The dog wasn’t much to look at, the first time Mason saw her. Just a scared little black-and-white thing crammed up against the back wall of her crate with her tail between her legs, shaking, not making eye contact with Mason or anyone else.

She was a pit bull—at least partially, anyway—but she didn’t look like the pits Mason had seen growing up: solid, rough-looking dogs jacked front to back with heavy muscle, collared in chains, and boasting foul dispositions. The pit bulls Mason had known had been mean animals, goaded into aggression by owners who used the dogs to intimidate and impress—and, occasionally, to punish.

This creature, she wasn’t impressing anyone. And she sure wasn’t intimidating.

“That ain’t a dog,” Bridges Colson said, laughing, looking in at the little runt. “That there is fucking bait.”

Bait. They all had a laugh at that, the lot of them—hell, Mason included. Laughed all the way until Ms. Linda Petrie pointed him over to that crate, told him the little runt dog was his dog, no two ways about it.

Mason looked over at the other guys, their own dogs—puppies, yellow Labrador retrievers, German shepherds, a couple of gangly, hairy mutts—all of them strong, all of them happy as a TV commercial, big pink tongues lolling out, chasing balls, shaking paws, the whole doggie dream, and he looked in at his own little wretch and felt damn cheated.

But Linda Petrie was talking again, and there was something about when she talked, you wanted to pay attention. Like she didn’t give a shit, like she’d march right into the Chippewa pen and stand up in front of a couple of dozen hardened felons and not even worry if the two guards behind her would have her back if the whole show went sideways. And that’s pretty much how she did it.

“This won’t be happy hour,” she was saying. “And there’s nothing that says we have to keep you here, with these dogs. This is a privilege the warden has extended you, and if he or these two gentlemen behind me come to believe you’re abusing that privilege, well, hell, they’ll find someone else who appreciates the opportunity a little more. Are we clear?”

She looked hard at the men, each of them in turn, and when she looked at Mason, he nodded like the rest. Wanted to ask what happened if your dog washed out before you did, but Ms. Linda Petrie had moved on.

“This isn’t the start of some lifelong friendship, either,” she said. “You’ll work with your dog for six months, train them up, and then we’ll place them in homes with people who’ll care for them. You won’t get to see them again, so don’t bother asking. Anyone have a problem with that?”