Total pages in book: 254
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
My donut stared at me, but I felt his “yes” after a moment.
One down, one to go. “What do you say, Agnes? Want to come?” I asked her.
How she managed to be able to glare at me despite being in her mini wolf form was honestly a talent, but she was doing it. Her short, little growl, I took as a yes.
Phew. “All right, let’s go then,” I told them, cocking my head toward the door before they changed their minds.
Both pups took flying leaps off the bed, and I winced when Duncan’s was a little less than graceful and he landed sprawled out on his stomach, but he got up like nothing happened. Agnes disappeared through the small door, but he waited for me. A two-year-old magical boy was the most reliable male in my life—my dad not included. It made me love him even more somehow.
After brushing my teeth, smoothing on some deodorant, and taking a quick pee, I put my boots on and slipped my phone into the fanny pack I had hanging off the doorknob, clipping it on and giving Dunky a scratch behind the ear before we took the staircase where Agnes waited on the landing. We had just gotten to the first floor when both puppies’ heads cocked to the right a moment before the clip-clopping of feet echoed and a satyr woman appeared around the corner from the direction of the kitchen.
It was Phoebe.
The frantic expression on her face put me on alert. “Have you seen Shiloh?” she called out in a shaky voice.
Since Agnes and Duncan couldn’t exactly answer, I did. “Hi, Phoebe. No. Not today.” After school yesterday, sure.
“Pascal?” Phoebe tried.
I shook my head, hoping this wasn’t going where it seemed like it was.
She managed to look even more sick, and her hands went to her face. “Do you know where Randall or Ani are?”
Nothing good could come from her asking for two of the ranch’s security people. “No.” It had only been us three at breakfast, Franklin and Henri had both been pretty scarce lately, and I let that thought go as soon as it entered my head. “What happened? Can I help?” I asked.
Phoebe sniffled, her big brown eyes widening. “I can’t find Shiloh or Pascal. They were playing outside of the house while I was on the phone with my sister…. I can’t find them. They didn’t warn me they were going anywhere, and I checked Pascal’s, but no one was there because I said I would watch him… but now I can’t find them.”
I walked right up to her, barely containing the urge to hug her or put my hands on her shoulders to tell her everything was going to be okay. “I would be freaking out too. I’ll help you look for them, all right?” I glanced over at the puppies. “You two will help, won’t you?”
“Yes,” Duncan answered as Agnes stared at me with her bright blue eyes.
“I don’t know where anyone is right now, but I’m sure someone will help you find them faster than they would help me if I asked. I’ll start looking with these two, and you can get other people to help.” I took her hands. “We’ll find them. How long do you think it’s been since you saw them?”
She whimpered, clutching my fingers tightly. “I don’t know, Nina. We were on the phone longer than I’d expected.”
“It’s okay. I have my phone. I’ll come back in an hour if I don’t come across them, and we can reconvene here. Sound good?”
We would try our best. I had a baby wolf and a baby Duncan, and they could smell things from much further away than I was able to. When he was even younger, Duncan had found some stuff that was genuinely impressive—if you could be impressed by finding dead animals.
“We’ll start looking. Please call me if you find them, all right?” I told her.
Phoebe nodded quickly, and in no time, she was down the opposite hallway, close to where the nursery was. Meanwhile, the pups and I headed down the main hall that went by the living area and out the back door toward the vehicle warehouse.
Agnes stopped for no reason, the air around her changing before her human form appeared.
“Do you want to stay?” I asked.
“I told them not to go,” she blurted out, managing to look grim in gummy bear pajamas and two pigtails that were half undone.
“Not to go where?”
“To look for the waterfall.”
“What waterfall?” I’d never heard about a waterfall.
“The waterfall.” The way she said it made it seem like I was an idiot for asking for specifics. Like there was one that I should’ve known about.
I crouched. We could talk about the waterfall later. “You think that’s where they went?”
The unflappable menace didn’t look so unflappable. She started wringing her hands. “Maybe.”