Page 124 of Death on Gallows Path

All that, of course, came much later.

For now, I grinned as I called off my dog, juggling the phone and the sprats bag in my non-gun-holding hand.

Oh, heck, I emptied the bag of stink-to-high-heaven treats on Pammy. Gracie went to town. No discernment in sight.

In Gracie’s world, Timmy better have treats if he wanted her to get him out of the well.

I didn’t care.

Forget Lassie Syndrome.

Forget Lad, Lassie, and toss in Hooch and Rin-Tin-Tin.

My dog was better than any of them.

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

I called Teague rather than 911 — one-button speed dial.

I tumbled out enough words for him to get the gist — good thing he’s a champion gist-getter.

“Where?”

“Zepke’s. In the store. Treats aisle.”

As it happened, 911 received two other calls.

One from Leo, saying he’d gone into the alley to check a noise, was locked out, and thought the store was being robbed.

One from Oscar, who spotted Pammy and Zoley through Zepke’s front window. Instead of driving off, he stayed in his car, watching. When he saw Pammy pull out something he thought was a gun, he called 911.

He kept saying he couldn’t be sure and maybe he had it all wrong. Maybe it was a phone, not a gun, and he was making a mountain out of a molehill . . .

The man might have taken too many anger management classes.

The sheriff’s department was responding, with Teague — hearing the location was Zepke’s — leading the charge, when my call reached him.

I gave Teague an overview of what we knew and what we suspected at the scene.

That Pammy funneled the money Damon swindled to foreign accounts.

That she despised her husband.

That she hated Zoley.

Had hated her from the start. Maneuvered her way out of being the new-girl target of Zoley and her fellow mean girls. Then learned to use her puppet, from getting out of the small college she’d felt limited her prospects to cutting her out with Damon as a likely source of money to directing her through the murder plot.

All Pammy’s secrets . . .

Secrets weary of their tyranny.

Pammy’s whiny, “Those animals bit me,” was ignored as deputies witnessed Gracie’s and LuLu’s ongoing licking, not attacking.

Zoley had other things to say.

“She shot Damon. She did. I hate guns. Ask anybody. She shot him. I was just there.”

Pammy’s puppet had a voice. A loud voice.