"It's quite blustery today," I murmured as a fine sheen of ice-crusted snow crunched under my feet while a steady wind buffeted us. The edge of the water, glazed with shards of ice, reminded me of broken glass. Tall grasses, stiffly encrusted with snow, barely swayed in the wind coming off Lake Plantain. Frosty boulders dotted the landscape. New Hampshire in March was frigid. I stopped abruptly when Bun's voice entered my head.

Bunny, my black-and-white rabbit, snuggled against my chest in the baby sling he rode in. Bun's head protruded from the sling opening, and his ears twitched as he glanced around.

"That looks odd, like a frosty hand rising from the tall grass over there." Bun dipped his head to my left. I followed his lead, slanting a look in that direction.

Holy crap, it did look like a frozen hand reaching upward. My heart began to pound, my breath came short and fast, and I veered toward the area.

"You don't think it's real, do you?"

"I'm sure it's just the way the frost has clumped the grass together. We'll have a look."

My name is Juliette Bridge, better known as Jules. I'm the owner of Fur Bridge Farm, where I raise rabbits, find good homes for them, and care for others that have been rescued from difficult and often abominable situations. Bun, my best buddy, lives in my farmhouse as my resident housemate. He has a personality that warms my heart, that is, when he's not poking his sweet little nose where it doesn't belong.

Not your average rabbit, Bun's smart, sociable, talkative, and very talented. His specialty is pure nosiness. He communicates with me by way of mental telepathy, which adds another dimension to an ongoing list of my problems. I know, it sounds ludicrous, but when Bun talks, I've learned to listen. I never thought I'd have a talking pet, but there you have it. He's never mentioned how this ability came about, and I've never asked. Uncertain if everyone can hear him, I can only assume they aren't willing to acknowledge his ability.

We've shared the farmhouse for the past couple of years, after I rescued him from a despicable family with no respect for animals. They were glad to see him go, saying he was in league with the devil. I figure they could hear him talk.

The first time I heard his voice, a soft, lilting, somewhat musical sound, I wondered if I'd imagined it. As time went on, he kept talking to me, and I continued to ignore him. One morning, about a year ago, we were taking our usual walk, when I ran into Margery Shaw. Margery had been Bun's previous keeper and there was no love lost between us. Having seen Margery coming before I did, Bun had huddled down inside the sling, burrowing as far as he could, trying to disappear. I heard a warning to take care before there was only silence.

The woman marched up and asked if I'd heard the rabbit talk. That was the dawning realization that Bun could, and often did, communicate with me. Unwilling to admit it to Margery, I shook my head and asked if she was imagining things. Her anger evident over my remark, I left her standing on the path as I jogged off, holding Bun close to my chest.

From that day forward, Bun and I have conversed on a regular basis. I doubt I can answer him telepathically and haven't tried. I'm careful where and when I speak aloud to him. It doesn't look good to prospective rabbit owners if I'm blathering on about something to Bun when they've come to the farm in search of rabbits of their own.

My face numb from the wind, I slipped and slid our way through the snow, focused on what looked like a hand, all the while mentally denying it was one. As we drew near, Bun started to quiver, a clear sign of his excitement. Bun always likes to be right, especially under these circumstances.

I came to a stop and leaned forward. The hand, a real hand, was connected to the arm of a man lying amid grasses that arched tunnel-like over his lower extremities. He seemed to reach out, maybe in hope that someone would take hold of his hand and lift him off the ground. I trembled, and then shook, before pacing back and forth while I muttered that this must have been an accident. I pulled my cell phone from the pocket of my jacket and dialed 9-1-1.

A female dispatcher answered the call and listened as I babbled on about my find and where it was located. Finally, she asked, "Are you still at that location, ma'am?"

"Y-yes."

"Stay there, emergency services will be with you shortly. Please remain on the line until they arrive." Her voice, calm and soothing, left me less frantic, and I stopped pacing. I detest murder, or violence of any kind, though I admit I'm a curious sort, though Bun is much more inquisitive than I am. My intuitive, long-eared pal is right quite often. That's why I listen when he speaks to me.

Moments later, sirens blared, and a police cruiser slid to a halt not fifteen feet away from us. A rescue vehicle parked, and four men scrambled over the snow, closing the distance between us.

Sheriff Jack Carver gave me the once-over as he came abreast of me, Bun, and the deceased.

"When did you find the body?"

I slanted him a look, shut off my phone, and tucked it into my jacket pocket. "Just now. I walk every morning, but not usually here."

"Why come this way today?"

"I wanted to see if there was an ice buildup around the lake. It's quite beautiful, without a dead man, that is."

Carver gave our surroundings a sweeping look and shrugged. "I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder. All I see is frozen ground and a slippery road."

Bun popped his head out of the sling. He sniffed the air, twitched his ears, and settled against my chest. "He might have a point."

"I suppose you're right," I said, not speaking just to Carver, but also to Bun. We watched as paramedics pulled a sleigh-type basket over the snow-covered ground. They stood back until given the go-ahead to take pictures and do their job before collecting the dead guy for his ride to the morgue. Ice chips dropped off his face and clothing as the crew wrestled him into the sleigh. Once he was strapped in and tightly secured, the team took him away. All that was left on the ground where he'd lain was a dark patch of something I thought might be blood.

The sheriff noted the spot at the same time I did, leaned forward, ripped one of the mashed stalks of grass from the ground, and held it to his nose. He bagged the grass and tucked it into his coat pocket.

Who was this dead person, and what was he doing by the lake? Inwardly, I shivered at the thought of him dying in the cold, and then turned my attention to what the sheriff was saying.

He waited for an answer to the question I hadn't heard and then repeated it as he tipped his head in the dead man's direction.

"Are you familiar with him?"

"No, I don't recognize him. Do you?"

I pointed to the dark spot. "Is that blood on the ground?" "It doesn't concern you."

Bun moved around, then wiggled his head out of the sling again. He watched the sheriff with keen eyes.

Jack gave Bun a glance, then offered me a cool attitude that surely meant he'd be asking the questions. "You're certain you've never met him before? Maybe he stopped by the farm, or you ran into him in town?"

"Not that I know of. If I did come across him somewhere, he didn't make an impression. Sorry, Jack."

We walked from the beach onto the upper part of the road where his patrol car sat running.

"Do you always...