Dog Show Disaster Read online

  Praise for

  Allie’s Bayou Rescue,

  Book One in the Princess in Camo Series

  “Allie’s Bayou Rescue is an awesome book to read together as mom and daughter! We love how real it was about the obstacles we face as girls—but not without a God who cares for us in our struggles, pursues us, and knows EXACTLY where we are going, AND HAS IT all under control—especially when we don’t.”

  Elisabeth and Grace Hasselbeck, TV personality and daughter . . . and Daughters of the One True King!!

  Other Books in the Princess in Camo Series

  Allie’s Bayou Rescue (Book 1)

  Running from Reality (Book 2)

  Finding Cabin Six (Book 4)

  ZONDERKIDZ

  Dog Show Disaster

  Copyright © 2018 by Missy Robertson and Mia Robertson

  Illustrations © 2018 by Mina Price

  Requests for information should be addressed to:

  Zonderkidz, 3900 Sparks Dr. SE, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49546

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Epub Edition August 2018 9780310762577

  ISBN 978-0-310762522

  All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise noted, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.Zondervan.com. The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.®

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

  Zonderkidz is a trademark of Zondervan.

  Art direction: Cindy Davis

  Interior design: Denise Froehlich

  Printed in the United States of America

  18 19 20 21 22 /LSC/ 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  “Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of evil behavior. Instead, be kind to each other, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.”

  EPHESIANS 4:31 (NLT)

  To my amazing husband who can’t take a nap without a lapdog and a blanket and who doesn’t let that effect his masculinity. You’re the man, Babe!

  —Missy

  To Mamaw Kay for always teaching me that dogs are much more than just pets—they’re lifelong companions.

  —Mia

  Contents

  Praise for Allie’s Bayou Rescue, Book One in the Princess in Camo Series

  Other Books in the Princess in Camo Series

  Chapter 1: Caught in the Act

  Chapter 2: Donuts and Dilemmas

  Chapter 3: Canine Carnival

  Chapter 4: Picnic Pests

  Chapter 5: Speech Impediment

  Chapter 6: Flips and Flops

  Chapter 7: Miss Lewis

  Chapter 8: Complications

  Chapter 9: Landslide

  Chapter 10: And Now . . . the Bad News

  Chapter 11: Cousins to the Rescue

  Chapter 12: Comedy Night

  Chapter 13: 0600

  Chapter 14: Baby Mellon

  Chapter 15: Steering into a Brick Wall

  Chapter 16: Up a Tree

  Chapter 17: Party Pooper

  Chapter 18: No News = No News

  Chapter 19: Monday Mayhem

  Chapter 20: Burgers and Indigestion

  Chapter 21: Fire Storm

  Chapter 22: No Show

  Chapter 23: Prayers and Petitions

  Chapter 24: Resignation

  Chapter 25: Mother’s Day

  Chapter 26: Turning Point

  Chapter 27: Reality Take Two

  Chapter 28: And the Winner is . . .

  Chapter 29: Bark Fest

  Chapter 30: Dunks & Pies

  Chapter 31: A Dog-Shaped Hole

  Excerpt from Book 4 in the Princess in Camo series: Finding Cabin Six

  CHAPTER 1

  Caught in the Act

  Hazel Mae!”

  I sprinted down the dirt path in our neighborhood, that leads to the creek running behind my old house. That’s exactly where I knew my silly, white poof-ball dog would be. Using her old backyard as a bathroom.

  Lord, it’s a beautiful Saturday morning. Please don’t let Mad-girl be home and ruin it.

  “Mad-girl,” is none other than Madison Doonsberry, twelve-year-old daughter of Andrew Doonsberry, who happens to be the new owner of my old house.

  Hazel Mae, being a dog, couldn’t seem to understand that the house wasn’t hers anymore, so she kept escaping from my cousin Kendall’s house—my current residence—to, well . . . deposit nasty things on the Doonsberry’s lawn.

  Like I needed any more help getting Madison to hate me.

  “Hazel Mae—don’t you even think about it!” I spied her up in the distance, circling around her favorite grass patch. I pulled a plastic bag out of my sweatshirt pocket, and hurdled over the hedge so I could snatch her up before . . .

  “Are you trespassing again, Allie Carroway?”

  Mad-girl.

  She crossed her arms, glared at me, and stuck her right hip out to the side.

  “Am I going to have to call the homeowner’s association this time and file a complaint? Or perhaps I should call my dad’s film crew to come over. This would make a great episode for Lunker Law. Doonsberrys vs. Carroways. I bet ratings would skyrocket.”

  Madison’s dad once lived in this part of the Louisiana bayou, but moved away thirty years ago. During that time, he became a high-powered lawyer in Florida, got married, and had two kids—twins Parker and Madison. Four months ago, he and his wife divorced, and he returned to Louisiana to star in a reality TV fishing show called Lunker Law. It’s a great show. Informative, funny, and I would love it a whole lot more if it didn’t air on another network at the same time as my family’s show Carried Away with the Carroways.

  Madison flipped her long, strawberry blonde hair behind both shoulders and smirked.

