During summer, the dawn chorus was Marlo’s wake-up call. They had both slept again after their lovemaking, and now she eased herself from Adam’s hold and went through her normal morning routine. She put Justice and Fala into the yard with their breakfast and took a shower. She leaned her head back and let the warm water run over her before soaping up her body. Her new, responsive body that tingled and came to life every time Adam touched her.

She still had her eyes closed when the shower door opened.

“Don’t mind me.” Adam leaned a forearm at the open door and watched her.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m striking off something from my fantasy list. You have no idea how often I’ve imagined you wet in the shower with the suds running down your body.” He licked his lips. “And the real thing is even better than I’d hoped.”

She threw a sopping washcloth at him and without taking his eyes from her, he snatched it from the air with one hand. Water and suds flew in a fine arc, covering them both.

“Oh, dear.” He grinned. “Now it’s war.”

Marlo pressed herself against the wall as Adam stepped into the stream of water. “Not much room in here,” she gasped and was quickly silenced by a pulse-raising, early morning kiss.

He released her. “That is what you get for leaving the bed without saying goodbye.” He leaned back in. “And this is what you get—”

She put his hands against his chest, holding him away, grinning. “Remind me to do that more often. Now, at the risk of being called a killjoy, I am presuming we have a day from hell ahead of us. I need to prepare.”

He caught her as she stepped past him. His lips pressed up against her ear. “We’ll get through the day together and continue this tonight.”

Later in the kitchen Adam drained his coffee mug and stood. “Right, time to go and put out some fires.”

Marlo grimaced. “Am I in trouble?”

“I can’t see why.”

“But Justice is in trouble, isn’t he?”

Trouble? Well, that’s one way of putting it.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen with Justice. I don’t know how that sort of thing works over here. I’ve got first dibs on Butch this morning to talk this over, so you hold tight here, okay? Screen your calls until I can let you know what’s going to go down.”

He climbed into his rental car, put the key in the ignition and drummed out a rhythm on the steering wheel with his forefingers. “Someone got his tension temporarily relieved…until I reach the station.”

* * *

Butch pointed at a chair across from his desk. “Sit,” he ordered before stabbing at a button on his intercom. “Margaret, need two coffees, now.”

Margaret was Butch’s P.A., and the rumor was that she filled that role in private, too. Not that anyone was brave enough to ask the right questions to confirm it. She rolled in a few minutes later and placed two steaming hot mugs onto the police chief’s desk. “Next time, say ‘please’, or you’ll wear it.”

“Next time, wear a shorter skirt and show more cleavage, or I’ll send you home to get changed.”

Adam had been shocked when he’d first heard their banter, but it appeared they’d carried on like this for years. And God help anyone else who tried to take the same line with Margaret. She would kick the person’s ass, with Butch waiting in line to complete the job. Butch may have sounded Neanderthal, but the guy couldn’t have been softer or more protective when it came to women.

He leaned back in his chair, cradling his coffee. “So, Kiwi, what went down last night?”

“You talked to Barrett yet?”

“Yeah, briefly.”

Adam reached for his coffee. “Tell me the score.”

“Condensed version. Barrett says he went around to Marlo’s, as per his orders. Once he was in the house, he made some sort of remark that he supposed could have been construed to be offensive—you know what a jerk-off he is. She went nuts and set the dog on him.”

“I see the attack gave him amnesia.”

“Full-blown.”

Adam blew in his coffee, and tried a sip. Still blistering hot. He returned the mug to the desk and looked up at Butch. “What Barrett tried on Marlo…that was attempted rape. When I got there, he’d locked them in the house, the dog and Marlo were going nuts, Barrett was bleeding all over the place and mouthing off about shooting the dog, and Marlo was half-naked.”

Butch leaned back in his chair. “Barrett’s a fucking moron. He thinks getting a hard-on is personal growth. I’ll deal with him, but I need to talk to Marlo.”

“Turns out, he’s had dealings with Marlo before. You need to check him out in relation to an incident with one Officer Carl Hanson and Marlo, about nine years back.”

“It’ll be in his file. How is Marlo?”

“Once you see what went down with Hanson, you’ll get a good idea for where she’s at.” His phone vibrated in his pocket. “That’s her now. Can you give me a minute here?”

He walked out into the corridor as he answered. Her news sent a chill to the pit of his stomach and after making her promise to stay right where she was, barged back into Butch’s office.

Butch raised his eyebrows.

“They took Justice. The Animal Control guys turned up and got all heavy with Marlo and took him away. Christ, I feel like I’m living in Camp What-the-Fuckery. Did you know about this?”

