Enforcing the Paw Read online

  Once we were back in the kitchen, I readied my pen. “What’s your ex’s name?”

  “Ryan Downey.”

  I jotted the name down. “You said earlier you hoped we could put a stop to things ‘this time.’ Has there been a history of this type of incident?”

  “History?” She scoffed. “There’s enough history to fill a textbook. It’s been one thing after another since I broke up with him a month ago. He was putting too much pressure on me, wanting to get too serious too fast. To be honest, I just wasn’t that in to him. We’re too different. At first he tried to get me back. He came by here every day for a week, sometimes more than once. When I stopped answering the door he left flowers and gifts on the porch. He’s the one who gave me the gnomes. If they weren’t so cute I’d get rid of them.”

  Hmm. If I had a beef with an ex and something around my house reminded me of him, I probably would have gotten rid of it, cute or not. But I knew not everyone thinks the same way, so I accepted her explanation.

  She opened a drawer and pulled out a stack of greeting cards. “These are the cards he left after I dumped him.”

  She held them out to me. I took them from her and quickly looked them over. Each of them was a typical, vague “thinking of you” type of card. He’d scrawled handwritten messages on each one.

  You should be with someone who deserves you.

  Your soul mate is out there. Don’t keep him waiting.

  You won’t be alone much longer. Someone’s going to snatch you up!

  Ryan’s words could be seen as encouraging. Then again, they could be taken as veiled threats.

  I handed the cards back to her. “Hang on to those.”

  “You think they’re important?”

  “They could be.” It was too soon to tell.

  She nodded and returned the cards to the drawer before turning back to me. She seemed to be addressing my earlobe. “The last time Ryan came by, I told him in no uncertain terms that we’d never get back together. After that he started doing mean, vengeful things. He stole my mail and poured salt in my garden to try to kill the plants. He’s also driven by late at night several times and thrown tennis balls at my car to set off the alarm. My neighbors have complained to me about the noise. It’s a nightmare.”

  “Did you see him do these things? Pouring the salt and stealing your mail and throwing the tennis balls?”

  She frowned. “No. But like I said, there’s no reason for anyone else to be doing things like this to me.”

  Again, she could be right. But she could also be wrong. It was my job to gather facts and explore all potential leads. Could the brick be the result of a petty sibling squabble? Brothers and sisters could do some pretty mean things to each other under the right circumstances. I’d once broken up a fight between two brothers, but not before one gave the other a bloody nose. “Do you get along with your family?”

  “As well as anyone does, I guess. We’re not exactly close, but there’s no animosity between us.”

  “Do they live here in town?”

  “No. My parents live down in Waco where I grew up, and my brother is in graduate school in Austin.”

  Looked like the immediate family could be ruled out. “What about your friends?” I asked. “Have you had a falling-out with anyone?” Women could be petty, too. One wrong look at another’s boyfriend and a woman could find Whore! scribbled across her windshield in red lipstick.

  “No. I haven’t had any problems with friends.”

  “How about coworkers?” I asked. “Do you get along with everyone at the office?”

  “I don’t work in an office,” she corrected, a hint of impatience in her voice. “I work at a rehabilitation center. My work is pretty solitary. I mostly just interact with patients, and even then it’s not often. Only two or three times a day.”

  “What do you do?”

  “I’m a clinical dietitian.”

  That explained all the tomes on diet and cooking. “Your n-neighbors,” I said, noticing her gaze went to my mouth when my stutter manifested again. “How are your relationships with them?”

  “Fine, I suppose. We say hello if we happen to pass each other on the street or see each other getting the mail, but other than them complaining about my car alarm, that’s been the extent of our interactions.”

  She didn’t appear to have a dog that might be barking and annoying anyone, and I hadn’t heard any noisy wind chimes dinging and donging in the breeze. Still, in these types of situations the culprit was sometimes a neighbor who’d reached the end of their rope. I told her as much. “Do you have a noisy hobby or play music loud in the backyard? Maybe have an outdoor cat that uses someone’s flower bed for a litter box?”

  “I know what you’re getting at, but no. I don’t have any pets and I’m quiet and I keep to myself. The perfect neighbor.” She threw her hands in the air, her voice growing shaky and high with emotion. “The cop who came out before asked me virtually the same questions. I’m telling you the same thing I told him. Ryan is behind this. I know it!”