  “It’s okay, Hazel Mae. I don’t blame you. These things are always the fault of negligent pet owners.”

  Hazel Mae—oblivious to my pain—finished up her business and ran around the lawn, wagging her tail, and chasing after a butterfly.

  How can you be so happy in enemy territory?

  “I’m really sorry, Madison. It won’t happen again.”

  “Well, I seriously doubt that. I’ve seen your show. You bayou people have no discipline.”

  “Bayou people?”

  I reached down with the plastic bag to pick up Hazel Mae’s mess. When I stood back up, my head started pounding.

  Gee, I wonder if I have the discipline to hold on to this bag? It feels like it wants to fling itself toward Mad-girl.

  It took all my bayou self-control to put the bag down on the grass instead.

  “Yes, bayou people! Everyone knows about your disasters.” Madison opened her hand and began to count “disasters” off on her fingers. “Let’s see, you had a goat loose in the house, frogs jumping around in the laundry room, your brother practically blew the place up on the Fourth of July, and didn’t your dad bring a beaver in one time? Seriously, Allie, I don’t even like to think of all the horrible messes you’ve made in my house.”

 
“It was my house for twelve years,” I said.

  “And it’s a wonder it’s still standing.”

  I took a deep breath, and blew it out.

  Count to ten, Allie. One . . . two . . . ten. Okay.

  I forced a grin.

  “It’s a nice house, Madison. If it weren’t for my allergies, we’d still be in it.”

  Gah. Why did I have to say that? No need to give her any more ammunition.

  “Well, Allie-Allergy, you’ll be happy to know that we enlarged your teeny-tiny room. I honestly don’t know how you managed to breathe in that little space. And, I half-expected to find dead rats in the wall when we tore it down.”

  Hazel Mae finally chased the butterfly in my direction, so I scooped her up.

  “Gotcha, you little fur ball.” I turned back toward Madison. “You tore a wall down?”

  She smiled and flipped her hair some more.

  “Made two rooms into one. Added new carpet, crown molding, and even put in a bay window. The place just needed someone with class to make improvements.”

  “Class?” Now my blood was boiling.

  Lord, help me not to say something I’m going to regret.

  I opened my mouth, and began to say something I would regret. “Listen, if you think . . .”

  Thankfully, Madison interrupted. “Speaking of class, you go to Ouachita Middle School, right?”

  Madison came over and started petting Hazel Mae.

  “Be careful. She’s a bayou dog. She could have fleas or ticks, and she’s known to have really bad breath.”

  Madison didn’t respond to that. She looked at me with her cloudy green eyes.

  “Well, do you? Go to OMS?”

  I shrugged. “Yeah, I go there.”

  “Then we might be in the same class starting Monday.”

  “But I thought you went to that private school.”

  Madison looked away, but kept petting Hazel Mae.

  “Yeah, well that didn’t work out. Parker and I are transferring.”

  Great. My enemy not only lives in my old house, but now she’s going to my school.

  I gulped. “Do you know what teacher you have for homeroom?”

  Please, don’t say Mrs. Mellon.

  “It’s Miss Lewis, I believe,” Madison said. “Parker has a Mrs. Mellon. It’s the first time we’ve ever been in different classes.”

  Good news for me, and bad news for you, Mad-girl.

  “Is Miss Lewis nice?” Madison pulled her hand away from Hazel Mae and bit her lip.

  I stepped back and focused my gaze on Mad-girl’s furrowed brow. “Well, everyone has their own opinion of Miss Lewis. I think I’ll just let you make up your own mind.” I grinned, and held up a hand to wave goodbye, and good-riddance. “See you on Monday!”

  CHAPTER 2

  Donuts and Dilemmas

  Hazel Mae, did you hear that? Mad-girl is coming to my school! How am I supposed to survive that? There should be a law that designates Doomsberry-free zones.”

  “Doomsberry” is the nickname that my Mamaw Kat gave to Madison’s dad when he was a kid. I guess he was a rascal, always hanging around her house causing trouble—including stealing some valuable heirloom tablecloths out of the storage shed and making tents out of them.

  I gave Madison the nickname Mad-girl. I’ve never called her that to her face, it’s just my little private joke—because she always seems to be mad.

  At least she is at me. And, besides losing track of Hazel Mae a few times which resulted in a mess on the Doonesberry lawn, I’ve never done anything to deserve her anger. If anything, I should be mad at her for always referring to me as “bayou people” (like it’s a bad thing), for making fun of the house I love, and for always rubbing it in that her dad’s show ratings are higher than my family’s show ratings. For now.

  I huffed and puffed my way through the neighborhood—which is made up of houses that mostly belong to my family members. It had always been so peaceful here—until Madison Doonsberry moved in.

  I looked down at Hazel Mae, who had her tongue hanging out, panting.

  “I guess you’re not going to give me any advice, are you? Must be nice to be a dog sometimes.”

  I jogged up and over the small hill in the middle of our park-like neighborhood and ran down the trail to our brand-new Carroway cousin clubhouse—The Lickety Split. I stopped and stared at the newly-stained wood building, situated way up in a tree, with a roomy balcony and a twisted branch railing. If this were a movie, there would have been angels singing in the background of this scene.

