Rowan (The K9 Files Book 10), Page 3

  “Will do,” he said. And he headed to a hot shower and then to bed.

  Chapter 3

  Friday morning dawned bright and clear. Unable to resist that same urge, Brandi got up, dressed, and packed up a couple protein bars, a thermos of coffee, a couple bottles of water, and some dog food. She returned to the site of the fire. As she parked, another vehicle pulled in behind her. She frowned on the inside because, of course, it was the same guy she’d met yesterday. She hopped out, grabbed her walking stick, and saw he did the same.

  He stopped, looked at her in surprise, and said, “You weren’t kidding about coming again, were you?”

  “Of course not,” she said. “I come every day.”

  “Okay,” he said. “Can I show you a picture of the dog I’m looking for?”

  She nodded. When she took a look, she smiled and said, “He looks like quite a character.”

  “He is,” he said. “He has also been very well trained and is very attached to my heart, so, if I can find him, I would love the opportunity to rescue him.” He looked up at the hills all around them and said, “There’s just so many miles of fire damage that it makes you wonder how far they could have gone.”

  “I imagine they’ve gone a long ways and potentially keep coming back,” she said. “At least I hope so.”

  “Are you looking for a dog or a cat?”

  Without thinking she answered, “A dog.” And then she stopped and glared at him.

  He looked at her and, in a mild tone, said, “There’s nothing wrong with still being attached to an animal that may or may not have perished in a fire,” he said gently.

  She shrugged. “Most people think I’m being foolish, and I should just let her go.”

  “Most people aren’t people like us,” he said. “We’re both out here looking for dogs.”

  She hesitated, nodded, and said, “Well, if I see him, I’ll let you know.”

  He said, “I’ll do that for you too. What kind of dog are you looking for?”

  “A golden Lab, but her markings are darker, more red.” She hesitated, then added, “She was pregnant.”

  A wince whispered across his face.

  She nodded. “Exactly. Just seems to make it that much worse.”

  “There is no worse,” he said, speaking in a low tone. “It just all hurts.” He asked, “Which direction are you going?”

  She frowned, not sure she wanted to let him know.

  And he said, “I just thought, if you went in one direction, I could go in a different one, and we could cover twice the ground.”

  With relief, she nodded and said, “That makes sense.” She pointed up to the left. “I haven’t been there in over a week. I’ll head up in that direction.”

  He nodded and pointed to the right. “I’ll head over here.”

  “Good enough,” she said. She stopped and then added, “I don’t have any way to contact you, if I do find him.”

  He smiled, pulled out his phone, and said, “Why don’t you take down my number.”

  She quickly pulled out her phone and added his name and contact number.

  “Rowan,” she said. “That’s an unusual name.”

  As she commented on his name, he retorted, “So is Brandi.”

  “My sister’s name was Whiskey,” she said with a laugh.

  His eyebrows shot up. “Your dad obviously loved the spirits.”

  “I think he felt we would be spirits, as we almost didn’t survive our birth. She didn’t, and I did,” she whispered. A tug of sadness remained in her tone that time still hadn’t dispelled.

  He looked like he wanted to say something, but he didn’t. He just gave her a quick smile and said, “If you’re back here right before dusk, I’ll see you then. Otherwise have a good day. I’ll be stuck up in the hills for most of the day.”

  “You’re not going for the whole day, are you?”

  “I’ve got five days to see if I can find any sign of Hershey,” he said. “I don’t really want to waste any of that time.” With a wave of a hand, he headed off to the right.

  She watched him, noting that his gait was a little stiff on one side. She frowned because she knew exactly how hard these hills could be, but he appeared to be physically fit and was certainly determined. He was also smart about climbing and didn’t go straight up; he angled his walk, until he got to the spot where he wanted to go and then reversed back and went up again.

  She turned her attention to the left side and picked out a path and got started herself. An hour later she was up in the area where she was trying to go. She had a whistle in her hand that she’d always used for her dog, and she called out several times, hoping—at one point in time, someday—that the dog would hear her. But, so far, she hadn’t had any luck. And she didn’t want to even think about what the options were.

  Brandi kept on walking, and about an hour later she heard another whistle. She turned, realized that she’d swung back around to the other side, closer to where Rowan had been walking. But, depending on where he was going, she lifted her whistle and called out again. She froze when she thought she heard something in the underbrush. And, up here, some green areas had appeared, where the fire seemed to have slashed through in swaths and had missed a bit of land in other places. It was kind of hit-and-miss, but a green strip was up ahead. She frowned because she was pretty sure she’d been through this section many times, but it looked different today.

  She whistled, using her lips and not the actual metal whistle, and called out, “Hey, baby, you there?”

  Hearing an odd growl in the background, she froze.

  “Hello,” she said gently, not moving any closer. When she heard another whistle off to the right, she looked up, and there was Rowan, calling out. She whistled in his direction, and, when he turned, she waved at him.

  Her phone buzzed almost immediately. Found something?

  She responded with Yes, but I don’t know what.

  As she looked up, he slowly made his way down the hillside toward her.

