Dog Biscuits

by Geonn Cannon

  Dale winced and stepped back. A small pile of blue cotton balls had grown next to the sink while they were talking. “A little less like you’re freezing to death. It might take a few more passes before you’re back to normal.”

  “Sorry. This is more sleep deprivation than you’re used to.”

  “But not more than I’m willing to suffer. I’ll just call my boss and tell her I’ll be late tomorrow. Don’t smile, I’m working on that part of your cheek.”

  Ari tried to keep her face still. “I was hoping this job would give me a chance to think about the Totems case.”

  “Any insights?”

  “Nothing worth noting. I still have to catch someone in the act. Lindholm has a boat. It could be like what Wayne Corbett had going on the island. Pick up drugs from Canada, bring them in across the water. I could follow that trail a little further and see what I find out.”

  Dale put oil on another cotton ball and brushed it along the line of Ari’s jaw. “Be careful when you do. And if you can’t be careful, then know I’m waiting to take care of you.”

  Ari squeezed Dale’s hand. Maybe the dangers of their job didn’t matter so long as they could keep that in mind. She might get shot at, beaten up, thrown into the water, or any number of other threats, but she knew Dale would always be there to pick up the pieces and patch her up. And she would be there for Dale when she brought the danger to their doorstep. For now, that would be enough.

  #

  In the morning, Ari wrote her report about what she’d seen and where the vandals had gone. She had to invent a story about a guard dog she’d hired to help her out. She hated to lie on an official report, but it was second nature to her now. She couldn’t very well explain that she had been the dog, that she’d been the one pursuing the vandals back home, without having her credibility and sanity questioned. They referred to the wolf as “Tule” in all official documents, just in case any judge or lawyer demanded she be presented as a witness.

  Dale checked her face in the sunlight to make sure they’d gotten off as much of the spray paint as possible. There was still a bit of blue on her ears and jaw, but makeup covered it enough for her to be out in public. She didn’t like wearing that much makeup, but it was preferable to looking as if she was bruised on the cheek and throat.

  When the report was ready, she went to the marina and reported her findings in person to the owner. He listened and, when she got to the part about where the culprits lived, he went to the window and leaned out to look toward them. He pointed.

  “That one there?”

  “That would be it, sir, yes.”

  He cursed under his breath. “That’s why it was always on Sunday. Un-damn-believable, those little bastards.” He walked back to his desk and heaved himself into his seat. “It was happening on Sunday so it would be the first thing I had to deal with Monday morning. I’m going to kill those assholes.”

  Ari thought about asking for more details, but it really wasn’t any of her business. She had been hired to find out who was vandalizing the marina and its boats. She’d done that, and now the owner was writing her a check, and that meant her involvement was officially over. She accepted the check, thanked him, and went back to the office where Dale could officially close the case in their files.

  While Dale dealt with the paperwork, Ari investigated the black market for Cynosylline. Newspaper reports indicated there was a pretty steady flow of the drug up from Mexico and through the San Diego port. A quick side trip onto Conor Muldoon’s website revealed he spent two seasons coaching a team in Phoenix, Arizona. The Mexican border was practically in his backyard and San Diego was just a decent-sized road trip away.

  She sent Diana a text, asking her to call when she had a few minutes to spare. Her phone rang less than a minute after she sent the message.

  “This really is something that could wait,” Ari said when she picked up.

  “I took the day off. Lucy had an appointment and I wanted to spend some time with her. But anything that breaks up the monotony of daytime TV is a godsend. I mean, god, how many game shows are there?”

  Ari smiled. “How is Lucy doing?”

  “As well as can be expected, I guess. A day at a time. But come on, I’ve been thinking about this nonstop. Give me some escapism.”

  “Sorry, I was just calling for a recommendation. Do you know anyone on the drug… squad? The drug unit?”

  “Narcotics?”

  “That’s the word.”

  Diana said, “Yeah, I know some people over there. I could put in a good word if you need me to. What have you gotten yourself into this time?”