  It was a beautiful sight.

  And—it’s a Doomsberry-free zone!

  The Lickety Split took the place of our old clubhouse—the Diva Duck Blind. The Diva had been painted pink and purple—a real girl hangout. But everything changed a few months ago when Kendall’s family adopted twelve-year-old Hunter. We did what any group of loving cousins would do—we changed the clubhouse to be more boy-friendly—but not until we had a little “initiation fun” with Hunter. Well, we thought it would be fun, but then there was a storm, and the lights went out, the river flooded, we lost Hunter, and a gator tried to eat my cousin Ruby. That’s all. Initiations in the bayou can be intense. But, since we’re “bayou people,” we survived, and then we tore down the Diva—which we found out was full of mold—and constructed The Lickety Split.

  I had taken three steps up the spiral staircase when a brunette head with a pink streak popped over the balcony railing and yelled down.

  “Oh, good, you’re here early. I have something to show you.”

  It was my cousin, Lola.

  “Early?”

  And then I remembered. It was almost time for our weekly “Donuts-in-the-Split” cousin meeting.

  Hazel Mae ran up the stairs in front of me while I checked my phone. Nine-thirty. Why was Lola here so early?

  I continued up the steps.

  “Hazel Mae escaped and I had to catch her before she went on the Doonsberry’s lawn again.”

  “Uh-oh.” Lola put her hand to her mouth.

  I nodded. “Yeah, I didn’t get there in time either. And now I’m on Madison’s list.”

  Lola waved me over to the wooden writing desk with the log legs that Hunter had built for the Split.

  “Speaking of Madison, I need to ask you what I’m supposed to do about this.”

  She pointed to a turquoise envelope, covered in yellow daisies. Lola’s name was written on the front.

  Lola picked it up, opened it, and pulled out a stiff piece of cardstock that had those yellow daisies bordering words written in calligraphy:

  YOU’RE INVITED

  Madison Doonsberry’s 13th Birthday Party

  Saturday, April 1st, 4:00 pm

  Swimming, Food, Games, and Sleepover

  Hope you can come!

  I read the whole invitation over and over. It was annoying seeing my old address on an invitation to someone else’s party.

  I looked up at Lola.

  “Well, I can see why she likes you, since you’re the fashionable one.”

  Lola scrunched her eyebrows together. “I don’t know what to do. I’m the only one of us who got an invitation. Don’t you think that’s weird?”

  “Ruby didn’t even get one?”

  “No. And she was standing right next to me when Madison handed me mine, so it’s not like Madison forgot or anything.”

  Ruby is Lola’s younger sister, but she looks like she could be related to Madison, with that red hair of hers. She just turned eleven, only a year younger than Lola, but she’s sweet as pie, and everyone loves her. If anyone would get a birthday invitation, it would be Ruby.

  “What did Madison say when she gave it to you? Did she mention me at all?”

  Lola shook her head. “All she said was that she thought all her friends at private school would like me, and that she hoped I could come.”

  A voice called from below.

  “I have fresh donuts!”

  R
uby. This is another reason everyone loves her.

  Lola walked out to the balcony, and I followed. “Ooh, Sis! I’m glad you’re early!” Then Lola turned to me. “Ruby made the donuts from scratch this week! She was frying them up just a little while ago.”

  Every Saturday since we opened the Lickety Split, we’ve scheduled a ten o’clock, Donuts-in-the-Split meeting. We take turns bringing the donuts. Mine are always day-old, because I have Mom drive me by the donut shop on Friday after school. Ruby’s weeks are the best.

  “Why did you leave so fast?” Ruby, huffing and puffing from climbing the steps, handed the basket of donuts to Lola, who uncovered them and sniffed. “I wanted you to help me decorate them.”

  “I’m sorry, I had some things on my mind, so I wandered over.” Lola pulled out a fresh donut that had light pink frosting and dark pink sprinkles. “Looks like this one’s for me.” She started to take a bite, but Ruby put her hand up to stop her. “Don’t you think we should wait for everyone else?”

  Lola stopped mid-bite and sighed. “You’re right. But I hope they hurry.”

  “Everyone else” is my thirteen-year-old cousin Kendall—who I currently share a room with while waiting for my new “allergen-free” house to be built—and Hunter, the boy who always wears basketball shorts.

  “Hey!” An out-of-breath voice sounded from the ground. Hunter. I looked over the railing at the top of his wavy, blonde head. He must have run the whole way. A sweat drip creeped down the side of his cheek, and his black, rectangular-framed glasses sat halfway down on his nose.

  “I really wish we would reinstate passwords,” Hunter said. “I loved mine.”

  “Gator Buster,” was Hunter’s password. We gave it to him temporarily, when we had the old Diva, since his middle name is Buster, and because part of his initiation was to prove that an old family story about a boy-eating gator living in Mamaw and Papaw’s shed was false. Hunter proved it by sitting in that shed for an hour and not getting eaten, but then later—in the swamp—he ended up wrestling and then wrapping a gator’s mouth closed with duct tape.