Part 2
“Not on the path. Not behind the dunes.” Dean watched her fingers hold the ear gently open. “I waited and listened.”
Celia recorded the characters before letting the ear fall. “Sometimes these are breeder identifiers. Without the records behind one, we can’t tell much.”
She passed a scanner over Rookie’s shoulders, then along his body. The instrument stayed silent. She checked again from another angle.
“No detectable microchip.”
Rookie woke enough to yawn, exposing a tiny pink mouth, then laid his head across her wrist.
“Does the tattoo mean someone’s looking for him?” Dean asked.
“It means we have something to report. Someone may be looking regardless.”
He nodded. The answer was reasonable, and he disliked how much effort it took to accept it.
Celia drew a stool close. “Now, before you offer to manage his recovery, have you raised a puppy?”
“I’ve handled working dogs.”
“Dogs who already knew where to go to the bathroom?”
Dean looked at Rookie.
“That would be a yes,” she said.
For the next twenty minutes, he wrote in a pocket notebook whose earlier pages contained fuel-line measurements and part numbers. Celia covered meals, water, medicine, clean bedding, rest, and signs that required an immediate call. She explained toilet breaks with the same care she gave the infection.
Rookie slept through the briefing.
“Your recruit’s not taking notes,” she observed.
“I’ll carry him through this portion.”
At the front desk, Celia gave him the local animal services number. She helped ensure the medical information would reach the right staff, but the found-animal report was Dean’s responsibility.
He made the call from the parking lot. He described the location, the fishing line, the puppy’s appearance, and the tattoo. After intake arrangements and the clinic’s recommendations were reviewed, animal services allowed him to provide temporary care while inquiries continued.
He was to remain reachable, protect the puppy, and cooperate with any verified ownership claim. The arrangement was not an adoption.
Dean repeated the conditions back accurately.
On the way home, Rookie slept in a secured carrier borrowed from the clinic. At a stoplight, Dean glanced through its door.
“You understand we’re just getting you sorted out.”
A faint snore answered him.
“Temporary quarters.”
The light changed. Dean drove on.
By the next afternoon, people were coming into Arthur’s shop asking about the puppy. An outboard motor sat open on Dean’s bench, its fittings arranged on a cloth, when Lydia appeared carrying her phone with both hands.
Arthur looked over his glasses. “If you’re another person wanting canine fitness advice, we’re booked.”
“How many have asked?”
“Enough that I’m considering a consultation fee.”
Lydia didn’t laugh. She went to Dean’s bench and waited until he set down his tool.
“I did something thoughtless.”
He listened while she explained the clip, the hundreds of thousands of views, and the strangers sending it to friends. She turned the phone facedown before she finished.
“I should’ve asked. I can take it off my page. I can’t promise that makes the copies disappear.”
Dean rubbed a spot of grease from his knuckle. “Don’t put my address anywhere. Or details about my old unit.”
“I won’t.”
“May I see it?”
She brought up the recording. Over the shop’s ventilation fan, he heard himself laugh. He watched a man on a beach fold helplessly over his knees while a puppy sneezed beside him.
Arthur came closer, wiping his hands.
“That’s the fellow I’ve been trying to get to breakfast,” he said.
Dean gave him a look, but Arthur was studying the screen with open satisfaction.
People had written that Rookie was obviously in command, that three repetitions qualified him for retirement, and that his reward ought to be edible. Dean read two comments before handing the phone back.
“He really did hit the sand that hard?”
Lydia nodded. “And got right up for another try.”
Dean picked up his wrench. Arthur left him to work, though not before observing that the shop sounded better with a little laughter in it.
At home, the kitchen had been rearranged according to Celia’s instructions. A safety gate closed off a small, washable area. Cleaning supplies were out of reach. The shallow bowl sat on a mat, and the new bed occupied a draft-free corner.
Dean placed three soft toys beside it.
Rookie inspected everything, seized his familiar towel, and backed across the floor until it lay over Dean’s boot.
“Bed’s there.”
Dean moved the towel.
Rookie brought it back. On the second trip, he stopped to chew the hem, apparently testing its durability.
