Rottweiler Rescue (26 page)

“Are you hurt?” he asked, looking at the way I was cradling my right arm with my left.

“My collarbone was broken when he ran me off the road last night, and I threw away the sling when I crawled through a window to get out of the house. A second-story window,” I said, hoping for sympathy.

No sympathy was forthcoming. He just said, “Come with me. You can sit down in my car, warm up, and tell me what happened. The paramedics will look at you soon.”

Sitting down sounded good, so did warm. Now that I wasn’t moving and flooded with adrenaline, the chilly air of the fall night was biting through my jeans and sweatshirt, and every ache and pain was back full force.

 “Okay, I just need to get Robo. He’s in the way tied to the fence there.”

“Leave him. He’ll be fine. I need to talk to you.” His young face was set in the same hard lines as the other deputy’s.

Robo was lying quietly by the fence. I wanted him with me, but it was true that he would be safe where he was for a while. Horton led the way to one of the squad cars and opened a back door. The sight of the door with no inside handle changed my mind about cooperating.

“Arrest me and force me in there if you have to,” I said, “but I won’t get in unless you let me go get my dog.”

He looked uncertain for a moment. Neither of us found out what he would have done.

“You’re not getting in at all,” said Brian Forrester as he walked around the back of the car. “We’ll get the dog, then you’re coming with me.”

“Lieutenant....” Horton didn’t like it at all.

“I’m here unofficially, off duty, and in my own vehicle. Ms. Brennan is hurt. She’s refusing treatment by paramedics and accepting a ride with me.” His voice dropped low and challenging. “Is that going to be a problem?”

“No, sir, Lieutenant,” said Horton, all but saluting.

Brian and I walked across the yard to Robo in silence. All around us, emergency workers did their jobs. Firemen had reduced the flames from the house by more than half and soaked the nearby trees.

The paramedics loaded Erich into the ambulance, slammed the doors behind him, and drove off, lights flashing and sirens blaring. Deputies searched the yard. Flashes cut through the night as investigators photographed everything.

Yet somehow, the sensation of all eyes on us was so strong everyone seemed frozen in place.

We reached Robo, and I whispered a few words of reassurance to him as I unhooked his leash from the fence, then turned to Brian. Tension was in every line of his body, his eyes narrow and mouth tight.

“What’s going on?” I asked. “Why did you say you’re here unofficially?”

He shook his head. “Later. Did you really shoot Kohler?”

“Only after he firebombed the house and....”

He cut me off. “Did you give anyone a statement?”

“No, Erich was demanding attention, and of course he’s wounded, so everyone did pay attention to him. Deputy Horton was the first one who wanted to hear my story, and he wanted me to get in the car first. That’s when you showed up.”

“Good.” He took the leash from me. “We need to get out of here. If anyone stops us, your collarbone is broken. It hurts like hell, and you think you may be going to pass out, and you want me to take you to the hospital.”

His attitude was both confusing and frightening. Did I trust him enough to just do what he wanted without an explanation? Yes, I realized. And the pain in my shoulder was reaching new heights.

Not only that, the death throes of my house were too terrible to watch, and I wasn’t going to get into the cage of the backseat of an official car voluntarily, with or without Robo.

“Okay,” I said. “I’m with you. They took my gun, but if you let me have yours, I’ll shoot anyone who gets in our way.”

“That not funny,” he said through his teeth.

Sure it was. If not, why was I choking back laughter? Or was that sobs?

No one tried to stop us as he led the way to a dark blue Jeep Cherokee. Once Robo was settled in the back and I was in the passenger seat, Brian wasted no time getting us out of there. As he turned off the dirt road onto pavement, I saw him glance in his rearview mirror almost as if he expected to be followed.

“What’s going on?” I asked him again.

“I’m officially off the Sheffield case, under orders to take some time off, and most especially and emphatically under orders to stay away from you. Everyone back there knows it. Hell the firefighters and paramedics probably know it.”

“But why?”

“Because the deputy who did the drive bys on your house last night reported seeing my car, or actually as he pointed out, the county’s car, in your driveway — at 3 a.m., at 5 a.m., and at 7 a.m. Oh, and his report mentioned that the lights in the house were all out. And to make sure the report didn’t just get filed away, he told everyone he met about it this morning.”

