Under the Dog Star: A Rachel Goddard Mystery #4 (Rachel Goddard Mysteries)

by Parshall, Sandra

  “Holly took him in the house. It was love at first sight. She’s going to give him a flea bath right now so he won’t have to spend the night in the basement.”

  “Holly and her grandmother can’t make pets of all of them,” Tom said. He swept his gaze down the long line of runs, most of them filled now with other people’s rejected dogs. And more would come, more abandoned animals tossed onto the roads of Mason County like trash.

  When Rachel didn’t answer, Tom put an arm around her shoulders. “Hey, come on. Let’s go home and wash off the dirt and fleas and god knows what else we’ve picked up. Then I’ll go get Billy Bob. Let’s have a nice quiet evening for a change.”

  Rachel looked up at him. “No work tonight? Nobody to question or hunt down?”

  “I just need to make a few phone calls for updates from the other guys.”

  “But you don’t have to go anywhere?”

  “I don’t have to go anywhere.”

  He could hope, anyway.

  Chapter Thirty

  The jangling phone woke Tom from a deep sleep. Groaning, he pulled his arm out from under Rachel’s head, checked the time on the bedside clock’s LED, and fumbled for the receiver.

  “What?” he answered.

  “Hey, Tom, it’s me, Joe.”

  “What the hell? It’s after two in the morning.”

  “Yeah, I know, sorry. But I got a situation here.”

  “A situation?”

  Beside Tom, Rachel stirred. “What’s happen—” A yawn cut off her question.

  Tom pushed himself up and switched on the lamp. Frank blinked from the foot of the bed and Billy Bob groaned in his spot by the door.

  “Well,” Joe said, “I was kinda worried about this dog, you know, afraid he was gonna hurt himself trying to get loose, and I couldn’t sleep for worrying, so I came back over here to the pound to check on him, and it’s a good thing I did.”

  Tom clasped a hand to his forehead and closed his eyes briefly, praying for patience. “Your point, Joe? You’ve got a point?”

  “The lock on the back door was busted, and I walked right in on Pete Rasey trying to get that dog out of his cage with wire cutters.”

  “What?” Wide awake now, Tom threw off the covers and swung his feet to the floor. “He was trying to steal the dog?”

  “Tom?” Rachel sounded alarmed. “Which dog? What’s going on?”

  Tom waved a hand to hush her. “Is he still there?”

  “You bet he is,” Joe said. “I held the little bastard at bay with the tranq gun, and I locked him in the kennel. He’s making more noise than the dog. Trying to kick the door down.”

  “Don’t let him get loose. I’m on my way.”

  Tom filled Rachel in while he threw on some clothes. Sitting up in bed with her auburn hair loose around her face, she looked so beautiful that he wanted to forget about the Rasey kid and crawl back into bed.

  “It could be a teenage prank,” she said.

  “Or it could mean Pete’s connected to the dogfighting operation.” Tom sat on the side of the bed to pull on his boots. “If that dog’s an escaped fighter, they probably want him back.” He shifted to look at her. “I’m positive it was Pete Rasey that set fire to the house.”

  “What? Why didn’t you tell me? Why haven’t you arrested him?”

  “I don’t have the evidence to make it stick. I was going to say I don’t like leaving you here alone, but with Pete out of commission, I doubt there’s much danger. If you don’t feel safe, though, I want you to go over to my aunt and uncle’s house.”

  “I’ll be fine,” Rachel said. “Go, go. I really like the thought of Pete Rasey in a jail cell.”

  ***

  When Tom reached the pound, Pete was screaming obscenities and pounding on the locked kennel door, accompanied by the big alpha dog’s howls and barks.

  Kevin Blackwood, on night patrol, had arrived before Tom and stood in the corridor outside the door, grinning as if he’d never had such a good time. “Man,” the young blond deputy said to Tom, “this sure beats riding around in the dark by myself.”

  Tom laughed. “We need to get you back on day duty.” Leaning toward the door, he yelled, “Pete! It’s Tom Bridger. Just settle down. You’re coming with me, and you might as well accept that.”

  “Fuck off, dickface!”

  “Okay, if you want to take that attitude.” Tom motioned for Joe to unlock the door.

