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Bozo had already recognized the car and was barking eagerly as he headed in that direction. Now two cars blocked Jane Dobson’s driveway.
When Dan opened the door to step out, Brandon pretended to fall against him. “You’re Adam,” he whispered urgently. “You live up the street. Bozo says Lani’s inside somewhere. No sign of Rojas.”
Dan got out of the Explorer with Hulk on his own leash. Brandon passed Bozo’s leash to Dan, then stumbled to the passenger side of the Escalade and made a show of rummaging through the glove box.
“Ma’am,” he heard Dan saying behind him. “I’m Adam, from just up the street. Sorry about my friend. I’m afraid he’s had a bit too much to drink, but you really shouldn’t try driving a vehicle with that kind of damage.”
“I want you both out of my way. Now!”
There was desperation in Jane Dobson’s voice now, along with the very real expectation that whatever order she issued would be instantly obeyed. Brandon turned back toward her carrying a fistful of paperwork, supposedly the insurance documentation that she didn’t want or need. He was pretending to be dead drunk. He had parked in the wrong driveway. The accident was clearly his fault, and yet she didn’t care about making an insurance claim? There was something wrong about that—something very wrong.
As Brandon stepped toward her, the woman moved back to the Acura’s open driver’s side door. Leaning inside, she emerged carrying a leather purse. When Brandon saw her shift the purse from her right hand to her left and then reach inside with her right, the hairs rose on the back of his neck. She could have been reaching for a cell phone, but his gut said she wasn’t. She had to be reaching for a weapon.
With his Glock in a small-of-the-back holster, Brandon knew there was no way he could manage any kind of gunslinger quick draw. “Gun!” he shouted, hitting the deck and hoping that Dan would do the same.
What Brandon didn’t realize—what he hadn’t observed in any of Dan Pardee’s dog-training sessions—was that, in the world of combat dogs and their handlers, that single word, “Gun!,” was an urgent command all its own. Hulk didn’t react immediately because his master hadn’t issued the command. Brandon had done so, and Bozo was Brandon’s dog now. The shepherd’s crouch-powered spring covered the distance between him and the woman in a single leap. He knocked her flat and was all over her while the offending gun went spi
“Get him off. Get him off!” she screamed. “He’s hurting me!”
“Off!” Brandon and Dan ordered together. “Leave it,” Dan added for good measure. Obligingly, Bozo stepped away.
Jane sat up and used the frame of the car to pull herself to her feet. The gray wig she was wearing had been knocked askew. Blood flowed from her damaged right wrist.
“That dog is vicious and needs to be put down. I’m calling the cops.”
“Please do,” Brandon said. “Actually, I can hear sirens, so one of your neighbors must have already phoned it in. Dan, you and Hulk keep an eye on her. Don’t let her go anywhere. In the meantime, there’s something Bozo and I need to do.”
Brandon stepped forward and picked up Bozo’s lead. Then he drew a strip of colorful material out of his pocket and held it out to Bozo. “Find,” he ordered. A moment later, Bozo was standing at the back of Lani’s Fusion barking his head off.
With his heart racing in his chest, Brandon walked over and pressed the trunk release. At first glance, Lani was so still that he thought she was dead. After a heart-stopping moment, he realized she was asleep. Not asleep—unconscious. A moment after that he spotted the tiny but still-bleeding puncture wound on her arm.
He spun around and strode back to the woman, who was leaning against her car. “What have you done to her?” he demanded, brandishing his fist. “If she dies . . .”
Brandon might have gone after her then and there, but Dan barred his way, Dan and Hulk together.
“The cops are here,” Dan said. “Let them handle the situation.”
“Lani’s there. We need to get her out of the vehicle.”
“No,” Dan told him. “The cops need to see it—all of it.”
A patrol car pulled up behind Dan’s Explorer, followed by an aid car and a fire truck. The young patrol officer who walked up the driveway toward them was exactly the kind of cop Brandon had worried might walk into this mess—someone who was inexperienced and still wet behind the ears. The name plate pi
“A man named Henry Rojas kidnapped my daughter and locked her in the trunk here,” Brandon explained, stepping toward the Fusion. “I believe this woman was his accomplice.”
“I didn’t!” the woman screamed. “I had nothing to do with it—nothing at all. And that man set his dog on me. Look at my wrist. It’s a wonder I’m not dead.”
Ignoring the woman’s protestations, Officer Lopez followed Brandon and Bozo to the back of the Fusion and peered inside.
“Is that your daughter?” he asked.
Brandon nodded.
“Is she dead?”
“She’s still alive, but she needs medical attention. The man holding the other dog is Dan, her husband.”
“Any guns here?” Officer Lopez asked.
“I have one,” Brandon admitted. “And so does Dan. He’s Border Patrol. I’m Brandon Walker, retired sheriff of Pima County. We both have permits. The woman there tried to draw a weapon on us. It’s over there on the far side of her vehicle. If it hadn’t been for Bozo here, Dan and I would be history.”
Lopez nodded. “Sounds like a valuable animal. We had a report of shots fired, but we couldn’t get an exact location. When someone called in to report a disturbance at this address, we came here instead.”
“You said there were shots fired?” Brandon asked. “I never heard any.”
Just then an oversized van with SWAT stenciled on the outside pulled up beside Dan’s vehicle, and a team of battle-ready cops spilled out.
Officer Lopez turned to the woman. “Excuse me, ma’am, is there anyone else in the residence? This Mr. Rojas, I believe the name was. Is he still inside?”
“I don’t have to talk to you,” she said. “I want my lawyer, and I need a doctor.”
“What’s your name, ma’am?”
“Dobson,” she said. “Jane Dobson.”
“The wrist doesn’t look all that bad,” Lopez said. “In fact, it’s already stopped bleeding, but do we have permission to search your premises?”
“You most certainly do not!” Jane Dobson said. “You need a warrant.”
Unperturbed, Lopez turned to Brandon. “Is it your understanding, Mr. Walker, that Mr. Rojas might still be inside the house and could possibly be in danger?”
When it came to needing a search warrant, the belief that someone might still be in danger was an automatic get-out-of-jail-free card.
Brandon nodded. “We know Rojas drove Lani here, but we haven’t seen any sign of him.”
Someone Brandon assumed to be the shift supervisor rolled up in an unmarked vehicle, and a uniformed officer named Sergeant van Dyke stepped out. He and Lopez huddled for a moment. At the end of their discussion, Lopez cuffed Jane Dobson and led her toward his patrol car while Van Dyke ordered everyone else away from the area.
“But what about my daughter?” Brandon demanded. “She needs medical attention.”
“I’m sorry,” Van Dyke said. “She stays where she is until we clear the residence.”
Much as he didn’t like it, Brandon knew that was the right call—the only reasonable call. Moments later, the SWAT officers entered the house with weapons drawn. The team leader was back out in less than a minute. “House is clear, but we need the M.E.”
“You’ve got a body?”
“Yup.”
Van Dyke turned back to the nearest EMT. “You’re good to go,” he said.
Brandon followed the medics back into the garage and watched while they carefully removed Lani from the trunk and placed her on a gurney.