Never Forget: A Novella in the Echo Platoon Series

by Marliss Melton

  What to do? Call Maya to ask if Curtis was okay? He dismissed the idea. She already thought him a lunatic for claiming to see ghosts. He looked at Draco who sat there regarding him expectantly. He had to do something. He would head over to her place and at least take a look. If Curtis really was in trouble, then there ought to be some sign. He’d be better off shooting himself in the foot than waking Maya up for no reason.

  She wasn’t going to have anything to do with him if she thought he’d become delusional.

  *

  “MA’AM—” THE OLDER officer who stood at her breakfast bar scanning the file on William Godfrey shook his head, “I hear what you’re saying, but there’s not enough evidence to suggest an abduction. Do you have any witnesses?”

  He’d already asked her that question. “No.”

  “Any evidence besides a barking dog?”

  “No.” She paused, fighting the panic clawing inside her to remain rational in front of these officers. “All the evidence I have is that my son is still missing.”

  “But Goddard has no motive for revenge since NCIS hasn’t yet prosecuted.”

  “Yes, he does. His pay has been reduced. He’ll probably get passed over for an upcoming promotion since he’s under investigation. You should have seen the look he gave me when he realized who I was. My son goes over to his house all the time to hang out with his son or his nephew—I don’t know what their relationship is. Can’t you at least question him?”

  “We can knock on his door and talk to him if he answers,” the officer offered.

  “Please,” she begged.

  He heaved a sigh of annoyance while meeting the other officer’s eyes. It was clear they both thought Curtis was fine. Boys his age disappeared all the time. He’d be back in the morning.

  “As long as you keep your distance,” he replied. “Hurling accusations at the man isn’t going to help anything.”

  “Of course,” she agreed.

  Slapping his hat onto his balding head, Officer Ramsey headed for her exit with his colleague. Maya chased them to the door. They had parked their cruisers in the middle of the complex. The sirens were silent, but their blue lights strobed the brick facades of the condominiums around her. She could see the faces of several neighbors peeking out of adjacent windows.

  Too distraught to care, she planted herself on her front stoop and watched the officers make their way up the road to Santana’s condo. His mother wouldn’t be happy to see them, Maya was sure. But it was William Goddard they wanted to talk to.

  It had stopped raining, she noted absently. Heat rose off the pavement, forming an eerie mist in the cooler air. Crickets and tree frogs played background music as Ramsey and his colleague, Officer Reynolds, climbed the stairs to knock at Santana’s front door.

  Maya clutched the wrought iron railing until her knuckles ached. In her peripheral vision she noted and dismissed a vehicle approaching from the other direction. It swerved into a parking space one door down from hers.

  Her gaze was glued to the officers as one of them raised a hand to knock.

  The loud bark of a dog yanked her attention to the car that had just arrived. As Rusty leaped out of the driver’s side door, Maya glimpsed Draco’s snout jutting out of the lowered back window.

  The wave of relief that swamped her as Rusty stepped up alongside her caught her completely off guard. She hadn’t realized until that moment how much stress she’d been holding in for so many hours.

  “Rusty!” His unexpected appearance ripped away her self –control, causing her to burst into embarrassing sobs as she turned to greet him.

  “Hey.” He swept her against him without an ounce of hesitation, holding her upright as she sagged against him, suddenly exhausted. “What happened?”

  “It’s Curtis,” she managed to choke between convulsions of her lungs. She forced herself to loosen her fierce hold. “He’s missing,” she added, dashing the wetness from her cheeks.

  He nodded, looking not the least surprised to hear it.

  She turned in his arms to point out the officers standing at Santana’s door. “They’re going to question William Goddard. He’s under investigation by NCIS—one of my cases, actually—for suspicion of theft. A shipment of weapons went missing under his watch—him and two others. I didn’t realize it, but the boy who lives with him is Curtis’s friend, Santana.”

  Rusty stiffened as he followed her gaze. “No one’s answering,” he stated.

  Sure enough, Ramsey and Reynolds were coming off the stoop and heading back in her direction.

