Free Flea Market Fatal by Brianna Bates Page B

the house. Daphne used most of the first floor as her office and led them through a waiting room filled with doggie treats into an exam room. With her stethoscope, she listened to Cody’s breathing and heartbeat. Then she checked the dog’s teeth.
    “Okay, Cody, looking good.” Daphne looked up at Missy. “Where did you say she was hurt?”
    Missy stooped and pointed. She could tell that Cody was tensed up.
    Daphne gently touched the dog’s side near her back hip, and Cody whimpered.
    “Oh my,” Daphne said.
    “Is it bad?”
    Daphne didn’t answer. Her fingers continued to softly probe the dog’s flank for a moment. Then she stopped and sighed.
    “I’ve only practiced ten years but I’ve seen more than enough of these to last a lifetime,” Daphne said.
    “What?”
    Daphne reached into her pocket for a treat and offered it to Cody. The dog gently took it and swallowed it one gulp. Daphne petted her and ran a hand down her spine, careful not to go near the injured area.
    “Missy, somebody hit her. My guess would be a foot.”
    Missy covered her mouth. It had to be the killer. Obviously Cody had intervened, hoping to save Albert’s life. Her bravery had earned her this injury.
    “Is anything broken?”
    “I won’t know till we take an x-ray.”
    Daphne and Missy took Cody into another room and got her set up on a metal table. The vet explained she needed Missy to keep Cody very still. She stayed right next to Cody while Daphne set the machine up. The dog barely moved, even when the machine started making loud noises as it snapped pictures of her.
    “Just give me a moment,” Daphne said.
    Missy gave Cody a couple more treats while they were waiting and rubbed behind Cody’s ears.
    “I wish you could talk, girl. Then you could just tell me who the killer is.”
    Cody barked and thumped her tail against the metal table. She had bad dog breath, but Missy didn’t mind. She’d never had a dog but was getting used to this. She was surprised to find how much she enjoyed taking care of a living thing and for the first time in her life she felt sad about not having any children yet. The emotion totally blindsided her. Missy wasn’t even married, wasn’t even close to married.
    Daphne returned with two films. She walked to the other side of the room and turned on the light boxes then hung the films. Waving Missy over, she turned to study the x-rays.
    Missy watched over her shoulder, studying the dog’s bones. She’d broken an arm in grade school and remembered her own x-rays. Dog bones looked no different than human bones, really.
    “Here.” Daphne pointed. “You see that tiny black line on the rib?”
    Missy would never have noticed it if Daphne hadn’t pointed it out. But once she saw it, she could tell it was bad.
    “Broken?”
    “Hairline fracture in one of Cody’s ribs.”
    “Oh-my-God. She has a broken rib?”
    Daphne nodded. “Poor girl.”
    “But she’s been up and down on all the furniture, in and out of the car…I mean, you’d never know she had a broken bone.”
    Daphne turned off the light boxes and pulled down the x-rays. “Dogs are very stoic compared to us humans. They don’t exhibit too many outward symptoms of pain or trauma.”
    “What can we do?”
    Daphne offered Cody another treat, which the dog lapped up greedily. “Give her some meds to ease the pain. Unfortunately there’s not much I can do about a hairline fracture in one of her ribs. She just needs time to heal it herself.”
    Missy felt awful. Here she’d had Cody all over the last couple of days and the dog had been in serious pain.
    “Come on,” Daphne said. “I’ve got what you need in the store room. Let’s get her started right away.”

Chapter Fourteen
     
    Missy drove very carefully to the police station and tried to avoid any and all bumps in the road. Cody was stretched out on the seat next to her, and she didn’t want to jostle the dog now that she knew about the broken rib. Poor girl.
    She made it