“Kit, it’s Miki. I just got back from a new project in Santa Fe. You are not going to believe the assignment I landed this time. Let’s go drink double shots of tequila while I tell you about it, okay? I need some advice. Stop spoiling those gorgeous canines and give me a call.”
Kit smiled, wondering what kind of bizarre situation her old friend had gotten into now. A year ago it was making a tour documentary for a punk band that performed with defanged rattlesnakes, and her most recent job had been shooting trailers for indie horror movies. Whatever her new assignment, it was bound to be strange. Miki attracted bizarre like honey attracted flies.
The next message was the crisp, professional voice of Kit’s vet, calling to make an appointment for a vaccination titer, a procedure required to check the immunization status of the four puppies. Liz Merrigold had been the O’Halloran family vet for nearly a decade, as well as the local contact for the breeder who had supplied Kit’s current litter of training dogs. Liz always kept a sharp eye on the animals placed for training under her supervision, gladly providing medical advice and moral support, day or night.
Kit jotted a note on her calendar to call and confirm a time for the visit. While she wrote, she triggered the last message.
“This is Doctor Rivera’s office, Ms. O’Halloran. Doctor Rivera asks that you call the office at your earliest convenience. He’d like to speak with you.”
Kit looked down at her hands. All the energy seemed to bleed out of her body. She sank lower in the chair, staring at the breeding awards that lined the walls of the study. Presidents, generals and movie stars smiled down from mismatched frames, mute records of her family’s contribution to humane and practical training techniques for service and working dogs. In twenty-five years her parents had personally trained over two thousand dogs, and Kit was determined to expand on their legacy.
But her body might have different plans.
After a long day of exercise, she could no longer ignore the deep throb in her right hip. Wincing, she pulled a heavy medical textbook from a nearby shelf. She didn’t expect to find anything new because she had read every relevant page at least fifty times. All of them pointed to the same conclusion: joint deterioration, pure and simple.
Kit wished that Trace would come home. She missed his outrageously bad jokes and his off-key Rolling Stones renditions.
But she never knew when her brother would appear, and she tried not to think about the possibility that he might never come back. Although the details were secret, Kit knew he was part of a highly trained covert operations team, and right now they could be deployed anywhere.
Almost certainly, it would be someplace dangerous. More than once she remembered Trace calmly telling her that hell was their specialty.
Baby gently nudged her leg. Kit sensed that the dog had come to offer reassurance with the warmth of her body and the soft thump of her tail. It was uncanny how pets developed a skill at reading their owners’ moods.
Kit took a deep breath, stretching her legs slowly. Her joints felt stiff, but they were no worse than any other day, and that was something to be thankful for. Leaning down, she slid her hand through Baby’s soft fur. She had cried herself dry months ago, cursing her body, her genes and nameless bad luck. Neither the tears nor the curses had made her feel better.
As she stared at the medical book filled with grim facts and sad pictures, something shook free inside Kit. Slowly it uncurled against her chest, blowing away restless fears and dreary expectations. She wouldn’t plan her future based on old medical files. She was strong. She would make her own future.
She closed the textbook with a snap. No more obsessing about medicine and new discoveries. If you gave in to fear, you’d lost already.
Outside the moon drifted above the mesa. Kit ran a hand through her hair and stretched. “I’m in the mood for a hero tonight. What do you guys say? Gary Cooper or John Wayne?”
Diesel stared at her, cocking his head in the half-listening, half-baffled pose that always made her smile.
Baby turned in a slow circle, stretching out on the floor.
“Bogie it is, then.” Shaking her head, Kit went out to find Casablanca.
TWENTY MINUTES LATER the Germans were storming Paris, Bogie was fighting a broken heart, and Kit couldn’t have been happier.
Curled up on the couch, she watched black-and-white images play across the wide-screen TV that had been her father’s single vice. She smiled as the story wrapped around her, pulling her in and making her forget her own troubles. Ilsa and Rick would always have Paris, and she would always have Casablanca.
