Gina shrugged, then reached for the latch. “Sure, I guess. What about?”

“About Rover,” said Amy.

Gina’s hand froze. Her eyes locked with Amy’s and she sneered.

“Probably best that you leave,” said the woman, and turned back toward the house.

“Please,” said Amy, feeling panic rise in her, overwhelming. “Ms. Fuentes, I need your help! Anything you can tell me, about how you got rid of him—”

“Not interested,” said Gina, flipping a hand up.

“Please!” cried Amy. “My family is in danger! My little sister’s in—” And then the stress of the past few weeks, the hospital trips, the fire, the exhaustion and pain and despair, it all broke free, and Amy burst into sobs. Tears rushed down her cheeks, and her voice cracked. She’d worked so hard at keeping it together, but now she just let it out in a blast of spit bubbles and shaking.

Gina Fuentes stopped. Her shoulders heaved with a sigh.

“Get inside,” she said, and unlocked the door.

Once they were inside and settled in, Ms. Fuentes offered Amy a tissue.

“Thank you,” said Amy, taking it and blowing her nose. She sat huddled on the woman’s old, sunken couch while Ms. Fuentes puttered around making them tea. Amy’s eyes scoured the walls and found them covered with old pictures of dogs—Labs, Scotties, goldens, dachshunds, greyhounds, terriers, and retrievers of all sorts. Ms. Fuentes was always with them, kneeling next to them or holding them in her lap, and she was always smiling.

“I used to train dogs professionally,” she said, coming in with two mugs of steaming tea. She set one down on the coffee table in front of Amy. “Careful, that’s hot. Yeah, nothing fancy, just basic obedience stuff. This was before you had to go to college for that kind of thing, mind. No one wanted to see your degree, they just wanted their dog to roll over and shake hands.”

“We tried teaching my dog, Stormy, to give us her paw,” said Amy. “It never took.”

Ms. Fuentes groaned with exertion as she sat down in her armchair. “It’s tougher than it looks. And to get it really in there, to get a dog to internalize it, you have to be able to read them. That’s what I was good at. Me and dogs, we understand each other.”

“Do you have one now?” asked Amy.

The woman shook her head. She tugged absently at the string of her tea bag. “Sort of between dogs right now. After that last one.”

Amy felt the words hang in the air, heavy with secrets. “Were you able to read Rover?”