Page 101 of Mommy

I can see Derek’s smirk through the mental image of a butt naked Ezekiel trying to form in my mind.

“Unless you want Rosemary to see your cock shrinking into a limp worm, I suggest you do.”

“She loves him in all his forms.” Ezekiel retorts but I can hear him shuffle in the background. “Babe! Slip into a shirt and get over here!”

More shuffling on the other end of the line and then Rosemary’s voice, just as out of breath as Ezekiel was.

“What is it?”

“Derek and Ivy. They say there’s something they need to tell us before I can eat you out.”

“Ohh, hey guys” she murmurs, sounding a little shy, and I’m relieved because she is probably blushing too, and I’m not the only one embarrassed here.

The Hey I want to mumble to her in return still doesn’t make its way over my lips.

“So, we’re all here. What’s up Derek?”

“It’s about the ring. Abigail came to the station today, she said something odd. I know, we thought they were breeding the dogs themselves, to be able to sell them, but I think we were wrong. Abigail mentioned something that changed my mind.”

There is pain in his eyes, lacing the dark green and turning it murky.

“They are not breeding dogs, Ezekiel, they seem to be buying them. From people like Gavin. He wasn’t there to abandon Posie that night, he was there because he had sold her.”

“And he expected his buyers to be coming for him that night we turned up at his place.” Ezekiel murmurs, his mind clearly connecting dots I’m somehow oblivious to.

“Exactly.”

“And that’s why he panicked and blew his head off.”

My eyes widen. I didn’t see Derek or Ezekiel before they took a shower that night and I had thought they had only beaten the guy up a little. Taught him a lesson in abuse and neglect. I didn’t think Gavin had died.

There’s no guilt in Derek’s eyes when he looks at me though.

“That’s what I thought too.”

Okay.

So, it looks like I’m the only one not really getting what they are talking about here. I don’t even remember anything about a ring. All I know is that Posie needed us, and that I’m beyond grateful that we got to her in time. To think that she could’ve ended up in the hands of a bad person, in the pits of what must be hell, turns my stomach.

“I’ll be checking the dark web for a trace, maybe that way we can find out anything we have missed so far.” Derek says, his gaze glued to the phone on the table between us.

“Wait,” Rosemary’s voice cuts in. “If they don’t breed the dogs to make money, then what do they need the puppies for?”

Derek’s jaw turns to stone beneath his skin, but he doesn’t answer. Instead, Ezekiel does. His voice, softer than I’ve ever heard, and I would bet good money that he is reaching out to comfort Rosemary before he starts talking. They are one of those couples that always seem to be touching each other, as if he can’t function without having physical contact at all times.

My fingers lace in my lap under the table, desperate for a connection that isn’t there as I listen.

“They train the dogs. They do everything in their power to turn them into killing machines, and when they are strong enough they are forced to fight for their life every day. Do you remember what I told you about where I got Zero?”

He pauses, and I assume that Rosemary nodded because after a moment of silence he goes on.

“They tried to turn Popeye into the exact same thing. Dog fighting is still a lucrative source of… entertainment in some social groups.” Ezekiel stumbles over the word, disgust painting his tone as he spits it out. “Derek and I had kind of hoped it was only a breeder, but this confirms what we suspected from the beginning. The house where we got Popeye? That’s where they kept the mothers and their pups. If I had looked closer that day, maybe I would’ve seen the truth behind that first room. They use these dogs to make money. And they didn’t stop just because we got a few of the dogs out.”

Posie is living proof that they didn’t stop.

The fact that we found her, and the fact that she was pregnant and abandoned by someone who got paid to do so… it all links together.

How many didn’t make it out?