Free Death at the Summit by Nikki Haverstock

pretend.” Jess turned to look at Moo on the floor next to the table. He had managed to pull the sweat shirt up over his head but not completely off. He flipped back and forth, his head obscured behind the stretchy red fabric covered with tiny glitter snowflakes. “You, too, Moo.”

CHAPTER EIGHT
    “We should take Moo outside.” I removed the sweatshirt from Moo’s head then took our cups into the kitchen and loaded them into the dishwasher.
    We left the cafeteria with Moo leading the way. Instead of heading into the hallway, he veered the other way, back into the dining room. Spread throughout the room were the various suspects whom Brian had held back, minus Minx. Moo ran up to Loggin, and we followed.
    “Is this your dog?” Loggin looked between Mary and me as we approached.
    “He belongs to Liam, but he spends his days with me.” I scratched Moo’s rump.
    “Cool, he’s an awesome dog. Where’s the other gal?”
    “Who?” There were a lot of gals around. I had a suspicion whom he meant.
    “Pretty, red hair. She yelled at me earlier. What’s her name? Does she work here? Is she an archer?” He kept a casual tone.
    I chuckled. “Her name is Minx. She doesn’t work here, and she is a very good archer.”
    “Really? What kind?”
    I looked at Mary, who was smiling at his obvious questions. “She shoots target recurve and competed in the Summer Games this last summer.”
    “Wow. I want to apologize to her. Do you think you could…?”
    “I’ll see if I can help you out. Did you get your really serious problem solved?” He had been pretty upset earlier.
    “I think Orion will help me out. He needs to finish talking to that guy over there, then he’s going to try to introduce me to Elizabeth and Liam Andersson.”
    I looked at where Tiger and Orion were still talking, then turned back to Loggin. “Good luck.”
    ***
    Stepping outside, I was blown away how by different everything looked. The world was white; the sky, the ground, and even the horizon had disappeared. The housing units were hidden, and after I’d stepped a few dozen feet into the parking lot, the center vanished behind me. Moo took off at a dead run and disappeared.
    I grabbed Mary’s arm while calling to Moo. “Moo! This is crazy. Is there any way to drive in this?”
    “I don’t think so. I think everyone is stuck until it stops and the snowplows get out here.”
    It was still early afternoon, but it felt like it was twilight. Moo zoomed out of the snow. His front legs rose high over the piling snow. He leaped up then landed deeply, sending out sprays of snow, as he approached. His back legs splayed wildly as they landed. He sped toward us and hit the space between Mary and me. The force of the blow was not as severe as the one was yesterday since it was split between us. I braced myself but still hit the ground hard. In a repeat of yesterday, I lay there for a second, catching my breath.
    “You okay?” I called out to Mary, who had also gone flying.
    “Geez, Moo, what was that about?” Mary was already getting up and wiping off the snow.
    “Sorry, I should’ve warned you. Liam said that Moo has a problem with playing too rough in the snow.”
    “Thanks a lot. That would have been super-useful information to have had five minutes ago.”
    Moo reappeared from the whiteness and skidded to a stop in front of us. His tongue hung out, and he was breathing heavily, with a big doggy grin on his face. He started sniffing around for a spot to do his business.
    “What do you think about what Minx said?”
    Mary kicked at the snow. “Poor gal, I know just what she is feeling. After my mom got so sick, I felt the same way. But once I moved here, I started to feel better. Starting to shoot again has helped a lot, too.”
    I nodded. I hadn’t grabbed gloves, and the cool air bit into my hands. I shoved them into my pocket only to run up against the small, hard memory chip. “We should watch the video of the fight. Think there will be