J Jance - Queen of the Night

That was the start of it. Dan had applied for the Shadow Wolves, where he had been accepted into the training program and where he had aced every test. The job paid well enough that, even though he was unmarried, he was able to use his VA benefits to buy his first house. It was still a sparsely furnished home on Tucson ’s west side, but it came with a spacious fenced backyard where Bozo had the run of the place. Best of all, unlike so much rental property, it didn’t come with a lot of rules, including the dreaded NO PETS ALLOWED prohibition.

Yes, this was a place both Dan and Bozo could call home.

Once on board with the Shadow Wolves, Dan found it easy to prove his worth. He loved the work and he was good at it. As the weeks passed, however, with Dan going off to work and with Bozo staying home, he could see that the dog was growing more and more depressed. Bozo understood work. He knew that Dan was working and he wasn’t, and the dog didn’t like being left behind. Bozo demonstrated the extent of his separation anxiety by chewing up any number of expensive items-shoes, boots, holsters, and drywall-anything that was within easy reach.

Dan knew the dog well enough to understand the problem. He had two choices-either lock the dog in a pen outside and leave him there all day long or else put the dog to work, too. Talking Bozo’s way into Shadow Wolves hadn’t been easy.

“In case you haven’t noticed, Wolves don’t need K-9 units,” Captain Meecham told him. “Period. Besides, as near as I can tell, Bozo is definitely not an Indian.”

Meecham’s bloodlines and face said Kiowa even if his name did not.

“Let me show you what he can do,” Dan had offered. “Wouldn’t it make sense if we knew in advance if a vehicle was carrying illegal drugs as opposed to just illegal aliens? Get yourself a bag of grass from the evidence room and hide it in one of the cars outside in the parking lot. Let’s see how long it takes Bozo to find it.”

Dan had taught Bozo that little trick at their newly purchased, once foreclosed, home in Tucson. As a target, he had salted his own car with a small amount of grass he had taken off one of his neighbors’ junior-high-school-aged kids who was standing on a nearby street corner selling it to his classmates. Dan didn’t arrest the kid because what went on inside the Tucson city limits was outside Dan’s jurisdiction, but he knew he had scared the hell out of that pint-size dealer.

It took Bozo less than five minutes to transform Aaron Meecham into a believer. Once turned loose in the parking lot, Bozo had trotted purposefully up and down the aisles before stopping and vaulting into the back of Aaron’s immense Toyota Tundra and barking wildly at the stainless-steel tool chest where Aaron had hidden the weed.

“Okay, okay,” he said. “I’m impressed. I suppose we can try it for a while, unofficially, that is.”

Aaron had gone back inside then. As Dan walked Bozo through the parking lot and back to his vintage Camaro, the dog alerted two more times-at other vehicles, at coworkers’ cars.

“They’re working here and using weed themselves?” Dan asked the dog. “It’s a good thing Captain Meecham didn’t hang around long enough to see that. If he had, there’d be hell to pay.”

Now, a year after that test run, Bozo rode shotgun in the front seat of Dan’s green-and-white Border Patrol SUV every time Dan went out on patrol. He loved it. So did Dan. Because of the rough terrain and the possibility of high-speed chases, Dan had found a dog harness that allowed him to fasten Bozo’s seat belt and keep him secure.

The dog was almost eight years old now. He had started limping a little again. The vet said that he had developed a bit of arthritis in his left rear leg, the one that had been damaged by the IED, and that maybe it was verging on time for Bozo to retire, but Dan didn’t want to think about that, not yet.

At the moment the two of them worked four ten-hour shifts a week. They went on duty at 8:00 P.M. and were off again at 6:00 A.M.

Dan was glad to have Bozo’s company through the long boring hours of patrolling and to have him there as backup during the occasional confrontation. Even the fiercest thug tended to give it up when faced with Bozo’s snarling countenance. And if one of them ever fought back and harmed the dog? Dan wasn’t sure what he’d do, but he didn’t think it would be inside the regulations.

While Bozo finished eating, Dan took his coffee, settled down in his one good chair, and turned on the TV. Punching the clicker, he paused briefly at CNN to pick up the headlines, and then moved over to his DVR to watch ESPN’s coverage of last night’s Padres game.

And that was how Dan Pardee spent a lazy Saturday afternoon, drinking coffee and watching the Great American Pastime with his faithful companion at his side.

Life didn’t get any better than that.

Casa Grande, Arizona

Saturday, June 6, 2009, 1:00 p.m.

96º Fahrenheit

Sue and Geet Farrell had lived in the same three-bedroom ranch-style home in one of Casa Grande’s older sections for as long as Brandon had known them. As he drove down the broad flat avenue that June afternoon, Brandon could tell that the neighborhood had seen better days. The street was lined with dead and dying palm trees. It took water to keep palm trees alive, and these days people were cutting back on water bills.

In front of Geet’s house four wilting palms still clung stubbornly to life, but the yard around them was a weedy, parched wasteland. Not xeriscaped-just dead. As for the house itself? The composition roof appeared to be close to the end of its lifetime, and the whole place could have used a coat of paint except for the peeling trim around the windows, which needed scraping and several coats. A wheelchair-accessible van with handicapped plates sat forlornly in the driveway as silent testimony to the losing battle being waged inside the house. Brandon parked next to it.

At the front door a sign over the doorbell button asked visitors to abstain from ringing it and to come around to the kitchen door so as not to disturb the patient. When Sue answered Brandon ’s light knock, he was shocked by how worn and tired she looked. She was dressed in nothing but an oversize T-shirt and a pair of cutoffs. With her hair lank and loose and with her face devoid of makeup, she looked like hell. Geet may have been the one who was dying, but Sue Farrell was also paying a terrible price.

“How’re you doing?” he asked, giving her a hug.

“Not all that well,” she admitted.

“Why?” he asked. “What’s going on?”

She shrugged and shook her head. “It’s tough. Everybody leads you to think that hospice is this really great thing, that once you accept it, life just smooths out and everything is peachy keen. What a load of crap! The hospice people are here a couple of times a week, and I’m grateful for that, but when Geet was in the hospital, he had round-the-clock nursing. Here at home, it’s up to me twenty-four/seven. People offer to help out from time to time, but it’s mostly my problem.”

“Is there anything I can do to help today?” Brandon asked.

Sue thought about that for a moment. “He’s asleep right now. I gave him some pain meds a little while ago. If you could sit here with him long enough for me to go to the grocery store and to pick up some prescriptions from Walgreens…”

Brandon ’s heart ached for her. Sue Farrell needed to run away, too. Looking at her haggard face, he caught a glimpse of his own possible future.

“Of course,” he said. “Not a problem. Take your time. Do whatever you need to do. In fact, if you want to kick up your heels and go visit a friend or see a movie, that’ll be fine, too. I’ll be happy to look after Geet for you. It’s the least I can do.”