Teddy didn’t know what was going on, only that the boy running toward the back skidded to a stop near the door, turned to a pair of potato fryers, and dipped his hands into them.

He screamed as he whipped his arms out and twin whiplike gouts of boiling oil shot out toward the front.

Teddy jumped to the side and tackled the Boss to the ground and out of the way as the oily whips snapped at the air above her. A fine drizzle of oil splattered around them and Teddy winced as some of it landed on her exposed calves. It hurt a bunch! Like getting stung by a swarm of small, wet bees.

“Dammit!” Melaton said before she vaulted over the counter.

The big guy was screaming now and the door at the back slammed shut with a dull thump.

“Where’d he go?” Teddy asked. He’d tried to hurt the Boss. She’d eat him!

“You can’t leave from the back,” the big guy said. “He’ll have to circle around.”

Teddy scrambled off the Boss and rushed toward the front. She saw the Boss rolling over onto her knees, her eyes wide behind her mask as she looked around. The Boss was clever, though, she’d figure it out.

In the meantime, Teddy had a jerk to catch. If she did it right, she was sure she’d get a meal out of it.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Bearing the Burden of Being the Best Bear

Teddy barged out into the parking lot in front of the pizza place, took three steps, then paused to look around. Where, she wondered, was the oily jerk who’d tried to hurt the boss?

A noise from off to one side had her turning toward the path between the pizza place and the fence around the house next to it.

Teddy ran over in time to see the jerk flopping over the top of the fence and into the yard beyond just as Melaton ran around the back. “Where?” the Hero asked.

“Fence!” Teddy replied.

The fence was way, way too tall for Teddy to try and climb over it, and turning into a bear to go through it would take a bunch of time.

She pouted a bit when Melaton vaulted over the edge and landed on the other side with a shout of, “Stop, damn you!”

Taking to the streets, Teddy ran as fast as she could past the first house, then another, and finally a third where she saw the jerk running around someone’s pool. Melaton was one yard back still.

That was her chance!

She darted toward the boy roaring as hard as her small human throat could manage.

The jerk stared at her, wide-eyed, then whipped his arm around in a big half circle.