Butch shook his head.

“Shit, Butch, I’ve got Marlo out there going off her head and under so much freakin’ stress, she’s about to blow an artery. Justice is gone. Do you know how important that dog is?”

Butch nodded.

“Who would take the dog? Is Animal Control your department? Would they come and seize him?”

Butch returned an ‘I don’t know’ shrug.

“For fuck’s sake, have you been struck dumb?”

“I’m waiting for your rant to finish. Are you done, or do you have another sack of words you’d like to shout at me?”

Adam dropped back into the chair and thrust his hands through his hair. “Crap, crap, crap, crap, there, I’m done. Your turn.”

Butch punched the intercom again and asked Margaret to get him the details on the seizure of Justice.

Her voice came back, telling him to get in line. Adam nearly laughed as Butch blew a kiss to the intercom before facing him.

“I don’t want you blowing a fuse when we get this information together.”

The pounding in his chest told him the fuse was already short-circuiting. “Tell me what you know.”

“I don’t know anything yet. You ever heard about that virtue called patience? It’s sophisticated, give it a try.”

Adam flipped him the bird. “CRAR will want Justice back. Surely the dog has some sort of protection, seeing as he’s evidence in the dog fight case.” He had to keep Justice safe for Marlo. That was nonnegotiable.

“I would think so, except…shit. I’ll call Animal Control, and you call CRAR. We need a safe house for Justice before some dickwad gets all gun-happy and puts him into permanent sleep.”

Adam left the office to make the call to CRAR, but his phone beeped before he had the chance. He checked the call display. Mae. Damn, he should have called her earlier. She was justifiably annoyed as Adam went through the events of the previous day, leaving out the more intimate details. By the end of the call, he’d secured her silence and a safe house for Justice.

He returned to his seat as Butch replaced the phone. “It would seem Barrett’s ego continues to roam unchecked. He put in the order for Justice to be seized and destroyed and filed a complaint about the attack. I’ll interview him tomorrow. Let him stew for a bit.”

“Barrett’s ego should be neutered. Can we spring Justice? CRAR will take him and make him disappear until after the court case.”

“I’m sure that can be arranged. But Adam?”

Here it comes…“Yes, Butch?”

“Do you think they can keep him hidden this time?”

“Ha, ha, very funny. Actually I need to talk to you about that. So far we’ve got some organization out there with people prepared to break in and steal stuff, with a goal to discredit CRAR or pit bulls or whatever. The dogmen, we presume, still want to snatch back Justice. Both these groups are a threat to Marlo…whether that’s perceived or real. Another thing, we seem to have a leak at Dog Haven. Too much information has come out for it not to be direct from there.”

Butch leaned over his desk, resting on his forearms. “If Marlo feels threatened, you need to take care of her first. I doubt she realizes it, but she’s a lot safer with Justice out of Dog Haven.”

“It’s okay. I wouldn’t let Justice go back to Marlo right now. In fact, it might pull a giant bug from our ass if we allow certain people to presume Justice was euthanized for biting a cop.”

“Easy. We can issue a news release today that can cover that. We’ll say the dog has been seized for an attack on a policeman and that the usual procedure is for euthanasia. You know how lazy the media are these days. I doubt anyone will have the energy to make the call and ask the right questions.”

“Good. What a pity the cop in question can’t be euthanized.”

Butch nodded. “We can take the heat off Justice by letting anyone who’s after him think he’s been destroyed. The thing is, are you going to ask Marlo to believe that?”

“No, no way. I can’t go out there and lie to her about that.”

“What if they go after Marlo again in an attempt to get Justice?”

“Shit, Butch, we’re talking about a dog here, not Shergar.”

“Shergar?”

“An Irish racehorse who was kidnapped…oh, never mind.”

“A horse was kidnapped? Were you involved in that, too?”

“That was on the other side of the world and a bit before my time.”

Butch shook his head. “You attract trouble, Kiwi. Did I ever tell you that?”

“Yeah, daily.”

“So, what are you going to say to Marlo?”

“The most I can do is let her think that Justice is being kept by Animal Control and that she can’t see him. If she’s put under pressure as to the dog’s whereabouts, she can direct them to your guys.”

“Well, I’m happy if you are. Now, what are we going to do about protection for her?”

“I’ll take care of that.”

“You sly devil.”

Adam shook his head. “No, really, you’ve got to read about what went down with Marlo, Barrett, and some asshole by the name of Hanson. The more we can keep uniform away from the Sanctuary, the better.”