He took off his hat, a brown wool cap that had known many winters, and slipped a battered brass Zippo into his coat pocket after lighting nothing. The lighter had a thumb-sized dent and the shine of something handled too often, an emblem he carried like a prayer. When his fingers found it, the old tremor eased a notch.
“Morning, Mr. McKenna,” said the woman at the desk. “You’re early.”
“Mornin’, Mara,” he answered. He knew her name—Mara Ellison, mid-forties, hair pulled into a working ponytail—because he’d come here the way men visit cemeteries. Not always to leave with something. Sometimes just to stand still among what remains.
Mara handed him a visitor badge and nodded toward the back. “They brought three new retirees overnight. Two from a police department out of state, one military. The military boy… they call him Scout. He’s a lot.”
Arthur gave a dry, almost-smile. “They usually are.”
He followed the wet-dog smell through the corridor, past laminated photos of animals with medals around their necks and gray around their muzzles. The place was clean, but it held a permanent weather of bleach and fur, of work done in all seasons.
In the kennel room, the sound rose and fell like wind through brush. A Doberman barked once, then twice; a yellow Labrador made hopeful eyes at him. But it was the third pen that brought him up short. Sable coat. Black mask. Left ear nicked like a torn flag. The Belgian Malinois stood the way soldiers stand when they’ve learned that stillness can make you invisible.
Scout watched him without blinking. Those amber eyes weren’t just looking; they were measuring.
