A hundred and four degrees out, and before I left for work I'd made a point of turning on the bedroom AC, because I was afraid the dog couldn't take the heat.
But my mother-in-law pried my bedroom door open by force, shut off the AC, and suffocated her dead.
By the time I got home from work, a dog worth a hundred and eighty thousand dollars had become a pot of soup.
Brenda Abbott, meanwhile, was patting my sister-in-law's six-month belly, looking pleased with herself.
"My baby girl, did you get enough to eat? Mom's not going to let you fall short on nutrition, so don't you worry."
It was a touching little scene between mother and daughter, and neither of them noticed me standing there, stunned.
That dog was the breeding rights my husband had bet his entire net worth on to turn his life around.
A hundred and eighty thousand for one. Three hundred and sixty thousand for two.
And before she died, that dog had a full six puppies in her belly.
…
I stood frozen in the bedroom doorway, cold all over.
My voice shook. "Where's… where's Cotton?"
Such a sweet little dog. I'd only had her a week, and I was already attached.
John said in another month Cotton would have been giving birth.
They said she was a strong one, that she'd gotten pregnant with all six on the first try.
Every time I'd pictured myself helping deliver them, nursing her through how weak she'd be, something warm had spread through my chest.
And now? That thick smell of meat drifting out of the kitchen had already told me the cruelest answer.
Brenda's eyes rolled around, and she let out a fake little sigh.
"You go out and don't even leave the AC on? That dead dog suffocated in here. By the time I found her, the short-lived little thing had long stopped breathing."
She shrugged. "So whose fault is that? If you want to blame someone, blame yourself for being careless."
I glared at her, dug my phone out of my pocket, and opened a smart-home app.
The screen showed today's temperature log, clear as day.
8:03 a.m. — before I left, I'd turned the bedroom AC on, set to seventy-five degrees.
8:15 a.m. — AC running normally.
9:46 a.m. — AC turned off manually, method: 【panel switched off by hand】.
I turned the screen around and held it up to her.
"Mom, I turned on the AC when I left. And I made a point of locking the bedroom door."
"So two hours later, who broke my door open by force, and then shut the AC off by hand?"
Brenda glanced at the screen, and a flicker of guilt crossed her face.
Then she squared her shoulders and shot me a vicious look.
"It was me. So what? Running the AC costs money anyway. You've got cash to burn, you'd be better off buying your sister some tonics.
"Besides, one lousy dog — so it suffocated, big deal. I used it to build my daughter's strength back up. Lucky for it, really."
She reached out and stroked my sister-in-law's showing belly, her voice suddenly going tender.
Her cold indifference sent my blood running backward in an instant.
Tears slid down my cheeks. Shaking all over, I screamed at her.
"That was a companion dog! A companion dog! How could you be so cruel? How could you swallow her down?!"
Megan Whitney set down her soup bowl and stared at me coldly, her expression cast from the exact same mold as her mother's.
"Sis-in-law, my mom did you a favor and took care of it. Who's the long face for?"
I stared at her in shock. "She — she deliberately suffocated my dog! What do you mean, did me a favor?"
Megan gave a cold snort. "Go ahead and raise your voice at my mom one more time, I dare you!"
"This is my brother's house. My mom and I do whatever we want here!"
I nodded slowly. "Fine. In that case, then we'll… we'll have John settle this!"
