Maxie and Rosy walked Sinclair back home.

Before then, he was introduced to the helper dogs; Cherry, Ray, Hill, Matt, and Tonic. Hill was the Golden retriever that had pulled the thorn out of his flesh. Cherry was the second helper, the only Labrador Sinclair had seen around since he came. Tonic was a husky and had the scariest teeth of them all. That made him glad he was not on the dog's bad side.

Halfway to the mansion entrance, his pals wished him sad goodbyes.

"Don't be so blue, Sinclair boy." Maxie encouraged. "The little Hopkins girl will be fine. If it were you getting kidnapped, it would have been helpless cause the Hopkins can replace a dog. But you see, they could never replace their precious kid. They'll pay the ransom before you can spell bark, and the girl will be back home like nothing even happened. You'll see."

"I don't think that makes him feel better, Maxie." Rosy wisely inputted.

"It doesn't." Sinclair admitted, unable to lift his eyes to acknowledge the dark. It filled him with dread. And there were the statues also. "I don't want her to be taken away at all."

Maxie sighed. "In all honesty, ain't nothing a dog as little as you can do about that. Matter of fact, even if there was a dog as big as me in that house, it wouldn't change a damn thing. They'll come for the kid, and they'll gag you so you don't get to make a sound."

"Maxwell!" Rosy scolded in a snap.

Maxie whimpered slightly. That bit made Sinclair's mouth twitch. "Sorry. I was just stating facts."

"Sinclair doesn't need to hear you state facts, what he needs to hear is what'll make him feel less anxious and less frightened of what's about to happen. If you can't say something to help, then maybe we should get going."

"My bad, Sinclair boy. Rosy's right. I apologize."

"It's fine, Maxie." Sinclair lowered his head even more, feeling as if he would catch a cold any second.

But Rosy came up to him with sad eyes and leaned against him for a while, surrounding him with warmth. He felt her breaths push repeatedly against his side from under her sleek, soft fur.

"It'll be alright, I promise." She pulled away. "And Sinclair?"

"Yeah?"

"Don't look." She muttered.

With that, she turned away and followed Maxie out of the compound.

Wickleworth almost had a heart attack when Sinclair appeared in the doorway.

"Oh, good heavens! There you are, pup!" She placed a hand on her chest, and for the first time, came forward to pick him up.

Shock filmed her eyes when she noticed his stained coat.

"What has happened to you? Oh, look at all these injuries! Did you get into a dog fight? Oh dear, we can't have you this dirty and bloody. Mrs Hopkins would kill me right after Leah has. To the bath at once!"

After a nice and gentle scrub in hot bubbly water, some first aid and bandages around his wounds, a bowl of nice oats, and a warm blanket, Sinclair felt much much better. He tried not to think of his encounter with Harry and how lonely he had felt inside that bush of thorns. It scared him almost to tears and he dearly wished he would never have to live through such again.

But the experience did open his eyes to how lucky he was.

Back at the pet store, he'd heard stories about stray dogs and other animals, who lived in boxes or dark alleys without a roof over their head, food or a nice bath. They survived on scraps and trash, and stank all the way into New Year's Eve. They had no owners nor a collar and were likely to be yelled at if they ever came close to someone who wasn't pleased with stray dogs. They had no one like Rosy, or Maxie, or even Leah to be friends with them. He heard that such dogs often turned out wrong or never lasted too long. The ones lucky enough to attract attention had to be either adorable or really young, or both.

He nestled into the soft blanket on his soft mat, only a stone throwaway from Leah's bed. She usually went to bed as early as 7PM, and even though Sinclair could not tell time, he knew it was around 7PM.

How long til 10PM? How would he know? Would Wickleworth be asleep by then?

Just as he thought of it, the nanny walked in, holding a tray with her medicine bottles and a glass of water inside. Then, she looked straight at him. "The doors are all locked up. No jumping around now. You stay in there nice and toasty til morning. I'm going to come in here two more times before I go to bed myself."

She placed the tray down and checked on Leah; readjusted the toddler's pillows and tucked the sheets in properly around her then picked up the tray and shuffled out.

Sinclair prayed with everything in him that he was wrong about the nanny and that she had nothing to do with the kidnapping. Also, he prayed she would walk into Leah's bedroom right as the nappers were about to break in, call the police and have them all arrested. Those kind of thoughts made him feel at ease by a margin, and soon enough, began to lead him adrift into sleep.

When his eyes dragged open, the atmosphere was cool and calm. The darkness seemed deeper, and he sensed that a lot of time had passed. The bedroom was fairly dark because of the moonlight that streamed in through the windows on either sides of Leah's bed. Everything appeared exactly as he had seen it when he first closed his eyes.

Relief filled him to the brim at that.