Claude Rains leered at her. Kit fought a yawn as the day finally took its toll. She fell into dreams of black and white and a world filled with weary heroes.
MOONLIGHT SHIMMERED across the floor. Baby stretched out at Kit’s feet, gnawing on a rubber chew toy.
As Kit slept, the four dogs moved closer. At a look from Baby, Diesel vanished to patrol the courtyard while Butch and Sundance moved to check the backyard and rear doors.
In silence, Baby lifted her paws to the windows that overlooked the mesa. There in the moonlight the dog’s ears pricked forward.
A family of quail scurried for cover, routed from sleep by the shadow of a passing hawk. Wind hissed through the juniper branches that tossed in the moonlight.
Baby absorbed all of these movements, assessing them as unimportant. But something else moved in the darkness, and it was a thing the dog had never sensed before.
The other three dogs appeared from the shadows, drawn by the force of Baby’s uneasiness. As one, they sank down before the window, alert to the night.
While the moon rose higher and war waged across North Africa, Kit slept on, caught in restless dreams. Ranged around her, the dogs kept a wary vigil, sensing new predators afoot beneath the desert moon.
CHAPTER FOUR
SILENT AND CONTROLLED, the highly trained covert operative jumped the courtyard wall and scanned the outside of Kit’s house. At the edge of the shadows, certain he was alone, he triggered his cell phone.
Ryker answered on the second ring, sounding irritated. “0200 hours. This had better be important, Houston.”
“Permission to break cover, sir.”
“You’re persistent, I’ll say that.”
Wolfe didn’t answer. The night was silent, the air rich with the pungent bite of piñon and burning mesquite logs.
“Any new threats, Commander?”
“A cougar in the area. She drove the thing off with a stick. Added to that is the possibility that the men from this morning may return. I can’t keep her safe if I’m hidden at the top of the hill, sir. It’s simple physics.”
“There’s nothing simple about physics,” Ryker muttered. “Foxfire proves that every day.” He cleared his throat. “Permission granted. But keep things airtight. I’m holding you personally responsible, is that understood?”
“Affirmative, sir.”
“Then good night,” Ryker said sourly. “Some of us need to sleep.”
When Ryker disconnected, Wolfe reconnoitered. He knew the layout of the ranch from his mission documents, but even without the plans, he would still have remembered his way.
With quick movements he jimmied the side door lock and broke into the house. Once inside, he listened for Kit’s voice or the sound of footsteps, but all was quiet. Only as he turned down the front hall did he hear low voices—male and female.
Instantly his hand flashed to the Sig at the small of his back. How had someone gotten past him? He’d been watching every road, window and door for a week. During his brief naps, his scattered motion sensors took over, so the property was always monitored.
Light flickered from the far end of the hall. Muffled voices rose in anger.
Neither of them was Kit’s.
When he glanced around the corner into the living room, he saw Kit asleep on the couch, legs curled up, her hand flung over the back of a pillow. Ranged around her were the four dogs Ryker had
briefed him about. Smart, fast, and highly motivated, they were products of the same genetic technology that made Wolfe one of the government’s most valuable military assets. Kit mumbled in her sleep, one hand in Baby’s fur, and the big puppy moved closer, almost protectively, as Wolfe surveyed the room. Currently Kit had no idea about the nature of the dogs she was raising. Though her supervision of the dogs’ training remained hotly contested by the Foxfire scientists, the bottom line was results: as long as Kit’s dogs showed superior skill acquisition, they would stay right where they were.
For long seconds none of them moved, Wolfe by the door and the dogs keenly alert near Kit. Baby’s head rose. She sniffed the air softly, and Diesel came to stand beside her, their intensity was nearly palpable.
Muted voices continued to come from the flickering television on the far wall as Wolfe monitored the room, staying far back in the shadows.
Then Baby turned in a circle, sneezed and sat down beside Kit with no further wariness or hostility. Wolfe felt some of his tension ebb. The dogs appeared to have accepted him as friendly. Ryker had assured him that their shared chips would make this likely.