Dean looked at the perfectly adequate bed, then at the puppy settling against his ankle.
“Fine. But you’re blocking traffic.”
He stood still until Rookie fell asleep.
Two days later, Celia called while Dean was tightening a fuel connection at the shop. A man had come to the clinic claiming the puppy. He had agreed to return that afternoon with evidence.
Dean’s wrench stayed in his hand a few seconds after she stopped speaking.
“What did he bring the first time?”
“Nothing that established ownership.”
“I’ll meet you there.”
Travis Maddox entered the clinic with his phone already out. He was thirty-seven, stocky, with flat blond hair and a dark watch pulled tight around his wrist. His work jacket smelled faintly of vehicle exhaust when he passed Dean.
“Duke,” he said. “That’s my puppy’s name. Where is he?”
Celia remained at the reception desk. “We need to verify your claim through animal services. Let’s start with what you’ve brought.”
Travis showed her pictures. One contained several German Shepherd puppies behind wire. Another showed a puppy asleep against cardboard. In the third, motion had blurred the face.
Dean stood to one side and watched Travis’s thumb move between them.
“Do you have a clear picture of the markings under his chin?” Celia asked.
“He’s black and brown. Same as every shepherd.”
“A veterinary record would help. So would a bill of sale.”
“You think I keep papers for everything?”
“What about the ears?” Dean asked.
Travis turned toward him. “One’s down.”
“Which?”
“They move.”
Celia wrote something on the intake sheet. Travis pressed his lips together, then tapped the edge of his watch.
“You looked inside the ear, didn’t you? There’s a number.”
Dean stopped leaning against the wall.
Celia’s voice remained unchanged. “What number should we find?”
“I’d have to check.”
“Then provide it, with your other records, to animal services. They’ll review everything.”
Travis stared at her. “Some guy takes my dog, puts him online, and now I’ve got to apply to get him back?”
“You have to establish that he’s your dog.”
He looked at Dean. “Getting paid for all that attention?”
“No.”
“Then what’s your interest?”
“He was sick.”
For a moment, the only sound was a dog shifting in a carrier beyond the desk.
Travis put his phone away. “You’ll hear from me.”
After he left, Dean watched traffic move beyond the glass door.
“I’ll send a record of this conversation,” Celia said. “Including what he said about the tattoo.”
Dean nodded. He had no proof that Travis was lying. He had even less reason to believe the man knew Rookie.
What Dean couldn’t yet know was that Travis had transported puppies north from a breeding business in Georgia. There were problems in that shipment’s records, and the puppy on the internet had given those problems an unwelcome face.
That night, Dean sat on the living room floor, updating the medicine schedule. Rookie had abandoned his bed again and was trying to wedge the towel beneath Dean’s chair.
An old team photograph lay on the coffee table. Dean picked it up, and Rookie immediately placed a paw against the bottom edge.
“Careful.” Dean started to lift it away, then lowered it between them. “That’s Owen.”
The puppy looked at his finger.
“He could burn breakfast in three different pans. Called it experimentation.”
Dean touched the corner of the picture.
“One time he set off the kitchen alarm making pancakes. Flour all down his shirt, smoke everywhere. Told us the stove had an attitude problem.”
Rookie leaned against his leg. Dean stayed there until the lamp beside the sofa clicked off on its timer.
A few evenings later, the camera near Dean’s side fence recorded a person stopping outside the gate. The face was obscured. The figure looked toward the back of the house and moved on.
Dean saved the recording and reported it, giving the number from the disputed claim. The footage wasn’t enough to identify anyone or establish a crime. He checked his locks anyway and replaced a weak outside bulb.
Inside, Rookie was pushing a cloth toy under the sofa. Dean retrieved it. Rookie promptly shoved it back into the darkness.
“You’re creating work.”
His phone rang before he could rescue the toy again.
Lydia didn’t begin with a joke.
“Families have been sending me pictures,” she said. “Some bought puppies from stores. There are veterinary bills, too.”
Dean sat on the sofa’s edge. “What kind of pictures?”
“Ears. Identification tattoos.” She paused. “More than one starts with VLR…”
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