wondered when they'd figure that out,” she said quietly, the fury still there. “Makes it harder to clean up. Don't worry, it's not toxic, just a pain. You step in it, or touch it, and you'll carry it with you all day, and probably leave traces behind.”

“Can't have that, can we?” he said, and despite her anger, Este smiled briefly.

“Why are you even in this morning?”

“I wasn't—I was driving by and saw it,” he said. “Checked with the security firm to make sure there hadn't been an alarm that we missed, and then called you. I thought you'd want all the details before—”

“Yes.” She managed to smile at him. “Thank you.”

“Oh my God.” The voice came from behind them, younger and more horrified. Este turned, and scowled at the young woman standing there.

“What happened?” Then she saw the man standing next to Este. “Doc, why're you here? Did something happen in the clinic? Oh my God—”

“No, the clinic's fine,” he said. “No alarms, no broken windows this time. They just slapped paint on the outside.”

The girl sagged a little in relief.

“Don't give them the satisfaction of a reaction,” Este said, and the velvet and granola was back in her voice, the anger banked out of sight. “Just get it cleaned up. Block off the entrance somehow, make everyone use the main parking lot, or find somewhere else to park. Make sure all the deliveries go through the kennel entrance today, or reschedule them for tomorrow. And keep your mouth shut, both of you. No gossip, no bitching. This goes nowhere, do you understand?”

“Yes'm,” the volunteer said, and the man sketched an unironic salute. “I hear and obey, my queen. We still have the tarps inside, from last time,” he said to the younger woman. “Go get them. I'll get the paint remover.”

“And coveralls,” Este said. “I don't want any of this crap getting on anyone, or carried into the shelter itself.”

The other two moved off, the young woman unlocking the clinic door and disappearing inside, while the man went back to his car to take off his jacket and change into sneakers.

Este ignored them both, staring at the graffiti and the
handbills pasted up on the door as though memorizing the sight. “Enough,” she said, finally. “Enough. I will not let this shelter be brought down. Not by
anyone
.”

*  *  *

Georgie, remembering what Penny had said about listening and remembering, tried to pay attention to what the other humans were saying, but there were too many of them all talking at once, and none of it made sense to her. When they went back into the main room, the one that smelled of so many animals and people mixed together, Georgie let out a sigh, aware that she had probably failed. Herself reached down to pet her, and then dropped the leash and gave the “at ease” command again. That meant that Georgie was free to wander, but not go too far. There wasn't anywhere to go, anyway: doors and walls surrounded them, and the doors were all closed.

There was a bulldog sleeping on the carpet. He raised his head and studied her with a wariness she half-remembered. This dog hadn't found his human yet.

The bulldog waited for Georgie to come closer. With a quick look over her shoulder at her humans, she did so.

“You the sniffing-dog? The noser? So, what's up? Do they know what's the wrongness?”

“Something about missing money,” she said, not bothering to ask how he knew why they were there. Gossip went both ways, after all. “I don't know more than that yet.”

The bulldog snorted and put his head back down. “Money. Money ain't what's wrong here, puppy.”

“That's what the humans are worried about.”

“Yeah, well, humans don't know shit. They never do.”

Georgie whined a little, deep in her throat, but cut it off when Ginny looked over her shoulder at the two dogs, having caught the sound. She wagged her tail so her human would know everything was all right, and waited until they went back to talking with the woman at the desk.

“They'll figure it out. We have to let them catch the scent, is all.”

When the older bulldog merely harrumphed, clearly unimpressed with human noses, Georgie added, to herself, “or Penny will find a way to tell them.”

T
eddy had expected that they
would wait in the bullpen area for Este to finish her call, but instead Nora herded them through the open office and back to the front desk. Soft music was playing over speakers now, and there was a large reddish-black dog of unknown breed lying on the rug near the battered sofas. Teddy assumed, since there were no other humans around yet, that it was one of the shelter dogs given a run of the place. It certainly seemed to have made itself at home, only lifting its head enough to check out the newcomers.

“All right, before we go into the kennels, we need to do some basic paperwork,” Nora said, clearly channeling her best memory of a second-grade teacher. “Can I have your driver's licenses, please?”

“Our what?” Ginny raised one blond eyebrow and cocked her head as though Nora had just asked them for a cheek swab or something.

“Your licenses. Or any other form of government-approved identification, et cetera, et cetera. We need to have them on file, before we can let you into the kennel area.”

Ginny apparently decided that was reasonable, because she dropped Georgie's leash and started digging into her bag. “At ease, Georgie.”

The shar-pei let out a sigh and wandered off to touch noses with the other dog, settling down next to it the way she did when tied up outside Mary's.

“Why do you need our identification?” he asked, even as he pulled out his own wallet. “I mean, we're just walking through, not actually working for you or anything.” He meant it to sound casual, but it came out a little sharp.

“It's a security measure, don't worry,” the receptionist said, clearly used to reassuring people about that. She took the pieces of plastic and slid them under the copier's lid, pushing a button and letting the copier do its thing. “Like Ms. Rees said, anyone who goes into the kennel area has to be officially identified. Silly, really, but there are rules. So, are you looking for another dog, or maybe a cat? We have a bunch of cats that are really good with dogs.”

“They're here to scope out the place for a new donor,” Nora said before he could head off any attempts to steer him toward adoption. “A potential new donor, anyway, so we want to give them every courtesy!” She made her eyes wide with excitement, and her braids danced when she nodded her head. Someone had clearly taught her the textbook mannerisms to convey enthusiasm. On her, it almost looked natural. “And yes, we're hoping to convince them to bring home a new friend while they're at it.”

The hell they were, but he bit that back and just smiled at the women, promising nothing. Nora had turned on the
chirpy, slightly ditzy charm to match the receptionist's, making Ginny wince noticeably before she smiled back, too, clearly remembering that they were supposed to be playing eager supporters. It was all vaguely terrifying.

Still, they had gotten at least a glimpse of the professional, responsible Nora, the one they'd seen with Ms. Snyder. He was going to trust that one, rather than the nervous Nellie who had approached them in Mary's. The girl was green, nervous in unrehearsed situations, but she wasn't dumb or ditzy. He was less convinced about the dreadlocked receptionist, who had plastic daises on her desk and dotted her blotter with little hearts and flowers. What was she, twelve? Still, she had responded smartly to Georgie's immediate distrust, and he had no reason to believe that she couldn't do her job.