by Kelly, Diane
When I reached her, she stopped circling, sat, and cut wary eyes my way. She clearly knew her behavior had been less than exemplary, which only made me all the more angry. This relationship would never work if she didn’t respect me.
I clipped her leash on to her collar and wrapped the leash around my hand until it was taut. I knelt down, put my face in hers, and stared her in the eye in an attempt to remind her that, as far as our two-member pack was concerned, I was the alpha dog.
“Bad girl!” I hissed through clenched teeth.
She stared back at me for several seconds, refusing to blink or look away.
Forcing air up from the back of my throat, I began to growl: Grrrrr. Brigit growled right back. Damn. What was I supposed to do now? I pulled my lips back to expose my teeth. After all, that’s what a dog would do next, right? Brigit opened her mouth, too, but instead of showing me her teeth she whipped out her tongue and licked me across the lips before I could pull my head back.
“Ew!” I stood and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand, gagging and fighting the urge to scream for disinfectant and iodine like Lucy did in the Peanuts shows when Snoopy kissed her. Oh, how I wished it were true that a dog’s mouth was cleaner than a human’s. Given that they licked their butts, I didn’t believe it for a second.
My eyes scanned the area. While virtually everyone was watching us, nobody seemed to have their cell phones out taking video. Thank goodness. The last thing I needed was someone providing the footage to the chief or the local news or featuring it on YouTube in a video captioned “Kissing K-9 Cops Interspecies Love Affair.”
Brigit did the up-down tail wag. Screw you.
Again I wondered whether I should’ve resigned when Chief Garelik gave me the chance.
I tugged her leash. “Come on, girl.”
Brigit followed willingly now, trotting back to the cruiser with her head and tail in the air, happy as you please.
Once she was in her space and I was behind the wheel, I pushed the button to roll up the back windows and met her gaze in the rearview mirror. “You’ve lost your window privileges.”
That’d teach her.
I headed south to Berry Street, the boundary of my division, then turned around and spent some time cruising through the Bluebonnet Place, Ryan Place, and Fairmount neighborhoods. Weren’t nobody misbehavin’.
As the workday began to wind down, I drove north, aiming for the new mall. The Shoppes at Chisholm Trail was an open-air center of rough stone in a variety of light shades trimmed with dark wood, the effect tastefully rustic. The building was shaped like a large X, with smaller stores along both sides of each arm and larger high-dollar department stores anchoring the ends. In the center of the X sat a large glass-enclosed, diamond-shaped courtyard with a wooden façade over the glass roof to block out the brutal Texas sun.
The shopping center was named after the famous cattle trail that had run from South Texas up through Fort Worth and the plains of Oklahoma, ending at the rail yards in Kansas. A small herd of bronze longhorns greeted shoppers at the main entryway. Riding behind the steers was a bronze cowboy on horseback, his lasso poised over his head as he aimed for a willful maverick who’d strayed away from the herd and appeared to be aiming for the Abercrombie & Fitch store to check out the sales.
Despite the shrubbery forming a foliage fence around the metal cows and the Please Do Not Touch Statues sign, people inevitably squeezed through the bushes and climbed onto the back of the front-most steer to have pictures snapped with their cell phones. The joke was on them, though. The metal heated up in the sun and burned their lawbreaking asses.
Some offenses carry their own penalties.
The Shoppes at Chisholm Trail was built on the former site of an outdated strip center that had recently had a date with a bulldozer. Why the mall’s owner had chosen to combine the British spelling for “shops” with the name of an Old West cattle trail defied both logic and grammar, but given my mixed pedigree, who was I to complain about the culture clash? The mall contained a mix of chain stores and specialty niche shops, catering to both locals and tourists who were in town to visit the nearby museums or attend events at the Will Rogers Coliseum.
The mall employed its own security team, of course, and I had no obligation to patrol the place on foot. But when a girl could get paid for window-shopping, hunting bargains on the clearance racks, and sampling testers at the Macy’s perfume counter, she’d be a fool not to, right? Besides, I was afraid if I sat on my butt too long in the cruiser I’d end up with a case of flat ass. And it’s not like my stroll would be entirely self-serving. After all, when Derek and I’d worked this beat together we’d arrested the occasional shoplifter and kept an eye out for gang activity. My new partner and I would do the same.