  “Can’t say. I just need to know how someone might hypothetically get their hands on a drug.”

  “Uh-huh.” Ari could hear her moving on the other end of the line. “Do you have a pen?”

  Ari said, “I’m sitting at a computer. I can type it in.”

  “Wow, futuristic. Okay, Sophie Lehman is an undercover detective. I can find out where she is and get you a meeting with her. Give me an hour or so.”

  “Thanks, Diana.”

  It only took forty-five minutes for another text to arrive. “Zanjeer, the Indian restaurant outside the Northgate Mall. One hour. She’ll be in a baseball cap. Dress to depress.”

  Ari smiled and went to check the small wardrobe to see what clothes she had in the hopes she wouldn’t have to go all the way home. She found a faded plaid shirt that was worn down at the elbows and a jacket with a broken zipper. She tucked her hair under a beanie and looked in the mirror to see if she looked “junkie” enough to meet with an undercover narcotics detective. Dale stopped her before she left the office and volunteered her emergency pair of eyeglasses, the ones with the thick pink frames.

  “Junkies have bad eyesight?” Ari asked, blinking through the lenses.

  “I don’t know… it just seems to complete the outfit. But at the very least they take some of the attention off how pretty you are.”

  Ari kissed her cheek. “Flirt. I’ll bring you something sweet when I come back.”

  Traffic slowed her progress to Northgate but she managed to arrive without too much delay. Sophie Lehman was sitting at the back booth, baseball cap twisted backward, hands crossed at the wrist and her fingers tapping a beat on the tabletop. She looked up as Ari approached.

  “You D’s friend?”

  “Yeah. You the lady I’m supposed to be meeting?”

  She gestured at the booth across from her and Ari took a seat. “Call me Mirth if you have to call me anything. Last name is supposed to be Murphy, meth-heads missing too many teeth to get it right, so…” She flipped her fingers in a ‘what are you gonna do’ gesture. “Who are you?”

  Ari wasn’t sure if she needed a cover. “Tule. I was hoping you could give me some information. Drug called Cynosylline.”

  Sophie kept her head turned toward the window and her eyes moving, following traffic outside the restaurant instead of looking at Ari. “Street name is Cyn, sometimes Sweet Cyn. Supposed to give you hyper-focus and tons of stamina. People call it Five-Hundred Hour Energy. The downside is that it causes dependency to a scary degree. You stop taking it, you crash like the Hindenburg. One kid in… uh… somewhere in the east. Detroit, Chicago, Cleveland, ended up in a coma when his supply ran out. Plus, whoever created it mixed in a lot of shit that leads to a whole laundry list of side effects. Insomnia, depression, high blood pressure, anxiety, memory loss.”

  “Yeah, but hyper-focus and stamina. Sports teams must love it.”

  Sophie shook her head. “You’d think so, but no. Stuff turns up on a drug test like a thunderstorm on a radar screen.”

  Ari was stumped by that, but she let it slide. “You seem pretty educated on it.”

  “I try to be educated on everything I might run into out here.” The waitress approached and filled a coffee cup for Ari. Sophie remained silent until she was gone. “What’s your interest?”

  “I think someone is bringing it into Seattle. Not t
o distribute. Well, not beyond a small group of friends and users. I want to know where he’s getting it, see if I can find out how much he’s getting and maybe cut off his supply.”

  Sophie pushed her lips out and narrowed her eyes as she considered it. “Cyn gets the most traffic by the University, for the obvious reasons. I haven’t heard of anyone getting busted for selling recently, though. Students are already broke enough without adding a designer-drug habit on top of it all.”

  “Cyn’s expensive?”

  “Thirty pills run you three bills.”

  Ari whistled. “Three hundred?”

  “Three thousand. Like I said, this thing… you hear about that drug last year? Wolfsbane?”

  “Uh, yeah, I think I heard something about it.”

  Sophie said, “That garbage was entirely synthetic, crafted in a lab for maximum effect. It was expensive as hell, too. I never even once saw a hint of it in real life.”

