He’d just come from a task force meeting and the news wasn’t good. One further lead had developed in their puppy mule case. One dog had turned up alive. It belonged to a family in New Hampshire who had gotten the puppy from a friend of a friend of a guy who ran into a guy on the street in Nashua selling a box of puppies he wheeled around in a Red Flyer wagon. He was “just one of those anonymous people” who turn up periodically in neighborhoods selling flowers in June, corn and watermelons in July, and extra cheap Christmas lights in October. Lucky break, the puppy had developed an infection at the site of his neutering. The family took him to a vet who discovered a heroin packet had been left inside him.
DEA had got to the vet who reported it and buttoned up the discovery before it became front-page news.
Good result: The smugglers didn’t know they were under surveillance and so could be caught in the act.
Bad result: Puppy mules contaminated with heroin were showing up in homes of unsuspecting families with children who might get exposed to other packets.
Dilemma: Put out a bulletin warning people off buying puppies from unknown dealers, or not? If news of the drug find leaked out, the smugglers would simply quit using that method.
Compromise: Send out a public health bulletin warning people that buying puppies from unknown dealers might expose the buyer to diseases like roundworm, hookworm, and rabies, and hope that people would be more careful.
Meanwhile, Scott and Cole were still point persons in the operation to find and shut down the smugglers. The meeting took two hours. They could have just sent Scott an e-mail. He hated committees.
“Hey. Sweet cheeks.”
Annoyed, Scott refused to look back as he reached the edge of the ring. No way was he going to answer to that name.
The major irritation in his life was X. According to his parole officer, X’s address was a flophouse for street people. Scott checked. The reality was X flopped wherever and whenever the mood struck him. Never the same place twice in a row. And usually during the day. Nights, X was on the prowl.
His parole officer was unimpressed by this minor parole violation. “I should be so lucky all my parolees are like X. He follows the rules. He’s clean. I don’t give a flying fuck where he sleeps. You got no legal authority to know about my meetings with him. You follow me, I’ll have you arrested for interfering with an officer of the court.”
“Hey there.” Jennifer had sidled up beside Scott in hot-pink jelly sandals that matched her top. “Didn’t expect to see you in Baltimore, hot buns. Thought you lived down near Richmond.”
Scott smiled tightly. No way to ignore her now. “It’s Jennifer, isn’t it? Actually, my lady friend lives here in the Baltimore area.”
Jennifer tilted her head back until she stared fully into his face. The gaze in her cherublike face was speculative. “Where do you come from?”
“Philly.”
“That’s where we’re going next. Then back to Maryland for the CPE because my daughter’s competing there. Guess we’ll be seeing a lot of each other.”
“Maybe.” Wanting to change the subject, Scott looked back over his shoulder to where Lorene, silent as ever, sat and waved. “I see you have your umbrella chairs and ice chest set up.”
“Oh, we’re always here early to pick our spots. The Winnebago gives us the edge. We park the night before and sleep in the parking lot, if they allow it. We’ve got the next three months charted out. Started out in Florida. We’re working our way up the coast to Maine, more or less, depending on the competitions we choose to attend. Won’t be home until fall.”
That surprised Scott. “Where do you call home?”
Jennifer lifted her shoulders. “These days, our motor home is home. We’re retired, you see, me and Lorene, and on a fixed income, which isn’t much considering—”
So sorry he’d asked. To cut that off he interjected another question. “Is your daughter competing today?”
“Not this time.” As she shook her head, rows of perfectly formed cylinder-shaped orange-red curls bobbled. “We got Lorene’s granddaughter with us on this leg of the trip.”
She pointed to a little girl who appeared to be about six years old. She was squatting in the grass in denim shorts and a floral top pulling at weed flowers.
“That’s Mimi. We call her Boo Bear. Her mother works most days and weekends and has to pay a sitter in the summer when school’s out. So we just brought Boo Bear with us. Want a beer?” She pointed to the cooler at Lorene’s feet.
“Maybe later.” It was only eleven A.M. These women started early.
“You know where to find us. Oh, here comes your lady friend.”
Scott turned to watch Cole and Hugo approach the entry to the ring, which was on the opposite side. He waved but didn’t call her name. He knew she was concentrating on the course and didn’t want to break her focus.
“There’s a lot of nervous energy in the contestants today. Bunch of beginners in the first round. Just pitiful, some of them handlers. Several dogs did flyoffs.”
“What’s that?”
“When a dog leaps off an obstacle too soon it’s called a flyoff. Most often it happens on the teeter-totter. What you Yankees call a seesaw?”
Scott shrugged. Chatty people wore out their welcome with him pretty fast.
She pointed to the obstacle on the side of the ring. “Once that high end drops to the ground some of these excitable rookie dogs figure they’ve done their part. But they need to come down the other side and touch that yellow area near the end. If they jump off before they touch yellow they get a penalty.”