I bypassed the crowded parking lanes and headed straight ahead, grateful for my reserved Law Enforcement Only spot near the mall’s main entrance. This time, I didn’t let Brigit out of the cruiser until she was properly leashed.
We strolled down the sidewalk, making our way past Macy’s. When we passed the pet store, Brigit tugged me over. She propped her front paws on the large aquarium that made up the store’s front window, her head whipping comically back and forth and up and down as she attempted to follow a clown fish darting around in the water.
Woof!
The frightened fish fled to the back of the aquarium, earning me and Brigit an annoyed, though warped, look from the store’s owner, who stood on the other side of the aquarium inside the store, stocking shelves.
“Sorry!” I called to the man. I pulled Brigit away. “C’mon, girl.”
Next door at the bridal shop, a thirtyish redhead in a sleek satin wedding dress stood on a low platform in front of a three-way mirror under the watchful eye of an older woman, presumably her mother. The tailor, a white-haired yet surprisingly spry Asian man named Vu, flitted around the redhead, gathering the fabric along the sides of the woman’s torso and slipping straight pins into place to guide the alterations he’d do later.
A few shops down at Williams-Sonoma, a woman in a mustard-yellow apron was conducting a quick course in fondue, offering samples of meats and breads dripping with melted cheese and encouraging those gathered around to take advantage of the sale on fondue forks and sets. While the cabinets in my apartment had no space for a fondue set, that fact wouldn’t stop me from enjoying a free early dinner courtesy of the cooking supply store.
The woman handed me a long-handled fondue fork with a sizable piece of cheddar cheese–covered sourdough skewered on the end of the two pointy prongs. Grilled cheese on a stick as far as I was concerned. Maybe not the healthiest choice, but sometimes a free meal took precedence over a healthy one.
“Delicious,” I told her when I’d finished eating the bite. I disposed of the fork in a metal ice bucket displayed for that purpose and she handed me another, this one containing a chunk of rye bread doused in a creamy white cheese.
Mmm. When I finished the rye, she handed me another fondue fork with a cheesy beef cube on each prong. I pulled the meat from the fork and fed the bites to Brigit, wiping my fingers clean on a napkin.
One of the owners from the adjacent wine store, a fiftyish woman named Stacy, stood in her doorway and held up a bottle of cabernet and a small plastic unicorn with a corkscrew for a horn. “Don’t forget some wine to go with your cheese! Free novelty corkscrew with each fifty-dollar purchase!”
Several of the shoppers chuckled at Stacy’s impromptu yet apropos sales pitch. Though I laughed along with them, I knew her pitch was far more desperate than it seemed. Shortly after she and her partner opened their wine shop, a discount liquor store opened only a block from the mall, causing their sales to plummet. I’d overheard them in the mall manager’s office not long before I’d Tasered Mackey. They’d been attempting to negotiate their way out of their lease or, at a minimum, to secure a reduction in rent. The mall manager had turned them down. He’d paid for the installation of custom-made shelving in the wine
shop and had yet to recoup the investment. The women had been forced to let their sales staff go, splitting the long shifts between just the two of them now. Working as many hours as they did had to be exhausting. But maybe their luck would turn around. The holidays and attendant festivities would be here before we knew it. Spending time with family led many people to drink excessively, too. Nothing like a crisp Riesling to take the edge off a critical aunt’s comments.
Before I could snag a chocolate-coated strawberry, my shoulder-mounted radio crackled to life, the dispatcher’s voice coming through. “K-nine team requested at Davidson rail yard. Urgent.”
While not technically located within the boundaries of the W1 division, the train yard was close by. As one of the few K-9 teams, Brigit and I were expected to handle calls outside our division when our special skills were needed. Dang. I’d been hoping to end my workday here at the mall.
