The story began about seven years ago, Theresa Smith said, and feels wilder every time she tells it to her friends, family and now the media.

For several years the Smiths had a Boston terrier named Pepper, who traveled back and forth between the Smiths’ home in Newport Beach and Theresa Smith’s parents in Costa Mesa.

Her parents cared deeply for the pup, who had been a member of the family for about 7½ years. So, it was simply a routine outing for Pepper when her family dropped her off in Costa Mesa in October 2016. But then, Theresa’s parents stepped out to attend church during Pepper’s visit.

When the couple returned they discovered that not only had their house been burglarized, but Pepper had disappeared.

Theresa Smith said the family was convinced Pepper had been stolen, as her habit was to always return home, even if she had escaped for a stroll around the neighborhood. When she didn’t, the family went into overdrive: posting on NextDoor, putting up posters and fliers asking people to reach out if they saw or had their dog.

“We had hundreds of people commenting. ‘Oh, I think I saw this one walking around in the neighborhood,’” Theresa recalled.

“I could not believe — until the point when we lost her — that people were so obsessed with animals,” she said with a laugh, during an interview this week. “We had people saying, ‘I think I saw an animal that got run over.’ ‘Oh my God, I saw this one walking in the street.’ ‘I saw this one in the park.’

“Every day, people were so worried and cared.”

But the family had no luck with their outreach efforts. Pepper seemed to be gone forever.

Pepper, a Boston terrier, is close to 15 years old now. She disappeared in October 2016.

(Don Leach / Staff Photographer)

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“We checked and called Animal Control daily for months and months and nothing. We just thought maybe she died, but I think she … was stolen,” Theresa said.

Finally, a call came in late last month with some good news.

“The Los Angeles County Animal Control called us, almost seven years later, to say, ‘I think we have your dog,’” she said. “I just thought, ‘There’s no way. She must already be dead.’ But, they had a dog that was microchipped and sent us a picture, and it was our dog. When they sent us the picture, we just knew right away it was her. Just the way she looked — years and years later, she didn’t really change her fur.”

Smith said Pepper mostly retained her dark fur and didn’t seem to gray out. Most importantly, they could tell it was her by how crooked her tail was.

Taylor Smith, who had been 15 or 16 at the time Pepper first went missing, said she was with her mother when the call came in.

Pepper, a Boston terrier, sleeps on her dog bed after reuniting with her family in late July.

(Don Leach / Staff Photographer)

“We were so excited. We were gonna pick her up as soon as possible. Next day, my mom drove to L.A. and picked her up,” said Taylor, now 23.

“We got her back. She was roaming the streets in Los Angeles and they went and got her, contacted us, and now we have her back. She’s almost 15 years old now and she spent almost half of her life with a complete stranger. It’s crazy. She’s blind, deaf and has bone cancer, but we got her back,” Theresa said. “We feel God got her back to us so that she could live the last part of her life with us.”

Taylor said she noticed Pepper already seemed to know her way to the door and recognized the family by scent. The two agreed that Pepper is still by and large the same. She still shakes her legs when she gets scratched in certain places, and she’s still as excitable as she was before she left. She’s as smart as they remember her being, too.

“Dogs never forget the smell of anything. I wasn’t sure if that was the case and then when my daughter came home, [Pepper] started wiggling her tail. She was so excited. We knew right away from the smell she recognized us,” Theresa said. “I get asked a lot, ‘Isn’t this the dog you used to have seven years ago?’

“She came home!”

Since disappearing, Pepper has lost both her sight and hearing but still manages to navigate the house largely by smell. The family said she recognized them immediately.

(Don Leach / Staff Photographer)