Free The Wild Ones by C. Alexander London

only just met you. I’ve spent my whole life collecting my secret seed savings. I fear I’ll miss them far more than I’ll miss a nephew. Apologies.”
    â€œBut . . . Uncle!”
    â€œNo, no, no. Sorry, Kit. Squeeze on, Basil.” Uncle Rik waved his paw in the air. “Just eat my nephew quickly and then we’re even.”
    â€œWait a moment, Basil,” Flynn instructed the snake. “I’d like to hear more about this retirement fund.”
    â€œI won’t say a word about it.” Uncle Rik crossed his arms. “Those are my seeds and nuts and scraps and scroungings, and I won’t share with anyone.”
    â€œTell me, Kit.” Shane smiled. “Would you like
not
to be eaten?”
    Kit couldn’t talk anymore because the snake’s squeezing was too tight, but he nodded.
    â€œDo you know where your uncle keeps his secret wealth?” Flynn asked.
    Kit nodded again.
    â€œNo, Kit, please don’t tell them!” Uncle Rik cried out, then pretended to faint onto his sofa, which Kit thought was a bit much, but the Blacktail brothers didn’t seem to notice the bad performance. They were thinking about robbing secret riches now and had no room in their raccoon brains for anything else.
    Basil loosened his grip and Kit took a big breath. He wiggled himself higher up on the snake’s back so he could look down on the Blacktail brothers.
    â€œWell? Where issss the loot?” Basil demanded.
    â€œThere’s a big tire outside,” said Kit. “He hides it there.”
    â€œOutside?” Shane looked doubtful.
    â€œOf course,” said Kit. “That’s the safest place. You hear about houses getting robbed all the time, and if he kept all his seeds here, they’d get robbed too. But you never hear about someone’s tire getting robbed. No one robs a tire.”
    â€œIt’s true,” added Eeni. “I’ve never heard about a tire robbery.”
    â€œYou keep quiet,” Flynn told her. “In fact, why don’t
you
go check it out for us. That way, if it’s a trick, you’ll be the one who gets tricked.”
    Eeni nodded and moved for the door, brushing past Kit with a reassuring squeeze of his paw. The others followed her outside—except Uncle Rik, who was enjoying his role, pretending to have fainted.
    The Blacktail brothers, with Kit, Basil, and Eeni, stood around the tire outside. A passing squirrel looked away from them, while two news finches pretended not to watch from a high branch. Their little heads tilted with anticipation of a good story to sing about. Windows in the Gnarly Oak Apartments slammed shut so that the eyes of young bunnies, foxes, rats, and mice wouldn’t see the ugly scene about to unfold below.
    Kit couldn’t believe that a whole crowded neighborhood could see the trouble he was in, yet no one moved to help.
    But everyone in Ankle Snap Alley knew that creatures who went around witnessing things had a way of vanishing into the sewers or slipping onto the train tracks. Better to see nothing, hear nothing, know nothing, and do nothing. Safer that way. Kit understood the word
circumspect
now for real, and he didn’t like it. He was certain if he ever saw another creature in desperate straits like he was in, he wouldn’t be at all circumspect. He’d help.
    â€œGet in there!” Shane ordered Eeni.
    The white rat sighed and scrambled up the side of the tire, then glanced back at Kit, who tried to warn her with his eyes to be careful. She winked, then vanished inside the tire.
    â€œWow!” she called out. “There’s too much in here to carry!”
    â€œProve it!” Flynn called out.
    A pouch came flying from inside the tire and landed right in front of the raccoons. It was bursting with seeds and nuts. Kit recognized it as his own seed pouch . . . Eeni had swiped it again when she’d brushed past him! How could she