  Pete was making so much noise that Tom doubted he heard the key turn in the lock. Tom shoved the door open and sent Pete stumbling backward. Moving fast, Tom and Kevin caught him while he was off-balance, grabbed his arms and jerked them behind his back.

  “Get your hands off me!” Pete shouted. He twisted and kicked while Tom fastened cuffs around his wrists. “You goddamn motherfucking shitface—”

  “Good lord,” Tom said. “What would your mom say if she could hear her little boy right now?”

  “Fuck off!”

  “Yeah, yeah, I got the message the first time.”

  Pete kicked backward, connecting with Tom’s shin.

  Tom yanked the boy’s arms back hard, making him yelp. “You assault me again and I’ll shackle your ankles and put a gag in your filthy mouth. Now calm down. You hear me?”

  Pete quieted, his breath coming in hoarse gasps, and when Tom looked at his face he could have sworn the boy was blinking back tears. Tough guy.

  Tom didn’t try to get anything out of Pete on the ride to headquarters. He let the boy stew in the back seat, hunched forward because of his cuffed hands, looking like a kid outraged at the unfairness of being caught misbehaving. The bloody excitement of illegal dogfights probably had a lot of appeal for somebody like Pete. Tom hoped to god that trying to free the alpha dog hadn’t been a prank, as Rachel suggested, but would provide a solid link back to the fight organizers.

  “I’ll call your parents when we get to headquarters,” Tom said. “They’ll probably be surprised to find out you’re not in bed asleep.”

  Pete huffed but said nothing.

  Almost an hour later, Tom placed a paper cup of water on the conference room table for the boy. Pete, his wrists cuffed in front now, his face still screwed up with sullen resentment, stared at the cup for a moment. Then he brought his hands up and whacked it sideways. Water sloshed across the tabletop. The cup rolled and fell to the floor.

  Tom walked down the hall to the restroom, grabbed a few paper towels, brought them back and tossed them onto the table. “Stop acting like a baby and mop it up,” he said. “This table had better be dry when I come back.”

  ***

  Usually Beck Rasey was the loud one, but this time his wife Babs screamed at Kevin Blackwood. Tom could hear her all the way down the hall. “This is the craziest thing I’ve ever heard in my life. You expect us to believe our son is out stealing dogs? From the pound? Why? That doesn’t even make sense.”

  Looking past her, Kevin threw a pleading look at Tom as he approached.

  “He was caught in the act,” Tom said.

  Babs spun around. Her blond hair stuck out in messy clumps, and she wore bedroom slippers with her jeans and sweatshirt. Beside her, Beck was sleepy-eyed and unshaven. “I don’t believe you,” she told Tom. “I’m not taking your word for anything.”

  “Joe Dolan walked in on Pete trying to cut an opening in the dog’s cage. I don’t know whether he was trying to steal it or set it loose, but either one is illegal. And he resisted arrest.”

  “I want to hear what my son says.”

  “Where is he?” Beck asked. “Back there?”

  He tried to brush past, but Tom planted a hand on his shoulder. “Hey, whoa. I’ll tell you when you can see him.”

  “He’s a minor. You can’t question him unless we let you. And we’re not letting you.”

  “Didn’t Pete turn eighteen a couple weeks ago?” Tom asked.

  Beck didn’t reply, but expelled a noisy breath through his nose.

  Babs erupted again.
“Will you just explain to us why our son would do something so crazy? Huh? Can you tell us that?”

  “It’s not up to me to explain his behavior,” Tom said. “It’s up to him. The dog he was trying to let loose is one of the meanest animals I’ve ever come across. It looks like it’s been used in dogfights, maybe escaped from his handlers. If Pete had let it out of the cage, it would have torn him apart. I don’t know what the hell he thought he was doing, unless he’s gotten involved in the fights and somebody sent him to get that dog. I need some answers.”

  “We want to see our son,” Babs said. “Now.”

  “I’ll let you see him if you think you can get an explanation out of him.”

  “I didn’t say we want to help you make a case against him,” Babs shot back. “I said we want to see our son. And we don’t want you in the room.”

