Bulldogs & Bullets: A Dog Town USA Cozy Mystery

by Meg Muldoon

  “I swear, Freddie, I’ve come within an inch of firing him twice already this week,” Lou said, placing a plate loaded with a turkey goat cheese pumpkin seed panini and two butter pecan cookies on the table and taking a seat across from me.

  Her cheeks were rosy, like she’d been rushing around all morning. She had on her usual pink Barkery apron – the one that had the little logo of a puppy eating a cupcake.

  “Hey,” I said, looking at the mouthwatering feast before me. “This isn’t my usual. What happened to the pear kale salad?”

  She shrugged.

  “It’s cold out there today, Sis,” she said, readjusting a bobby pin in the pile of blond curls atop her head. “You need something hearty to eat. Save that kale nonsense for the summer.”

  I gave her an irritated look, but I couldn’t deny that inside, my stomach was doing a little happy dance at the sight of the sandwich and cookies.

  Lou was like the evil witch in Hansel and Gretel – I swear that she was always trying to fatten me up at every opportunity.

  I glanced back over at the register. Marianne, one of Lou’s latest hires, was handling the line.

  “You shouldn’t be so hard on Pete,” I said, taking the toothpick out of the Panini and getting down to business. “Can you imagine how you’d feel if he started dating a supermodel and you had to see them together all the time? It’d be torture.”

  Lou chuckled and shook her head.

  “Okay, first of all, Greg isn’t a male model. So that’s not even an accurate comparison.”

  “No, he’s not,” I agreed. “Instead, he’s a wealthy real estate developer who’s regarded as one of the most eligible bachelors in the county. And on top of that, he probably could be a male model if he wanted to, and you know it.”

  Lou leaned back in her chair and crossed her arms. The edges of her mouth turned up slightly.

  She had no way to argue that one. And I got the feeling she was a little proud of that.

  “Okay, maybe you’ve got a point,” she finally said. “But I’m not dating Greg for any of those reasons. I’m dating him because he’s a good human being. Additionally, if Pete started dating a supermodel, then I would hope that I’d be mature enough to not act like a pouting child and throw temper tantrums all the time.”

  I chewed on a mouthful of turkey and bread, and gave her a deadpan look.

  If the roles were reversed, I was fairly certain that Lou would have been bothered. Maybe not as much as Pete – but a little at least. They’d been married for five years, after all.

  “Besides,” she added. “Pete had his chance to win me back. If he didn’t want something like this to happen, then maybe he should have bought me flowers every once and a while when we were married. Or taken me on a honeymoon instead of always delaying it. Or maybe he could have been there more for me emotionally when Mom died. Anyway, how come you’re always on his side lately?”

  “I’m not,” I said. “I just… I don’t know. I feel bad for the guy, I guess.”

  “Well, I’m not as heartless as all that, Freddie,” she said, sighing. “I feel bad for him too, sometimes. But that’s just how things went down. I couldn’t help that I’d fallen out of love with him. And you know what they say: All is fair in love and war.”

  I thought about Jimmy for a split second, and the happy glint in his eyes when he’d been talking about Kathryn and the baby.

  People liked to throw that saying around – about all being fair in love. But it never made the people who got caught on the unfair side feel any better.

  “I guess you’re right,” I said, taking another bite of my sandwich. “It’s probably all for the best anyway. You seem happy with Greg. And Pete will find somebody else soon, too.”

  She nodded, looking out the window as the wind shook a shrub and caused its bony branches to scrape the pane.

  “Maybe,” she said.

  She paused for a long moment, and then her face suddenly lit up.

  “But enough about me. I want to hear how it went last night with Sam.”

  Her eyebrows flew high, reminding me of the same kind of look Mindy Monahan had given me the night before when she started going on about how good-looking Lt. Sam Sakai was.

  I shifted uncomfortably in my chair.

  I’d never really been very good at girl talk.

  “It went well,” I said.

