Chapter 1 - THE CRACK ABOVE US“Get him off her! Please, get him off!”
The woman’s scream cut across the park.
Titan, my eighty-five-pound German Shepherd K9, stood over a seven-year-old girl pinned beneath a heavy wooden picnic table. Her face was wet with tears. Her little hands covered her eyes. Three adults were attacking my dog from different directions, pulling at his tactical harness and striking his ribs.
I was already running.
“Titan! Off! Aus!”
He ignored me.
That should have been impossible.
For five years, Titan had followed commands through gunfire, smoke, shattered glass, screaming suspects, and screaming officers. I had never once seen him refuse an emergency release.
But now he stood over this child like a steel barricade.
His front paws were on either side of her shoulders.
His body was rigid.
His ears were pointed upward.
He wasn't looking at the girl.
He wasn't looking at me.
He was staring into the dying branches of the enormous oak tree hanging over the picnic area.
“Get him off her!” the girl's mother sobbed.
A man grabbed a length of firewood.
“He's crushing her!”
He raised it.
I moved before I could think.
The wood slammed into my shoulder.
Pain exploded down my arm, but I stayed between him and Titan.
“Don't hit my dog!”
“He's got a kid trapped!”
“He's protecting her!”
Nobody heard me.
Titan suddenly shifted.
His hind legs dug into the dirt.
He pushed the girl's body deeper beneath the table.
The mother screamed.
“She's going to suffocate!”
I dropped to my knees and grabbed Titan's collar with both hands.
“Titan!”
His muscles tightened under my fingers.
For one horrifying second, I thought my partner had snapped.
Then the entire park went silent.
A sound came from above us.
A violent splintering crack.
Everyone looked up.
The largest branch of the oak tree broke free.
It dropped like a falling bridge.
Titan twisted sideways.
I saw nothing but a blur of dark fur.
The branch slammed into the picnic table.
Wood exploded.
People screamed.
Dust filled the air.
The table collapsed exactly where the little girl had been lying moments before.
Titan took the edge of the impact across his back.
He grunted.
Then he pushed himself upright.
The little girl was alive.
Protected inside the pocket beneath the broken table.
I stared at Titan.
He looked at me once.
Then he looked up again.
Not frightened.
Not confused.
Searching.
“Titan…”
He suddenly pulled hard against his harness.
I nearly lost my grip.
He dragged me toward the tree.
“What are you doing?”
He stopped at the trunk.
His nose went to the bark.
He sniffed once.
Twice.
Then he growled.
Not the warning growl he used when confronting suspects.
Something lower.
Colder.
A sound I had never heard from him before.
The girl's mother crawled out from beneath the debris.
“Thank God…”
She wrapped both arms around her daughter.
The child was shaking.
I thought it was over.
I thought the branch had simply fallen.
A tragic accident.
A dying tree.
A terrified dog who had somehow seen the danger before anyone else.
Then Titan scratched at the ground.
Once.
Twice.
He dug beneath the roots.
I crouched beside him.
“What did you find?”
His claws tore through damp soil.
A strip of black fabric appeared.
Then a metal object.
A climbing carabiner.
I froze.
The tree had been fenced off two weeks earlier because the arborist had warned everyone to stay clear of its dead limbs.
Someone had climbed it anyway.
I picked up the carabiner.
It was warm.
Not from the sun.
Warm like somebody had been holding it.
Behind me, the little girl stopped crying.
She stared at me.
“Officer?”
“Yeah?”
Her lips trembled.
“There was a man in the tree.”
Every hair on my arms rose.
“What man?”
She pointed toward the fallen branches.
“He told me to stay quiet.”
I looked at Titan.
Titan was already staring into the woods.
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And this time, I knew exactly what he was waiting for.
Someone was still out there.
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