We watched her for a few moments, then she laid her head down, shut her eyes and sighed. Although she’d had a rough few days, she seemed to finally be at peace. “I’ll get her something to eat,” I said.
Once I set her food down, all of us retired to the living room to give the family some space.
I sat down and settled my head back against the cushions, relieved I should get more than a few hours of sleep now that the puppies had the proper care.
“What if I had babies?” Daisy said, lying down at my feet.
Apparently, I’d have to explain that she’d been fixed and puppies weren’t in her future.
“Did you find out who Sasha belongs to?” Jacob asked.
“Not yet,” I sighed. “I’m going to poke around a bit online and check the missing animal groups on social media. Hopefully, we’ll have her back to her owners in no time.”
“Where did you find her?” Eric asked.
“Daisy found her in the barn,” I replied, tapping her on the head. “Isn’t she amazing?”
“Yes!” she yelled, jumping to her feet, her tail smacking against the couch and the coffee table. “Yes, I am!”
“What a good girl,” Jacob said, laughing. “I swear she understands everything you say, Mom.”
“Sometimes it seems that way,” I replied.
“I understand because I’m so awesome!” Daisy said.
After chatting with the boys for a few more minutes, they announced they were heading out for a bit. I retired to my bedroom to poke around online and see if I could find Sasha’s owner.
I scanned the groups, then made a few posts and included my phone number, leaving out the dog’s name. Sasha didn’t have a collar and I had no way to explain how I became aware of her name besides my talking dog, so I left that out of the description. I also didn’t mention the puppies. I didn’t want them falling into the wrong hands and get caught up in a dog fighting ring or something equally horrible. The owner would know if their dog was pregnant or not. This was a way to weed out those with bad intentions.
Hopefully, I’d find Sasha’s owner before Christmas Eve. Having the puppies corralled in my kitchen would put a damper on our holiday dinner. How in the world was I supposed to cook a turkey with eleven puppies underfoot? And I needed to make a decision—if I didn’t hear from the owner, should I get a table at the Christmas Festival where I had a good chance of getting them adopted? Or did I hold out and hope the owner eventually contacted me? The puppies seemed to be full-bred Bernese, which led me to believe that Sasha belonged to a breeder. Had she run away to have her babies? Or had she just somehow gotten lost?
As much as I hated breeders, I also understood that certain dogs were bred to work. Bernese made excellent service dogs, so perhaps that was the future of the puppies, which I didn’t mind. The breeders who ran puppy mills were the ones who really got under my skin because it was all about the money, not about the life and happiness of the dogs.
With a sigh, I sat back and stared at my phone, willing the owner to call.
“Gina! Gina!” Daisy yelled from the living room. “Gina! Come here! Hurry!”
Uh-oh.
“This doesn’t sound good,” I muttered.
Chapter 9
I hurried down the hall to find Daisy in the kitchen with Sasha and the pups. At first glance, I perceived everything to be okay.
“Gina, she loves my idea for names!” Daisy yelled, her tail wagging.
And I’d been right. My dog sometimes got overly excited and I misjudged her enthusiasm for something being wrong.
“That’s great,” I said, grinning while my shoulders relaxed. Sasha seemed somewhat rested and happy to be around her babies. Maybe now was a good time to question her. “Daisy, ask Sasha what her owner’s name is, please.”
The two dogs stared at each other for a long moment, then Daisy glanced up to me. “She says she doesn’t have an owner. But her human’s name is Linda. And by the way, I don’t have an owner, either,” Daisy sniffed. “I choose to be here because I like you a little bit. You don’t own me.”
Okay, fair enough. I wasn’t going to argue semantics. “Does she know Linda’s last name? Or where she lives?”
After a moment, Daisy shook her head. “Nope. But Sasha says she lives over the hill.”
I rolled my eyes. Perfect. We resided in the mountains with nothing but hills surrounding us in every direction.
“Okay, so a woman named Linda who lives over the hill is Sasha’s human,” I said. “What about Charlie? Does she know who Charlie is?”
Their gazes met again and Daisy shook her head.
“What about the man she chased from the barn?” I asked. “Does she know that person?”
After a moment, Daisy replied, “Nope.”
“Can she describe him?”
“It was dark, so no.”
If she’d never seen Charlie or the person she chased from the barn, then it was pointless to ask if they were one and the same.
Pursing my lips in frustration, I clenched my hands at my sides. “How did Sasha end up in Charlie’s barn?”
“She was about to have her babies and she needed somewhere to do that besides the snow,” Daisy said. “So she found the barn.”
