Time to give him a boost. He gave the flashlight to Riley. “Train the light on his chest for me, okay?”
He let Robo settle back on his side, positioned the dog’s tongue in his mouth and closed his jaw, cupped his muzzle with his hands, and began mouth-to-nostril respirations. Cole could see his breath lift the dog’s ribcage. He kept up a rhythm for several rounds, gratified to see Robo’s chest rise with each one and then fall as he allowed him to exhale on his own.
Cole stayed focused on Robo but was acutely aware of the activity around him. Another car pulled up in the front yard, overheads flashing. The deputy who’d gone to search Mattie’s house approached from the backyard, and relief washed through Cole when he heard McCoy’s steady voice. “What’s going on here, Deputy Garcia?”
Garcia summed up everything that Cole had told him earlier. “Mattie’s not in the house, Sheriff. We don’t know where she is.”
“The lock on this gate has been broken,” McCoy said.
Cole paused, monitoring Robo’s ability to breathe on his own. The shallow, intermittent breath pattern returned. “I have to get Robo to the clinic, stat. I need to put him on a respirator.”
“Was he poisoned?” McCoy asked.
“Tranquilized. Search this grassy area for a dart. I need to know what was used on him. If you find one, don’t touch it with your bare hands. These drugs can be dangerous.” As he spoke, Cole squatted and gathered the big dog up in his arms, clasping him by chest and haunches. Riley hurried to help. Straining, he stood, rearranged his grip on the limp dog, and headed for his truck. “Go open the back door of the truck, Riley.”
Sheriff McCoy followed close behind. “What can I do to help?”
Cole groaned as he lifted Robo into the back seat. McCoy reached through to help him adjust him on his side. “Could you drive? I better not leave him back here alone.” McCoy agreed and Cole climbed into the back of the cab, wedging between the front and back seats so he could lean over Robo.
McCoy shouted to Garcia that he was going to the vet clinic and that Deputy Johnson was on his way. Then he climbed into the driver’s seat. Riley was standing back, her face white, her distress evident. Cole couldn’t leave her alone in the yard like that. “Riley, do you want to come with me?”
“Yes!”
“Hop in front.”
Even though McCoy made good time on the drive to the clinic, Cole had to deliver more respirations to Robo. Thank goodness the young dog had a healthy heart. It was still beating, but its increased rate told Cole that it was stressed. Riley gave McCoy directions to drive down the lane to the clinic’s front door.
“The key is the silver one beside the truck key,” Cole told him, throwing open the back door as soon as the sheriff parked. “I’ve got Robo. Go ahead and open the doors into the surgery room.”
Relieved that his respiratory equipment was now seconds away, Cole hoisted Robo out of the back seat and carried him through the lobby into the surgery room. He laid him on the stainless steel surgical table and positioned him on his back. Grabbing a cannula, he opened Robo’s limp jaw, positioned his tongue out of the way, and performed the intubation. Within seconds, he hooked up the oxygen, made sure that the knob for passing the sedative was set to off, and let the machine start sending life-giving air to Robo’s lungs.
As he watched the dog’s chest rise and fall in a regular pattern, he thought, Okay, buddy, you’re safe for now. But where is she? Where’s Mattie?
TWENTY-FIVE
Cole didn’t have time to waste. He’d bought a reprieve by using the respirator, but Robo was far from medically stable. He needed to know what drug had been injected into this dog and what he could do to reverse its action.
McCoy was on his cell phone. “Send Johnson over with it now. Tape off the yard. Avoid going in there until I can get back with Detective LoSasso.”
After ending the call, McCoy turned to Cole. “Garcia found a dart in the grass by the house, and it’s on its way here. I should get back to the scene, but do you need me to help you?”
“Riley can help until I get Tess to come in.” Cole began securing Robo to the table with straps to keep him from falling off in case of seizures. “You can take my truck.”
“I’ll go back with Deputy Johnson after he brings the dart. What does Robo need?”
Cole listened to Robo’s heartbeat and felt reassured that it was still steady and strong. “He’s heavily sedated, either with a drug overdose or with something that suppresses his breathing. I have some anesthesia reversal drugs on hand, but I need to know what I’m dealing with to determine what to use.”
McCoy glanced at the machine that was breathing for Robo. “Is he stable now?”
“For the moment. But I don’t know how long that will last, whether there are side effects to what he’s been given, or whether the drug’s done any permanent damage to his brain or heart. The sooner we can get this state reversed, the better.” He looked at Riley. “Can you stay beside him while I search for options?”
Although pale, the teen appeared to be back in control of her emotions. She stepped forward to follow through with what she’d been asked.
“Let me know if anything changes or if he starts to move, okay?” Cole said.
Riley nodded.
Cole called Tess, waking her from sleep, and she agreed to come as soon as possible. He hurried to the office to power up his laptop.
Johnson arrived with the dart, which had been sealed into a clear, plastic bag labeled “Biohazard.” The sheriff turned the baggie to study the dart’s front and back, and then laid it on the desk beside Cole’s computer. “Cole, Deputy Johnson and I both have to go back to Mattie’s house. I want to leave this dart with you, but I don’t have a spare officer to stay and keep it within the departmental chain of custody. I want to swear you in as a Special Deputy.”
Cole glanced up from his computer. “Now?”
“Right now. Do you accept the duty of maintaining this evidence and keeping it within your possession until it’s returned to another law enforcement officer?”
“I do.”
“You are officially appointed. Call me with an update when you can.” And with that, McCoy and Johnson hurried out the front door.
“Is Robo still the same?” Cole called to Riley through the pass-through.
“Yes. He hasn’t moved.”
Cole picked up the bag and examined the dart. It was exactly like the ones used by the wildlife department: heavy gauge, one-and-a-quarter inch, steel needle; four inch plastic cylinder that contained the dosage; and an orange plastic, daisy-shaped flight stabilizer at the rear.
With the tranquilizer delivery system confirmed, now he needed to figure out what drug had been in the cylinder. His first thought was BAM, the drug the wildlife department used to sedate wild animals. BAM was actually a combination of drugs, and they planned to use it on the mountain sheep in a few weeks. Unfortunately, though Cole had ordered the kits that contained the reversal agent, he hadn’t received them yet.
He carried both laptop and dart into the surgery room where he could relieve Riley. He set them down on a countertop and tapped the drug reference words onto the keyboard. He quickly located an official site for BAM and opened the webpage.
Scanning through the information, he zeroed in on its effects. It worked quickly, provided low-level sedation for two to four hours, and was often the drug of choice because it allowed relaxed respirations—no “frozen chest.”