Better than getting an ankle savaged, Wolfe thought wryly.
He made a mental note to drop this observation into his next report, along with a description of the dogs’ quick threat response when they’d shot over the courtyard wall to protect Kit.
Spirit and courage. Both were key traits for a military service dog, and these animals would be amazing assets when their training was complete. Healthy and clearly curious, they shot forward to sniff at his legs and circle him excitedly.
But Wolfe was watching Kit and the way light from the television played over her face, outlining her cheekbones and full lips. The surveillance photos in his file didn’t show the gold in her short hair or the dark curve of her eyelashes. Nor did they capture her restless energy, even in sleep.
As he came closer, Wolfe noticed the ugly welt on her arm where she’d fallen on the trail this morning. Near the welt was a bruise from Sundance, who had kicked her accidentally while running through an improvised obstacle course on the mesa.
She’s changed, Wolfe thought. Grown up with a vengeance.
There was no mistaking the smooth curve of her breasts or the line of her thigh beneath the nightshirt she wore.
Bad news, pal.
Frowning, he looked away, studying this airy room with views over three mountains and forty miles of sagebrush. He’d spent some good hours here, playing pool with Trace, arguing about cars and politics. He’d felt safe here once.
Memories rushed over him, good mixed with bitter, drawn from his few hours of normal boyhood. In this house he had glimpsed all the things his life might have been in a different family.
One with a father who didn’t enjoy casual cruelty.
Wolfe hadn’t thought about his father for years. His past was a closed book, the wistful boy buried deep. Before joining the Navy, he had changed his name and dropped the bitter memories like a stone hurled far and long into deep water. Only seventeen, he’d already been a man when he left Lost Mesa. He’d worked in the fields, backbreaking labor that had carried him from county to county and harvest to harvest. Two days after his eighteenth birthday he’d seen a recruiter’s office and felt a light go on.
Two days later he was on a bus bound for the closest training facility. The Navy had made him whole again and he’d met every challenge thrown his way, proud to become a SEAL. When he’d been selected to join the ultrasecret Foxfire unit, his new life had seemed complete.
All these thoughts flashed by in seconds as Wolfe stood in the blue-gray light of a movie he didn’t recognize. The four dogs didn’t move, faces alert beside the couch where Kit slept, and Wolfe knew beyond a doubt that they were measuring him, analyzing every action. He avoided any swift movements that could be mistaken for aggression, and when the dogs continued to show no sign of hostility, he crouched beside the smallest one, a black Lab with melted chocolate eyes.
So this was Baby.
The runt of the litter, she was also the smartest and most gifted, if Ryker’s files were right—and they almost always were. Wolfe raised his hand, checking the dog’s response.
The big dark eyes focused intently. She sniffed his open palm and nudged his hand, her tail bumping on the rug.
The SEAL felt a little surge of satisfaction when Baby rolled over calmly in a gesture of trust, raising her head to meet his hand. The animals were well nourished and superbly groomed. Their coats were thick and smooth, their eyes clear. According to Ryker, none of the government’s in-house labs had produced dogs with anything close to Kit’s record of health and growth rate. Wolfe made a mental note to check the ingredients of the new food mix she had developed. He had already sent back photographs with a 12X zoom and detailed notes about her training methods. Clearly she deserved her excellent reputation.
Ryker wanted to know how a civilian working alone in an isolated and meagerly equipped location could outperform highly paid scientists in state-of-the-art facilities. Some people were convinced that Kit’s parents had stumbled across a food additive to enhance the dogs’ training speed. Others had called it blind luck. For his part, standing face to face with Kit’s dogs, Wolfe suspected a different process was at work.
Kit didn’t hesitate to crawl through the dirt on her stomach to show a six-month old puppy how to be silent in the brush. She didn’t hold back a laugh of pure glee when she jumped from a ladder into a mound of straw with two wriggling dogs in her arms. She offered unquestioning loyalty and her animals responded in kind.