  “Well?” she said, a little taken aback. “Just well?! Not great or fantastic or wonderful or incredible?”

  I smiled broadly, unable to play it cool any longer.

  “Okay, okay,” I said. “The date was more than good. It was…”

  Lou grinned at my inability to find the words.

  My sister let out a little squealing noise and reached across the table, squeezing my arm harder than was necessary.

  “Sounds like somebody’s head over heels in love,” she said in a sing-song voice.

  I felt my cheeks burn.

  I let out a big happy sigh.

  “Sam’s so… Well, he’s just so…”

  I was tongue-tied.

  “I just never thought I’d ever feel this way,” I finally settled on.

  Lou’s eyes got a little glassy.

  “I’m so thrilled for you, Freddie,” she said.

  Her voice trembled slightly, and I found myself surprised by her emotional response.

  “It’s just… I know what a rough time you’ve had these last few years,” she continued. “With mom dying and with that other worthless loser breaking your heart. And then him getting a job at The Chronicle when all you were trying to do was get away from him… I guess I was really worried there about you for a little while.”

  She squeezed my arm again.

  “But I can see now that I don’t have to anymore.”

  She sniveled and looked away before standing up abruptly.

  “Okay, I’ve got to get back to work, Freddie,” she said, running her fingers under the rims of her eyes. “Marianne’s drowning over there with that long line.”

  She patted me on the shoulder.

  “Thanks, Lou,” I said.

  “For what?”

  I shrugged.

  “For being there during the hard times.”

  “Freddie, I’ll always be there through whatever times. We’re sisters, right?”

  A moment later, she started walking back over to the counter, but stopped after a few feet.

  “Oh, before I forget, I wanted to talk to you about The Howl-O-Ween Fundraiser,” she said. “You think you’ll be able to get off a little early from work that day to help Pete and me in the kitchen?”

  Every year since opening the dog-friendly eatery, Lou had thrown a big Halloween party and fundraiser at The Barkery for folks in the community. The event also doubled as a fundraiser to help the local Humane Society, and seemed to get more popular every year. More and more locals showed up with their dogs, dressed to the hilt in Halloween costumes. Part of the success of the fundraiser had to do with Lou’s delicious treats. The other part had to do with the flowing beer supplied by The Dog Mountain Brew Pub.

  “Of course I can help,” I said. “Just so long as there’s no big breaking news that day. You know, big stories like a cat getting stuck in a tree or old Peg Blankenship complaining about the kids vandalizing her mailbox.”

  Lou grinned at my sarcasm.

  “Thanks, Freddie,” she said. “I invited Sam yesterday to the fundraiser, too. He said he might be working that night, but he’ll check his schedule.”

  “I’ll make sure he’s not working,” I said.

  She smiled.

  “Good.”

  A moment later, she was back at the cash register – all business again.

  I spent the rest of my lunch hour finishing off the sandwich and cookies and watching the candy apple-colored leaves fall from the trees that lined the alley behind the bakery. Then I drove back over to the office, this time at a much slower, happier speed.

  When I got back
to my desk, a fresh bouquet was waiting there. A second bunch of roses to add to the ones he’d gotten me the night before.

  I picked them up and inhaled their sweet scent.

  “Ooooh… seems like things are getting serious,” Jennifer Helt said, popping her head over the cubicle divider.

  I smiled and unwrapped the attached note.

  “Your desk was looking a little plain, Wolf” it read.

  I grinned as that fiery feeling welled up in my chest.

  Thing were getting serious, indeed.

  Chapter 6

  I crossed the parking lot just as the dull greys of dusk started settling over Dog Mountain.

  I wrapped my scarf tighter around my neck as I tried in vain to fight off a series of shivers.

  The chills couldn’t be blamed on the sharp, ragged wind blowing leaves at my feet. Or the frosty, dampness in the air. Or on the early symptoms of a cold, either.

