Joel’s wife brought in three glasses of sun tea and sat down in the chair opposite the couch while I explained about Christy’s stalker—and how I thought that if the dog breed he had was rare, maybe we could find someone who knew him in the dog world. I gave her the bare-bones description Christy had given me.
“Molossers,” Lucia said, then gave Honey a grin. “It is a type, not a breed. It includes mastiffs and Saint Bernards. How familiar is your husband’s ex-wife with dog breeds?”
I called Adam’s cell phone.
Christy answered yet again. “Adam’s phone,” she said. “He—”
“So how much do you know about dogs?” I asked her without giving her a chance to tell me why she was answering his phone—again—and why he couldn’t talk to me.
“I grew up with golden retrievers,” she said.
“Do you know what a molosser is?”
“No,” she admitted reluctantly.
“Ask her if she could recognize a Newfoundland,” Lucia suggested.
I decided this three-way had gone from awkward to ludicrous, and I handed the phone over to Lucia. Eventually, Christy got on the Internet to look at dog breeds.
“Cane corso,” Christy said. “They look right.”
“Cane corso are smaller than you describe,” Lucia said. “Also, they usually have nice temperaments. But poor handling can turn even a Labrador into a dangerous animal. We will keep the cane corso as a possibility. You said these dogs were black.”
“Yes,” Christy agreed. “Really black. In the sunlight, it looked like they were black striped on black.”
After twenty minutes of questioning and checking out various breeds, Lucia’s tones changed from cautiously professional to profoundly sympathetic. Christy was good, even over the phone.
“What language was the dog’s name in?” Lucia’s voice was soothing.
“I don’t speak any foreign languages,” Christy apologized.
“She’s been to Europe,” I murmured.
“Did it sound German?” Lucia asked. “The Broholmer might fit.”
“Not German,” Christy said even more apologetically. “Maybe it was Spanish or even Latin.”
Lucia stared at her white dog as she thought. Finally she said, “The fila Brasileiro—a Brazilian mastiff—might fit. They are rare and very much one-person dogs. They can be very aggressive if not socialized when they are young.”
Christy made her spell it out so she could look it up. After a few minutes, she said, “No. These dogs … their heads were more in line with their body size. And the fila Brasileiro look like bloodhounds to me. Kind of friendly. There was nothing friendly-looking about his dogs. This is sort of stupid, but I just remembered something.” She paused, and said, sounding embarrassed, “The dog’s breed. It sounded like a bird’s name.”
“Perro de presa Canario,” Lucia said immediately. “Some people call them dogo Canarios, presa Canario, or just presas or Canarios.” She spelled it for Christy without prompting.
After a minute Christy made a disappointed noise. “No. These dogs’ ears are too small. His had long ears, like the last breed we looked at.”
“Presas usually have their ears clipped—like boxers or Doberman pinschers. They do it to the American Staffordshires like my own dogs, too. I chose not to. They say it is because they are used with livestock—to prevent damage. We had a Doberman once who was not ear-clipped, and he always had trouble with his ears being sore where they bent over. But the primary reason for clipping is that it makes them look more fierce. There are people who breed presas who do not crop their ears. See if you can’t find a photo of one with natural ears.”
“I will keep looking…” Christy’s voice trailed off. “There’s one with unclipped ears. That’s it. Presa Canario.”
I took the phone back. “I’ll call Warren and let him know what he’s looking for.”
“I’ll let Adam know, too,” Christy said brightly. “He’ll be glad I figured it out.”
“Sounds good,” I responded after sorting through the things I’d rather have said to her and remembering that I had resolved not to be spiteful or petty today.
I disconnected my phone.
“So,” I asked, “just how rare are presa Canarios?”
“They are rare in the US,” Lucia said. “But a few years ago there was a man who wanted to breed them for pit fighting. He was put in jail, and his lawyers ended up with a pair of his dogs. The dogs had been mistreated, and the lawyers had no idea of how to handle them. The dogs killed a woman in their apartment building who was coming home with her groceries.” Lucia’s pretty mouth tightened, and her white dog bumped her leg to comfort her. “Do you know what happened?”
