Days after Ana Rodriguez started working for the Belles, feeding the chickens had become a part of the morning routine: her bosses’ youngest daughter, Jordan, would fetch a scoop of pellets from the plastic tub in the pantry. Ana’s daughter, Sofía, watching from the in-law unit above the garage, would bolt outside the moment Jordan exited the house.
The girls would meet by the coop. Usually, Ana waited inside for the delivery of the eggs, speckled blue and white and brown, with bright orange yolks, courtesy of Sunny, Moonbeam, Punky, Clucky, and Cosmo.
Wednesday morning, Sofía insisted that Ana come along instead of staying in the kitchen. Ana’s left wrist ached, the old bruise faded but tender. Ignoring the throb, she followed Jordan into the backyard, where windblown leaves and twigs scattered on the ground.
Jordan—who seemed more fish than girl, her bobbed blonde hair tinted green as old pennies—walked with a confidence that Ana wished for her own daughter.
When they reached the coop, the door was open, and a few feathers floated in the air. Ana realized that she hadn’t heard the chickens clucking this morning. Jordan halted, as if she could tell something was wrong. As Sofía reached the threshold, Ana shouted, “Go back inside!”
“But the chickens…we didn’t feed them yet!” Sofía said.
Jordan clenched the cup so tightly her knuckles turned white.
“Now,” Ana said.
With a nod, Jordan headed to the house, and Sofía returned to their quarters. Holding her breath, Ana poked her head into the coop. Squatting, her eyes adjusting to the dim light, hoping for groggy chickens, their eyes shut and their beaks tucked into the fluff on their necks. Instead, she discovered a mess of entrails and feathers, an eye-watering stink of ammonia and coppery blood that made her want to jump in the pool though she couldn’t swim.
By the time Ana returned to the kitchen, Jordan must have told her mother. The girl buried her head into Blair, who rubbed circles on her back.
Ana washed her hands in the hottest water she could stand.
It was the third time the chickens had been massacred, Blair told Ana. “Sometimes they break into the coop. Sometimes…” She paused. “We have to make sure the door stays closed.”
Jordan pulled away from her mother. “It was closed.”
The door? The night before, while Ana prepared dinner, she told Sofía to get off the phone, which she’d borrowed to watch videos, and practice dribbling the soccer ball or go look at the chickens instead. Maybe Sofía left the door to the coop open. Her throat tightened. She should explain what happened, take the blame, but what if Blair fired her?
“Do you want to skip practice?” Blair asked Jordan.
No, Jordan said, and left to get ready. Luna, the family’s Labradoodle, waddled in and lapped water from the bowl.
“I keep telling Sam we should train another Orb on the coop,” Blair said. “I work for Orb. But he says there’s no point; we’re asleep when it comes. And with too many cameras, you get overloaded on notifications.”
Ana dried her hands on a dishtowel. She no longer believed in God, but made a silent prayer to whomever spared her daughter from getting caught on camera.
During the night, the wind had roared for hours, the branches of the oak trees thrashing and creaking; at one point, she’d woken up from a nightmare that her ex had come after her. Come to collect the rent she owed. She’d moved without telling him, packing after he left for work and their roommates were out, too. Tossed the phone on his calling plan, and replaced it, a new number for a new life, where he couldn’t find them.
But if the wind had been too loud to hear the shrieks of the chickens, wouldn’t it also have been too loud to hear if Julio entered the backyard? Too loud for the Belles to hear her screaming? Maybe she could convince them to install a camera in the side yard.
*
That night before dinner, Blair sorted through the mail, most of it junk, discounts on cleaners and fundraising appeals from the ACLU and the Nature Conservancy. She set aside the offer for another credit card; they were maxing out the limits on their main and backup cards. She’d talk to Sam about getting another.
She started to toss a flyer advertising a meetup for newcomer families into the recycling bin. Then she noticed the contact: Nic, whose daughter belonged to a rival swim team, Falling Leaf Country Club, that had dominated every competition. El Nido’s version of the Yankees, Patriots, and Lakers, all in one. Nic, who was trying to get Jordan thrown out of the summer league’s swim finals.
As she studied the flyer, an idea took shape: maybe she could send the nanny, who’d moved here a week ago with her daughter, could seek intel at the gathering.
She thrust the flyer at Ana. “You should go!” she said. “The girls can watch Liam.”
“Thank you but—no.” Ana wiped the counter and swiped a stain on the white tile backsplash.
Blair insisted. “We’d pay you for your time.”
Ana rinsed off the sponge, her shoulders rigid.
Blair would have to explain. “Nic—the organizer—is claiming that Jordan’s cheating. At the swim meets.”
“Why?” Ana asked.
“Because she wins!” Blair said. There was more to it, of course. There always was.
Even Jordan’s big sister, Quinn—an all-American and high school team captain, who’d been competing since the age of seven and was already verbally committed to Princeton—had never been so driven at that age. Jordan, though: Jordan was a shark. If she stopped moving, she’d die. You’d never guess that she’d been a preemie. She’d been breaking records all season.
