Creed stopped Brodie when she started to call in Grace’s alert. With his back to the man on the porch, he held up his open palm as a signal for her to stop. Her fingers left the radio before she pressed down the button. This was one of the few times he appreciated her ability to keep her face blank without emotion or question.
They left, continuing up the street, walking side by side, not saying a word. Grace still had her toy, the squeaks filling the silence between them.
Lately, the dark tended to throw Creed off. His eyes pivoted to bundles of shadows, expecting them to come to life and charge straight at them. Was he always like this during night searches?
He didn’t want to admit to Brodie that his sense of direction was messed up or that his anxiety level kept climbing. And especially not now when she was watching him with long glances, waiting for an explanation.
To simplify things, he stopped and asked Grace to surrender the pink elephant. Ignoring the dog drool, he slipped it back into his daypack, then he said, “Grace, take us back.”
She immediately turned them around and headed in the other direction.
Finally, when they were out of earshot of the man he presumed was Mr. Monroe, Creed nodded an all-clear sign to Brodie.
“Why didn’t we call in the alert?”
“It was my mistake. I think she was alerting to the fertilizer in the pickup’s bed. When we were back with Jason, she started picking up a scent. I thought it was...” He avoided using Grace’s name and Will’s. “I thought it was the boy’s. I didn’t ask her to specifically find him. But she’s a multi-scent dog. If I don’t ask, and she smells something else that she’s trained to find, she will alert to it. She’s done it before when I haven’t been careful.”
“Why fertilizer?”
“A lot of the same ingredients are used in making explosives.”
“You and Grace have searched for bombs?”
Creed shot her a look to keep her voice down, not just because Grace noticed, but because residents might.
“We haven’t in a while. But it is one of the scents she’s trained to detect. And she’s alerted me to it a time or two.”
“That was what you and Rufus searched for in Afghanistan.”
“Yes.”
“I never considered that you’d still be doing searches that dangerous.”
“We haven’t. Not in a long time. Grace and Bolo are really the only ones, and I would never take an assignment that would put them at risk.”
“So Scout—”
“Search and recovery. I don’t train dogs for apprehension either, but Bolo has a crazy instinct to protect me. Kind of like Hank with you. Certain dogs...we train them, but they still have their own instincts.”
“I trust Hank’s. And he sure didn’t like that guy.”
“Remember the missing teenager Norwich had us looking for? I think that was his father.”
“I’d run away from him, too.”
Creed glanced at her. He had said the teenager was missing. Brodie immediately said, “run away.” It made him think of Sully wanting to protect the boy.
Grace led them to where they had started. Jason and Scout had moved to an empty parking lot across the street, where he was helping a couple of people set up a large canopy tent. An SUV had parked close by, its tailgate up, displaying cases of water, battery-operated lanterns and several coolers.
Scout noticed them first but waited for Jason before crossing the street.
“Volunteers,” Jason said, waving a thumb over his back. “They brought some water and sandwiches for all of us.”
Creed was surprised Jason didn’t already have one of the sandwiches in his hand. The kid had an insatiable appetite, and all they had in their packs were protein bars.
“Find anything?” he asked.
Creed told him about the fertilizer.
“I want to take Grace by the houses that Scout alerted to. Something tells me that trail is fresher than a week ago.”
Scout and Jason took one side of the street. Creed and Grace took the other. Brodie and Hank followed. Creed asked both dogs to “find Will.”
They weaved around parked vehicles, trying to avoid going up onto front lawns and keeping out of driveways. Both dogs went into tracking mode at the same time, and Creed knew which houses before Jason pointed them out. But Grace didn’t stop. She slowed to wave her nose over the weeds in an alley, then moved on. Tree roots buckled the concrete of a common area and drew her attention. But again, she moved on.
On the other side of the street, Scout wanted to run. Jason strained to keep up. Despite each dog’s different stops and starts, it became clear they were headed not only in the same direction, but to the same place. A small park with a playground took up half a block. It looked well maintained but poorly lit. Obviously intended for daytime use only. The area was more sand and clay than grass, with a couple of huge live oaks.
Creed could make out the shadowed forms of a swing set, slide, and merry-go-round. As soon as they all stepped into the park, he could tell where both dogs were headed. Far off in the corner, on the edge of the square, was a Dumpster.