He thought he was stopping for a stray dog in the snow-until he saw what she was hiding beneath her body

for coffee more often than she admitted she had time for. Bennett stopped in after shifts when he was nearby, sometimes with updates, sometimes just to scratch Scout behind the ears and pretend he had business there.

The cabin no longer held silence the same way.

It held the click of Scout’s nails on the floorboards, Ruth’s laugh from the kitchen, the continue reading …