Page 119 of Worst in Show

I nod, my eyes stinging. “Me too. Ugh, you’re going to make me cry again.”

“No, no more crying. Here, have some more wine.”

I cover my glass. “I’m good. I should get to bed.” Dog show or not, the first day of Winter Fest is always a big one. I grab my things and put my glass away.

“Hey,” Micki says when I’m almost to my room. “Everything will be fine. Try not to worry.”

I wish I was as certain as she is.

The salted road crunches under the tires as Cholula and I leave the vet’s office. It’s a gorgeous winter day—perfect for the fair—but here we are, heading in the opposite direction.

“It wasn’t meant to be, huh?” I tell the poor pup in the seat next to me.

She lifts her head and looks at me solemnly. She’s being so good, leaving the bandage alone, and according to the vet, the fever is gone. She’ll make a full recovery.

“We’re back,” I call, carrying Cho into the back hallway of Happy Paws twenty minutes later.

No one answers.

I shrug out of my jacket—no easy feat with a lax twelve pounds in my arms—and make my way through the store. “Pop?” I look up the stairs. Still nothing. At least nothing human—only Boris lifts his head on the landing above and licks his snout.

I ascend the stairs, trepidation filling me at what I might find. “Where is he?” I ask Boris when I pass him, searching. But the place is empty. Cap is gone, too.

As I stand in the middle of the room trying to make sense of this, my eyes land on the idle stairlift that’s been left in the downstairs position. I didn’t notice that earlier. Could he have taken Cap for a walk?

I leave Cholula on her bed and jog back down. No, he couldn’t have. He’s not reckless, and he’d never leave the store closed on a Saturday for something as mundane as that. This doesn’t make any sense.

I’m scratching my head, searching the space for clues, when my phone rings in my purse. Micki’s name flashes on the display.

“Harvey is missing,” I answer in a rush. “I don’t know where he is.”

“Hello to you, too,” Micki says, lightly. “He’s here with me.”

At the fair? I pace toward the windows. This is so confusing. “But we agreed he wasn’t going to work the booth this year. Why is he…? Is something wrong?”

“He’s fine.” Micki laughs. Behind her, the crowd cheers. “Dude, you need to get your butt over here stat.”

“Why?”

“I’ll show you. Hang up and I’ll FaceTime you.”

What is she talking about? I do as she asks, and when she calls back, my screen fills with a shot of the agility course in the Winter Fest barn.

“Pair number eight is next,” the MC’s tinny voice says over the PA system. “And boy, these two are something—Captain Spots von Puppington handled by John Leopold Eustace Salinger the third. My mouth is going to need a nap after that.”

There, on my tiny screen, are Leo and Cap in the lineup of competitors waiting their turn, and I think I must be hallucinating.

Micki’s exuberant mug returns. “Can you believe it?” she hollers. “He showed up at the booth an hour ago looking for you, ran off when I told him what had happened, and now he’s doing this.” She gestures to the arena where I see several jumps, a tunnel, posts to weave through, and a seesaw.

“With Cap?” My slack jaw barely forms the words.

“Something about Tilly not cooperating unless Cholula is around?”

That’s right! But instead of giving up, he’s taking a chance on the improbable. For me.

“They’re up,” Micki says. “Can you see okay?”

I don’t know how to stop shaking my head as I watch the slow-moving disaster that is Cap in an agility course. He barrels straight through the first obstacle instead of jumping over it while Leo runs beside him shouting orders. The audience laughs. And Leo, who hates making a spectacle of himself…

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