By the time the odometer indicated she’d driven nine miles from the turnoff, the road narrowed to little more than one lane. She started up a steep rise, keeping watch for a two-track road that would veer off to the left. She hoped she hadn’t missed it.
At the top of the rise, she could see dense evergreen forest that stretched for miles and miles in an undulating mountain panorama. A hundred yards farther, she spotted the two-track winding away through the trees.
“There it is, Robo. I think we’ve found it.”
Robo waved his tail but kept his eyes on the view outside the windshield.
Mattie slowed to creep forward as she directed the cruiser off the road and down into the ditch to access the two-track. When the roadbed scraped the bottom of the car, they lurched sideways, sending Robo skidding across his platform, though he remained on his feet.
“Sorry about that.”
Again, Robo went to the window and sniffed.
After a couple minutes of rough driving, Mattie spotted the sheriff’s Jeep and another cruiser parked in front of an old cabin. She’d found the right place. Slowly, she bumped over the rocks in the track and pulled up beside the Jeep.
Sheriff McCoy stepped out of the cabin onto a plank porch, followed by a woman wearing a forest ranger’s uniform. Abraham McCoy was a big man, built solid as a tree trunk, with massive shoulders and a thick neck. He had skin the color of a Hershey bar, dark walnut eyes, and a bushy black mustache. He’d grown up in Timber Creek and attended the town high school, just like Mattie, but about fifteen years ahead of her.
Rumor had it that McCoy could have gone to any number of universities on a football scholarship, but he’d chosen to commute to a local junior college instead so he could help his mother care for his ailing father and younger siblings. He’d been a deputy for years before the county electorate voted him in as sheriff.
The first time Mattie met McCoy, she’d been a six-year-old kid, scared to death. Her world and family had just been shattered. He was a young deputy. She could still remember the sad look on his face as he picked her up and carried her to his patrol car. For a moment, she’d felt safe, enfolded in his arms against his solid chest. For one moment.
She switched off the cruiser’s engine. Getting out of the vehicle, she told Robo, “You’re going to wait here.”
He protested with a short yip.
In return, Mattie gave him a look that apparently quelled any further urges to kick up a fuss. She walked toward McCoy, meeting him halfway between her car and the cabin.
He introduced the ranger. “This is Sandy Benson of the US Forest Service. She called us up here.”
Benson gave Mattie a firm handshake. She was a strongly built woman, muscular, a little taller than Mattie’s average height. A broad-brimmed ranger’s hat sheltered her auburn hair and fair skin. Her hazel eyes held a look of concern.
“I was telling the sheriff that I saw a pickup truck and dog trailer up here last week. I stopped to talk to the guy, and he said he was doing some search and rescue training with his dogs. Seemed different, him being up here alone. Usually people train in groups. But he didn’t seem to be breaking any laws, so I left him to it. When I passed by here this morning, I noticed the same rig.”
McCoy added a detail. “You say that was about eight fifteen this morning.”
Benson nodded. “I went up Old Flowers Trail to clear some deadfall. About an hour later, I heard a shot coming from this direction. I started down the trail to check it out. On my way, I heard another shot. By the time I got back here, the rig was gone. I decided to take a look and found a large blood stain on the porch.” She shrugged, spreading a hand out front. “I had no idea what to think, but with the narcotics problems we’ve been having around here lately, I thought I’d better call you guys.”
Coming from inside the cabin, Chief Deputy Ken Brody joined them. Tall, athletic, and built like a wedge, Brody had been Mattie’s biggest challenge in the cross-country test to determine Robo’s new handler. In fact, Mattie knew he could have whipped her butt if they’d been running on a track. But Brody’s center of gravity had been too high to maintain his speed going downhill. Mattie was built lower to the ground with decently muscled hips and powerful legs. It gave her an edge over the other runners.
Brody took an aggressive stance, straightening his back, squaring his shoulders, and tucking his thumbs into his belt, his right hand cupping his holstered handgun. He narrowed his eyes, ice blue beneath black brows, and stared at Mattie.
She straightened her shoulders and stared back, looking away only when McCoy spoke.
“Ranger Benson recorded the license plate number on the vehicle last week. We tried to run the plate, but we can’t connect to the Internet up here.”
“There’s nothing inside the cabin,” Brody said. “Floor’s been swept, no footprints. Seems strange for it to be so clean.”
“Yes, that’s odd. Somebody trying to hide something?” McCoy said. “Poaching deer out of season?”
Brody dipped his head in a barely perceptible nod, one of Brody’s macho moves that Mattie imagined he practiced in a mirror. “Maybe.”
“I thought that might be a possibility,” Benson said, “but it seems strange for the blood to be up on the porch like that. I doubt if an animal would get shot and bleed out up there.”
Ed Johnson, a rookie who’d joined the department while Mattie was at the academy, came from around the cabin, eyes to the ground. Still in orientation, he’d been riding patrol with Brody. Built like a runner, tall and slender, he had sandy hair and a face full of freckles.
“Find anything out back?” McCoy asked him.
Johnson walked up to join them. “No, nothing but dog tracks.”
“Any trash? Items left behind?” Mattie asked.
“No.”
McCoy turned to Mattie. “I want you to take your dog and see if you can detect anything we’ve missed.”
“Do you have something in mind specifically?”
Brody spoke, his voice soft, his words slowly paced as though he were addressing someone of limited intelligence. “If we did, we wouldn’t need the dog to look for it, now would we?”
Mattie didn’t bother to reply. It had to have been Brody’s seniority that had landed him the chief deputy position; she couldn’t imagine his personality ever winning him anything.
McCoy didn’t acknowledge Brody’s comment either. “I’d like you to search for anything that could help me decide which direction to go with this. Do we have a crime here or not? Is there any detection of narcotics?”
“I’ll get on it.”
As Mattie walked back to her vehicle, she saw Robo dancing and grinning in the back. She knew how he felt, and when she reached the car door, she could show all her excitement and more. It was part of the job.
“Come on, big guy. It’s time to go to work.” Mattie used a higher pitched voice, something she’d been taught that would rev up his prey drive and get him ready to search. “Do you want to go to work, Robo? Do ya?”
She opened the door and Robo bailed out. He pranced around at her feet, tail waving and eyes watching her every move. He followed her to the trunk of the car.
“Let’s get out your things.”
Though it probably wasn’t necessary, she kept up a running patter while she unpacked their equipment. Already, Robo could barely contain himself. His trainer had used techniques involving reward and play to train him, and this, combined with a shepherd’s natural instinct to assist humans, made Robo love his job. Although he still received rewards to reinforce certain skills, she could tell that the work itself was probably all the reward he needed.