  When he approached and was about ten feet away, she held up her hand and pointed to the underbrush.

  “Hershey?” There was a rustling in the undergrowth. And then Rowan called out again.

  “Do you think it’s him?”

  “I’m not sure,” he said, walking forward. He stood beside her, then bent down onto his knees and called out, “Hershey? Is that you, boy?”

  Rowan knew his voice was different with the lung damage he had sustained, and it was quite possible that Hershey might not recognize him. “Hey, buddy. Come here, boy.”

  And it was also ludicrous to imagine that this was Hershey, but Rowan didn’t want to take a chance on it being one of their dogs or even somebody else’s dog that needed a hand. He whistled gently several times. After regaining his feet, he took several steps forward. Another growl came from inside the brush, warning him to stop.

  He stepped back and asked Brandi, “Does that sound like your dog?”

  She shook her head. “No, it doesn’t. But that doesn’t mean a whole lot.”

  He hesitated, looking at the brush. “Well, we can try and flush him out,” he said, “but he might come out, ready to attack.”

  “But he shouldn’t attack, unless he’s injured, or he is protecting something.”

  “It’s likely his new home,” Rowan said, studying the hidden hideaway that the dog had found, if it was a dog. “The other option is it’s not a dog at all.”

  “I wondered about that,” she said. “Do we try to feed it?”

  He looked at her sideways. “Do you have dog food?”

  She nodded and slowly lowered her backpack to her feet. “It’s probably somebody else’s dog,” she murmured.

  He said, “Put down a little bit of food, where it’s obvious that the dog can get it, and then we’ll back up and see if it comes out.”

  She took a step forward, and they both listened to another growl of warning. She opened the can and poured a bunch of food onto the gro
und and then retreated.

  They slipped off another ten feet, and he said, “Let’s just sit here and watch.”

  They both sank to the ground, where they were in a much-less-threatening position and waited. He kept his gaze not on the spot directly but within his peripheral vision. A lot of animals could feel the gaze and wouldn’t move if they felt they were being watched. And just when he was about to give up hope, he heard an ever-so-faint rustle. And something small and roly-poly came out from underneath, drawn by the scent of food, and it attacked the dog food very quickly. And then a smaller dog came out. He whispered, “Did you say yours could be with pups?”

  “Oh, my God,” she whispered. The one that first popped out looked decent, but the second one looked like it had suffered a lot more. But both were in remarkable shape, considering.

  “Do you think they’re yours?”

  “They might be,” she said. “They look like Lacey, but, of course, they don’t know me from anybody.” Her tone was bewildered and sad. “And where’s their mom?”

  “I’m not sure,” he said, “but they’re attacking that dog food like they haven’t eaten.”

  “I want to give them more,” she said immediately. “How can we bring them in?”

  “The problem,” he said, his tone low, “is that those are not the dogs that growled at us.”

  He looked over at her to see her staring at him and then she gulped. “So?”

  “A dog is in there,” he said, “who may be injured and doesn’t want us to approach. Or he probably tried to stop the pups from leaving. Or yet another dog in there, who is protecting yet again somebody else.”

  “None of which are good options,” she said. “Too many unknowns.”

  “Right,” he said, “but how much dog food do you have? I think we should leave them more, and we’ll give them a bit of space and then come back again tomorrow.”

  She frowned at that, obviously not liking the idea of leaving them.

  “We’ve got the location marked,” he said. “We don’t have leashes for at least three. Unless you have some?”

  She shook her head. “I was looking for my dog, the mother,” she said. “It never occurred to me that maybe she had her babies and that they would still be alive.”

  He watched the tears form at the corner of her eyes at the thought.

  She wiped them away impatiently. “God, what a heartbreak this is,” she murmured.

  “But technically, it’s a good one,” he said, “because now we know that dogs are here that need help, and we’re in a unique position to try to assist them.”

  She gave him a bright teary smile at that. “That’s very true,” she said, “but I don’t want to leave them.”

  “Well, let’s compromise,” he said. “Let’s leave them alone for a little bit, go back to the vehicles, take a break, take the pressure off them, so that they don’t feel like we’re sitting here, haunting them, and then we’ll come back up.”

  “Right away?”

  “Well, I want to get a leash or maybe three or four,” he said. “Then we can go from there.”

  “That’s possible too,” she said, slowly nodding. “But, my God, to be this close.”

  “And this close is not gaining their trust,” he murmured. He grabbed her hand, then said, “Don’t look directly at them. Look from the side, and I think you’ll see that something is staring at us from under the far side of all that brush.”

  She stared at him and said, “How can you see that?”

  “Because I’m looking with my peripheral vision. It’s one thing if they know we’re here and another thing to think that we’re after them.”

  “And, of course, they don’t understand that we’re here to help, do they?”

  “No, not at all,” he said, “and the minute they feel threatened, we’ll never get close to them. They’ve been on their own too long. And we don’t know even who these animals are.”

  She nodded. “So what do you suggest?”

  “I suggest we retreat a little ways back.”