  I raised a palm. “I’m not saying I don’t believe you, Ms. Valdez. It’s my job to ask questions and rule out other possibilities.”

  She crossed her arms loosely over her chest. “I understand.” Though her words said she knew where I was coming from, her tone told me she didn’t like it.

  “Do you recall the name of the officer who came out before?” It couldn’t hurt to have a chat with him or her, compare notes.

  “Mackey,” Adriana snapped without hesitation. “Tall, redheaded guy. No offense, but he was useless. Do you know him?”

  Hell, yeah, I knew Officer Derek Mackey. Derek, a.k.a. the Big Dick, had been my training partner. He was an asshole of epic proportions. He’d once sent me out into a monsoon to buy him a bag of chips at the convenience store, then locked the doors on me and cackled when I yanked on the handle and banged on the glass, trying to get back in the squad car. There was an inch of water in my shoes by the time he let me in. He passed gas in the cruiser on multiple occasions and held the button down so I couldn’t unroll my window. He never asked where I wanted to eat lunch, stopping once or twice a week for meals at Hooters or a topless bar, claiming a regular police presence was a help at the latter due to the crime associated with sexually oriented businesses. Yeah, right. He’d just wanted a cheap lunch and cheap thrills. I’d learned to pack a lunch box and eat in the car by myself.

  “Sure, I know Officer Mackey.” I hoped my distaste for my former partner wasn’t evident in my voice. “He and I were partners a while back.”

  Adriana gave me a pointed look. “I hope you’ll do more than he did. He took my statement but that was it. He said that since there was no property damage and no witnesses, it would be a waste of time to talk to Ryan or take the tennis ball in to be checked for prints.”

  Though I didn’t exactly feel inclined to defend the bastard who’d made my life miserable for months, I did feel the need to defend the integrity of the Fort Worth Police Department. I also felt the need to make this woman feel safe again. “Officers have to make case-by-case judgment calls,” I said. “Officer Mackey must’ve thought it would be futile to check with Ryan because people rarely admit their crimes. As for the tennis ball, it’s virtually impossible to lift prints off them due to the texture of the covering. But I’ll speak with your ex. If he’s behind these acts, he might back off if a police officer shows up.”

  “Tell him he needs to move on,” she said. “I already have. I’m dating one of the doctors from work now.”

  “Good,” I said. “It’s nice to have a special someone.”

  I had a special someone of my own. Seth. While my life had seemed full enough before him, he added something I hadn’t realized I’d been missing. Romance. Companionship. A pair of ears to listen and broad shoulders to lean on.

  I held my pen at the ready. “What’s Ryan’s address?”

  She rattled off the name of an apartment complex on Hulen Street, which s
at at the western edge of the W1 Division, my usual beat.

  “He lives in apartment 206.”

  “Got it.” I also asked if she knew his middle name, which she did.

  “Michael. Why?”

  “I’ll need to run his name through the system. See if he has a record of any sort.”

  “He never mentioned having one.”

  “Most people who have a criminal record don’t speak of it.” Especially if they wanted to get close to someone, to be trusted. “I’ll be right back.” I returned to my car with Brigit trotting along behind me. After retrieving latex gloves and a plastic evidence bag from my trunk, my furry partner and I went back to the kitchen. I ordered Brigit to stay put while I ventured again to the bedroom, picked up the brick, and dropped it into the evidence bag. Why the guy had thrown a brick instead of a garden gnome was beyond me. But maybe he didn’t want to end an innocent little life.

  Adriana stood in the doorway, watching as I collected the evidence. “I appreciate you taking this seriously. I guess because you’re a woman you understand how scary something like this can be.”

  “It would certainly be unsettling,” I agreed. Still, a brick through a window was child’s play compared to a sociopath strapping a bomb to your chest, gang members aiming guns at your face at point-blank range, and a stranger slamming his SUV into you on the highway, running you off the road into a construction zone, and opening fire when you were trapped in your car. But no sense one-upping her with my dangerous on-the-job exploits. Besides, a stalker could pose a real threat. It was never clear how far a stalker would go. Some merely exacted a bit of petty revenge and moved on. Others escalated their threatening behavior, doing more and more dangerous things until they were either caught and jailed, or until they killed their victims. I had no idea what type Ryan Michael Downey would prove to be but, for everyone’s sake, I was hoping he was the petty type.

