Chapter 3 - The Man Who Watched Titan
I had spent eight years working police K9 cases.
Drug houses.
Armed suspects.
Missing children.
Burglars hiding in crawlspaces.
People running because they believed a fence, a dumpster, or darkness could defeat a Belgian Malinois.
I had been threatened before.
So had Titan.
But seeing photographs of us pinned to a wall beneath Centennial Park felt different.
Personal.
The underground chamber was fifty yards into the old drainage network.
Concrete walls sweated moisture.
Rust-colored water ran through a shallow channel beneath our boots.
Temporary lights threw long shadows.
Titan moved beside me, nose low.
Ramirez walked ahead.
Maya followed behind.
The chamber had once housed utility equipment.
Now somebody had turned it into a crude living space.
Camp cot.
Portable heater.
Bottled water.
Canned food.
Battery packs.
A folding table covered with maps.
And on one wall—
Me.
Titan.
Photographs taken over months.
Titan entering the precinct.
Me loading him into our department SUV.
Claire outside a grocery store.
Noah walking into middle school.
I stopped breathing.
Ramirez swore quietly.
“Ethan.”
I moved closer.
One photograph showed my house.
Another showed Titan playing in our backyard.
Taken through the fence.
My hands curled into fists.
“Whoever did this knows where my family lives.”
Ramirez immediately reached for his radio.
“Send units to Cole’s residence.”
I was already calling Claire.
She answered on the first ring.
“What happened?”
“Lock the doors.”
“Ethan—”
“Now.”
Her tone changed.
“Okay.”
“Where’s Noah?”
“With me.”
“Get away from the windows.”
“What is going on?”
“Police are coming.”
Silence.
Then quietly:
“Are we in danger?”
I looked at the photographs.
“Yes.”
That was one promise I wouldn’t soften.
“Do exactly what the officers tell you.”
“I will.”
“I love you.”
“Ethan—”
“I love you.”
“I love you too.”
I hung up.
Titan was standing beneath the photographs.
He sniffed one showing Noah.
Then looked at me.
Dogs notice emotion.
People talk about them smelling fear.
That isn’t exactly right.
They notice everything.
Posture.
Breathing.
Chemical changes.
Voice.
Titan knew I was angry.
He leaned against my leg.
I touched his head.
“Family’s fine.”
Ramirez looked toward the maps.
“Come see this.”
One was Seattle.
Red circles marked public spaces.
Centennial Park.
Green Lake.
Discovery Park.
Seattle Center.
Several elementary schools.
A hospital.
Another map showed highways south toward Tacoma.
A third showed ports and freight yards.
Maya examined handwritten codes beside each mark.
“These look like transport routes.”
“For snakes?”
“Maybe.”
I opened a folder on the folding table.
Veterinary records.
Rainier Serpent Conservancy.
Animal numbers.
Some pages missing.
Some altered.
A photograph slipped out.
Four men standing inside a reptile facility.
I recognized Walter Pike immediately from his missing-person photo.
Next to him was an older man identified on the back as Dr. Malcolm Vale.
Founder.
The third man was younger.
Tall.
Dark hair.
Same eyes as Malcolm.
Back of photograph:
Derek Vale.
Malcolm’s son.
The fourth man’s name had been scratched away.
Ramirez pointed.
“Derek.”
Maya’s expression darkened.
“You know him?”
“By reputation.”
“What kind?”
“Bad.”
She took the photograph.
“After Malcolm Vale died, Derek fought the state over the conservancy.”
“Why?”
“Malcolm’s permits were tied to him personally.”
“So Derek couldn’t keep the animals.”
“Not legally.”
“What happened?”
“Derek claimed they belonged to the family business and tried to block the transfers.”
“And failed.”
“Yes.”
Ramirez looked around the underground room.
“Apparently he found another solution.”
We located Derek Vale’s current address.
An apartment in Tacoma.
Empty.
His vehicle was missing.
Phone disconnected.
Bank accounts nearly empty.
But one detail mattered.
His employment.
Owner:
ViperLine Exotic Transport.
A licensed animal transport company.
Or at least it had been licensed.
State approval suspended seven months earlier over paperwork violations.
A wildlife investigator described the violations as “the kind that suggest somebody is moving animals they don’t want regulators to see.”
Derek Vale had access.
Vehicles.
Containers.
Contacts.
And motive.
But motive for what?
