Chapter 4 - No Name Yet
The clinic staff asked Walter what to call the dogs.
He refused to name them.
“Names make promises,” he said.
Elena studied him.
“And you aren’t ready to make one?”
Walter looked at the mother dog curled around the two stronger puppies.
“I don’t know whether I can keep four dogs.”
He lived alone in a small house outside town.
His wife, Ruth, had died five years earlier.
Their only son had moved to Oregon and rarely called.
Walter’s pension covered the mortgage and groceries but little else.
The clinic bill would already be more than he could afford.
Elena told him a rescue organization might help.
Then she scanned the mother dog for a microchip.
The scanner beeped.
The chip was registered.
Everyone in the room went still.
The dog’s name was Grace.
Her listed owner was Rebecca Whitmore.
The Whitmores owned the largest construction company in the county.
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Their family appeared in newspaper photographs at charity galas and hospital fundraisers.
Rebecca had reported Grace stolen six months earlier.
