The China Dogs by Sam Masters Read Free Book Online Page A

walks as he answers, “Initial investigation of the scene has been concluded and the beach has been reopened to the public. We haven’t yet identified the owner of the dog that attacked the deceased and we’d be grateful for any help the public can give us.”
    â€œDo you have any theories about what went wrong here?”
    He hesitates for a second. “An increasing amount of people are irresponsibly abandoning animals that they’ve grown bored with. Pets they can’t afford to feed or have treated at the vet’s—so we may well be looking at the result of such an abandonment.”
    â€œThank you, Lieutenant Walton.” The reporter turns directly to the camera to start a Q&A with the local studio anchor. A caption crawls across the bottom of the screen naming the dead girl as seventeen-year-old Kathy Morgan and gives a police number for people to call with information.
    Jude guns the volume down. “Story’s awful, but he’s kinda cute in a freaky way.”
    â€œYeah, I was thinking of calling him and asking him out.”
    â€œYou’re shameless.”
    â€œThat’s my middle name.”
    â€œI’m out tonight anyway, so best amuse yourself.”
    â€œSomewhere special?”
    â€œJake’s parents’ twentieth anniversary dinner, so couldn’t cancel. Sorry.”
    â€œWhat is twenty—silver?”
    â€œChina.”
    â€œShit, that’s boring. Silver or gold is good, but china?”
    Jude pulls an apologetic face. “We got them a picnic set—in white china.”
    â€œPlease euthanize me before I get to the age when I think china’s exciting.” She gets to her feet. “I’m gonna find the card the cop gave me and call him—at least I know he won’t be boring.”
    18
    Bill Baggs Park, Miami
    G host sits in the pine-smelling, log-walled Ranger Station and carefully studies the pistol used to kill the dog on the beach.
    It’s an old Smith & Wesson Sigma, a double action 9mm with stainless steel slide and polymer grip.
    He looks across the wooden table to the man who fired it, a shaking twig of a young guy who doesn’t look old enough to buy beer. “Five shots—how come you needed so many?”
    Twenty-two-year-old Mark Hadley has come in specially to be interviewed and sits alongside his boss, Senior Park Ranger Dwain Tulocky. Hadley’s red-rimmed eyes and skin, almost as pale as Ghost’s, are signs he’s not yet over the ordeal. “It wouldn’t stop. It jus’ kept comin’ an’ comin’.” He drops his head and stares at the table as though he’s looking around for words he misplaced.
    Dwain gives him a nudge. “Tell him about the Taser, son. Tell him what you done first.”
    The young Ranger puts his hands below the table and sits on them to stop them from shaking. “Like Mr. Tulocky says, I Tasered the thing first. That’s protocol an’ all. But it didn’t do nothin’. Animal just kept chewin’ on the girl—on what was left of her. Have you seen it, officer? D’you know how big it was?”
    â€œI have.” Ghost looks into Hadley’s eyes and can tell the kid’s back on the beach facing down the dog, sickened by the girl’s death and at the same time frightened for his own life.
    â€œGo on,” prompts his boss. “Tell what you did next.”
    â€œThe wire from the Taser barb were just dangling there from its side, with enough juice flowing through it to make a grown man flip like a pancake. The dog wasn’t the least bit bothered, so I had to use my gun.” He nods toward the Sigma in Ghost’s hands. “I reckon I was nervous, coz I aimed at the head but hit it somewhere around the left shoulder. It made a noise, man, a real growl, like nothin’ I never heard before, so I shot it again, more out of reflex than anythin’.” He puts the fingers of