I grabbed my mic and pressed the button, turning my head to speak into the device. “Officer Luz responding.”
Brigit added a woof as if to remind me that she was at work here, too.
We scurried to the cruiser, hopped in, and backed out of our reserved spot. I turned on my siren and lights to signal the cars ahead of me to pull to the side. I sailed out of the mall parking lot and back down University, reveling in the feeling of power as the others yielded to me. I took a turn onto Vickery and pulled into the rail yard a minute later.
The yard, which was operated by Union Pacific, comprised a dozen or so tracks running side by side, along with a diesel maintenance area and a large asphalt lot where the boxcars or their contents could be transferred to tractor trailers to be moved to their final destinations. Today the tracks bore long lines of railcars, including engines, rectangular boxcars bearing dry goods, and cylindrical tank cars containing liquids. Some of the cars were shiny and new, others old and rusty.
Two cruisers sat on the asphalt near the outside track, both with their flashing lights on. A late-model pickup truck sat just ahead of the cruisers, both of its doors hanging open. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that at least two people had fled from the vehicle. The only thing that was unknown was why. Drugs? An outstanding warrant? Stolen vehicle?
My former partner stalked down a line of railroad cars fifty yards ahead, his gun drawn. Officer Hinojosa, a Latino guy in his midthirties, was bent down low, attempting to spot feet moving among the trains.
I parked behind the other patrol cars and climbed out of my cruiser. “What’s up?” I asked Hinojosa as I let Brigit out of the back.
“Stolen pickup,” he said. “Mackey tried to pull them over for a traffic violation, but they took off.”
Hot pursuit. That explained why Mackey was here, outside W1.
“The truck pulled in here,” Hinojosa said. “The driver and two passengers bailed.”
This was where Brigit and I came in. I unclipped her leash and gave her the order to find the trail of the people who’d fled from the pickup.
She put her nose to the ground, sniffing in first one direction, then another, before picking up the trail and following it. As she trotted along, Hinojosa and I trotted along behind her, our footsteps crunching in the gravel. While my fellow officer pulled his gun, I opted for my baton, whipping it from my belt and flicking it open with a snap.
Brigit’s nose led her between two cars. While she could easily duck under the coupler, Hinojosa and I had to climb over it. We were sandwiched between two trains now. My partner continued on for three more cars before again cutting between them, taking us deeper into the yard.
My pulse pounded. With trains on each side, I felt trapped. If the car thieves were armed, if they took shots at us, would Hinojosa and I be able to escape? Or would we be gunned down, our blood seeping into the gravel? And if the thieves were armed, would they take a shot at Brigit? I found myself wishing my partner had a Kevlar vest, too.
One more cut through and Brigit took off running, the scent evidently much stronger now. We ran after her.
She stopped and turned to look between two cars ahead, barking to alert us to the presence of her quarry. She disappeared between the cars as the truck thieves apparently fled.
Thank God they’re running instead of shooting.
Hinojosa and I crossed between yet another set of cars and turned up the row. Ahead were two white men and one black man, all running, Brigit on their heels.
I gave her the takedown signal and she lunged ahead, bringing down the front-most man. The slower car thieves sprinted past their cohort, who now grappled with Brigit in the dirt and rocks between two trains. As Hinojosa and I ran up, I ordered Brigit off the prone man.
“I got him!” my coworker said.
I gave Brigit the order to continue her pursuit and ran after her once again. She leaped onto the back of the black man and he stumbled forward across an empty track, hitting a knee on the metal rail. He fell to the ground, clutching his knee, rolling side to side, and issuing a howl of pain that echoed off the metal cars nearby: “Aaaaaaah!”
As I ran past the man I hollered, “Stay right there!” A moot point probably. He wouldn’t be able to run off with a shattered kneecap.
Ahead, Derek stepped out from between two cars on the right. “I got him!” he yelled.
Spotting Mackey, the remaining runner turned to the left in an attempt to escape between two trains, but on my signal Brigit took him down in short order, too.
The Big Dick ran up, his face red with both exertion and anger. “I told you I’d get him!”
