It’s only when the college kid sees Whisper that the connection is made. He starts running, his backpack slipping off his shoulder and banging against his thigh. Whisper yanks the leash from Brazuca’s hand and takes off after him. They’re just two streets over from Crow’s town house. She snaps at his leg and he goes down. Then stands over the kid, who’s just about pissing his pants, with her teeth bared and a sliver of drool swinging above his face, until Brazuca catches up.
“Hey, Sunil,” Brazuca says, slightly out of breath.
“Get this thing off me!” Whisper’s dog walker is staring at her with fear in his big doe eyes.
Whisper snarls. It’s clear the antagonism is mutual.
Brazuca crosses his arms and leans against a streetlight. He’s spent the past few hours dozing in the car, waiting for the kid to leave the house. His leg is stiff and aching, but the college kid doesn’t have to know that. “Hmm, I don’t think you’re cut out to be a dog walker.”
“You’re telling me! I just needed the money, okay? You know what college fees are for international students, man? Then that dog gave me so much trouble and those scary white guys showed up—”
Brazuca suppresses a groan. Barely. “Did you just say ‘scary white guys’?”
“Hey, I don’t tell you what to be afraid of, dude. These guys . . . you ever seen a horror movie? Who’s always the bad guy in a horror movie?”
“A creepy little girl, usually. Did these scary white guys have hockey sticks and masks?”
Sunil blinks up at him. “No, they had guns. What planet are you from?” Sunil proceeds to describe the two idiot assholes Warsame followed from the Burnaby house.
Somehow Brazuca isn’t at all surprised. “What did you tell them?”
“They were asking about the lady who hired me. I told them everything. She pays like shit. Went to Detroit. Then they made me call her and find out where she was staying.”
“So you did.”
“It’s not like they gave me a choice!”
Whisper growls at his raised voice, so he lowers it to continue, careful to keep his eyes on her. “Did I not mention the guns? After I hung up with her they told me to forget about everything and just pretend that the whole thing didn’t happen. But I couldn’t look that dog in the eye, man. I just fucking couldn’t do it. It’s like she knew what I did.”
Brazuca thinks about this for a moment. He drums his fingers against his bad leg. “Where was she staying?” he asks.
“What?”
“The address you gave them.”
Sunil shrugs. “Somewhere in Midtown Detroit,” she said. “I think it was on Second Avenue—does that make sense? Called Motor Midtown Motel or Midtown Motor—”
“I got it.” He moves closer so that he’s standing directly over Sunil. “If something happens to Nora because of this, we’re coming back for you. Come on, girl,” says Brazuca, beckoning to Whisper.
She jumps off her old dog walker and trots after Brazuca without a backward look at Sunil sprawled on the ground. “I’m calling the cops!” Sunil shouts after them.
“Do it,” Brazuca says, knowing the kid likely won’t. How would he explain this whole mess?
As they walk away, he thinks about putting Whisper on leash, but she seems content enough to walk at his side until they get to the car. Last year, the two of them had combed the wild, rugged coastline of Ucluelet on Vancouver Island. They had been looking for Nora then, too. He’s never had a pet, even as a child, so he can’t tell if Whisper’s instinct for Nora is just the natural way of things, or if the dog has something special. He can’t shake the feeling that she knows something’s wrong. In her dislike for Sunil, the urgency in her step, her knowing eyes, she’s on high alert. After she’d found Nora washed up on a stretch of beach, her body shaded by rocks and trees, Brazuca had a taste of Whisper’s love for Nora. He will never underestimate it again. He wonders what has taken Nora away from her dog, and from Seb.
What could possibly be so important in Detroit?
He gets a feeling, a kind of bad omen. Or it would be, if he believed in things like omens. Which he doesn’t. Back in the car, he almost heads over to Bernard Lam’s place to close his case, but Sunil was right. There’s something about that dog that just won’t let up.
Like now, for example. She’s staring at him from the backseat, a rumble building in the back of her throat. Telling him, without words, that there are more important things to do.