  “No,” she moaned. She already knew what this meant. They couldn’t force William Goddard to speak to them—not without a warrant, which no judge would issue at this time of night—let alone ever—given the scarcity of evidence.

  Draco suddenly issued a rash of fierce barks that raised the hair on Maya’s nape. The officers hesitated, leery of coming any closer.

  “Sorry,” Rusty said out the side of his mouth. “He sleeps with me. I was afraid he’d destroy my room if I left him behind.”

  “Let him out,” Maya suggested.

  “You sure?” He seemed hesitant to impose.

  The dog reminded her of Curtis. “Yes. Let him out.”

  As Rusty went to get Draco from the car, Ramsey and Reynolds made their way closer.

  “No one’s answering, ma’am.” Ramsey kept a wary eye on Draco while planting his right hand on his hip, close to his gun. “The most we can do is park at the entrance to your neighborhood and see if he leaves. Sometimes perps get leery and make a run for it. If he does, we’ll pull him over on a traffic citation and have a word with him then.”

  Maya’s throat constricted. That was it? That was all they could do to help? Curtis was in trouble. He needed help now.

  Draco stopped barking as Rusty released him from the car. He strained at the leash Rusty held, scrabbling onto her stoop to sniff at Maya’s shorts. His tail began to wag.

  “Is that a working dog?” Officer Reynolds asked, staring intently at Draco.

  “He’s a retired MWD.”

  “Gorgeous animal. I used to work with a K-9. Too bad he can’t find your boy for you.”

  Maya looked over at him sharply.

  “We’ll be in touch, ma’am.” Ramsey tipped his hat to her, and the two men turned away, heading to their respective vehicles.

  Too stricken to speak, Maya watched them drive away. They hadn’t done a blessed thing to help her. As their taillights blinked out of sight, Rusty put a warm hand on her back.

  “Why don’t we take Draco for a walk?” he suggested.

  The unexpected offer had her instantly pinning her hopes on the dog. It must have shown on her face for Rusty gave a slight shake of his head.

  “I’m sorry. Draco was trained to find firearms and explosives, not people—unless, of course, they’re carrying weapons.”

  She wanted to scream with frustration, but once again, she kept calm in the face of the helpless and terrified voice in her mind urging her to lose control. True, she had hit a mental wall more than once over the past few hours, but she kept reminding herself that she was all Curtis had to count on. She could not let him down.

  “Draco looks too keyed up to go inside anyway,” she said quietly, “so . . . maybe we could just try. After all, he knows Curtis.”

  “I just don’t want you to expect a miracle from this dog,” Rusty said.

  “I won’t,” she promised, “but let me grab one of Curtis’s T-shirts or his jacket so Draco knows who we’re looking for.”

  “Maya—” Rusty began.

  “Just in case,” she said. In a flash, she had entered her condo and returned with one of Curtis’s well-worn shirts. Before Rusty could stop her, she bent down and waved it in front of the dog, then rubbed it on the end of his nose, with no idea if she was doing it correctly. The dog showed a brief momentary interest, then turned away.

  What had she expected? That Draco would become the famed Lassie and start leadin
g them immediately to her son? Instead, they ambled along, walking the dog in the opposite direction from William Goddard’s condo.

  Numb with exhaustion and hopelessness, Maya tagged along, scarcely registering the sweet scent of freshly washed grass or the cool air that swirled around her bare legs as Rusty let out Draco’s lead. The Malinois loped ahead of them in an S-pattern, doing what he’d been trained to do without being asked.

  When Rusty reached out and caught Maya’s hand, a question seized her simultaneously.

  How had he known that she needed him?

  Draco gave a sudden jerk on the leash, pulling them off the sidewalk to the opposite side of the street. Maya took advantage of the approaching street lamp to search Rusty’s profile.

  Like the dog, he appeared fully alert, his senses receptive to the environment. SEALs were famous for heeding their intuition, but how could Rusty have known anything was amiss? Or had he come over for some other reason?

  She slowed to a stop, causing their hands to fall apart as the dog continued to propel Rusty forward.

  “Draco, zit.” The dog immediately sat, and Rusty swung back around to look at her, a questioning look on his face.

