Page 3 of Wicked Healing

Hobbling down the ramp, he looked up at her. Erin wished she could take the muzzle off of him, but she just didn’t trust him yet. He didn’t trust her either.

“Heel,” she said, walking toward the gate into the dog park. He followed her through without question, so she took that as a good sign. He sat while he waited for her to latch the gate behind them, then looked around the area. Erin assumed he needed to go potty, so, spooling out the length of the horse lunge line, she murmured to him, “Go potty.”

Wicked sat there for a long time, even after she’d parked herself on the bench thirty feet away. Pulling out her phone, she pretended to ignore him.

The dog lowered his head to sniff the ground first. There had probably been a lot of traffic through here over the past week, so it took him a minute to get his fill. Then he stretched a bit, until he seemed to hit a painful spot and he stopped. Erin frowned. If he was in pain then that would make him bitchy too. Maybe she needed to check his discharge papers and see if he needed another dose of medication.

Wicked pushed to his three feet and bounced over to a conveniently placed fire hydrant. Surely every male dog that came in here blasted that sucker. Wicked sniffed for a moment, then lifted his amputated leg slightly and let loose. Oh, jeez. The poor guy had really needed to pee. She felt guilty for waiting so long now. Once he got done he wandered around a little more. There was a thick patch of grass he headed toward, not burnt by the spring sun. It was still green and soft. With a final glance around, Wicked lowered himself to the grass and rolled. Tears came to her eyes because it was such a dog thing to do, and he’d been in cages and transports for a week, at least. They had grass at Lackland-San Antonio, but with his aggressive behavior she doubted he’d been given any quality time.

Then he stood up and gave a hearty shake. When he was done, he lowered his head and she turned to look at him. She caught her breath just as he scraped the muzzle off his head.

Erin didn’t panic. She just sat and waited, cursing at herself for not checking the fastenings. Wicked didn’t seem to be interested in doing anything though. He wasn’t suddenly going to go on the attack. Ignoring the muzzle he nestled down in the grass, and with a final glance around even put his head down.

Erin wasn’t fooled, though. He’d put his head down, but his big, dark ears continued to flick back and forth. Then he went still and just seemed to be absorbing the heat of the sun.

Erin sat there on that bench a lot longer than she expected to just to give the male the relaxation he seemed to need. After about forty minutes, a car pulled into the lot and parked, and she knew their time was about over. There was nothing in the paperwork about aggressiveness with other dogs but he was a Navy SEAL K9, so she’d have to watch. Two golden labs jumped out of the Jeep, pulling at their leads. They’d been here before because they dragged the owner around to the gate. They seemed eager to get inside. Wicked had raised his head. Even from twenty-five feet away she could see the breath he sighed out as he clambered to his feet. Erin watched him carefully. If the other owner kept control of the labs they should be okay.

The labs, happy critters that they were, saw Wicked and began to head for him, because three playing was always better than two. Wicked wanted no part of them. The scruff of dark hair along his neck bristled, and he seemed to brace himself. Even if he was a dog-friendly dog, he wasn’t in good health right now. He definitely wasn’t in the mood for Lab antics.

The owner of the dogs was being towed along, blithely unaware that anything was amiss.

Erin stood up from the bench and began looping the excess lunge line in her hands as she headed toward Wicked. The labs were within thirty feet and the owner still wasn’t trying to curb their direction.

“Control your dogs!” Erin snapped.

“Oh, they’re friendly,” the girl said, laughing.

“He’s not!” she said, pointing at Wicked.

The girl glanced at the former Military War Dog and suddenly realized that he was not as happy to see her dogs as they were to see him. She reeled back on their lines and started dragging them in a different direction.

Erin stopped at Wicked’s side, hopefully giving him pack support. He quit growling and looked at her.

“Time to go?” she asked him.

Glancing at the Labs one more time, Wicked started heading to the gate. Erin leaned over and picked up the muzzle. It was one of the heavy-duty ones and she had no idea how he’d been able to get it off. It should have been attached to the collar.

* * *

They stoppedfour more times on the way to Phoenix. One stop was for about six hours as she slept in the front seat of her car. Each time she got him out of the back he growled at her, but she didn’t put the muzzle back on him. If he wanted to express to her how much he didn’t like what was going on, she was okay with that. And she thought he was a little fearful in addition to being in pain. She dosed him four times with liquid pain meds in his water and he seemed to sleep easier between stops.

When they made it to her house, there was a cacophony of noise as she parked in front of her garage and she had to smile. She’d only been gone two and a half days but to her crew it probably seemed like longer.

Her mother met her on the front porch, drying her hands on a dish towel. Erin jogged up the steps and hugged her. “They sound almost frantic. Are they starving?”

Linda Knox shook her head in exasperation. “You know they’re not. They’ve had hours of cuddling and attention and treats. I can hardly move off the couch.”

Erin grinned. “I don’t think they even notice I’m gone when you’re here.”

“That’s completely untrue. Sophie especially misses you.”

Erin sighed. The tiny little brown and white terrier mix was the smallest of her group, and the most timid, as well as the most recent addition. The poor thing would hide behind the couch all day if Erin let her, but she had to get used to living a normal life. Her former owner, an elderly woman, had passed on, and someone had suggested that Erin needed another dog to foster. It wasn’t like she had four already, or anything. Five was a nice round number. And six even more, she thought as she moved toward the back door of her SUV. That wasn’t even counting her boarders. Why was she such a sucker to help out?

“Can you corral them into the back yard?”

Her mother nodded and went inside to shoo them all out into the fenced back yard. It would take a few minutes.

Wicked gave her a wary look as she opened the cage door and attached the lunge line. He even growled a little, but it wasn’t as full as the last time she’d gotten him out. She would let him scope out the rocky front yard first, then she could put him in the side yard enclosure. It was almost thirty feet long and had a wire roof, a requirement for military dog fostering. It had taken her days to build, but she was happy with what she’d done. Wicked could smell all of the dogs here first, then she could bring them out one by one to meet him through the fence of his enclosure. If all went well she could try introducing them again face to face another day. After he’d chilled and recovered for a while.

---