Crash & Burn (Tessa Leoni, #3)(10)

Then, facing forward, she leaned forward toward the glass-strewn center console, her movements slow and careful. She understood glass, Wyatt realized. Or at least had enough experience with it to know to proceed with caution. More sniffing, above the glass. And then.

Woof.

She retreated to the center of the bench seats. Woofed again. Jumped over the seat backs to the cargo area. Another bark, tail up, eyes back on Frechette as she ran to the rear bumper, body on high alert.

Frechette got the message. “Track, Annie. Track!”

She sailed out of the car, a tad too enthusiastically, then had to backtrack to recover the trail. But within a matter of minutes, she was on scent, head down, sleek body moving effortlessly over the ground as she jogged from side to side, bush to bush. She began to ascend the ravine; they followed.

Moving in the dog’s wake, Wyatt began to notice things he hadn’t spotted before. The way this one bush had a broken branch. Another offered up a long strand of dark hair caught between two leaves. A person had come this way, and to judge by the freshness of the snapped twig, very recently.

Tracking was never completely linear. They stayed ten feet back, allowing Annie plenty of space to work as she jogged forward, eased back, raced right, then regrouped to the left. An older, wiser dog might have paced herself, whereas Annie had clearly thrown herself into the chase. Come hell or high water, she was gonna find her target.

They worked their way up the ravine in a slow zigzag pattern, as if the initial person hadn’t known where she was going. Had been stumbling around in the dark.

More evidence: a dislodged rock, trampled grass, a scrap of torn fabric. Wyatt flagged each item for future collection. They’d have to map this trail, sketch it up, then retrieve all evidence for testing.

Two-thirds of the way up, they came upon a large boulder, streaked on one side with a reddish-brown substance. Blood, Wyatt realized. Heavy enough not even the rain had been able to wash it away. They paused as Annie worked the base of the boulder, whining anxiously. The girl had been injured, then. Maybe, as they’d discussed, she’d regained consciousness before the mother and gone in search of help.

A lone child, standing roadside in the middle of the night . . .

They didn’t talk anymore. Annie moved forward. Wordlessly, the three men followed.

Cresting the hill, Annie began to bark. Now she dashed into the road, racing straight ahead, then right, then left, then around and around in a twenty-foot circle, nearly frantic. She crossed the road, darted back. Headed back down the ravine ten feet, came leaping back.

“Track!” Frechette commanded, frowning at his charge. “Told you she was young,” he muttered under his breath, half excuse, half explanation.

Annie didn’t look at him anymore. She continued running in circles with growing frustration.

Abruptly, the dog sat. She stared at Frechette, barked twice, then lowered her head and lay on the ground. She was no longer a friendly, eager canine. In fact, she wouldn’t look at them at all.

“What does that mean?” Wyatt asked.

“She’s done. Not only lost the trail, but she’s worked herself into a state over it. She’ll have to rest before we can try again. Give us thirty minutes.”

Wyatt nodded at the handler, who stepped forward to tend his despondent charge.

“Dogs don’t take failure well,” Kevin commented.

“Neither do I.” Wyatt headed back to the edge of the ravine, peering down at the meandering trail they’d just followed. So someone—the missing child?—had made it this far, and then . . .

“Sir.”

Wyatt turned to see Officer Todd Reynes standing by him. “Todd,” Wyatt greeted him. “Heard you were the first responder. Thanks for taking the lead in looking for the missing kid.”

“Not a problem. Sir, that’s the search dog, right?”

“Yep. Her name’s Annie. Young, we’re told, but did a good job tracking the trail this far. Now, however, you can tell she’s a little frustrated.”

“She’s lost the scent?”

“Apparently.”

“I think I might know why.”

Wyatt arched a brow. “By all means, Officer,” he said, indicating for the man to explain.

“See that sign there?”

Wyatt turned toward the roadside. Sure enough, fifteen feet down was a yellow caution sign warning of the sharp turn ahead.

“When I first arrived on scene, I noticed the caution sign because Daniel Ledo, the man who placed the initial call, was standing beside it. While right about there”—Reynes pointed to Annie, still lying on the ground, gazing up at her handler mutinously—“was the ambulance.”

Wyatt straightened. “You’re saying—”

“That’s where the EMTs loaded the driver onto the stretcher.”

Wyatt closed his eyes. He got it now. The scent the dog had picked up, the trail they had just followed up the ravine. Not the missing child’s after all, but the driver’s.

“Always the risk,” he muttered. “I mean, you can tell the dog to track, but you can’t tell her who to follow.”

He crossed to Frechette to break the news. Frechette reiterated that his dog needed a break, but in twenty or thirty minutes, they could try again.

Which they did. Twice, with the same results.