by Dale Mayer
“Grant and Ginger Buckman,” he said.
She looked up, her eyes widening. “Oh,” she said in a faint voice.
He frowned. “What does that mean?”
“They’re dead,” she said. “They were killed in a slide about six weeks ago.”
He just stared at her.
She nodded slowly. “It was on the news. But I guess the news didn’t make it down to where you are.”
“Not to mention the fact nobody would know to call us. Any news on the dog?”
“No,” she said. “I haven’t heard anything about a dog.”
“Do you happen to know anybody related to the family?”
She shook her head mutely. “I’m sorry, no.”
That wasn’t the news Weston had expected to hear. For some reason he thought this would be a simple drive out to the homestead to see Shambhala was well loved and doing fine. Then he’d drive back, visit with his daughter and escape. But the whole trip was already far more complicated than that.
“I’ll contact the police to see if I can get a report on the accident and find out if anybody knows what happened to the dog.”
“I have the number for the police,” she said, hurriedly standing up. Putting Sari down on the chair, the little girl just sat there and stared at Weston.
He tried a smile, but nothing seemed to work to make her change her expression. Except the photo of the dog. He pulled it up again and said, “Shamba.”
The cherub’s face split into a happy smile. “Doggy.” She tapped the screen. The dog disappeared. She stared up at Weston with her huge eyes, and tears welled up in the corners, her bottom lip trembling.
Immediately he brought the image back up again and showed her. “Shamba.”
When his screen went black, he got the same response. And, just as Daniela came running back with a card in her hand, he got the picture up before the waterworks started. She scooped up Sari and smiled as Sari tapped the phone again.
“She appears to like doggies,” he said with a wry smile.
“She’s also got a mind of her own.” Daniela laughed. “She wants what she wants when she wants it.”
He wrinkled his nose at that. “I’d say that is probably something all of us would like to achieve—but it’s also a family trait,” he said. “I’m not necessarily an easy person to get along with either.” He looked at the card. “Do you mind if I step out on the porch to make a call?”
She motioned at him. “Please do. I’ll get her a little bit more to eat and some milk.”
He nodded, smiled and stood. He took the card and stepped outside and dialed. Behind him, he could hear Sari asking, “Doggy?”
Daniela chuckled. “I guess that’s the only thing that’s really important to you, isn’t it?”
“Want doggy,” Sari said, her bottom lip trembling.
“No more tears. Let’s get you some milk.” She walked over to the fridge.
Weston smiled as he waited on his call to be answered. As soon as somebody did, he identified himself and said he was here at the request of the K9 division, looking into Shambhala’s history.
“They owned a dog,” the officer said, “but we found no sign of it when we went to the cabin.”
“And why did you go there?”
“Standard procedure, to make sure there were no children, visitors, elderly, or pets left behind who would suffer with the loss of this couple.”
“And were there?”
“An old cat was in the cabin who didn’t take kindly to being removed. It’s been adopted through the cat rescue coalition.”
“What about the dog?”
“No sign of it. We heard talk of a dog being there but found no sign of her when we were there.”
“Do you think it was buried with the truck?”
“The truck wasn’t buried. There was a rock slide on the road. They tried to drive around, and the truck went over the edge.”
“So, if the dog had been in the back, it could have jumped free?”
“I suppose so,” the police officer said slowly, “but I think it would have shown up by now.”
“I’m here at Daniela Rogers’s place. She thought she saw this dog at the feedstore.”
“I hadn’t heard anything about that,” he said briskly. “Maybe call them and see if they’ve seen it around.”
“I can do that.” Weston hesitated and then asked, “Was there anything suspicious about the rockslide accident?”
“No,” the cop said, too quickly. “The case was ruled an accident.”
Thanking him, Weston hung up and thought about that. Something was definitely off in the officer’s tone. But then he didn’t know anybody here, and he was an outsider. It could be the detective was just having a crap day and didn’t want to be bothered. Or he hadn’t done his job and didn’t want to have the case be questioned.
Weston brought up the feedstore on his phone, found the number and dialed it. When somebody answered, he explained he was looking for this dog, and it may have been seen around the feedstore.
“A couple dogs have been hanging around but only one recently,” he said. “A cream-colored one. She was looking pretty thin though. We put food out at times, if we get a bag that’s busted or somehow damaged. We have an awful lot of critters around—skunks, raccoons and the like—so who knows how much these skittish dogs may ever get of it.”
“Okay,” he said. “Are you against me coming in with a big crate and trying to catch her to see if it’s the one I’m looking for? If she’s not, I’d still like to get her to a rescue to help her.”
“It’d be nice if you could rescue her,” he said, “but we can’t get close enough to really help any of them.”
“Well, surely rescue groups would come in and help, right?” Weston asked.
“We called them early on. They tried a couple times but didn’t get anywhere.”
“Do you know what breed the cream-colored dog is? Does she have only three legs?”
“From what I can remember, she’s kind of shepherd looking but not quite. And yes on only having three legs. That’s partially why everyone here was giving her handouts. They felt sorry for her.”
