Page 56 of So Alone

“Turk,” Faith said. “It’s me. Snap out of it. You’re stronger than this.”

Turk closed his mouth and blinked. He cocked his head and stared at Faith, then tentatively bared his teeth again.

“Turk, please.”

The hair on her left ear prickled. She spun to that side just in time to see the dogs rushing her. They moved silently, their growls silencing as they pounced.

She turned and sprinted back up the hill. The hillside was rocky, which made things difficult for the dogs, so she was able to keep her distance as she climbed the ridge. She looked back behind her at the top and saw Turk at the head of the pack, still looking curiously at her even as he joined in the pursuit.

There was no curiosity in the gazes of the other dogs. Their eyes blazed and their lips pulled back over their teeth as they began to growl and bark again.

“Turk, snap out of it!” Faith shouted, backpedaling. “Turk, wake up, dammit!”

In the distance, she could hear Chung laughing. Her blood boiled. He had come after her dog. He was using Turk against her.

“You think you’re a hero, Chung?” she called out. “You’re no hero. You’re not rescuing these dogs. You’re using them. You’re nothing more than a cowardly little man hiding in safety because you don’t have the guts to handle your problems yourself.”

“A for effort, Special Agent!” Chung called out cheerily.

A Rottweiler leaped over the last rock and stood in front of Faith. Two Dobermans leaped to the other side and boxed her in.

“Dammit, Turk!” Faith called before sprinting away again. This time, she couldn’t outrun the dogs, so she had to keep an eye to either side and avoid the snaps they launched at her ankles. She dodged left and right, crying out once when the Rottweiler tore through the fabric of her pants, narrowly missing her Achilles tendon.

She looked ahead and saw the hole in the fence. She sprinted toward it, but before she reached it, one of the dogs leaped in front of her.

Not one of the dogs. Turk. Turk, the most well-trained of all these dogs, had used her training to cut off her escape and herd her away from safety.

She sprinted toward him, praying that he wouldn’t be so far overcome that he would attack her.

Her prayers were in vain. In a blur of motion, he leapt at her. She knew from their training that he was going for her throat, so she brought her left arm up to protect herself. His jaws snapped shut around her wrist and bit down hard.

She cried out in pain and fear as the rest of the pack converged on her. She fired twice into the air and the pack stopped, shocked by the noise.

Turk, however, had lived around guns his entire life. He didn’t so much as flinch. He released Faith’s arms and jumped easily away from her grasp. He continued to look at her as though he was confused, and she supposed that was the reason he was still alive. He had attacked her but wasn’t finishing the job.

“Turk, it’s me,” she said, getting slowly to her feet, firing once more into the air when the dogs started closing again. “It’s Faith. It’s Mama. Please come back to me.”

Turk took a step closer, teeth bared. The other dogs followed, and when a shot into the air failed to disperse them again, she fired a round into the ground in front of them. They hesitated, but after a few more seconds started closing again.

Turk flattened his ears and approached sinuously, a wolf hunting his prey. She backed away warily, but a few seconds later, her shoes hit the chainlink fence. The dogs quickly fanned out to keep her from escaping and started closing again.

Turk opened his mouth, tongue lolling, panting with anticipation of the kill. She lifted her weapon and fired into the ground again, but the dogs ignored it.

“Dammit, Turk, don’t make me shoot you!” she said, pointing her trembling handgun at his muzzle.

He didn’t slow, and she realized that this was where she would die. She couldn’t bring herself to shoot him. He was her dog. He was her closest friend. If the Copycat Killer knew about Turk, he would never have bothered with Gordon or Michael or even David. He was the reason she was alive, the reason she hadn’t given up. She couldn’t kill him, not even to save her own life.

“I’m sorry, boy,” she whispered, tears streaming down her face. “Mommy tried.”

She lowered her handgun and prepared for the end. Then she remembered David’s advice about aggressive dogs. Calm self-assurance. Act like you’re unworried and in control.

She couldn’t imagine calm self-assurance would help her in this case, but as long as she was going to die anyway, she might as well try it. She stood tall and squared her shoulders, adopting the businesslike expression she wore on a case. She looked at Turk and in the tone of command she used when on the job with him, she said, “Turk, protect.”

Turk crouched, ready to leap. Then he stopped. He blinked and straightened, cocking his head in confusion again.

The other dogs, predictably, couldn’t care less about her tone. They rushed her, closing the distance with surprising speed.

“Turk, protect!” she commanded again.

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