  “Why are you here, Rusty?” she demanded.

  Her traumatized mind wondered if he and Curtis hadn’t set this scenario up together—some sort of bizarre plot to win her over. Curtis could be waiting somewhere, unharmed, certain Rusty would lead her straight to him, thereby proving himself a hero of the highest caliber.

  Rusty just looked at her. The longer his compassionate gaze rested on her, the less she believed he would conspire with Curtis in order to win her over. Besides, Curtis had only just learned that his mother and the SEAL had in interest in each other. Why would he want to make Rusty look good?

  “You asked me earlier tonight if Ian ever spoke to me,” Rusty said.

  It took her a second to realize he was answering her question.

  A chill settled over her, causing the hair on the back of her neck to rise. What did Ian have to do with any of this?

  “He did, earlier tonight,” Rusty continued.

  The chill glided over her shoulders and down her arms, sprouting goosebumps. “What did he say?” she whispered.

  “That Curtis needed help.”

  The breath in Maya’s lungs congealed. She could tell by the gravely monotone in which Rusty spoke that he wasn’t inventing tales. She didn’t believe in ghosts—at least, she hadn’t—but fear still whipped her heart into a gallop. After all, the evidence that Rusty spoke the truth was the fact that he was standing in front of her and her son was missing.

  “We have to find him,” she said in a strangled voice.

  Reaching for her, Rusty caught up her hand again, offering his strength. He didn’t make an outlandish promise that they would find Curtis, but as he squeezed her hand in his, she felt that together, they could.

  “Draco, zoek,” Rusty said quietly.

  The dog took off again, pulling them between the parked cars that faced the sidewalk. The dog might not be trained to find people, but Draco tested the air, put his nose to the concrete, then jerked them back in the direction of Santana’s home.

  Maya’s hopes fluttered. “I think he smells something.”

  “Maybe,” Rusty allowed.

  Chapter Fourteen

  ‡

  MAYA’S HAND FELT like ice in Rusty’s grasp, conveying the depths of her fear. Christ, she didn’t deserve this—not after what she’d suffered losing her husband.

  Perhaps he was grasping at straws, but Draco definitely was behaving as if he was scenting a target. He strained toward William Goddard’s condo, his hackles bristling, his ears swiveling like satellite dishes on the top of his head.

  Did Draco think, in his warped, post-traumatic canine mind that he was back in Afghanistan, hunting down ISIS sympathizers? How could his behavior have anything to do with Curtis’s disappearance? And yet—

  A shadow drifting through the green space up ahead prompted Rusty to hustle Maya off the sidewalk in between a parked motorcycle and a conversion van. Reeling a resisting Draco in after them, he peered over the van’s hood as the silhouette of a man rounded the front corner of Goddard’s end unit.

  Maya peeked over his shoulder. “It’s Will Goddard,” she whispered.

  As Draco started to growl, Rusty dropped into a crouch banding a hand around the dog’s muzzle to silence him.

  Draco submitted to his hold, but the growl still rumbled in his chest.

  The bark of a second dog supplied the reason for Draco’s aggression.

  “Shut up, Lucifer,” muttered Will Goddard.

  Several options raced through Rusty’s mind as he tightened his grip on Draco’s collar. He could free the dog with the order to “reveire.” If Goddard had a weapon, Draco would attack him, hampering his departure. But then he’d have to deal with Goddard’s dog, not to mention a chance that the man would shoot the MWD. And Maya herself might come to harm if Goddard caught sight of her.

  “Where might you be going?”

  The sound of her voice, forceful and full of accusation, caught Rusty completely off guard. He straightened, realizing she had rounded the back of the van to intercept Goddard’s departure.

  “Where’s my son?” she demanded, blocking Goddard’s access to his vehicle.

  Her ambush had startled Goddard back onto his lawn. For a moment, it looked like he would bolt for the woods behind the condos. But then, seeing she was all alone, he lifted his chin and held his ground.

  “Whatchu talkin’ about, woman?” he scoffed. “I don’t know your son.”

  “Yes, you do. He plays video games with Santana.”