He wriggled out of his blanket, made straight for Leah's bed and was even more relieved to find her sound asleep. She was still safe. Though her face was shaded, he could clearly see the rosy pink in her cheeks.

Concluding that the kidnap might not happen at all, perhaps because the participators fell into a horrible agreement that made them all hate each other and call off their partnership, he jumped off the bed and returned to his mat. Somehow, he felt reinvigorated as he carefully stretched his weak and injured limbs, preparing to return to sleep.

That was when he smelled something.

His eyes scanned the room. Since his arrival, he had gotten used to every smell in and around the entire mansion. The current odor, though, was new and foreign. He wasn't sure what to name it because it wasn't exactly a horrible smell. It smelled like perfume, but the kind that Honey would use instead of Prim.

At that, his eyes widened. Recognition turned to fear and liquefied all of his bones.

The smell belonged to a man. The time had finally come.

He rose, agitated yet terrified. The urge to run outside and bark at whatever he saw came strong, but his legs felt like jelly and he cowered instead. Maxie had been right.

He really could do nothing.

But his desire to see the intruders for himself was more overpowering, so he mustered up as much courage as he could and traipsed toward the door. It wasn't locked, he knew, but it was jammed shut. Yet he doubted it would stop the kidnappers. His ears perked to pick up the slightest noise, but there was none.

Just when he thought all was well, the door flew open – quietly. But contrary to his fear, it was only Wickleworth.

His pounding heart took a while to settle as he watched the nanny stagger over to Leah's bed. She did the usual checkup routine then proceeded to do something strange – she opened one of the windows. Sinclair immediately thought it strange because Leah's windows were meant to stay closed all through the night to prevent the cold from getting in, and Wickleworth was well aware of that.

He growled in anger. She definitely had to be one of the conspirators. What was stranger still was how she walked as if she was half asleep and half drunk. When she left the room, she did not even shut the door completely.

Sinclair followed her to discover where she was headed, but found that she simply beelined her own bedroom and shut the door.

Before he could think of anything else, he picked up on quiet noises from downstairs. Since the mansion was quite big, he felt sure that it would take some time before the men could locate Leah's bedroom. Regardless, he went to see things for himself and came upon a trio of men dressed in black. They moved noiselessly, going in and out of rooms and hallways, but none looked to be armed with a gun. That bit was a tad comforting to Sinclair.

Without a second thought, he sprinted as fast and as quietly as possible to the staff quarters, hoping to find either Lucy or anyone else. However, he found all doors under lock and key.

His second destination was the controls room, which was empty. The security personnel, Winston, usually left for the day just like everyone else, but he made sure to keep the cameras on.

Staring up at colorless screens, Sinclair noticed that the intruders had split. One was en route to the backyard, probably without knowing it; the second was only a hall away from the controls room whilst the third was exiting the master bedroom hallway. Only one passageway above that axis was the location of Leah's bedroom.

Given how late it was, Sinclair doubted that anyone would come to his aid even though he went out looking for it. Displaying on a different computer screen was a half image of the BabyBoom and Blues van, which had been thoroughly stripped of its blue sticker, parked a few kilometers from the main exit. Another intruder sat in the driver's seat, quietly tapping on the vehicle door in an anxious way. Without a doubt, Sinclair knew the man was prepared for the takeoff right after his cohorts fished the target out.

Just then, his attention returned to intruder number three, who had reached the floor of Leah's bedroom. And what was worse? The door was unlocked. Panic formed into bile in Sinclair's throat as he watched the figure inch further, until he entered a blindspot and could be seen no more.

More cold creeped into his legs. He turned, feeling helpless and recalled Maxie's words. There was nothing a dog as little as himself could do to stop three fully mature individuals from obtaining a year old girl from inside a potentially empty mansion.

As he recalled this, Rosy's comment the other day came to his mind. He needed to be confident — he needed to be brave, for Leah's sake. Even if it meant getting hurt, badly, he would leap into the fire for her. They were best friends. She relied on him a lot, and he dreaded the thought of Prim and Honey returning to discover that he had been present when their daughter was taken.

Perhaps he was just a puppy. But even puppies had the bark in them.

There and then, he decided to take a stand. One way or another, he would save Leah. All he had to do was figure something out really quick.

Then, it hit him like an old thought. The intruders were strangers and inside a mansion they'd never been in before, they had to believe one thing – that they were all alone. He could use that to his advantage. He could disorient them. No man, no matter how big, was bigger than fear, especially of the unknown.

He would scare the wits out of them and possibly even chase them away before they could do any real damage. Bonus points for being the tiniest living thing in the entire mansion, he could wreak havock without being seen.

That, too, was a massive advantage on his part.

In spite of that, he felt motivated to act. It was now or never.

With a sense of determination, he darted out of the control room.