Hello Love Read Free Page B

shook his head. “I guess it’s possible, but I’ve never heard of it happening, at least not around here.”
    “But it could be a prank, right?”
    “Sure, it could be.” He shuffled his feet uncomfortably. “I’ll ask the other neighbors on this road and see if anyone else has heard anything.”
    “What about the bottle?” Dan asked. “You could check it for fingerprints.”
    “It was an empty bottle of Jim Beam,” Lindsay said. “I found it in the ditch and picked it up with a plastic bag so they could take it to the lab.”
    “Your daughter gave me the bottle, sir. I will be turning it in with the paperwork.” The look on the cop’s face told Dan there was no lab, and even if there had been, a stolen dog wasn’t a top priority. He referred back to his notes. “The description your daughter gave me is that Anni is about thirty pounds, with a reddish-orange coat. Mostly one color with a light-colored streak on her nose and underside. Mixed breed, some beagle. She’s wearing a collar and identifying tags. She said she doesn’t bark much, and is eight years old. Do you have anything to add to that?”
    Dan thought. “Her collar is red and her name, Anni, is stitched right into the collar. She’s well behaved and knows her name.”
    The police officer dutifully added these details. “Very good, sir.”
    “When she does bark, it sounds really cute,” Lindsay said, sniffing. “Not yappy, just sort of short and crisp, like she’s talking.”
    “Okay.” The officer nodded, but he didn’t write it down.
    Dan asked, “So what’s your plan to recover Anni?”
    The cop shifted his stance and closed the notebook. “I’ll ask around and we’ll have our eyes and ears open.”
    “That’s it?” Dan couldn’t hide his frustration.
    “Pretty much. Without a license plate number or more identifying information, there’s not a lot we can do,” he said apologetically. “I’ll leave it up to you to file a missing pet report with the Humane Society. It’s too bad your dog wasn’t microchipped. That would help if she’s found far from home.”
    Dan had wanted to get her microchipped, but Christine didn’t like the idea. Now he wished they’d done it anyway. “Thanks, Officer,” he said. “If you hear anything, anytime, day or night, please let us know.”
    Dan and Lindsay stood in the doorway and watched as the squad car drove away. She said, “Daddy, I’m really sorry.” The despair in her voice was heartbreaking enough, but the fact that she’d called him “Daddy” made it even worse. She hadn’t called him that in years.
    “Get your jacket,” he said. “I want to drive around and look for her.”
     

FOUR
    Andrea stared down at the two large index cards in her hand. So many narrow lines on each one. She was supposed to fill these with words? All around her, women were digging into their purses, fishing for pens. Jade found two of them and handed one to Andrea without saying a word.
    When everyone had their cards, Martina said, “I’d like each one of you to think about what you really want in the foreseeable future. What will enrich your life? A better job, help around the house, a new relationship? Think about where you’d like to be a year from now and use every bit of your imagination to visualize it. You’ll need to do this with a serious intent if you want to make your wishes your reality.”
    She continued, “What we’re going to be doing today is placing an order. Let me give you a real-world example. Say you’re at home and you want something, like a book, so you go online and order it from Amazon. Two days later, the book you ordered is in a box on your front porch. What if you’d just thought, ‘I wish I had that book,’ but you didn’t do anything else? Would it be on your porch two days later?” A few ladies shook their heads. “No, it would not. Because you didn’t put in an order. Think of all the times you’ve said, ‘Why isn’t this happening for