Earlier this summer, she’d reported that Nic’s daughter had been sneaking in extra pulls underwater and sometimes using illegal kicks. The other volunteers monitoring the lanes didn’t notice or let it slide. But if the girl wanted a future in swimming, she had to follow the rules. Nic found out she’d reported the violation. The poor child had been so rattled, she’d faltered in the next couple meets. And now Nic retaliated with what amounted to a technicality.
“They want to see her birth certificate to prove her birthdate. Like…like she’s Obama!” Blair leaned against the marble-topped kitchen island. “I’ve—we’ve—spoken to the league officials, Jordan will compete in her age bracket as she has all season. But Nic won’t stop. She’ll try to mess with us on the Mavericks.”
Ana cocked her head.
“It’s the club team for the best swimmers in the area,” Blair said. “Quinn’s been on it for years. Try-outs are in a couple weeks. If you go tomorrow, maybe you’ll hear Nic say something? Maybe about what she’s planning. Or if she’s trying to get other parents on her side.”
“You want me to spy on her?” Ana asked flatly.
“All you’d have to do is look around. Listen to what she says…” Blair trailed off. Yes, she’d asked Ana to spy; yes, she’d put her new employee in an impossible position, in which she couldn’t say no unless she wanted to jeopardize her new job and her housing.
An employee who had so far been exemplary, cleaning the messes that her family made. She entrusted the care of her children to Ana. Intimate as family, or almost.
“Forget about it,” Blair said. How many times in the last year had she watched yet another viral video of a wild-eyed white woman, lording her privilege? She’d smugly think to herself, not me, not ever. As she pulled out forks and napkins to set the table, she tried to remember something from White Fragility, which she’d listened to as an audiobook at 1.5 speed. “You’re from Guatemala?” she blurted. “That’s great that Kamala visited. Do you have any family there? Your parents?”
No, Ana said. She straightened the toaster.
Even as Blair wished she’d said nothing, she fought the urge to share that her husband’s grandparents had come from Mexico and had run a popular restaurant, Casa Lopez, on the east side of Los Angeles. At the Bellavista—the subdivision Sam was developing at the edge of town—he’d even named two streets after them: Via Paloma and Via Armando. She checked the time. “Sorry to keep you. See you tomorrow.”
“Jordan loves to swim,” Ana said. A statement, not a question.
“We had her in the pool before she could walk,” Blair said.
“If someone came after my daughter…” Ana leveled her gaze at Blair. “I’ll go.”
“Are you sure?” Blair asked. The forks clinked in her hand.
“This morning, you talked about getting a camera for the coop. How much is it to install one?” Ana asked.
Blair sighed. “I’m trying to make Jordan forget about getting more chickens. We should have gotten rid of the coop when we had a chance!”
While getting dressed for practice, Jordan had sobbed so hard she nearly hyperventilated.
“Sometimes the coyote—or whatever it is—digs under the coop,” Blair went on. “We’ve talked about installing an additional camera trained at the coop.”
“A camera could show it coming in,” Ana said. “Maybe it’s through the side yard?”
“Don’t worry: no chickens, no coyote,” Blair said. “El Nido’s safe, very safe. The police don’t have much to do.”
She chuckled, then caught herself after noticing Ana’s worried expression. Where did Ana move from—Oakland? Hayward? Union City? She didn’t know what fears kept Ana up at night, and if additional cameras would put her at ease. And she agreed to spy on Blair’s behalf.
It would cost Blair nothing to grant this request. “I’ll write our product manager now,” Blair said. “And get the app installed on your phone.”
*
The chickens had indeed been attacked by a coyote, a juvenile who’d never before enjoyed the pleasures of the coop. Its fur was the mottled grey and russet brown of autumn leaves, the tip of its tail black, as if dipped in paint. Until last night, this one had mostly eaten plentiful roadkill found in the verdant hills and valleys of El Nido: the leg of a deer, the smashed remains of a squirrel, and the tail end of a garter snake. Carrion.
Let’s call him Wily. The residents sheltering in place during the pandemic hit more deer, left more trash that fed more rats, all of which sustained a bigger pack of coyotes over the past year. It had been crowded, competitive, fighting his brothers and sisters to nestle at the center, for the last scraps of flesh, for the fallen fruit.
He’d left his pack in the spring, around the time this year’s pups had been born. At one, he’d been overcome by the powerful urge to roam. Like his ancestors, once known as prairie wolves, as song dogs, as tricksters and gods, who emerged from the deserts and high plains. Generations moved west, east, north, south, their way eased by pioneers who killed off predators, chopped down trees, and ranched cattle. When hunted, poisoned, and persecuted, the coyotes scattered and regrouped, their numbers surging a hundred-fold.
A couple weeks ago, after encountering the bulldozers at the Bellavista, he’d slunk closer to homes in this neighborhood. Having breached the chicken coop, having acquired a taste for fresh blood and the sweetness of domesticated flesh, Wily raised his ambitions.
__________________________________
From Coytoteland by Vanessa Hua. Used with permission of the publisher, Flatiron Books. Copyright © 2026 by Vanessa Hua. All rights reserved.