Stealing back his father’s snakes?
Revenge against regulators?
Why leave them in a crowded park?
Why photograph me and Titan?
I kept returning to that question.
Titan and I had never met Derek Vale.
At least not knowingly.
Then a detective at the tunnel called my name.
“We found video.”
A trail camera had been hidden behind a drainage pipe.
Battery powered.
Motion activated.
Its memory card contained three days of footage.
Friday, 11:48 p.m.
A white cargo van backed toward the drainage entrance.
Two men unloaded containers.
One was Derek Vale.
The second wore a hood.
12:06 a.m.
Walter Pike appeared.
He argued with Derek.
No audio.
But the body language was obvious.
Walter shoved one container back toward the van.
Derek struck him.
Walter fell.
The hooded man dragged him toward the drainage tunnel.
The blood trail.
The broken glasses.
We watched in silence.
At 12:18, Walter Pike reappeared.
Alone.
He stumbled toward the trees.
His left arm was bleeding heavily.
He carried something in his hand.
A small key.
Sophie’s key.
Then the footage jumped.
Saturday morning.
Derek returned.
He searched the drainage area.
Angry.
He kicked one container.
Then he looked directly toward the trail camera.
For one terrible second, I thought he saw it.
He didn’t.
But he stepped close enough for the image to capture his face.
Calm.
Focused.
No panic.
This wasn’t someone who had lost snakes accidentally.
He knew exactly what he was doing.
The next clip showed something even stranger.
Derek placing one of our photographs on the wall.
Titan and me outside the precinct.
He stood there staring at it for nearly a minute.
Then he wrote something beneath it.
The camera angle couldn’t show the words.
We searched the wall.
Most of the lower paper had been torn away.
But beneath one photograph, faint marker remained on concrete.
THE DOG SEES FIRST.
A chill moved through me.
Maya stared at Titan.
“What does that mean?”
“No idea.”
Ramirez looked toward me.
“Has Titan ever been involved in one of Vale’s cases?”
“No.”
“Search warrants?”
“No.”
“Transport inspections?”
“No.”
“Anything reptile related?”
“Until yesterday, the most exotic thing Titan ever found was a guy hiding meth inside frozen salmon.”
Maya almost smiled.
Almost.
My phone rang.
Detective Lewis.
He had gone with the team to inspect Walter Pike’s apartment.
“Cole.”
“What’d you find?”
“Place was tossed.”
“Burglary?”
“Looks like someone searching.”
“For?”
“No clue.”
“Any sign Walter went willingly?”
“No.”
“Blood?”
“Small amount in the kitchen.”
I looked at the trail-camera footage.
“He made it back home?”
“Maybe.”
Lewis continued.
“But here’s why I’m calling.”
“We found his van.”
“Where?”
“Three blocks from Centennial.”
My attention sharpened.
“When?”
“Abandoned sometime Friday night.”
“Blood?”
“A lot.”
We drove there.
Walter’s van was old.
White.
Rainier logo removed but still faintly visible beneath the paint.
Crime scene had already processed the exterior.
Inside, the cargo floor looked clean.
Too clean.
Luminol changed that.
Blue-white streaks lit across the metal.
Blood.
Someone had tried to wash it.
Titan sniffed the rear doors.
I presented a scent article from Walter’s apartment.
A worn baseball cap.
“Titan.”
He inhaled.
“Find him.”
His entire posture changed.
Work mode.
Head down.
He circled the van.
Then moved toward the sidewalk.
We followed.
Half a block.
One block.
Two.
Titan stopped beside a storm drain.
Scratched.
Police removed the grate.
At the bottom lay a plastic ID badge.
Walter Pike.
Rainier Serpent Conservancy.
“He dumped it?” Ramirez asked.
“Or somebody wanted us to think he did.”
Titan kept tracking.
Three blocks farther, we reached a bus shelter.
The trail ended.
Security camera.
We pulled footage.
Saturday.
2:11 a.m.
A man emerged from darkness.
Gray hair.
No glasses.
One arm held tightly against his side.
Walter Pike.
Alive.
He waited.
A black SUV arrived.
Walter hesitated.
Then got in.
The vehicle drove away.
“Plate?”
“Obscured.”
“Driver?”
“No clear image.”
But the SUV had a sticker on its rear window.
A coiled snake wrapped around a white letter V.
Maya recognized it.
“ViperLine.”