  Ari wished she had been so lucky.

  “Cyn is the same thing. Lots of hype if you’re listening in the right places, but your standard drug user is going to find something cheaper. The person you think is handing it out to his pals. Is he rich?”

  “Yeah, he’s pretty well off.”

  “Then at some point, he’s probably sold the shit. I can ask around, see if anyone has heard about a new influx. Angle I’m working now, it would make sense I want to score a wake-up pill.”

  Ari said, “I appreciate it.” She wrote down her number on a napkin and passed it to Sophie instead of offering a card. “Thanks for your help.”

  “Any friend of D.”

  She started to reach for her wallet, but Ari waved her off. The meeting was her idea, so coffee was her treat. Sophie left and Ari watched through the window as she walked away. Muldoon was doping his boys with a drug that would eventually leave them dependent on his supply. She’d started out looking for ways to take them down for the drug, but now she could see that the players might just be victims of their coach.

  Either way, she needed to get Muldoon out of the way and get the players help before it was too late.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Dale’s phone was on speaker, propped against her coffee cup to amplify the sound of Ari’s voice. She’d made sure Ari was using the hands-free hookup before letting the conversation begin. She listened to what Ari had learned about Cyn and its side effects, then turned to face her computer and began typing.

  “Are you on your way back to the office?”

  “I was going to make another stop first. There’s someone I need to talk to.”

  Dale said, “Okay. Hopefully I’ll have something for you by the time you get back. Love you.”

  “I love you,” Ari said.

  Dale disconnected the phone and focused all her energy on the computer. She had bookmarked most of the Totems players, their histories, all the biographical information that she thought they might need in the course of the investigation. She called up the Muldoon tab and skimmed over it with a new eye. He started his coaching career in Detroit, so she started there. Not a bad record, but no championship. He was with them for two years before he moved to St. Louis. That was the first team he got to the playoffs, so she made a note of the dates and did a side search. After that, Muldoon spent a long stretch in Phoenix. She did a second side search on that city.

  An hour later, she called Ari. “Hey, where are you?”

  “The waterfront. I’m waiting for the guy I wanted to talk with. What’s up?”

  “I was thinking about what you were told about Cyn’s side effects. Mainly the withdrawals leading to depression and comas. I started looking at the cities he left behind in his career. Now, Muldoon has never been touched by scandals. But that’s because he’s always long gone by the time the problems show up. He’s like a shady contractor who puts on a shitty roof and hightails it to Montana before the next storm comes along.

  “I found two former hockey players in Detroit who wound up in the hospital six and ten months after Muldoon moved to Phoenix. One had fallen into a coma. He never woke up from it. The other one tried to commit suicide. He was managed to succeed at killing himself two years later. His family said he’d become depressed after leaving the team. Now, I mean, that’s a valid reason for someone to be depressed, but knowing what we know…”

  “Sounds like Cyn might have been involved. Was there anything in Phoenix?”

  “Another player suicide. His wife said he was suffering from insomnia and anxiety.”

  Ari said, “Fits the bill.”

  “I thought so. I can keep digging to see if anyone else shows up.”

  “Do it. I’ll put it together in a file for GG&M when I drop the bombshell they’re officially going to need a new coach. I don’t know what I’d do without you, Dale.”

  “With any luck you won’t have to find out. Good luck with your meeting.”

  “Thanks. Hopefully he won’t keep me waiting. I’ll call you when I’m on the way back.”

  “Be safe.”

  She hung up again and sighed. If anyone could protect the team, it was Ariadne. She just had to find enough evidence to hang Muldoon and get him away from the players so they could get the help they needed. Dale was more than happy to do her part. She flexed her fingers before she rested them on the keyboard to start searching for more skeletons.

  #

  A brief shower had left Waterfront Park’s fixtures beaded with raindrops. The boardwalk was soaked under her sneakers but the weather hadn’t kept the tourists away. They gathered at the railing to take pictures of ferries pulling across the Sound or to wave at friends and family members riding the Ferris wheel. A few were gathered around the coin-operated telescopes to scan for wildlife.