  Maya sounded angry enough to attack the man physically. As she stepped off the sidewalk onto his lawn, he reached behind his back, no doubt intending to retrieve a hidden weapon. Rusty didn’t wait to find out.

  “Reveire,” he hissed unhooking Draco’s lead. At the same time, he withdrew his Gerber blade from beneath his pant leg.

  Like a black phantom, Draco streaked out of his hiding place. The Doberman noticed him first, careening into his owner as he pranced sideways.

  William looked up. “What the—?”

  Hurdling the Doberman, Draco struck Goddard with paws outstretched. The man went down, screaming as Draco landed on top of him, sinking his teeth into his shoulder.

  The Doberman defended his master and lit into Draco, who leaped off of Goddard to face his challenger. To the sound of snapping jaws and blood-curdling snarls, Rusty sprinted over to Maya, and pushed her in the direction of the parked cars with an order to call the cops. He kept an eye pinned on Goddard, who sat up clutching his shoulder with one hand, a pistol with the other. The whites of his eyes shone up at Rusty as he raised a nine millimeter with a shaky hand.

  Rusty let him see the Gerber blade, which he could throw as fast as the man could fire at him. “You don’t want to shoot me,” he said on a certain note.

  One of the dogs gave a yelp of pain.

  “Draco, los!” Rusty commanded, certain it wasn’t his dog who’d gotten hurt. “Los!” he repeated and Draco released his opponent, which darted behind its master and cowered there.

  Rusty reached for Draco’s collar. The ex-military dog growled at Goddard, eying him intently. The man aimed his weapon at Draco.

  “I wouldn’t do that,” Rusty cautioned. “One bullet isn’t going to stop him. Go ahead and put your gun down. The police are on their way anyway.” At least, he hoped Maya had called them.

  Goddard kept his pistol trained on the dog. Tensing, Rusty prepared to hurl his dagger before the man got a shot off. But then, with a sigh of defeat, Goddard lowered his weapon and laid it on the grass.

  “Hands in the air,” Rusty suggested, hearing the sirens approaching a moment before glimpsing blue lights heading in their direction. “Don’t move,” he added, slipping his own weapon back into the strap at his ankle.

  As the cruisers screeched to a stop
in front of the condo, Maya greeted them with a quick explanation. Ramsey and Reynolds approached Goddard with their weapons drawn. But Goddard was clutching his shoulder, apparently in too much pain to resist arrest.

  Now the police could question him. Soon, they might have answers as to where they could find Curtis—assuming this creep had made the boy disappear.

  Please, oh, please, Rusty thought, don’t let this man have murdered Maya’s son.

  SANTANA JIMMIED OPEN his bedroom window, got on his knees, and pressed his ear to the screen to listen.

  “—ain’t got nuthin’ to do with that,” he heard his uncle insist.

  Why hadn’t the cops arrested him? They’d taken his gun, but they were letting him just stand there talking shit while Curtis’s mother stood gnawing on her fingernails, in the embrace of that stranger with the dog. And all this time Curtis was buried underground . . . probably freakin’ out.

  “Then why were you running off just now?” one of the officers demanded. “What have you got to hide?”

  “Man, I don’t need this harassment. You chargin’ me with something or not?”

  Uncle Will had some nerve talking to the cops like he was all innocent. Santana licked his dry lips, tempted to say something.

  “We’ll start with you carrying a concealed weapon,” one of the officers suggested.

  “I got a right to defend myself,” his uncle retorted. “This crazy woman verbally assaulted me, and then his dog attacked me, and he threatened to knife me.”

  “Don’t pretend you don’t recognize me, Seaman Goddard,” Curtis’s mother spoke up.

  “Where is Curtis Schultz?” a cop asked.

  Santana swallowed hard.

  “Who?”

  “This woman’s son.”

  “How should I know?”

  His uncle wasn’t going to tell them. The pressure that was just starting to ease off Santana’s chest returned, making it hard to breathe. Curtis was going to die, making Santana an accessory to murder.

  Tell them, said a voice inside his head.

  His stomach churned. He couldn’t. Uncle Will would hear him, and then he’d kill him or send someone to do it.