  I breathed in deeply and stole a glance at the black Kia Sedona at the far end of the parking lot, watching as smoke rose up in plumes from its exhaust pipe.

  I picked up the pace, walking quickly, my boots clicking hard against the gravel-studded asphalt.

  There was nothing unusual about a Kia sitting in the newspaper parking lot. Nothing unusual at all, considering that the lot was filled with cheap cars like Hondas, Hyundai’s, and other Kia’s – a direct result of the diddly squat salaries that newspaper professionals made.

  But the thing that made the car different from the other cheap hunks of metal in the lot was the fact that it didn’t belong to anybody working at the paper. And the fact that I’d noticed this exact Kia Sedona on six separate occasions at various locations where I had been on assignment over the past few months.

  I had the distinct feeling that seeing it so often hadn’t been a coincidence, either.

  I was being followed.

  Though who was doing the following and why they seemed to be keeping tabs on my whereabouts was as murky as the bottom of a polluted pond to me. I had attempted several times to get the plate numbers of the Kia, but it appeared to be a new car, and the paper license plate taped to the back windshield was obscured by the car’s dark windows. And aside from that, the vehicle had a habit of pulling away abruptly anytime I started trying to get closer to it, meaning I’d been unable to catch a glimpse of the driver or the car’s plates.

  I knew that a reporter being stalked wasn’t all that unusual. After all, most of us were in the business of ruffling feathers. And there were certain people out there who reacted to that in unpredictable ways.

  But being followed like this was a first for me. And I quickly realized that I wasn’t fond of the paranoid, on-edge, apprehensive feeling that the sight of that black Kia gave me every time I saw it idling in a parking lot.

  And I wasn’t fond of the fact that the feeling lately was starting to turn into something more:

  Fear.

  I’d been wracking my brain, trying to figure out who I might have inadvertently crossed. But the only thing close to controversial that I’d covered in the last few months was the Myra Louden homicide case. But even with that, I didn’t think I had angered anybody to the point of stalking.

  My phone buzzed from the pocket of my trench coat, jarring me from my thoughts. I paused for a moment to fish it out, and the engine of the Kia revved suddenly. I felt my heart pound in my rib cage as it peeled out of the lot, its high beams on full force – blinding me, and everybody else, to the identity of the driver.

  Dammit.

  Once again, I’d gotten nothing.

  My only consolation was that I was fairly certain that I’d get another chance. And most likely, soon.

  I jumped into my car quickly, locking the doors. Then I answered the phone, catching it right before it went to voicemail.

  “Freddie Wolf,” I said.

  “Hey, Freddie. It’s Mindy.”

  “Oh, hey.”

  I felt my stomach tighten slightly.

  Usually when sources called so soon before I was scheduled to meet them, it wasn’t a good sign.

  And with only a few days before I needed to get that Sunday A1 dog poop in school playgrounds article in, I couldn’t afford to have sources cancelling. Not if I wanted to get back in Kobritz’s good graces anytime soon.

  “I was just calling to make sure you were still going to be at the school board meeting tonight,” she said.

  I let out a short sigh of relief.

  “Yes, I’ll be there,” I said. “I’m just grabbing an early dinner and going home to walk Mugs. But I’ll be heading over to the district building in about an hour.”

  “Good,” she said, sounding nearly as relieved as I felt. “Because I think you’ll get your money’s worth tonight, Freddie. This isn’t one you’ll want to miss.”

  The way she said it piqued my interest. But before I could ask her to elaborate, she interrupted me.

  “Oh, and are we still on for grabbing a drink later?” she said. “I could really use one after the day I’ve had.”

  In the rush of the busy morning and afternoon, I had completely forgotten that I’d agreed to meeting up with Mindy later on.

  But a cold beer with an old friend seemed like a good way to close out the day.

  “I was thinking Dog Mountain Brew Pub,” Mindy said. “That way I can bring Bogey along.”

  I stifled a sigh.