  Ari paused by the statue of Christopher Columbus and took a moment to take in the view. The park was anchored by the aquarium at one end and the Great Wheel at the other. Looking west she could see wide expanses of water broken only by the wake of ferries and the wooded side of Bainbridge Island. Turning around to look east, she could see the towering wall of the Alaskan Way Viaduct humming with the constant flow of traffic. Beyond it were the upper stories of downtown Seattle and tall cranes hanging over it all. She felt well-balanced between the natural and man-made sides of her city and took a moment to breathe in the scent of the water and the just-after-a-rain smell.

  This was her city, and this was the life she had built for herself. She wasn’t built to sit behind a desk at GG&M, no matter how heavy the paycheck might be.

  “You look deep in thought.”

  She jumped, so caught up that she hadn’t heard Dubov approaching. He had his hoodie pulled up over a baseball cap, the upper half of his face hidden by sunglasses. She gestured toward a seating area near the fountain where they could be at least partially unnoticed by passersby. He followed her and they sat next to each other on a bench that faced the water.

  “Sorry if I startled you,” he said.

  “Don’t be. I should’ve been watching for you. Nice outfit.”

  He smiled. “Bryan called it Unabomber chic. But I thought if I had to meet with you, I might want to look insuspicious.”

  She assumed he meant inconspicuous and smiled without correcting him. She liked his word better. “I have a problem, Mr. Dubov.”

  “You can call me Tyler.” He shifted uncomfortably and scanned the crowd. They were both keeping their voices down, and the fountain behind them was loud enough to discourage eavesdropping, but she understood his anxiety. “Is it about me coming out? ‘Cause I talked to Bryan about it, and I’m going to talk to the coach, and I think I just have to find the right time. I stopped with those awful tweets and—”

  Ari said, “It’s actually not about that. As long as the tweets have stopped, I don’t care when you come out. That’s your schedule. I have a problem with the other guys on your team.” She took out the baggie with the Cyn pill and put it on her thigh so he could see it without actually passing it over. No good ever came fr
om one person passing another a baggie with a pill in it, especially not when one of those people was obviously hiding his identity. “You recognize that?”

  “It’s a pill?” He leaned closer. “Uh… no? What’s it for?”

  “It’s called Cyn, Sweet Cyn, Cynosylline… It’s a performance-enhancing drug.”

  Dubov leaned away quickly. “Ah, geez. What are you doing with that?”

  “I got it from one of your teammates’ bags. You’ve never seen anyone popping pills like this?”

  He shrugged. “Guys pop pills all the time. Caffeine pills, shit for anxiety, pain, whatever. Hell, it’s not even just sports. Everybody’s popping pills all day long. But I’ve never, like, examined what they’re taking. One of my guys has this?”

  “If it helps, it’s one of the guys you told me felt sketchy about.”

  He didn’t look comforted.

  “What I don’t understand is how they’re getting away with it. This drug stays in their system long enough to get picked up on a drug test.”

  Dubov laughed and leaned forward, elbows across his knees. “You know how many guys in the NHL have been caught doping in the last ten years? Three. Out of, what, eight hundred guys on the ice. You look at football and baseball where performance-enhancing drugs are considered a necessary evil, you think hockey is just that clean? No, our screening is a joke. You know how often I’ve been tested in my entire career? Four times.”

  Ari said, “So they don’t care?”

  “They’re just not looking. And if they do find someone who tests positive, like the blind squirrel finding an acorn, they just get a twenty-game suspension for the first offense. Most of us are paid well enough that we can deal with that just fine. This stuff’s really bad?”

  “A guy in Detroit fell into a coma when his supply ran out. He never woke up. Some others suffered from anxiety and depression. Tried to kill themselves. At least one of them was successful.”

  Dubov hung his head and pushed his hoodie off. “There are guys on my team using it?”

  “At least one I know of. Three more I suspect. Could be more than that.”