Derek’s company.
“So Walter got in willingly?”
Ramirez asked.
“Maybe not.”
I rewound.
Walter approached the rear passenger door.
Before he entered, he looked behind him.
Not casually.
Like a man checking whether anyone was watching.
Then he removed something from his coat.
A small metallic object.
He crouched near the bus-stop bench.
When he stood, his hand was empty.
The key.
Locker 117.
The key he would later somehow get to Sophie.
Unless the timeline was reversed.
I checked the timestamp.
Saturday.
But Sophie said Walter gave her the key Sunday.
Which meant he had returned.
“How?” I whispered.
Ramirez looked at me.
“What?”
“Walter hid the key here Saturday.”
“Then?”
“Somebody picked it up.”
“Walter himself?”
“Maybe.”
I stared at the footage.
“Or somebody he trusted.”
We searched beneath the bench.
Nothing.
Then Titan sniffed the metal support.
He scratched.
Tape.
A tiny piece remained.
Someone had taped something beneath the seat.
Probably the key.
Removed later.
We needed bus-station Locker 117.
The station manager met us downtown.
Locker 117 had not been opened in weeks according to the electronic system.
Old-fashioned key lock.
No alarm.
Bomb squad cleared it.
We opened it.
Inside sat a black backpack.
Three folders.
A prepaid phone.
A flash drive.
And one sealed envelope.
Across the front:
IF I DISAPPEAR, GIVE THIS TO POLICE.
Inside was a handwritten note from Walter Pike.
My name is Walter Pike.
I worked at Rainier Serpent Conservancy for eleven years.
The animals were never transferred.
Derek Vale falsified the records.
I helped him.
I regret that now.
Ramirez looked at me.
“Keep going.”
Fourteen venomous animals were sold illegally after Malcolm Vale died.
Derek began recovering them six months ago.
I do not know why.
Last week he forced me to help transport them back to Washington.
I believed they were being sold again.
I was wrong.
He showed me the locations.
Parks.
Schools.
Government buildings.
He said people only notice danger after it becomes personal.
I stopped reading.
Maya whispered.
“He was placing them deliberately.”
I continued.
If Derek learns I made copies of the records, he will kill me.
I have hidden the full evidence on the drive.
There is one animal he cares about more than the others.
Number One.
Do not let him release Number One.
The species name had been heavily blacked out.
But Walter had written beneath it:
If Number One reaches a crowded indoor location, people will die before responders understand what they are looking at.
The prepaid phone suddenly rang.
All of us froze.
Nobody knew the number.
Ramirez put it on speaker.
“Hello?”
Silence.
Then a man spoke.
“Sergeant Ramirez.”
Calm voice.
Mid-forties maybe.
“You opened Walter’s locker.”
Ramirez looked at me.
“Who is this?”
“You already know.”
Derek Vale.
“Where’s Walter?”
“You should ask Officer Cole.”
My blood went cold.
“Why me?”
Derek laughed softly.
“Because Walter made one mistake.”
“What?”
“He trusted your dog.”
I stepped closer to the phone.
“You’ve been watching Titan.”
“I’ve been studying him.”
“Why?”
“Because animals don’t lie.”
“What does that mean?”
“You’ll understand.”
“Where is Walter?”
A pause.
Then Derek said:
“Alive.”
“For now.”
“What do you want?”
“The flash drive.”
“No.”
“You haven’t even heard the trade.”
“I don’t care.”
“You will.”
The phone vibrated.
A photograph arrived.
Noah.
My twelve-year-old son.
Walking outside his school.
Taken that morning.
Zoomed from across the street.
My vision narrowed.
Derek’s voice continued through the speaker.
“You should care very much.”
I could barely speak.
“You go near my family—”
“I already did.”
Another photograph.
Claire getting into her car.
Taken less than two hours earlier.
“You want the drive?”
“Yes.”
“Then come get it.”
Derek laughed.
“No, Officer.”
“You’re going to bring it to me.”
The call ended.
I stood perfectly still.
Ramirez touched my shoulder.
“Ethan.”
I looked down at Titan.
He was staring at the phone.
Ears forward.
Alert.
For the first time in our years together, I didn’t see a police dog.
I saw the reason someone had been photographing my family.
Titan had noticed something in Centennial Park that Derek Vale never expected anyone to notice.
May you like
And now Derek wanted him out of the way.
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