Page 5 of Guard Dog

“Leave her alone,” JD says shortly. “She doesn’t need reminders of Keith every time she turns around. Let her make the house her own.”

I sit with that for a moment. Violet is starting a brand-new life, and one of the first memories of her new home is kissing me and telling me that she wants me. I was the one who brought Keith into it. I’m starting to think that she is more over his death than I am. But I’m trying not to mention her too much, so I change the subject. “Russo, what was with the NCIS investigators all over Little Creek a couple months ago? Did you ever find out?”

Russo shrugs but seizes the change of topic. “Apparently some equipment went missing. Not a couple months ago, long before that, but somebody finally realized it. No armaments, butother gear. As far as I heard, they didn’t arrest anybody. I guess it happened too long ago. Or, it could have been inventory errors that were recently discovered.” He pops another beer, then leans back so his chair is balancing on its back legs. “What I did hear, though, is that Commander Aikenson has put in for early retirement so he can open a fishing charter with his brother just south of Coronado.”

Anybody who says men don’t gossip is full of shit. This news led to Coronado stories and the group of us demolishing a case of beer, which led to Bishop, the only sober one, driving Russo to his hotel while I crashed on the sofa in the break room and JD slept in his truck.

Until my cell phone rang at o-dark-thirty. Actually rang, with an incoming call. I groped my pockets with bleary eyes until I pulled it out and saw that it was Violet. Then I was wide awake. “Violet? What’s wrong?” It couldn’t be morning already.

“Somebody is trying to break into the house.” Her voice is low. Her words, quick. I can hear the panic she’s fighting to suppress. “I heard them at the window and turned on all the lights. I’m in Peony’s room with Keith’s .38. I’ve pushed the dresser in front of the door. 9-1-1 said help was at least twenty minutes away.”

I’m fifteen. Ten if I speed. “I’ll be right there. Don’t move. I’ll clear the house and let you know when it’s safe to come out. Are you okay?”

“Scared shitless but Peony is still asleep. Hurry, Deke. I need you.”

I shave an extra sixty seconds off and pull into the driveway nine minutes later. JD is about a minute behind me. The only car I see is Violet’s. I’m going for the “make lots of noise to scare them off” ploy, because I want them to run and not dig in. I park with the headlights shining on the front door. My SIG Sauer 226is in my hand as I circle the building. The front and back doors look intact. I call Violet.

“I’m here. There’s no sign of anybody. I’m coming in,” I say quietly. Then I leave the phone on so I can hear her as I slide my master key into the lock. I clear the rest of the house and note the front and back doors are both locked. “Okay, you can come out, Violet.”

She looks fierce. She has a wicked case of bed head, and racoon eyes since she apparently didn’t wash her face before she fell asleep. But her eyes are bright and alert, and her hands aren’t shaking as she holds her pistol pointed at the ground with one hand. Violet puts a finger to her lips, then pulls Peony’s bedroom door closed and motions to the living room. “Did you find anything?” she asks.

“No. There’s no sign anyone was here. What did you hear?”

“See,” she corrects. “I put Peony to bed and walked the house. Then I fell asleep on the sofa. When I woke up, the television had automatically shut itself off and the room was dark. I saw somebody outside the living room window with something in their hands. I rolled off the sofa, turned on all the lights, ran to my room to get the gun, ran to Peony’s room, barricaded the door, and called 9-1-1 then you.”

Keeping her head like that in the face of a burglar was some level-headed shit right there. “The front window?” I confirm.

She nods.

“I’ll check it out.”

I step out the front door, and the porch light beside me flashes on. The lights in the living room beam through the window into the darkness. I hear crunching on gravel. It’s JD. I fill him in, and he looks concerned.

“Did she panic? Have a nightmare?” he asks quietly.

New house in the middle of nowhere, alone with a baby. It’s a possibility. “We’re about to find out.”

Fuck me, she did not. New boot prints squish the yellow and orange marigolds I planted two weeks ago in front of the house, and fresh scrape marks on the paint around the windowsill tell the whole story. Somebody had wanted in.

“What the fuck do we tell her?” I ask. I don’t want Violet to freak out.

“The truth, unless you want her to be unarmed and unprepared. Stop treating her like she’s going to break at any second,” JD snaps. “Give her some credit. She protected her daughter and called for help. What the fuck else was she supposed to do? Go off looking for the guy on her own?”

My blood runs cold at the thought of Violet in danger. Goddammit, I have no right to say anything to her as a friend of her dead husband’s. Unless I’m willing to step up for her all on my own, I’m her boss and landlord and that’s it.

Fuck everything.

“I guess we have to talk to her.”

“And find out what she has that would draw a burglar,” JD adds.

I stare at him. “What?”

“This place has been empty for months. Then, the day after there is non-stop activity, somebody tries to break in. I don’t think that was random. Do you?”

No, I don’t. Fuck everything twice.

Chapter Five

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