“Yes, that’s likely her then,” Weston said. “I’m coming into town. I should be there within the next two hours.”
“We’ll see you then.”
Chapter 4
After hearing Weston’s plan, Daniela hesitated and then asked, “Do you want me to go with you?”
Weston looked at her, surprised, then glanced down at Sari, who was snuggled up against her mom again. “You don’t have to,” he said gently. “I know you need to be with her.”
“That’s the thing about little ones,” Daniela said with a smile. “She comes with me too.”
He laughed at that. “Not to mention the fact I don’t have wheels at the moment either,” he said with a nod. “So, if you don’t mind, I’ll accept your generous offer.”
“Good enough,” she said. “We can leave in thirty if you’d like. Puts us there a little early but not too much”
“Is that a problem? I can work with your timeframe. It really doesn’t matter when we get there. I had to give them a timeframe and I hadn’t asked you.”
She shook her head. “No, not at all. It’s fine.” She seemed to come to a decision as she stood and said, “Would you mind straightening up the kitchen, while I take Sari to the bathroom and grab her a sweater?”
“No problem,” he said. He started clearing away the dishes.
She noted how he turned to watch the two of them walk from the room. She had to hand it to him. This was a pretty strange event in his life, but he appeared to be handling it. She was a little disoriented by the conversation about needing to be all in or all out because she’d had the same thought herself. It never really occurred to her that he might choose to be all out. Mostly because she didn’t want him to.
At the same time though, he was correct. Sari had already lost Charlie and Angel. Sari was young and would adapt
, but Daniela hoped Weston would want to stay in his daughter’s life. He didn’t look like somebody who’d spent his life around nieces and nephews, and that made the adjustment that much harder for him. Not that she was making any excuses because, if there was ever a time for somebody to step up, it was when he found out he was a father. And yet complications for him arose, since he hadn’t found out until he’d already lost all access to the child. That was the part that really bothered her.
She had wanted him to meet Sari because she thought it was the right thing to do for her little girl. But now, maybe she was trying to give him a role in his daughter’s life because he’d had it taken away. It certainly wasn’t the story Angel had told her. But then, Angel was that kind of a person.
He was right. Angel was a bar-hopping party girl who lied to make ends meet and to make the world revolve around her in the way she wanted it to. Not the easiest of people to get along with.
Daniela placed Sari on the toilet-training seat. The little girl was doing really well. Daniela had wanted to potty train Sari early, and sometimes she managed, and sometimes she didn’t. Daniela had been happy to wait until Sari was a little bit older, but Sari had a mind of her own. When she was done, Daniela helped her off the seat, cleaned her up and pulled up her clothes. Washing her hands, she ran a comb over both of their heads and then picked Sari up and carried her downstairs, where she put on her coat.
Weston stood at the door, waiting for them, his bag in hand.
“Are you bringing your bag too?” she asked with a frown.
He raised his eyebrows. “I can hardly just stay here at your generosity,” he said. “I need to get some wheels at least, and I need to find a place to stay.”
“Oh,” she said, staring down at Sari.
“I don’t want to be a burden,” he said gently.
She looked up, flashed him a bright smile and said, “You won’t be.”
He hesitated, and she realized he really wasn’t sure about staying with her.
“It’s okay, you know?” she said. “It would be a good chance for you and Sari to be together.”
He nodded and then dropped his bag, tucking it by the wall. “In that case, thank you. But I still need to get some wheels.”
Feeling much better, she nodded. “That makes sense, if you’ve got a bunch of running around to do. I’m sure it would be nice to be independent.”
“Always,” he said.
She went to open the front door, but he stepped ahead of her, opened it and let them go through. As she walked down the front steps, he called out, “You lock the door, right?”
She looked back at him with a shrug. “I never do.”
When he frowned at her, she chuckled. “It’s Alaska, not Detroit.”
“I hear you,” he said, as he walked toward the sidewalk with a smile.
“I locked it anyway,” he said.
She shrugged. “Good thing I have a key hidden and keys on me. Otherwise I wouldn’t have thanked you for that.”
“Maybe not, but I’d still feel better to have it locked.” He hopped into the passenger side of the front seat and watched as she buckled his daughter into the back. It was still something for him to get used to. His little girl looked up at him and said, “Doggy.”
He chuckled. “You have a one-track mind.”
“Doggy.”
“We’ll go see what happened to the doggy,” he said.
Daniela hopped into the front seat, turned on the engine and pulled out of the driveway. “Where do you want to go first?”
“I’d rather check out the feedstore first,” he said. “I guess it’s a slim chance the dog is still there, but, if that was the last sighted location, then that’s our best bet.”
“And then what?” she asked as she turned the truck onto the main road.
“I need to get a set of rental wheels, so, if you can drop me off there, I’ll pick up a truck and probably take a drive out to Grant and Ginger’s place.”
“We might as well do that after the feedstore,” she said. “No point in us taking two vehicles out there.”