  I tucked the bagged brick under my arm, removed the gloves, and tossed them into Adriana’s trash can. After obtaining her cell phone number, I slid my pen and notepad back into my pocket. “I’ll let you know how it goes.”

  “Thanks, Officer Luz.” She blinked several times, as if holding back tears. “I really hope you can put a stop to this. I just…” Her breath hitched. “I just want it to be over.”

  THREE

  THIS MAKES SCENTS

  Fort Worth PD K-9 Sergeant Brigit

  Outside, Megan led Brigit to the gate and ordered her to find a scent and trail the disturbance. The dog obliged, sniffing around, but the only disturbance she smelled was in the backyard where they’d just been, and along this fence. She stretched up, putting her paws on the boards and looking over at Megan, trying to communicate that there was no trail to the front yard.

  Megan wasn’t showing any teeth. Darn. When Megan showed her teeth, she was more likely to give Brigit a liver treat. But it never hurt to ask, right?

  Still propped on the fence, Brigit emitted a soft, insistent woof. Translation: Pay me, or I quit.

  Megan shined her flashlight over the top of the fence and stood on tiptoe to look over it before reaching into her pocket and pulling out a treat. “Here you go, girl.”

  Brigit wolfed the treat down. Yum!

  They left the backyard. Megan stepped over to the fence next door and tried to open the gate, but it didn’t move. Back into the car they went.

  A few minutes later, Megan let Brigit out of her enclosure at an apartment complex. As they went up a set of outdoor stairs, Brigit’s nose picked up two familiar scents. The first was the aroma of squashed tomato. The second was the faint smell of a human male that she’d scented coming from the brick Megan had bagged.

  She put her nose down to seek the sources, moving faster as she hit the landing and scurried over to a pair of shoes lying tucked behind a folded lawn chair leaning against the outer wall. The shoes smelled like both the tomatoes and the man. She sat and looked up at Megan, giving her passive alert. Megan hadn’t asked her to look for a tomato or the man, but Brigit sensed it might be important and could earn her another liver treat. It was worth a try, right?

  Megan shined her flashlight on the shoes, whispered, “Good girl!”, and tossed her another goodie.

  This was turning out to be a darn good shift!

  FOUR

  LOVE LESSONS

  The Devoted One

  Tonight’s lesson had been short and simple, just a pop quiz in what would be a complete course in love and respect.

  Question 1: Was it right to treat me the way you did? To end things between us for no good reason?

  Correct answer: No, it was not.

  Question 2: Will you get in touch with me so we can make things right again?

  Correct answer: Yes, I will.

  The Devoted One had no doubt that they could get past this, that the two of them could get back together and move on, the last few weeks amounting to nothing more than a rough patch in what would otherwise be a long, happy life together. It was a shame the cops had to be involved, but if that’s what it took to get some attention, to reopen the lines of communication, well, then that’s what it took.

  With a lighter heart, the Devoted One settled back under the covers.

  FIVE

  WAFFLING

  Megan

  Sure enough, the shoes that Brigit had alerted on featured the same waffle-style soles that had left the print on Adriana’s patio. Sitting next to the shoes was a piece of newspaper covered in blue paint and weighted down with three orange bricks, all of which had the ACME imprint on the end just like the one that had been thrown through Adriana’s window. Sheesh. Some criminals don’t even have the sense to hide the evidence, do they?

  I pulled out my phone and snapped photos of both the shoes and bricks. I’d bag the shoes and one of the bricks later, but first I wanted to see how Ryan reacted to my questions.

  The guy had no criminal record. I’d checked before coming to his apartment. Given that fact, I might have hesitated to wake him at this late hour if not for the shoes and bricks out here on his porch. But with clear evidence of trespassing, vandalism, and assault right in front of me, I had no qualms waking the guy up. Besides, he might not even be asleep. Flickering light was evident through the window, telling me a television was on inside the apartment.

  I put my knuckles to the door. Rap-rap-rap-rap. When there was no response, I tried again. Rap-rap-rap-rap-rap.

