The kid just looked at her, his mouth open.
She nodded. “So, you took off with my bird, stealing him from where he belonged.”
He shook his head. “I didn’t know he was with you though. He was just a little ways from my house.”
“Maybe not,” Mack said, crossing his arms over his chest. “But it’s obvious he’s not some animal that you just get to pick up and take away,” he said. “Since when is that a thing? Do you do that with squirrels? Do you do that with crows? Do you do that with somebody else’s dog?”
The kid shuffled in place. “Well, no,” he said. “I just thought …” And then he stopped and let the words fall away.
“And what connection does Thaddeus have to you making those threats and leaving them at my back door?” she asked, glaring at him. “And why with rocks out of my own garden?” He just looked at her. “Did you think I would leave, that I wouldn’t take my bird with me or something?”
He shrugged. “I thought maybe, if you left, you would leave the animals behind for a weekend or something, and I could come in and get them.”
“Okay, so now you’re planning a breaking-and-entering scenario so you could steal my pets?” she said, her outrage growing even more. She glared at Mack. “Surely there’s charges we can file on him for that alone.”
The boy protested. “That’s not fair,” he said. “It’s just he’s kind of sweet.”
At that, Thaddeus strode up and down her shoulder. “Sweet. Thaddeus is sweet. Thaddeus is sweet.”
She looked at Thaddeus. “Don’t let it go to your head, big guy.”
He immediately started in. “Big guy, big guy, big guy.”
She rolled her eyes at Mack. “He’s apparently quite confused over the big guy thing.”
“No, he said that when he was with me,” the kid said.
“Speaking of that, where did you take him?” she asked, studying his face closely.
He shrugged. “I took him to my room.”
“And where is your room?” Mack asked.
At that, he pinched his lips together.
“Well, you’ll tell me, or I’ll find out anyway,” Mack said. “The difference is, I will be pissed after having to do the work myself.”
Finally the kid gave up his address, which put them right in the same area they had been looking at.
“It’s good to know that we were in the right corner of the neighborhood at least,” she said, studying the kid. “What’s your name?” And again he clammed up. She shrugged. “Do you think we won’t find out?”
“Abner,” he said quietly.
“Well, Abner. Do you realize that there is some severity to these actions of yours?”
He shrugged. “I don’t have much,” he said. “I was really hoping to have the bird.” His gaze locked on Thaddeus. “He’s really unique.”
“He is, but he’s not just a bird,” she said, “he’s part of my family.”
At that, the kid’s eyes flew wide open. “What do you mean?”
“He’s like a child to me,” she said. “They all are. They sleep in my room. They walk with me everywhere. They’re even involved in all my cold case investigations,” she said. “Thaddeus isn’t something I would just hand over to you, like a rock. He has feelings and affections and loyalties … to me.”
“But if he stayed with me long enough,” Abner said, “he would become my family.”
There was such a note of wanting in his voice that she stopped and looked at him. “Do you live with your mom?” He shook his head. “Where do you live?” He looked a little confused. “Ah,” she said, “you live in a foster home, don’t you?”
He nodded slowly. “But I’m almost eighteen,” he said, “and I’ll move out then.”
“It’s almost impossible to find a place that will take a bird like this,” she said. “And you can’t share him because he wouldn’t become yours. He would become everybody’s then.” He frowned and stared off in the distance. “Besides, it’s not an option,” she said firmly. “Thaddeus is mine. He’s part of my family. He was my grandmother’s before me and is still an important part of my family.”
His shoulders slumped again, and he slowly nodded.
“Did you show him to anybody else in your foster home?”
He shook his head. “No, not at all,” he said, then he stopped. “But you know something? He did disappear on me.”
“What do you mean?” Mack pounced.
“I lost him for a little bit,” he said. “I know I had locked him up in my room, but, when I went back, he wasn’t there.”
“That’s interesting. Where did you find him again?”
He shrugged. “I saw him in the yard, and then, when I went after him, he disappeared.”
“That’s because he was coming home,” she said.
“I don’t even know how he got back here,” he said.
“He was floating on a branch coming home,” she said, pointing to the river behind him, “and I did see a bunch of boys chasing him.”
He frowned at that. “Was one of them a redhead?” he asked angrily.
She nodded slowly. “Yes, but you were one of them too, weren’t you?”
“Well, I was farther down the river, so I didn’t see him.”
“I thought it was you,” she said in confusion.
“No,” he said, “it was probably my cousin. He looks just like me.”
“That’s possible,” she said, her face clearing, and she realized that he’d been just far enough away that she couldn’t have done a positive ID on him anyway. “The problem is,” she said, “because they were chasing him, I don’t know who to trust when it comes to kids. Not everybody will look after him.”
Immediately Abner nodded. “I know.”
Mack stepped in. “And what’s your beef with the redheaded kid?”
“He’s another foster kid,” he said, “but he’s really mean.”
“So, did he see you with the bird then?”
“I tried hard not to let him, but he must have. Then he probably let him out of my room.”
“Is anybody else in that foster home?”
He shook his head. “No, just the two of us. Although they have other kids who come and go sometimes.”
“Is there a mother?”
Again he shook his head.
“Interesting. What about Isaac?”
For a moment, the kid looked confused, and he stared at them, his brows furrowed. “Isaac?”
“That little neighborhood kid.”
His gaze cleared. “Oh. He’s just another kid from around the corner,” he said, shrugging his shoulders. “He’s always around but not really there. He gets in trouble if he plays with us.”
“And do you have any idea who he belongs to?”
“Well, another house,” he said. “I don’t know about his parents though.”
“Are there any parents?”