Chapter 5 - THE MAN INSIDE THE DEPARTMENTI didn’t go home.
Neither did Titan.
We moved to a federal safe facility while the device was copied and authenticated.
By sunrise, the FBI had joined the investigation.
By noon, the case had become bigger than anything I had worked in my career.
But the worst discovery wasn’t the list of corrupt officials.
It was one particular name.
Deputy Chief Raymond Holt.
My deputy chief.
The man who had personally approved the Black River raid.
The man who had ordered Titan suspended after the park video.
The man who knew exactly where Titan had been taken for veterinary treatment.
I wanted to believe there was another explanation.
There wasn’t.
The device documented seven payments to Holt over five years.
More than four hundred thousand dollars.
He had protected Crane.
He had warned him before raids.
And three years earlier, he had arranged for a veterinarian associated with Crane’s organization to examine Titan after his injury.
That was how the storage device ended up inside him.
Crane’s people had hidden it during the chaos of the raid because Titan was being transported away from the scene.
They intended to recover it later.
Except Titan went to a different emergency hospital.
The corrupt veterinarian never saw him again.
Then Crane disappeared.
For three years, he apparently assumed the device was lost.
Until recently.
“How did he learn Titan still had it?” I asked.
The answer came from Holt.
We arrested him quietly at headquarters.
He lasted forty-seven minutes in interrogation.
Then he asked for protection.
Crane had contacted him two months earlier.
A former Black River employee had confessed that the device was implanted in Titan.
Crane wanted it back.
Holt’s job was to separate Titan from me and arrange for the dog to be euthanized after a public incident.
Then the body could be intercepted before cremation.
The snake plan was designed to create exactly that scenario.
“But Titan saved Lucy,” Lena said.
Holt stared at the table.
“That wasn’t supposed to happen.”
“You smeared attractant on a child.”
“I didn’t.”
“You knew.”
His silence answered.
I had to leave the room before I hit him.
Outside, Titan waited beside an FBI handler.
His shaved shoulder showed the small incision where the device had been removed.
Lucy had nearly died.
Titan had nearly died.
And powerful men had considered both acceptable collateral damage.
Holt gave us one more thing.
A location.
An abandoned wildlife facility near the Kentucky border.
Crane’s new base.
Federal teams moved before dawn.
I wasn’t supposed to go.
I went anyway.
We found cages.
Hundreds.
Most empty.
Some containing illegal reptiles.
We found shipping documents.
Weapons.
Cash.
But not Crane.
He had left hours earlier.
On a desk sat a photograph of Titan.
A knife driven through it.
Beside the photograph was a burner phone.
It rang while we stood there.
Everyone froze.
I answered.
Crane spoke.
“You opened the drive.”
“Yes.”
“Then you know why people will keep dying.”
“Turn yourself in.”
He laughed.
“You think Holt was the highest name on that list?”
My eyes moved toward the agents around me.
“Where are you?”
“Closer than you think.”
Then I heard a child’s voice through the phone.
My heart stopped.
“Officer Mark?”
Lucy.
I turned toward Lena.
She saw my face.
Immediately grabbed her radio.
Crane continued.
“The Bennetts had excellent police protection.”
My blood became ice.
“But police protection doesn’t help much when some of the police belong to me.”
“Don’t hurt her.”
“You have what I want.”
“You can have it.”
“No, I can’t. You copied it.”
“Then what do you want?”
“Insurance.”
Lucy whimpered.
Titan stood.
His entire body changed.
He recognized her voice.
Crane gave me an address.
“Come alone.”
The line disconnected.
Lena said, “Absolutely not.”
I looked at Titan.
“No.”
“Mark—”
“He wants me.”
“He wants to kill you.”
“Probably.”
“And Lucy?”
“He’ll kill her if we bring a tactical team through the front door.”
FBI agents began tracing the call.
The address belonged to a closed summer camp on Percy Priest Lake.
Thirty acres.
Cabins.
Woods.
Multiple access roads.
A nightmare to secure.
I clipped Titan’s leash to his harness.
Lena stared at me.
“You’re not going alone.”
I looked down at my partner.
“I’m not.”
Titan looked back.
For three years, he had carried Crane’s secret beneath his skin.
He had survived venom.
He had survived a murder attempt.
He had saved a child everyone thought he was attacking.
Now that same child needed him again.
I knelt beside him.
“You ready?”
His ears rose.
The swelling in his paw wasn’t completely gone.
The stitches near his shoulder were fresh.
No responsible handler would have taken him.
But Titan had never cared much about responsible decisions when one of his people was in danger.
And sometime during those days at the Bennett farm, Lucy had become one of his people.
We drove toward the lake.
Federal teams followed several miles behind.
At the final intersection, I turned off my radio.
Crane had ordered me to arrive alone.
But he had made one mistake.
He thought the device inside Titan had been the most dangerous thing the dog carried.
It wasn’t.
May you like
The most dangerous thing Titan carried was loyalty.
And Wesley Crane was about to discover exactly what that was worth.
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