I nodded, because I remembered the incident, though I hadn’t known what the breed of dog had been. “They became suddenly popular.”
She made a growling noise, and the big dog who had been sleeping with his back to us turned around so he could see her. He didn’t get up, but he remained alert. The dog whose head was on my knee leaned on me a little harder and sighed, groaning a little as I let my fingers search out another good itchy spot.
“Canarios are not evil dogs,” Lucia told me, “any more than my Amstaffs are evil. Canarios are guard dogs, bred to protect their people, their herds—and to hunt for food by taking down big animals. Trained and raised with common sense, they are useful and valuable members of the family.”
It sounded like a rant. I have a few of those, usually involving idiots who try to replace fuses with pennies, people who text while driving, and tax codes so Byzantine not even the IRS really knows what they mean—so I nodded sympathetically.
“I know that you are married to the werewolf,” Lucia told me. “You understand about animals who can be dangerous under the right circumstance. If your friend’s stalker has Canarios—he could train them so that they kill on command.”
Honey bared her teeth and growled. All four dogs rose to their feet and surrounded Lucia—but they didn’t act upset, just ready. Dogs are better than people at reading body language.
“Big dogs are just dogs,” said Honey. “I am a wolf.” She looked at the Amstaffs, who returned her look unafraid and ready to defend their person if they needed to.
“But you, little brave cousins,” Honey said, half-amused under their regard, “you I would take with me on a hunt.”
Not many people could call Lucia’s dogs little and mean it. I would guess that it took a werewolf to feel that way; they looked plenty big to me.
Lucia, far from being intimidated by Honey, smiled. “Brave? Yes. They will take on anything to defend Joel or me.” Her smile dropped away. “Your friend”—Christy had promoted herself from my husband’s ex to my friend—“said that this man’s dogs were difficult, but he had no trouble with them. That tells me that they are his dogs and that they are very well trained. His dogs then will be as mine. They will not know that he is a man who attacks women who cannot fight back: a man who is a coward. They will only know that this man is their god, the one they must listen to and protect. Canarios are courageous. They will not run from you just because you are a werewolf.”
“I’m not actually a werewolf,” I told her apologetically. “But I appreciate the insight. Do you know anyone who raises Canarios? Someone we can talk to about other breeders?”
She nodded. “I do.” She left and returned with a card. “These people live in Portland and breed Canarios. They are very well-known and reputable. If Christy’s stalker is a breeder or an avid fancier, they will know of him.”
I called Warren as soon as we were in the van. He took the information and assured me that he was doing his best to find Juan Flores, so Christy could go back to Eugene.
“Thank you,” I told him sincerely, and he laughed as he rang off.
Honey was thoughtfully silent on the drive back to her house. I stopped in her driveway, and she opened the door. But she stayed in the van for a moment as she looked at her house. “Maybe I need t
o get a dog,” she said.
Between the prison trip and Lucia’s help with the dogs, I managed to come home very late on Tuesday and escaped quality Christy-time, for the most part. Though I hadn’t planned to, I left before breakfast was made the next morning. I had a last-minute fix Wednesday night that kept me nearly an hour later than usual. The thought occurred to me that if I could avoid home long enough, maybe I wouldn’t have to talk to her before she left.
I went home, confident I’d be too late for dinner, but when I came in the door, Christy met me with a smile.
“You are in luck,” she told me. “Adam had an errand to run so I waited dinner for him. You have about fifteen minutes to shower.” She wrinkled her nose.
“Thanks,” I said, as if she hadn’t just sent me off to clean up. I’d intended to shower because I was sweaty and dirty. I wasn’t going to behave like I was thirteen and refuse to do it because she’d told me to. No matter how strong the impulse.