“Or you could go home,” he said gently, “and spend some quality time with Sari.”
She snorted at that. “We’re trying to spend quality time with you, if you hadn’t noticed.”
He had the grace to feel bad about that. “I just don’t know how long I’ll be, and it might be boring.” He glanced back at Sari, who was staring at him with a passionate look in her eye. “Yes, doggy, I know,” he said before she could. The little girl beamed at him. He laughed. “She is quite the manipulator already.”
“She is, indeed,” Daniela said. “I think all kids are.”
“Never been around them,” he said.
“This is your chance,” she said.
“I can hardly relocate to Alaska,” he said. “It’s not like finding dogs is my typical kind of work.”
“What is your kind of work?”
“Hmm. Guess I need to think about that. It’s a little hard to describe, and you’re right. I was healing and trying to forge a new path for myself. I’ve been helping out a group, finding work for veterans. Then I heard about a bunch of people doing searches for these dogs. When I found out one was up here, I asked for the assignment.”
She smiled at that revelation and filed it away to think about later. “Still, it seems strange to me that the government would shut down such an important program.”
He looked at her with a wry smile. “Does it really surprise you?”
“Maybe not,” she admitted. “It always seems like the money’s going in the wrong direction when the government is involved.”
“Lots of times it does,” he said. “So, in this case, we’re trying to make sure the dogs end up having a good life.”
“Doggy,” came the voice of the very single-track-minded little girl in the back seat.
Both adults laughed. It was only a fifteen-minute drive to the feedstore, and Weston looked around with interest. “It’s been a few years since I was here,” he said. “I have to admit. It doesn’t look like it’s changed much.”
“It grew a little,” she said, “then the stock market contracted, and some of the stores shut down. I think the population has stayed the same over the last ten years, and the businesses changed some, depending on what could make a go of it.”
“Exactly. I’m sure the cruise ports are still making big money, aren’t they?”
“More than big money when it comes to the overall economy,” she said quietly. “But there’s almost a love-hate relationship with them.”
“I think that’s the same the world over,” he said.
Before long she took a series of turns and pulled into a large parking lot. At the end of the parking lot was a feedstore.
He looked at it and said, “I don’t think I’ve ever been in this one.”
“It hasn’t been in this location long,” she said. “It was in town before but much smaller.”
“Maybe that’s why,” he said as he hopped out. He stopped and looked around and saw some trees lining the parking lot and a wooded area off another hundred yards or so. “I suppose the dog could be hiding in there,” he said, as he pointed toward the woods.
She looked at him as she leaned into the back and unbuckled Sari from the car seat. “Sure,” she said. “But I’m sure they are also hunting the alleyway, looking for anything edible.”
“That’s very possible,” he admitted. “This dog’s not exactly used to hunting and hasn’t ever been allowed to hunt for her own food.”
“I guess the dog’s been fairly regimented with its K9 training, right?”
“The K9 training can vary, depending on what the dog will do. In this case, she was use to sniffing out IEDs and people. Though I’m sure a certain amount of survival training was included in that.”
She nodded, and, with Sari in her arms, they walked toward the front of the building. He kept searching out the side area, looking for any sign of a dog.
>
Inside, the place bustled with business. He waited until he could get one of the guys’ attention.
“Can I help you find something, sir?”
“I called about thirty minutes ago but ended up coming straight here,” Weston said, “about a dog I’m looking for.”
A look of recognition appeared on the guy’s face. “Oh, right, that was me you were talking to. Come on. I’ll show you where we usually see them.” He led the way to the back. “The dogs are usually seen in this area, but I haven’t seen any today.”
“That’s always the way, isn’t it?” Weston said.
The younger man laughed. “Exactly. But go ahead and call her, and see if you can get any to come in closer.”
“Do you have dog treats inside?”
“All kinds,” the kid said. He pulled out an open package from behind a register at the back door. “We often give them the treats from here. So go ahead and grab a bunch, if you think it’ll help you get close to the dog.”
Weston reached out his hand and grabbed several. Leaving Daniela and Sari inside the building, he walked toward the rear parking lot. He started calling for the dog, using the same military whistles she would be used to. An almost weird stillness filled the air, but no dog came running as he walked past the vehicles parked in front of pallets of feed still to be taken into the warehouse.
Then he thought he caught a furtive movement. Pausing to let his eyes adapt to the strange scenery around him, he caught the same movement off to the right. Slightly he turned to watch and could see a dog in between the pallets, staring at him. He crouched down slowly. “Shambhala?” And then ordered her, “Come.”
The dog bared her teeth and backed away, and he saw her missing back leg. If he needed a sign this was the dog, that was it.
“Shambhala,” he said, his voice firm but neutral.
The dog hesitated, growling, obviously confused and not certain about what to do. Weston took two steps forward, and her hackles rose, and she resumed growling.
Then he noted the dried blood on her shoulder. He frowned, then crouched down again. “Shambhala, come here.”
The dog whined and took a hesitant step toward him.