Wolfe wasn’t a scientist, but he sensed that Kit herself was the secret ingredient.
He looked up to the scrutiny of chocolate-colored eyes. Baby continued to study him for what felt like a lifetime, sniffing his hand. Damn if Wolfe didn’t feel as if he’d been scanned, analyzed and dissected from forehead to big toe.
When Baby nudged his leg, Wolfe winced. She was a little too close to the jagged cut he’d received during his insertion jump from a military chopper north of Taos. But he didn’t pull away, sensing the dog’s concentration.
Seconds later Baby was nudged aside first by Diesel, then by Butch and Sundance. Each dog sniffed the area on his thigh where he had been wounded. When they were finally done investigating, they drew back into a motionless line.
The seconds stretched out. Wolfe felt the dogs’ concentration grow.
What in the hell was going on? Why did he feel as if he was being ruthlessly analyzed all over again? Suddenly Wolfe realized it was his wound that fascinated the dogs, possibly because they sensed something unusual—or familiar—about his blood chemistry. Another observation to go into his report to Ryker.
Across the room, Kit twisted suddenly. Still asleep, she kicked free of her cover, her hand hitting the remote on the side table.
The images on the screen multiplied, twelve small boxes of the same street scene.
Curious, Wolfe moved closer. He’d never seen a complicated TV screen like this one. Back at the lab, facilities were tight and schedules strict. Training constantly, the team members had little time for entertainment, since they had to be able to deploy at a moment’s notice, day or night.
It was fair to say that he had missed a few things, given his lifestyle. With Baby by his leg, he followed images of tanks rumbling through the streets of Paris. Against the haunting chords of a piano, he saw Humphrey Bogart’s ashen face when he was left alone for a second time.
War was hell, all right. Wolfe could identify with that.
Kit twisted again. Her other hand hit the remote, changing the display to one small box in the bottom corner of the screen.
Fascinated by the technology, Wolfe picked up the remote and sat down in the far chair while he studied the unfamiliar control. He could rig complicated trigger units for every kind of explosive device, so he figured this equipment wouldn’t be much of a problem.
He touched one of the buttons.
The action froze on the big screen.
He touched another button. In seconds he’d worked out how to resume action, mute the audio and fast-forward. After making sure that Kit was still out cold, he started the movie again. Diesel moved closer while Baby nuzzled his shoulder. With the dogs ranged around him, he felt oddly safe and protected.
But safety was an illusion with Cruz on the loose. Jumpy, he rose and circled the room, checking windows and doors. After each pass, he was drawn back to his seat beside Baby and the images that flickered over the screen.
Without a sound Sundance moved to the big window overlooking the front porch. Diesel and Butch slipped away into the shadows. Baby didn’t budge, her head resting on Wolfe’s shoulder. For one strange moment the SEAL felt an unshakable sense of belonging.
But he didn’t belong. Not as a ragtag boy, and definitely not as a man. Because of Foxfire, he would always be different, and he had accepted that difference, both gift and curse, the day that the government had implanted his first chip.
And he had work to do. Now that he had ascertained Kit’s safety, there was no reason for him to sit watching a sixty-year-old movie and enjoying the sight of Kit’s hair aglow in the lamplight.
As Wolfe stood up, Baby slanted her head and met his eyes.
He wasn’t sure if he imagined what happened next. Across the room the sound climbed, voices murmuring. Wolfe tapped a button on the remote, wondering if he had accidentally hit something without noticing. But a second later the volume climbed again.
A defective television?
He frowned at the wall of high-tech equipment and lowered the audio again. Behind him the dogs were lined up in a row. Panting, they stared at him expectantly.
As a test, he muted the sound. Instantly, it shot back to its prior level.
Wolfe dropped the volume, sorting through possible explanations. A wiring malfunction? Battery failure?
Flipping the remote, he removed the batteries. He was about to pry off the inside cover and check the inner circuitry when the TV muted on its own.
Code Name: Baby Page 4
