From Bad to Cursed by Katie Alender Read Free Book Online Page B

it to me, and I pulled out my phone. Kasey’s name popped up on-screen.
    “Kase?” I asked.
    “Lexi?”
    She sounded upset. I sat up. “What’s wrong?”
    She sniffled. “Barney ran away.”
    “Who’s Barney?” I asked, mentally running through the roster of Adrienne’s siblings. Weren’t her brothers in college?
    “The dog,” she said, and I exhaled a giant breath. “Can you come help us find him?”
    “Can’t Mrs. Streeter help you?”
    “No. We think he’s in the woods, and she can’t go there in her chair,” my sister said. “Please? Adrienne’s about to lose it.”
    “All right,” I said. “I’ll be right over.”
    “For real?”
    I was taken aback. “Of course, Kasey.”
    “Oh,” she said. “Thank you so much.”
    I hung up the phone, wondering why she found it so shocking that I was willing to help her. Wasn’t I always the one who helped her?
    As we pulled into the Streeters’ driveway, the girls converged on us. Adrienne was in tears. Kasey hugged herself tightly and looked warily around the dark neighborhood.
    “Thanks for coming,” she said.
    “No problem,” I said. There were four girls there: Kasey, Adrienne, a pretty girl I didn’t know, and Lydia, who saw me looking at her and turned away to kick at the loose gravel in the driveway.
    What was Lydia doing at a lame slumber party?
    To my surprise, my sister had a plan. “I’ll go into the woods with Lexi. Adrienne, go in the car with Carter,” Kasey said. “Tashi and Lydia, go on foot. Call everybody if you see him.”
    We all fanned out, carrying flashlights and bags of dog treats. Kasey and I started down the street, shining the flashlight between houses and shrubs.
    “What kind of dog is it?”
    “A Westie,” she said. “He’s white, luckily.”
    Or not-so-luckily. Sure, a white dog was easier for us to see, but that also meant he was easier for coyotes and other predators to see, too. I quickened my pace.
    “How’d he get out?” I asked.
    “I’m not sure.” Kasey exhaled. “Something scared him.”
    “Mrs. Streeter must be going crazy,” I said. “Not being able to help.”
    “Yeah.” Kasey shined the light under a car.
    “Why is she in a wheelchair?”
    “It’s a degenerating disease,” Kasey said. “Adrienne has it, too.”
    “Degenerative?” I caught a glimpse of something white, but it was a trash bag by someone’s side door.
    Kasey fidgeted with the treats. “Alexis, if we find Barney, you should probably get him.”
    “Why?” As far as I could recall, the lengthy list of things that scared my sister didn’t include dogs.
    She turned the light over in her hands, trying to decide what to say next. “I don’t know if he likes me very much.”
    “What we should probably do, if we see him, is call Adrienne and let her come call him.”
    “No,” Kasey said. “He won’t go to her, either.”
    “But she’s his owner .”
    She sighed. “It’s a long story.”
    We came to the parking lot by the lake. There was a small log cabin with padlocked bathrooms and a water fountain. We stepped off the paved surface onto the clumpy grass of the picnic area, which led to a small stretch of beach dotted with dilapidated picnic tables and a barbecue grill covered in caution tape.
    I scanned the lake. The fountain in the center sputtered irregular streams of water, illuminated by the few floodlights that hadn’t yet burned out.
    “There he is! I see him!” Kasey said, pointing down toward the water’s edge.
    The beam of the flashlight bounced off a small white dog trotting along the shoreline.
    “Here,” Kasey said, handing me the bag of treats. “Call him. Make sure he sees that you have food. He’ll do anything for food.”
    “What do I do if he comes to me?” I asked. “Do you have a leash?”
    Her face fell.
    “I’ll grab his collar,” I said. “Go back to the Streeters’ house and get his leash.”
    “Okay,” she said. “And I’ll call Adrienne.”
    There wasn’t time to