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"He'll warm up to you eventually. He's a good kid."
Jett didn't react to my statement. Instead, he turned his attention back to the dog. "Any luck with him?"
"No," I said. "We've tried giving some basic commands in different languages, but he doesn't respond to any of them. If we knew his background…"
"If you contact the military about him, you’re signing his death warrant," Jett said.
I’d figured as much. While I wasn't particularly experienced with how dogs in the military were handled, I knew that they weren’t just randomly adopted out to people. It was like Jett had said, the dog was essentially a weapon. And a very dangerous one at that, especially in the wrong hands. Making things worse, this particular dog had undergone extreme trauma which made him even more dangerous. If the military found out the dog was on the loose, they would most certainly come to claim the animal and I had no doubt about what his fate would be then.
"Maddox is trying to find out what he can without setting off any warning bells," I explained. As I spoke, I noticed Jett doing something with his hands. At first, I thought the gestures might be nervous ones like when he'd been tapping the wheels on his chair as I’d prepared to take his stitches out, but this was different.
"He's a Belgian Malinois," Jett said. I'd already known that, but I was curious what else he had to say, so I kept quiet. As he spoke, his hand gestures continued. "Because of their agility, strength, and temperament, they’re often used in more intensive roles in the military. He could be anything from an explosive or mine-seeking dog to an MPC."
"MPC?" I asked.
"Multipurpose canine. Those are the dogs you hear about that rappel out of helicopters and scout tunnels. They're pretty much the canine version of SEALS and Marines," Jett explained.
"How do you know so much about this?"
"I had this thing with a guy who was a handler."
"A thing?" I asked before I could think better of it.
Jett shrugged. "I guess you could call it a friends-with-benefits thing."
Upon his admission, my green-eyed monster made an untimely appearance. An image of Jett wrapped around a faceless stranger had me seeing red and it was all I could do to appear unaffected. Thankfully, Jett wasn't looking at me. His attention was still on the dog.
"There you are," Jett suddenly said in the softest of whispers. I turned to look at the dog and felt my heart jump in my chest at the sight of the animal sitting quietly in the corner, its brown eyes fixated on Jett. The animal was clearly still terrified, but it was no longer growling or trying to hide in the corner. I glanced at Jett in amazement and saw his hand move. In response, the dog slowly dropped to the ground, keeping his eyes on Jett the entire time.
Jett let out a breath and looked my way. "Handlers use hand signals when the dog is too far away to hear them. He's a soldier, Doc, and soldiers never forget their training. Even when they want to. I think there's a reason he hasn't responded to any of the commands you tried."
Understanding dawned and along with it, a spark of hope. "He's deaf."
"My contact in the Pentagon doesn't have access to the information we need, not without getting flagged," Maddox said, his expression grim.
We were sitting around the dining room table in Maddox and Isaac's home. After a raucous family dinner and everyone getting their weekly manicure from Newt, Isaac had put the child to bed while the rest of us had started to strategize how to handle the dog. Jett's theory about the dog’s hearing turned out to be true and while it felt like a huge victory, I knew we were far from getting the dog on the path to recovery. Despite the animal responding to Jett's hand commands, it still showed significant aggression whenever anyone got too close to it. The animal also remained highly agitated even when left alone. We’d placed cameras in the dog's kennel area so we could watch his behavior when he was by himself. It'd been heartbreaking to watch the dog exhaust itself by continuously trying to escape the enclosure.
Maddox's news was disappointing but not a dealbreaker. While it would've helped to know what had happened to the animal, we still had options when it came to helping the dog.
"The hand signals are a good start," I said. "These dogs thrive on work. They live for it. He proved today that no matter how agitated he is, it’s still in his nature to respond to commands. I think that's our way in. That's how we build up trust with him."
Isaac returned to the room and went to Maddox’s side. I was envious of the easy way they touched one another—like it was the most natural thing in the world. Isaac put his arm around Maddox’s shoulders and settled on his leg. In turn, Maddox wrapped an arm around Isaac’s slim waist before he looked pointedly at Dallas and said, "The army considers that dog property. If they find out we knowingly harbored him—"