  Tom didn’t object to that. He could listen to their conversation over the intercom. He ushered the two of them into the conference room, then stepped into the sheriff’s office next to it and jabbed a button on the speaker on the wall. He was just in time to hear a loud POP! One of the Raseys had greeted their son with a slap. Babs, Tom guessed.

  “What the hell’s got into you?” Babs demanded. Her voice sounded scratchy over the old intercom system. “I thought you were in your room asleep, then we get a call from the police.”

  “Mom,” Pete protested. “That hurt.”

  “I’ll show you what hurts,” Beck yelled. “Don’t you have any sense at all? What did you think you were doing? What do you want with a dog from the pound?”

  Pete said nothing.

  “I asked you a question,” Beck said.

  Pete remained silent. Tom could picture the sullen expression on the boy’s face, having seen it often enough.

  “You listen to me,” Babs said. “We’ve put up with as much of this behavior as we intend to. Sneaking out to see that Hall girl, getting up to god knows what. This is the last straw, do you hear me? If I find out you’re mixed up in dogfighting, I’m gonna—”

  “What?” Pete broke in, suddenly belligerent and challenging. “What’re you gonna do? Hit me again? You better watch out, I might hit you back next time.”

  “You little shit,” Beck said. “You hit your mother and that’ll be the last thing you ever do on this earth.”

  “Go to hell, both of you!” Pete yelled.

  Then Tom heard a scuffle and the clunk of something hitting the floor. He rushed out of the sheriff’s office and threw open the conference room door.

  Beck had hauled Pete to his feet, knocking over the chair. Clutching the front of Pete’s shirt, Beck slammed his son against the wall. Pete raised his cuffed hands and punched Beck in the face.

  “Stop it!” Babs cried.

  Tom tried to get between them, but Pete and Beck kept throwing punches at each other around his head. After the third time he narrowly missed getting clobbered, he jabbed both of them in the stomach with his elbows and shoved them apart. “That’s enough. Settle down or you’ll both spend the rest of the night in jail.”

  Beck stumbled backward, gasping for breath, a hand to his stomach.

  Tom grabbed the chair and set it upright. “Sit down,” he told Pete.

  The boy slumped into the chair.

  “Out, both of you,” Tom said to Babs and Beck. They didn’t argue. Tom ushered them into the corridor and told them, “Go on home. I’ll be in touch with you after the sun comes up. Your boy’s going to need a lawyer, so you ought to start looking for one first thing in the morning.”

  As Tom closed the door on them, Babs looked as if she were about to burst into tears. Tom felt a degree of sympathy for her because he knew that seeing a kid in trouble would be hard on most mothers, but at the same time he held both her and Beck responsible for the boy’s behavior. No kid turned into an arrogant jerk all by himself. Pete’s attitude was a reflection of the way he was raised. Maybe now, though, the Raseys would stop making excuses for him.

  Tom pulled out a chair and sat down across the table from Pete. The boy stared down at his cuffed hands, his face twisted in a scowl.

  “How did you know that dog was moved to the pound?” Tom asked.

  “Plenty of people knew.”

  Tom didn’t doubt it. The capture of the pack’s leader would be a big deal to farmers and anybody else who lived in fear of the roaming dogs. One or more of the guys working at the sanctuary had probably told friends or family, and within a couple of hours the grapevine would have been buzzing with the story.

  “So why did you want to turn the dog loose?” Tom asked. “Is that what you were trying to do? Or did you plan on taking it somewhere?”

  Pete didn’t answer.

  “Did somebody ask you to get it out of the pound?” Tom persisted. “Did the guys running the dogfights want to get their champion back?”

  Pete’s head came up, and Tom knew he’d guessed correctly. Pete needed a few seconds to get his reaction under control and arrange his features into a sullen mask again. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Without changing his tone, Tom asked, “How involved are you in the fights? You enjoy that kind of thing? Seeing animals tear each other apart? You ever take Beth Hall to a dogfight?”

  Pete’s face blazed red, and he opened his mouth to speak. He changed his mind, clamped his mouth shut, and dropped his gaze.

  Tom had seen enough in Pete’s reaction to know that Beth might be the way to break down the boy’s defenses. “She’s an odd girl,” Tom said. “Not what she seems to be.”

  “You don’t even know her,” Pete spat out.