  A moment later, a child’s sleepy voice came from the other side of the door. “Daddy?”

  Not quite, kiddo. “Hi, honey,” I said with forced cheer. No sense scaring the kid. “My name is Megan. I’m a police officer. I’m looking for Ryan Downey. He lives here, right?”

  A click sounded as the dead bolt released, followed by a jink as the safety chain drew taut. The face of a young, towheaded boy with ice-blue eyes peered through the crack. He looked to be about five or six. He made fists with his tiny hands, rubbed his tired eyes, and yawned a wide, gap-toothed yawn. Darned if I didn’t find myself yawning, too.

  When Brigit wagged her tail next to me, the movement caught the boy’s eye and he looked down at her and squealed, half in surprise, half in delight. “Uncle Ryan!” he hollered as loud as his little lungs would allow. “Wake up! There’s a dog!” The boy disappeared into the apartment, continuing to yell. “Uncle Ryan! Come quick! There’s a big furry dog!”

  A man’s voice came back. Though it was gravelly with sleep, it also had an odd, kazoolike quality to it, as if he was speaking through his nose. “What the heck are you talking about, Toby?”

  “Come and see!” Toby shouted, reappearing at the door a moment later.

  “Is it something on TV?” came the man’s voice again. “You better not have woken me up for nothing.”

  A few seconds later, a man appeared behind the kid. He was so thin you could see his ribs, but he had zero muscle tone, his thighs jiggling. How he managed to look both emaciated and flabby at the same time was beyond me. He wore nothing but
an intrigued look and an ill-fitting pair of striped briefs his skinny hips had a hard time holding up. His chest bore just three visible hairs, but his bald chest seemed more likely due to insufficient testosterone than a wax job. His eyes were the same ice blue as the kid’s and bore crusty goop in the inner corners. His dark blond hair hung to his shoulders, Viking style. If Thor had a thinner, less attractive younger brother, this guy would be him and his name would be Thonk.

  Ryan’s gaze drew a line from Brigit up to me. Unlike Adriana, who seemed to avoid direct eye contact, Ryan locked his gaze on mine with laser-like intensity. “Well, hello, there,” he said, his voice full of innuendo.

  A slow smile spread across his lips as his gaze left my face and raked my body up and down. The guy seemed to be mentally undressing me. As quickly as he mentally removed my clothing, I mentally replaced them with unappealing apparel. An argyle cardigan. A loose jumpsuit. A floral-print muumuu.

  Reflexively, I crossed my arms over my chest, as if that could somehow block his imagination. “Are you Ryan Downey?”

  “Yeah. That’s me.”

  “I need to talk to you.”

  “Sure. Let me get the door open.”

  He closed the door, slid the chain aside, and opened the door fully. He raised one arm up over his head and grabbed the door frame, rocking back on his heels and thrusting his crotch forward a few inches. As if I wanted a gander at his goods. Blurgh. I was tempted to whip out my baton, poke it into his skinny gut, and use it to hold him at bay. This guy could really stand to learn something about boundaries.

  He cocked his head to complete the pose. “What would you like to talk about?” He said it with the same tone a guy might use if asking the question of a woman he’d met in a bar.

  “I can wait while you get dressed.”

  He glanced down at himself before looking back at me, a smirk playing about his lips. “It doesn’t bother me if it doesn’t bother you.”

  My first thought was that Ryan Downey was quite full of himself. My second thought was that he didn’t seem a likely match for Adriana at all. But I realized I wasn’t seeing him at his best. Heck, I’d look pretty scary to anyone who’d woken me in the middle of the night. And putting the eye crusties and sagging undies aside, he wasn’t entirely repulsive, lookswise at least. But his buzzy nasal voice and suggestive manner were major turnoffs, making him a 4 to Adriana’s 8. The arithmetic didn’t seem to compute. Then again, other unknown factors could result in mathematical adjustments. For instance, a guy might be handsome enough to rank a 9.5 on looks alone, but a bad credit score could drag him down a couple of digits or more. Did this guy have some hidden secret that warranted an award of extra points? He certainly seemed confident. What was the source of his self-assurance? Had he accomplished some big feat? Did he have some incredible skill or talent that wasn’t immediately obvious to me? Or was he simply delusional and narcissistic?