MEET THE MUTTS: TREY AND KIM by Maria Hudgins

Trey and Kim are two very smart and supportive Bichon Frise who steal the spotlight in Maria Hudgins’ story included our latest mutt mysteries anthology, To Fetch a Villain. They stopped by for a quick interview today.  

 Tell us about yourselves and your story.  Hi! I am Trey Chastain and I’m a Bichon Frise. This is my best friend, Kim, and she’s a Bichon, too. We both star in the story “At Your Service.”

Give us four words that describe you and your personality. I’m Trey and I’ll go first. Four words? Only four? Okay. I am Smart. I am dependable. I am loyal. I am a born leader.

     I’m Kim and I am not surprised that Trey had to go first. My four words would be: Determined, stubborn, pretty, and observant.

 What is your job in the story? Kim’s former owner, an evil man named Claude Raper, kept her imprisoned in a puppy mill until she escaped. He’s following her and trying to kidnap her back. Our job is to be very observant and help our mom, Jessica, get Raper put in jail where he belongs.

 Tell us about your favorite thing to do. Kim and I agree that our favorite thing to do is whatever we can do with our mom, Jessica. She takes us to the beach and when we get in the car, she opens the windows on both sides so we can let our ears flap in the wind.

 What do you always help your human with? I am a highly trained service dog and I take my job seriously. Jessica cannot hear. At all.  My job is to let her know when there is something she needs to pay attention to. I also nudge whoever is talking to her to remind them to face her so she can read their lips.

What is your favorite food/snack?

Trey: My favorite food is liver. I like chicken livers fried in oil but Jessica doesn’t make them for me too often because she hates liver and she says it smells up the house.

Kim: I like those little cheese things like the ones I got at Christmas.

What is something you won’t touch with a ten-foot pole? Both dogs: green beans!

Where is your special place for napping? Kim and I agree. The best place is where the sun comes in and hits the rug near the dining room table. Good thing there’s room for both of us.

 What do you do when your humans aren’t home? We’ll never tell.

Do you have a secret vice? (Don’t worry, we won’t tell your humans…)

Trey: I like to eat ants.

Kim: I’m gonna tell.

Trey: She can’t hear, remember?

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MARIA HUDGINS is a mystery writer from coastal Virginia and a lover of animals. She writes the Dotsy Lamb Travel Mysteries and the Lacy Glass Archaeology Mysteries. Her short stories appear in such publications as Virginia is for Mysteries, Fifty Shades of Cabernet, Murder by the Glass, and Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. The two dogs, Trey and Kim, featured in this story are based on Hudgins’s beloved Bichons, Holly and Hamilton, now gone but never forgotten.

 Website: https://mariahudgins.com/