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four
White Fern Road wasn’t even paved. The long gravel lane was dotted with a half dozen houses, set far apart and well back from the road that crunched beneath Sunny’s tires. Number 13 turned out to be several acres of old farmland, overgrown with grass and trees that hadn’t been trimmed in years. A small house sat nestled in a grove of pin oaks that looked like zombies, slowly bending toward the home that they tried to consume. Even from this distance, Sunny could see that the wood siding was chipped and the wraparound porch rotting. If it hadn’t been for the car parked out front, she might’ve thought the place was abandoned. Way out, in the middle of what might’ve been tobacco fields once upon a time, sat a faded, red barn.
Sunny typically liked old barns, big farms, rotting silos in the middle of Civil War–era battlefields. But not this one. That barn gave her the creeps.
She narrowed her eyes at the house. Was anyone home? She pictured a white-haired old lady sitting on a moldy couch, staring at the TV.
Something black, out by the barn, popped up. Once it reared on its hind legs, Sunny could see that it was a dog. So, Constance had been right.
The dog looked like he sniffed the air. Maybe he barked. Sunny wished she’d brought binoculars. It was impossible to tell from this distance if the dog was neglected or just outside doing his business.
The curtain covering one of the front windows of the house shifted. A face appeared behind the glass. Sunny cursed under her breath, got one more look at the dog, who had frozen, before she put her foot to the gas and drove away. She’d have to come back later to get a better look. Pete was expected at the house in ten minutes.
By the time Sunny got home, Pete’s battered blue pickup was already parked in the long, rustic driveway that led to her Queen Anne–style dwelling. Even though the house was proudly excessive, the passing of the elderly Potters and subsequent sale five years ago had been a sign to Sunny that it was time to make a serious go of Pittie Place. The Potter home had been the site of her first rescue: Bert, the coonhound. Daddy was already sick of her bringing home more dogs than his modest property could handle, so it hadn’t taken much to convince him to front her the money on her vision: to restore the house into a home for herself and into a headquarters for Pittie Place, which sat on a sprawling twenty acres.
Sunny still remembered Daddy’s expression when she’d told him of her plans and proudly announced, “It’s a Queen Anne.” When he was silent, his forehead wrinkled, Sunny had pressed on. “Do you know why this style bears that name?”
“Because it’s hoity-toity?” Daddy snapped back.
“No.” Sunny had faked a laugh. “It’s actually an inaccurate term, Daddy. The architectural expression is based more on the Elizabethan era than during Queen Anne’s reign. We’re talking a one-hundred-and-fifty-year difference. Isn’t that fascinating?”
“What’s fascinating is how much work this sumbitch is going to take,” Daddy grumped, arms crossed over his chest. “The Potters haven’t done anything to this house for years. And I’m guessing I’m the poor sumbitch who’s gonna do most of it.”
He hadn’t been wrong. The three-story home had been a serious task of restoration, but with Daddy’s help Sunny had completed it within a year to impeccable classic style. The intricate scrollwork had been cleaned and patched, the Williamsburg-blue fish-scale siding redone, the rotting boards of the wraparound porch replaced and the towers and turrets, flanked by two small balconies, revived to their former glory. Sunny’s bedroom was inside one of the towers, an octagon-shaped master suite that had one hundred and eighty degrees of light from the long, single-paned, double-hung windows. The other tower held a smaller but no less glorious bedroom.
When Sunny walked by Pete’s truck she saw that, despite the cold, the windows were rolled down. The interior was worn and muddy and smelled like dogs. Typical Pete. He was not, however, behind the wheel.
She went behind the house and spied him through the window of one of the several outbuildings Daddy had restored for the dogs. He was talking to Roger. Though not long into adulthood, Roger was Sunny’s longest-standing and most trusted employee. Off in the distance, Sunny could see one of the couples who had rented out one of her cottages, walking through the woods. Rather than tear down the vast array of structures the Potters had neglected, Sunny had turned them all into either vacation cabins or buildings for the rescue. Everything went hand in hand: the people who rented here wanted a rustic getaway and loved being exposed to the rescue.
Sunny went inside. Roger was closing up the feed bin. Pete was nearby, arms crossed over his chest, flannel shirtsleeves rolled to the elbows and ankles crossed in his tan work boots while the two laughed about something one or the other had said.
“Hey, Ms. Morrigan.” Roger offered his wide grin. “How’s it going?”
“Hey, Rog. Hey, Pete.” She did a head count of the current brood. Twelve. Not counting the cats that came and went. Many were pitties, but not all. There was a German shepherd from the kill shelter, a dalmatian someone had tied to her front door with a length of rope and a retired greyhound she’d found in a metal cage in someone’s backyard. He was healthy now, but at the time he was so starved each and every bone had shown through his skin.
“Hey, girl.” Pete winked at her. His light brown eyes, the color of honey, always looked like they were sparkling. “Where are those pups?”
Sunny smiled. “In the house.” She gestured with a tilt of her head and headed that way, knowing Pete would follow. She’d put the whelping box in the nook off the kitchen, which was warm and safe.
It didn’t take long for Pete to appraise Chevy and her brood with a look of satisfaction. “Constance says they’re good candidates, huh?”
“She did. Though I guess only time will tell.”
“Cici’s word is good as gold, far as I’m concerned.”
Sunny gave him a nudge. “You just have a thing for her.”
“A little bit.”
“Like, since we were kids.”
Pete shrugged. “She saw me as the pesky boy next door. Pesky Petie.”
“Well, the pesky boy a mile over, anyway.” Sunny laughed.
“I sure put in a lot of travel time to meet up with the Morrigan sisters.” Pete shook his head. His voice dropped an octave. “How’s she doing? Haven’t seen her this week.”
“She’s okay,” Sunny said. “Still not herself.”