“And my partner beat you to it.” I offered him a snide smile before calling Brigit off the man. I clipped her leash back on to her collar and stepped back, gesturing to the car thief lying facedown at our feet. “He’s all yours now, Mackey.”
Derek glanced down at the wet spot on the back of the man’s shirt. “He’s covered in dog spit.”
“Not my problem.”
I gave Brigit four liver treats, one for each of the men she’d taken down and one for pissing off Mackey. I followed the treats with a nice scratch and a, “Good girl!”
She wolfed down the treats and wagged her tail, side to side this time.
“Come on, girl.”
We left Derek to stew and returned to our cruiser to head back to the station. As I pulled out of the rail yard, an involuntarily smile spread across my face.
A day that ended in besting Derek Mackey was a good day.
SEVENTEEN
GOOD COP, BAD DOG
Brigit
Okay, so maybe chasing the squirrel had been impulsive and disobedient. But that damn rodent asked for it, twitching his tail at Brigit, teasing her, daring her to chase him.
Brigit knew Megan had been none too happy about her behavior, but Brigit also knew that she’d more than made up for it by taking down the three men at the train yard. Besides, any day that ends in liver treats is a good day.
EIGHTEEN
TROUBLESHOOTING
The Rattler
Since he hadn’t retrieved the bomb, he had no way of determining exactly what went wrong. Nonetheless, he attempted to troubleshoot the problem, carefully reviewing each step of the assembly process. Eventually, he reached the conclusion that either dust on the fuse had inhibited the ignition or the cheap alarm clock had malfunctioned.
No problem.
There was still time for a second practice session before his target date.
NINETEEN
SHOP TILL YOU DROP
Megan
It was early August now, and Brigit and I had been on duty together for two weeks. Brigit had quickly proved to be a much better partner than Mackey had been. She didn’t talk smack, didn’t force me to listen to sports radio, didn’t make inappropriate sexual comments. Like Mackey she occasionally passed gas in the cruiser, but at least she didn’t laugh about it and hold the window lock button down to prevent me from getting fresh air.
At 8:00 Friday morning, Brigit and I arrived at the W1 station in my smart car. The
re was only one parking spot left and it was next to Derek’s truck. The Big Dick had parked haphazardly again, his pickup straddling the line, taking up two-thirds of one spot and one-third of another. What a discourteous jerkwad. Luckily for me, my car only needed half a spot. I pulled in next to him and parked with room to spare.
After letting Brigit out of her side, I took hold of her leash in my left hand and pulled my baton from my belt with my right. I flicked my wrist and my baton extended. Snap. I delivered a solid hit to the rubber testicles hanging from Derek’s truck, my morning ritual.
Whack!
Oh, what a sense of satisfaction.
My partner and I continued on to our cruiser and took off to patrol our beat.
After a relatively uneventful morning, I decided to head over to country club, see if I could catch Cuthbert wet handed. The next time he violated the watering ordinance he was getting a citation. No ifs, ands, or buts.
My patrol car followed a shiny late-model black Lexus into the neighborhood. The car turned into the driveway of the clubhouse, but I continued on, past a long fairway bordered by a copse of trees.
Thunk!
A golf ball bounced off the hood of the cruiser, leaving a small dent in the black paint. My eyes went to my rearview mirror. No sense trying to figure out who’d hit the ball. All four men who’d been standing at the tee box had jumped into their carts and headed off down the cart path. Oh, well. Wasn’t my car. No sense taking it personally. Besides, the humiliation of making such a crappy shot would be punishment enough for the offender.
I continued on, into the neighborhood. It was Friday, the day when cleaning and gardening crews swarmed over the upscale neighborhood, mowing and blowing and dusting and disinfecting, getting the houses and grounds ready for the homeowners’ weekend entertaining. I slowed for a landscape worker standing in the street. He had a gas-powered leaf blower strapped to his back and waved the air hose back and forth at waist level as if it were a huge plastic penis and he were writing his name in the snow. As we drove past I raised a hand in greeting and Brigit offered him a friendly bark: Woof-woof!