Until that day. I was distracted from my conversation with Phineas by snorting and snuffling noises. Wulf had pulled most of the toys out, not to sample them, it seemed, but to get to the blue stuffed rabbit on the bottom. Now that he had it, he was growling and ripping at it.
Phineas and I laughed, thinking he was playing, but after a few seconds I started to wonder. His tail was stiff, and his growl was not playful.
I was walking over to take it from him and see if I could figure out what was wrong when, with one enormous paw pinning half of it to the floor and the other half in his mouth, Wulf ripped it nearly in two. Cottony white stuffing, like the fake snow you get at Christmastime, fell out onto the carpet. But that wasn’t the only thing that fell out.
“What is that?”
“Got me.”
I bent to pick up the small black rectangle. The white lettering on the side announced it as a FourSpy Mini. FourSpy? That didn’t sound good. I grabbed my laptop and did a quick search.
Surveillance, anti-surveillance, and spy gear. The Mini, identified by a bright blue star as a best seller, was an audio recorder. Voice activated to save battery life! Over one hundred and fifty hours of recording time!
“This James Bond crap is actually a thing?”
Phineas was beside me on the couch, leaning close to look at my screen. “It seems so.”
“So someone broke in and put that in Wulf’s toy.”
Wulf, who was now nesting in the blankets and pillow Phineas had tossed on the floor to make room for himself, wagged his tail at the mention of his name. But I was frowning down at the remains of the blue rabbit.
“No, actually, I don’t remember buying that. So they put that toy, with a recorder inside it, at the bottom of his basket.”
“It seems so,” Phineas said again.
But I couldn’t believe it. Okay, maybe I hadn’t been at the top of my game since I found Bella’s body, but surely Wulf, at least, would have noticed someone breaking in.
Wulf had been gone, though, chasing after Phineas. And I’d been in bed most of that time. I guessed it was possible, but I still had a hard time imagining someone coming in while I was home, and me not even noticing.
The whole thing was creepy. But then, the circumstances of my week had already gone so far beyond creepy. Comparatively speaking, this seemed like a silly thing to freak out over.
There was a small USB slot in the side of the FourSpy Mini. I plugged it into my laptop and double clicked on it, like it was any other drive. For a second, I actually thought something was going to happen. The drive hummed, and a window opened up.
But it was completely black, except for a little green dialog box. The username was already filled in: JBEGOOD. The cursor flashed in the password box below.
I tried a few things, at first relatively reasonable guesses. Anagrams of the username. The names of various artists who’d covered “Johnny B. Goode.” Lyrics from the song. When none of that worked, I moved on to childish spite and frustration: iamaspyingasshole, enemyofdecency, scarybirdsarescary. Eventually, after too many tries, it locked me out.
“Dammit!” I said.
“What difference does it make?” Phineas asked.
I stared at him. “You don’t want to know what they were getting from us?”
“We do know. We know what we’ve been saying.”
“But how much of it did this pick up, with all those toys on top?”
“I think the more important questions are who did it, and what were they looking for?”
I stared at the Mini for a few seconds, then smiled up at him. He raised an eyebrow at me, apparently questioning what made this such a smiling occasion.
“No,” I said. “The more important questions are when are they coming back for it, and how do we make sure we’re here when they do?”
Want to read the rest? Crook of the Dead is now available at Amazon.
As always, my thanks go to Lyda Phillips, the finest critique partner any writer could ask for; Christine Rasmussen, beta reader and cover artist extraordinaire; and Zoë Markham of Markham Correct, who finds all the stupid things you did and never laughs at you to your face.
I couldn’t do it without the unflagging support of my family and friends, which reaches nearly heroic levels among those living in the same house with me. Some women can have it all. The rest of us let the laundry slide and the dog hair pile up.
I’m deeply grateful to all the readers of Lydia’s first adventure, Ghost in the Canteen, especially those who took the time to leave reviews online or email me with your thoughts and comments. Thank you, and I hope you’ve enjoyed book two.
Peak of the Devil (The Adventures of Lydia Trinket Book 2) Page 24