All Shots

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    This book is an original publication of The Berkley Publishing Group.
     
    This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.
     
    Copyright © 2007 by Susan Conant.
     
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    First edition: November 2007
     
    Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
     
    Conant, Susan, 1946-
All shots / Susan Conant.—1st ed.
p. cm.
ISBN 978-0-425-21744-3
1. Winter, Holly (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Women dog owners—Fiction. 3. Dog trainers—Fiction. 4. Cambridge (Mass.)—Fiction. I. Title
 
PS3553.04857A79 2007
813'.54 — dc22    2007020308
     
    PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
     
    10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
     

 
    To Lynne and Dan Anderson
    in memory of their beloved Stocker,
    Ch. Grey Czar’s Blue Chip Stock
    (December 31 , 1993 — August 2 , 2006 ),
    the perfect malamute.
     

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
     
    Many thanks to Alaskan malamute Benchmark Heart’s Desire and to Heart’s devoted breeder-owner-handler, Phyllis Hamilton, for appearing in this book. Special thanks to Phyllis for talking with me about blue malamutes. I am also grateful to the late Jim Hamilton and to his delightful blue malamute, Benchmark Excalibur, called Steely Dan. Thanks, too, to my own malamute, Django (Jazzland’s Got That Swing); to his breeder, Cindy Neely; and to Roseann Man-dell and Geoff Stern; and to Jean Berman, Jessica Fry, Loulie Kent, Pat Sullivan, Margherita Walker, Anya Wittenborg, Suzanne Wymelenberg, and Corinne Zipps.
     

 
     
     

     

CHAPTER 1
     
    I returned home on that wet September afternoon to find in my driveway a Harley-Davidson Screamin’ Eagle Ultra Classic Electra Glide, a luxury road machine with power, pizzazz, and personality. It was outfitted with a myriad of snazzy features and accessories: heat shields, footboards, hardbags, compartments, racks, carriers, and a heavily padded seat with backrests for both driver and passenger. The chrome and the silver and the black leather glistened in the mist. The beast had a tinted wind deflector for a forehead, a big headlight muzzle, and for eyes, smaller lamps so clear and alive that they almost seemed to return my gaze, thereby confirming my sense that the two of us, the Harley and I, had not simply met before but knew each other in some deep and even mystical way. My soul mates, you see, are Alaskan malamutes, the ultimate canine touring models, Heaven’s Devils, all power, pizzazz, and personality, the Screamin’ Eagle Ultra Classic Electra Glides of purebred dogdom. Even so, what in Hells Angels was this vehicular malamute doing in my driveway?
    My name is Holly Winter. I live at 256 Concord Avenue in Cambridge, Massachusetts. ZIP code: 02138; the right one, as it’s said, presumably by virtue of being shared with the alma mater of