  “Well, not the way you do.” Tom paused. “Her father thought you were a bad influence on her. He thought you corrupted his little girl.”

  Pete snorted. “Well, he’s not here to boss her around anymore, is he?”

  “Sounds like you’re glad he’s dead.”

  Pete leaned forward over the table. “Yeah, I’m glad the son of a bitch is dead. He got what he deserved.”

  “Did you have something to do with it?”

  “Just because I’m glad he’s dead doesn’t mean I killed him.”

  “How does Beth feel about it?”

  “What do you think? He was always on her case about something—”

  “About you, mostly,” Tom said.

  “About everything. He thought that Korean girl they adopted was perfect. He was always telling Beth she oughta be more like Soo Jin.”

  “I can see how that would get under Beth’s skin. Did you know somebody slit Soo Jin’s tires and deliberately caused her accident? Maybe somebody in the family.”

  Pete opened his mouth, but shut it again as if realizing he’d already said too much.

  “Was Beth with you when you set my house on fire?” Tom asked. “Was it her idea? Did she throw the bottle herself?”

  “No!” Pete cried. “Stop blaming her. It was my idea, and she never even touched it.”

  “So she just went along for the fun of it? She watched while you set my house on fire with Dr. Goddard inside?”

  Pete’s sharp intake of breath sounded loud in the closed room. “I didn’t say I—”

  “Yes, you did,” Tom said.

  Pete slumped lower in the chair. “Dad says you shouldn’t ever talk to the cops without a lawyer. And I’m not going to. I’m done.”

  Chapter Thirty-one

  “If you’re sure Pete Rasey was the one who caused the fire,” Rachel said over breakfast Monday morning, “I guess I don’t need anybody playing bodyguard anymore.”

  “Yeah, I think you’re okay with Pete in jail.” Tom filled her coffee cup, then his own. “But if anything suspicious happens, if you think somebody’s following you—”

  “I’ll yell for help.”

  Rachel let a few minutes pass in silence as Tom ate his eggs and she finished her shredded wheat and berries. The day had dawned bright and beautiful, and sunlight flooded the farmhouse kitchen. Billy Bob and Frank bot
h lay on their sides on the floor, drowsing and soaking up rays. With the entire feral pack safe and well cared for, Rachel knew she should be in a buoyant mood, enjoying the ordinary pleasure of a real breakfast with Tom. But now that one worry had been dealt with, Marcy had reclaimed her thoughts. She couldn’t shake the image of the girl’s sad face. How could that lost, lonely child survive emotionally in a family that was falling apart?

  “Tom,” she said, “I keep thinking about Marcy, and her brother too. What’s going to happen to them if Mrs. Hall dies too? Soo Jin’s in the hospital, and Ethan doesn’t care about those kids.”

  He hesitated, scraping butter over a slice of toast before he answered. “I don’t know. I’ve wondered about that myself. Losing her husband the way she did would knock anybody for a loop, let alone a woman in her condition. We just have to hope her health will get better after she’s past the shock.”

  “She’s not going to recover, Tom. She’s being kept alive by dialysis. That means end stage renal failure. End stage. And she’s not going to get a kidney transplant, not with advanced lupus. The woman is dying.”

  Tom lifted a forkful of scrambled egg halfway to his mouth, halted and set it down on his plate. “Rachel,” he said, sounding to her like an exasperated adult trying to reason with a stubborn child, “this isn’t our problem. We can’t do anything about it. Those kids are legally Vicky Hall’s son and daughter.”

  “She doesn’t care about them, don’t you get that? They’re just ornaments to her, pretty little playthings, and now she’s tired of them because they don’t behave the way she wants them to. She doesn’t love them. She doesn’t give a damn about them.”

  “You can’t get involved. You have to back off.”

  She jumped up, jarring the table and sloshing the coffee from her cup. “You don’t understand. But I know what it’s like for those kids. I know what it’s like to grow up in a house with somebody who’s supposed to be your mother but never shows you any love, never does anything but judge you and criticize you and try to make you fit her idea of what you ought to be. I can’t stand—”

  “Rachel, stop.” Tom rose and pulled her into his arms. “Don’t do this to yourself.”