I was in my bathroom, pulling off my clothes, when I heard Adam come into the bedroom. I didn’t want to have him see how agitated she’d made me, so I just continued to get ready to shower.
“Three days since Christy got here, and we’ve made no progress, Mercy.” Adam’s voice came, slightly muffled, from the bedroom. “It’s not that Juan Flores doesn’t leave traces—it’s that none of them mean anything. It’s starting to look as though he might really be someone dangerous. My connections with the DEA tell me that they have ten Juan Floreses on their watch list—none of them up high enough in the money to be Christy’s Juan Flores.”
He neared the bathroom, and I heard him open a drawer. “They say it might mean that he’s not a drug trafficker, or that he’s so big no one talks about him. I’ve worked it out with a few of my people so I can work from home until we find him.” He paused, then said in a low voice, “You should know that Christy asked me to stay home because she doesn’t feel comfortable with the wolves if I’m not here.”
I turned on the shower to let it warm up as well as give me a chance to think about what I wanted to say to Adam. But when I turned, I was confronted by a large plastic see-through box covered with sparkly pink rhinestones that held a huge collection of makeup. Christy’s makeup was in my bathroom, on my counter, next to my sink. At least, I thought, she hadn’t put it next to Adam’s sink.
“Don’t we have another bathroom upstairs that Christy could use to store her makeup?” I asked.
There was a long silence, then Adam said, “There wasn’t room for her stuff and Jesse’s stuff in the smaller bathroom.” Another pause. “I told her you wouldn’t mind.”
I got in the shower and stuck my head under the hot water, so I couldn’t say anything I would regret. Coyotes weren’t as territorial, as a rule, as werewolves, but we still had our hard lines. Having Christy flouncing in and out through my bedroom into my bathroom crossed one of my hard lines. I washed my hair and tried to let things, the ugly, unpleasant things I was feeling, slide down the drain with the rest of the grime that had covered my skin.
The shower door opened, and Adam stepped in.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
I shook my head and leaned against him. The feel of his skin next to mine went a long way toward restoring my equanimity.
“She probably asked you if I’d mind,” I said. “And managed to imply that only a small-minded, petty person could possibly object to her husband’s ex-wife moving her makeup into the larger, brighter bathroom. If you told her she couldn’t, then you’d have been implying that I was a petty, mean-spirited person.”
“And jealous,” he added. “I’m sorry.”
I shook my head. “I love you,” I told him. “I love the man you are. But her makeup is not staying here. I won’t have her in our bedroom. In our bathroom. But I will take care of it.” I smiled at him. “I don’t care if she calls me jealous or petty. Not your worry. So still no real information on Flores?”
“No,” he said, soaping up his hands and starting to wash himself off briskly. “The Reno pack sent a couple of wolves to talk to the hotel where Christy met Flores. Turns out he comes there every year about the same time, checks in under different names for which he has ID—but that is apparently not unusual despite government regulations. There’s an actor who regularly checks in there under the name of the secret identity of the last superhero he played. But the staff remembers him because of the dogs—and confirmed that whatever name he’s registered as, he still goes by Juan Flores.”
I had followed Adam’s example and scrubbed myself down as he talked. I even managed to soap my hair and condition it before the magnetic draw of Adam’s skin forced me to touch him.
“He can speak native-quality Spanish, but his accent is weird,” Adam told me, but his voice was a little unsteady, and he braced himself against the corner of the shower. “Not from Spain, Puerto Rico, Cuba, or Mexico. The Argentinian maid said he sounded Colombian. The Colombian maid said maybe Venezuelan, and he used very old-fashioned—”
“Old-fashioned what?” I asked, letting my mouth follow my hands.
“Mmmm,” Adam answered.
Someone knocked on the bathroom door. “Hurry up, Mercy,” Auriele said briskly. “Christy’s made her famous Szechuan chicken, but it needs to be eaten right now.”
I backed away, and Adam snarled soundlessly.
“Yeah,” I said. “Me, too.”