  Not that I didn’t like the drooling pooch, but after the night before, I wouldn’t have minded a break from the lap dog and his heavy little paws.

  But in a town like Dog Mountain, asking somebody to leave their canine at home was practically blasphemous.

  “Uh, yeah. The pub sounds good,” I mumbled.

  I supposed as long as she was bringing Bogey, then I could bring Mugs along too – something my own attention-loving pooch probably wouldn’t have minded.

  “Sounds perfect,” she said. “See you soon.”

  She hung up abruptly.

  I slid my phone into my purse and started up the Hyundai.

  I was halfway home before the feeling of dread that usually followed seeing the black Kia Sedona finally hit me.

  It wasn’t that cold of a night. But I couldn’t seem to stop shivering the rest of the way home.

  Chapter 7

  I sat in the back row of the district building’s old, musty meeting room, doodling on my notepad as the Dog Mountain School District’s school board members filed into the room.

  The district building was a horrid brick monstrosity that by all rights should have been demolished long ago. It was constructed in the early 1900s, and had started life as the town’s first high school. The district took over the building in the late 70s when the new high school was built out on South Anderson Road. And since then, hardly anything had been done to make the district building more modern. The structure had zero ventilation, making school board meetings during the summer a living hell for the poor reporter sent to cover them. And being that it was October now, the tables were turning in the opposite direction. Tonight, the meeting room was colder than the grave, and I wished I had worn a more substantial jacket to work today instead of my thin, slate-grey trench that gave me a respectable reportery look. Because at the moment, this respectable reporter was freezing her behind off.

  I rubbed my hands together as a sudden round of laughter erupted from the seated school board members in the front of the room.

  I glanced at the clock on the wall behind me.

  I had ten more minutes of this to endure before the meeting officially started.

  I scanned the faces of the board members, wondering if they were cold too, or if meeting in this room month-in and month-out had given them some sort of immunity to the insane temperature swings.

  Ever since the paper’s permanent education reporter, Todd Ahern, took a better job in Seattle in August, the faces of the five board members in front of me had become all too familiar as the job of covering these meetings had fallen to none ot
her than me.

  I let out a muffled sigh, half paying attention to the board members’ usual pre-meeting talk about their respective jobs, spouses, and kids.

  Hal Parker had been the first to arrive, the way he always was. Followed by Sherry Lynn Hancock, an uptight yoga mommy who had a personal grudge against all members of the media because of a story Scott Appleton had written about her husband’s Thai restaurant paying its workers less than minimum wage. Then there was Donald Saracen, a man in his mid-seventies who often had trouble hearing, and would shout “What was that!?” at inconvenient moments during the meeting. In addition to those three characters, there was Sally Franklin, a retired school nurse, and Taylor High, a young, hungry, and mildly charming construction company CEO who no doubt thought being on the school board was the beginning of a long and prosperous political career.

  It was a typical small town school board, and I counted myself lucky not to have to cover the meetings too often. Aside from being incredibly boring, the meetings, much like the dog board hearings, accomplished very little. It was mostly about the school board members serving their own vanity and self-importance, and their love of hearing themselves talk long into the evening.

  Hal Parker was really the only exception in the group.

  The grey-haired man caught my eye and gave me a smile.

  “Oh good,” Hal said to the others in a pretend-hushed voice as he looked in my direction. “The paper sent the smart and cute reporter tonight.”

  I grinned.

  “Does your wife know the way you compliment members of the press?” I shouted, playfully.

  “Well, she’s on a teaching excursion to China right now,” Hal said, grinning and stroking the grey stubble on his chin. “So technically, no. But you’re welcome to tattle on me when she gets back.”

  I laughed.

  It was all in good fun, but the whole thing caused Sherry Lynn Hancock to scowl as if she’d showed up to her 6 a.m. yoga class only to find that it had been cancelled for the day.

  I ignored her, making a mental note to go talk to Hal at the break about the feature piece I wanted to write about him.