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By the time the session was over, I walked out of the room lighter than I’d been since I got back. I found Dad in the living room elbow deep in Cartel research. When he heard my footsteps, he removed his glasses he looked up and took a hard look at me.
“Well?”
“I think we’d be crazy not to hire him.”
Daniel
Debbi wore a bright yellow t-shirt with a cat on the front that read,You’re not drinking alone if your cat is in the room.
“I think we should make a quick call to Zack, give him our coordinates.” Frank gave me a creeped-out face. “Because if we don’t return, Debbi did it.” I hid my laugh by faking a cough.
Debbi led the way down a hallway and eyed me as she unlocked the door to a giant room filled with seven-foot-high fenced-in cages. A lot of eyes blinked back at me as I took in the place.
“Um, Daniel…” Frank squinted and plugged his ears at the deafening sounds that bounced off the concrete walls. Excited barks and whines bombarded us and drowned out Frank’s words. I swallowed back the smell of soiled pads and desperation.
“One call, and I can get you the best of the best from the military police.” Frank’s voice was loud and close to my ear.
“No,” I shook my head and looked around at the desperately unhappy pups behind the fences. The neighborhood pound held way too many dogs who needed someone. “They need us as much as we need them. Let’s give this a chance first,” I yelled back in his ear then bent down and reached through a cage and patted a border collie’s head. He whined as he soaked up the attention.
After a few minutes, the dogs settled down enough that we could actually hear each other, and Debbi leaned in.
“How many do you want?”
“Eleven.”
“Eleven?” She tucked a piece of frizzy hair behind her ear, only to have it pop back out. “What do you plan to do with them?” Her face became suspicious.
“Well, Debbi,” I flashed her my biggest friendly smile, I hoped it would put her at ease. “I plan to give them a life. One outside a cage.”
“Fine.” She shook her head and shrugged like I was crazy. “Use these to mark the ones you want.” She handed me a handful of yellow scarves. “Come find me when you’re ready, and in the meantime, I’ll get the papers drawn up.”
“Thanks, Debbi,” I called loudly. I was determined to make her like me.
“I say veto that one.” Frank pointed in the corner at the little Chihuahua. “His beady little eyes pierce my soul.”
“I’m not entirely sure a Chihuahua is what we’re looking for.” I chuckled.
“Yeah, well, just be happy Sue isn’t here. She’d want them all.”
“And that’s exactly why she isn’t.” I grimaced and split the scarfs up and handed half to him.
“Okay, Logan, where do we start?”
“I think,” I resisted the urge to take them all, “we go with our gut.”
Several hours later, we had weeded out some dogs I felt could be worked with. I knew we needed dogs who weren’t nervous or snappy. They had to at least look trainable. We needed intelligence and strength too, but that would show itself in time. We just did our best and tried to harden our hearts to those who obviously wouldn’t work. I was happy the border collie made the cut.
After all the paperwork was done, and Debbi was satisfied with our motives, we had our new K9 Trainees ready to go. We arranged to pick them up in a few days after they all got their proper shots. We headed back to Shadows.
“I need a shower.” Frank attempted to brush the dog hair that covered his shirt when he stepped out of the truck.
“Me too.”
“No time for that,” Dad called as he approached us. “We’ve got training to do.”
* * *
“You four looked exhausted.” Sue laughed as she reached up to rub my back when I sat down next to her at Patty’s. “You look like zombies. What’ve you been up to?”