“The bastard! Isn’t there supposed to a thin blue line or something? Is that only for city cops?”

In the light from the instrument panel, his face was shadowy, but I could see him finally relax, see the slight smile.

“If it had been anyone but Yates, he would have talked to me first, but he and I... see the world differently. The thin blue line probably fades away here and there in the city too.”

“So that’s why you didn’t answer my phone calls.”

“Afraid so. After spending the afternoon yes-sirring and no-sirring most of the department brass, I just stomped out of there and didn’t even think about messages until almost hour ago. Of course, I thought you were safe at Susan’s.” His tone was more resigned than accusatory.

I told him then about Susan showing up late in Wesley’s wreck of a car. About her grandchildren.

“What a screwed up mess,” he said. “Not much else could have gone wrong.”

“Sure it could,” I pointed out. “Robo could have ignored whatever he heard in the yard, and he and I would be crispy critters right now.”

Brian gave another quick glance in the rearview mirror. The road behind us was still empty.

“Are you expecting someone to chase us down and make me get in Horton’s car after all?” I asked.

“No, not really, but they’ll be wanting to get a statement from you as soon as possible. Which is why I wanted to get you out of there and talk to you first. Before you give any statement, you talk to Turner. Go over everything with him and do what he says.”

Surprise kept me from saying anything.

“I’m serious. You need to talk to Owen Turner or another lawyer right away,” he repeated. “If anyone wants to talk to you before you see him, have Susan handle it for you, tell them you’ve taken a sleeping pill or a tranquilizer or something.”

“
I
need a lawyer? You think
I’m
the criminal here?” I asked, ready to argue.

“No, damn it, I don’t. You’re the victim, and the worst part of my job is watching what happens to people like you who get dragged into the system by scum like Kohler. Victims, witnesses, relatives, neighbors. Look at you. You’ve got broken bones, cuts and bruises all over. Your car’s totaled, one of your dogs was shot, your house and everything in it is gone. And, yes, there are some prosecutors who don’t think citizens should have guns, much less ever use them. They’ll add to your misery while they chew over whether to charge you or not.”

My indignation turned to fear. “And will they?”

“Not in the end,” he said. “Probably not. No jury would convict you, and they’ll realize that, but having Turner’s help will make it a sure thing and get you out from under the threat a whole lot faster.”

“Okay,” I said. “I’ll leave a message for him tonight and talk to him before I give any statement.”

We were at the intersection of Pine Lane and Parker Road now. A right turn would take us to the hospital, a left to Susan’s. The right turn indicator was flashing.

“I don’t want to go to the hospital again,” I said. “Please. Nothing’s really worse than it was. If a pain killer and rest don’t fix things by morning, I’ll go to my own doctor.”

Wordlessly, he flipped the turn indicator to the left, but we only barely started south on Parker Road before he again signaled a right turn, pulling into the parking lot beside Walgreen’s.

“You look like the sooner you get something for the pain, the better,” he said. “Stay here. I’ll go in. Advil?”

I nodded, then watched him walk into the store. He should have looked unofficial, dressed in jeans, with a sheepskin coat hanging open over a corduroy shirt, but something in the set of his shoulders and confidence of his walk made me wonder if he was ever really off duty.

I leaned back and closed my eyes, but scenes of smoke and fire immediately filled my mind. So I got out, opened the back door, and started a gentle examination of Robo. He rolled an eye at me but didn’t move until I tugged his collar and made him sit up so I could get to his other side.

“Is he all right?” Brian said, walking up behind me.

“So far as I can tell, but I don’t think jumping out of second-story windows and taking down murderers is exactly what Dr. Hunsaker had in mind when he said he should take it easy for a couple of days.”

“That’s how you got out?”

“It was the worst part.”

He made a sympathetic sound, then said. “Come on, get back in. I’ve got some stuff for you.”

He not only had Advil, he had a bottle of water to wash the pills down. And an arm sling that looked every bit as sturdy as the one the hospital had given me the night before.

“They had it in with knee braces and some other stuff,” he said, helping me adjust the neck straps. Warm hands brushed my neck. I fought the urge to just lean into him and hide from the world.