  She nodded and then, with another open can of dog food, she left a bunch every ten feet down to where they sat, another fifty yards away. She sat on the ground and said, “It just feels so wrong to leave them now that we’ve found them.”

  “We’re only ten minutes from the vehicles,” he said calmly. “If you want to stay here, I’ll go get ropes for them.”

  She looked up at him gratefully. “Would you mind?”

  “No, not at all,” he said, “but also remember that it may not be your dog.”

  She nodded numbly. “I know,” she said, “but I don’t want to take a chance that it might be my dogs. These two could easily be Lacey’s pups.”

  “Got it,” he said. “I’ll be back in thirty.”

  Brandi shook her head. “No way,” she said. “You’re ten to the vehicle.”

  “And I have equipment in the vehicle,” he said. “I just don’t know if I have enough. I wasn’t expecting to find more than one dog.” With that, he slowly took off.

  Chapter 4

  Brandi watched as Rowan slowly made his way down the incline and out of view. She didn’t have anything in her vehicle of any use in this situation. She thought of all the times that she’d been out here and had never even seen these dogs. Yet now she was seeing more than one. So they’d come together as a pack, which was fairly common behavior. She couldn’t have handled even one without a rope because what if it wasn’t hers, like he said?

  These pups didn’t know her at all and were feral at that. But what had been terribly heartbreaking was how the one had been in rough shape, and yet the other one seemed to be dominant, larger, a little more aggressive and daring. It certainly understood what dog food was—or at least what food was—and it had scarfed down what it could. The second one had come farther out too.

  She took a drink as she sat and watched the two pups came back out again, looking for more food. They found the second pile and devoured it. At a sharp bark from the little blind corner in the brush, they raced back again into a hidden hollow there.

  She had her camera out and was busy taking as many photos as she could. She noted that it seemed like a whole lot longer than thirty minutes had passed since Rowan left. According to her watch, it was closer to forty-five minutes before she heard a sound and turned to see Rowan making his way back up the hill. She could see the strain at the corner of his mouth as he did the climb straight up this time. “I’m sorry,” she said. “That’s a lot of physical work for you.”

  “My therapist told me to get out and do more hiking,” he said. “I don’t think he meant for me to do it all at once though.”

  And just enough humor was in his voice that she realized he wasn’t upset at all. She said, “The pups came out to the second pile of food.”

  “Good,” he said. “That’s good news. I’ll circle around and come down from behind and above them,” he said. “I don’t know what else is in there with the pups, and it would be really nice if we had some way to know.”

  “Short of having a drone that we can fly in there or a little robot that can walk in or otherwise get a camera in there somehow,” she said, “we really can’t know.”

  He looked at her for a long moment.

  She laughed and shook her head. “I was joking.”

  “I wasn’t,” he said. “I brought a camera with me.”

  She stared at him in shock.

  He shrugged. “Remember? I’m military.”

  “Ex-military,” she corrected.

  “True, but some habits are hard to let go of,” he said. She looked at him suspiciously. He smiled and shrugged and said, “Don’t worry about it. But I’ll leave you again.”

  Rowan headed out, doing a wide circle up and around the animal den, happy that the pups were coming out but wondering just what was going on in that spot. And, even if it was Hershey inside growling, unfortunately he didn’t appear to recognize Rowan’s voice. That did make total sense to Row
an, after all the damage he had sustained. He’d caught the edge of a dirty bomb and had taken nails and spikes in several places. He’d even had an esophageal surgery, and thankfully everything had gone well, but it had left the tone of his voice ever-so-slightly different. He wasn’t even sure if he smelled the same to the dog now after all this time. After all the surgeries.

  He made it up and around the back, keeping an eye on the hollow from a good distance away, taking pictures as he went. It was a decent strip of greenery; however, from the top, he could only see into the hollow a little ways. He made it another good ten feet into the brush and then stopped. He had a good idea of where the actual den was, and he was nearing it now. The two pups had gone into what appeared to be a tiny cave. Which was also pretty damn smart. He managed to make his way down another five to ten feet, and then, thinking about it, he shut off his phone, so that nobody could get ahold of him and disturb what he was doing.

  Now atop the den, he attached the camera to a telescoping pole that he brought with him. Hooking it up to his phone, he slowly maneuvered the pole around the ground. He checked what he could see, but it was always just dirt and grass and brush. He thought the pups had to be less than fifteen feet ahead, but the telescoping pole only went eight feet. So he snuck his way a little bit closer and then moved the pole back out again. It took him a good forty-five minutes of touch-and-go patience before he finally saw something appear in front of the camera. Movement, brown movement. He waited, perching ever-so-quietly, his breath in the back of his throat, when he thought he saw something come toward the camera and then walk past. Holding the camera at a different angle, he managed to see a third pup and what looked like two adults. But very, very different adults.

  He needed to see the female and the male to find out just what he was dealing with here. Finally the female came into view. She was injured and looked burned and scarred, but it was a female-looking Lab with a lot of reddish color to her coat. With the camera feed into his cell phone, he took several screenshots, not great ones, but something that maybe he could send to Brandi down below and show her.