Vance never saw Jolly coming.
The impact took him off his feet. Jolly hit at the shoulder and drove through, and the force of it tore Vance’s arm from Kayla’s throat and sent them both sideways in different directions.
Kayla hit the asphalt on her hands and knees. I heard her suck air, a raw, gasping sound, her body pulling in what Vance had been crushing out of her. She crawled away from the tangle of man and dog, coughing, one hand at her throat.
Jolly’s jaws locked on to the forearm with the full-bite engagement I’d felt through a sleeve a hundred times. Except there was no sleeve. The gun went off. A single crack that echoed off the mountains and died. Then the weapon skittered across the asphalt, and Vance was on the ground with Jolly on top of him, teeth set deep, head working side to side, that low, sustained growl coming from somewhere primal in his chest.
“Don’t struggle, asshole.” I grabbed the gun. “You’ve been to the training. The more you struggle, the more he’s going to fuck you up.”
I wasn’t even close to calling Jolly off.
Vance was screaming, high and ragged, his back arched off the asphalt while Jolly held the arm and worked it.Vance’s free hand clawed at the dog’s head, trying to pry the jaws loose, which only made Jolly reset deeper.
Almost like the K9 had heard him threaten his best friend William.
Briggson came running out of the trees where Jolly had come from, weapon drawn.
Briggson.
That had not been on my bingo card for tonight either.
“Garrison! Garrison! Are you okay?” Briggson yelled as he ran.
“Yeah. But I need your cuffs.” Explanations would have to come later.
I caught Vance’s free hand and slammed it against the pavement. Pinned it there with both of mine while I dropped my weight across his chest. He bucked under me, still screaming, his legs kicking against nothing, but between Jolly’s grip on one arm and my body on the other, he had nowhere to go.
“Roll him.” Briggson had the cuffs in hand. He grabbed Vance’s shoulder, and together, we forced him onto his stomach. Jolly adjusted without releasing, shifting his grip as Vance’s body turned, and Briggson wrenched both wrists together behind his back.
Steel clicked. Vance’s body went still. The screaming dropped to a low, guttural moan, his face pressed against the asphalt, his breath coming in shallow bursts.
“Aus.” It was the hardest release command I’d ever given. As far as I was concerned, Jolly could chew on this piece of shit until he was nothing but bones.
Jolly released. Immediately. Clean. He backed off and sat, his whole body loose, tail going, mouth open in that perpetual grin that nothing had ever managed to take from him.
I looked for Kayla. She was leaning against the tire, herhand pressed to her throat. Her breath was ragged and ugly, but she was breathing. She nodded once. Small. Shaking. But a nod.
I turned back to Jolly. “Good boy.” My voice broke on the second word. I put my hand on his head and held it there, and his tail swept the ground behind him. “That’s my good boy.”
Briggson hauled Vance to his feet and leaned him over the trunk, keeping his hand on the back of his head.
“How the hell did you get here? And why is Jolly with you?”
“Mia identified Vance. She saw his photo at the station and told me he was thebig guyshe’d been referring to.” He said it flat, compressed, stripped to the essentials.
“Thank God.”
“Duty sergeant said you’d left the station. Vance conveniently was nowhere around the station either. I tried calling you. No answer. Went to your house. No vehicle, no you, but Jolly was there. Where the fuck would you be on the night of our biggest raid.” He paused. “Decided to run Vance’s department vehicle through the GPS system. Got the location ping. Grabbed Jolly and drove.”
“Jesus.”
“I didn’t want to come roaring in, in case the situation was…well, exactly what the situation ended up being.”
I nodded. “You pulling up would’ve ended in bullets flying. No doubt directly into our skulls.”
“Yeah. So I waited, saw my window, and was glad as shit I’d practiced sending Jolly in the drills.”
The guy who’d questioned K9 deployment from day one. Who’d badmouthed every decision Donovan and I had made. Who’d crossed his arms in every briefing and made it his personal mission to be the most difficult human being in any room he occupied.