“How’s that?” he asked, finishing with the straps.

“Fine,” I said. “I’m really sorry you’re in trouble with the department over me. It will be worse after tonight, won’t it. Will they suspend you?”

“Nah, more of the same. Maybe more time off, but I’ve got a lot of leave time built up anyway.”

“That’s not right. They shouldn’t do that to you because of me.”

“It is right. Getting personally involved with a witness is unprofessional. I jeopardized the investigation and maybe the conviction. If Kohler’s attorney finds out about it, he’ll claim we conspired to frame his poor, innocent client because he doesn’t like dogs and you’re obsessed with them. After tonight you and I are going to be strangers until Kohler’s convicted and locked away.”

He closed my door, walked around and got behind the wheel in a way that told me he wanted to change the subject, but I wasn’t ready to let it go.

“Did you tell them I forced you to come in the house and that you slept on the couch with Millie?”

“I did not.” There was a lot of male ego in those three words. I knew better than to say more.

He turned to face me. “Look, I should have called a female deputy to stay with you last night. And if I had, you wouldn’t have been alone there for Kohler to take another crack at. I’ve been breaking rules over you since that first interview.”

I thought back. “All that happened then was that I made you mad.”

“You did. You got to me good, and I let it show. Believe it or not, I don’t usually lose my temper like that in an interview — even with a smart mouth like you. Like I said before, it’s a part of the job I don’t like. Right at the beginning people like you have no idea what it’s going to cost them, getting caught up in the system. So there you were, you actually knew a judge well enough to call him for help, and instead of trying to help yourself, you were putting all your effort into keeping the dog away from us. I wanted to wring your neck. I wanted to....”

He stopped himself, deciding not to tell me exactly how much mayhem he’d wanted to inflict, then went on. “Of course, it probably made a difference that you weren’t a hairy truck driver or a seventy-year-old grandmother.”

With any luck at all, the shadows concealed the self-satisfied smile his words put on my face. I didn’t want him to start the car, take me to Susan’s, and disappear from my life for who knew how long.

“It will take years before the trial is over and he’s convicted.”

“Months,” he said. “It won’t be that bad. I’m hungry. How about you?”

At the thought of food, my stomach contracted sharply, letting me know the sandwich and couple of cookies I’d had with Susan and her grandchildren had been too little too long ago. And of course getting food meant putting off the drive to Susan’s.

“Yes, I’m hungry, but I can’t walk in anyplace looking like this.”

“Drive through,” he said, starting the car.

I ordered a double cheeseburger, large order of fries, and chocolate shake. This was a major comfort food kind of night. But something else niggled at me.

“You haven’t asked what happened,” I said.

Brian’s eyes met mine in the semi-darkness. “No, I haven’t.”

“I can’t tell you?”

He was silent so long I expected him to say no, but in the end, he crumbled his hamburger wrapper into one of the bags, crunched the bag and said, “Oh, go ahead, I’ve got nothing to take notes with, and I’ve got a lousy memory. So do you because by tomorrow you’re going to forget we ever had this conversation.”

So I told him about it — all of it, the sounds and the smells, and the fear — and felt a vast relief in the telling. When I was done, I asked him, “So am I a criminal too? It felt right. It still feels right.”

“As far as I’m concerned, if you’d shot him between the eyes with the dog holding him down for you, you’d deserve a medal, but my opinion doesn’t count. You talk to Turner before anybody else.”

“I will. I promise.” I leaned back in my seat and relaxed, feeling better than I had since that morning. It had to be the ibuprofen kicking in, starting to ease the pain. What else could it be?

The sight of the burned
out wreck of my house sometimes brought tears, sometimes rage, sometimes the fog of depression. On a cold morning in late January, for the first time since the fire, a sharp stab of joy ran through me as home came into sight.

I parked Susan’s farm truck in the driveway and sat for a moment, admiring the clean new world created by the previous night’s storm. Three inches of fresh snow blanketed the land, obliterating the gouges and ruts left by fire trucks months before. Even the skeleton of the house looked less tragic against a background of intense blue sky, bright sun, and glittering white carpet.