On the way down for dinner, I collected Christy’s things and set them down in front of her door.
“You aren’t going to talk to her?” Adam asked.
“I don’t need to,” I told him. “She’ll get the message.” If I had to give it again, she’d be buying new makeup and a new case. But I was pretty sure this would be enough.
I always start work early—a habit formed in summers when the afternoon sun can heat the garage ten degrees hotter than the triple-digit figures outside. But Thursday morning, I had left home while the sky was still dark just to get away from the breakfast Christy had been in the process of making. Nothing horrible had happened at dinner, but I didn’t want to repeat it, either. Tad didn’t show up at work until almost an hour after I did.
“No brownies?” he asked.
“Christy has taken over my kitchen,” I told him as I wrote the last check for the garage’s bills. “No stress relief for me. No chocolate for you.”
“No chocolate?” he said, leaning on the counter. “That’s terrible.” He waited hopefully, and when I didn’t say anything more, he asked, “So what did she make for us today?”
I waved him at the brown paper bag sitting next to my keyboard.
He sniffed, then opened it. “Cinnamon rolls?”
“You can eat these in here,” I said, and licked the last envelope closed. “Eat them both. They have Christy cooties.”
“The muffins were good,” he said. “So was the apple pie. I guess I can do without chocolate if the alternative is cinnamon rolls.” There was sympathy in his voice if not his words.
“Blasphemer,” I told him. “There are no cinnamon rolls better than chocolate.”
He sniffed again. “These might be.”
I left him to it and retreated to go work on cars. In my garage, I ruled without question—and had since Zee had retreated to the fae reservation. Her makeup case wasn’t going to end up in my garage.
But as soon as I put Christy out of my mind, I started fretting over my inability to find Coyote. I’d been pretty optimistic after Honey had grilled Gary Laughingdog. But I hadn’t had any brainstorms about how to be interesting enough to attract Coyote’s attention.
Last night I’d resorted to yelling Coyote’s name to the open air (well away from home to make sure no werewolves would hear me making an idiot out of myself). I’d tried talking to Coyote as if he were in the same room to see if he would come out of hiding—and wondered if I was going to have to mastermind a bank heist in order to attract his attention.
I was contemplating criminal activities when Hank c
alled. I peeled off the stupid latex gloves, so I didn’t get grease on my phone. Christy had done that much for me: since I started wearing the gloves—my phone was staying cleaner.
“Hey, Hank,” I said.
“You talk with Gary?”
Something in his voice had me straightening my spine. “Yes.”
“Hope you got the information you needed.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Last night or this morning, Laughingdog escaped. One of his relatives called me to see if I thought you might have had something to do with it.”
“No,” I said. I wondered who Gary Laughingdog’s relatives were and if they might be able to tell me how to get in touch with Coyote. “I don’t think so. Did you know that he has some kind of foresight?”
“Yes,” said Hank. “And much joy he’s ever gotten from it. Gets him into trouble and never out, he says. You think he saw something and broke out?”
“I don’t know him well enough to say that,” I said. “He had a couple of visions while we were there. Mostly a bunch of nonsense—” But he’d known Honey’s name. “Something to the effect of Coyote’s”—I remembered that odd pronunciation—“somebody’s children … breaking the night with their cries. I don’t know anyone else besides the two of us who qualify. Maybe he saw something that made his escape necessary.”
“And maybe Coyote’s kin don’t do well in lockup,” Hank said. “No more than does anyone, but Coyote was always good at getting out of places he didn’t want to be. Anyway, you can expect to see police sometime. They’ll talk to everyone on his visitors list, and there are about four of us up in the Yakama Nation and you. He’s not big-time, but breaking out might make him more important to them. They don’t like being thwarted.” “They,” I knew, referred to the authorities of whatever flavor. Hank didn’t like people who could tell him what to do—and he avoided them by being a very law-abiding citizen.
“Thank you for the heads-up,” I said.