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  ROWAN

  The K9 Files, Book 10

  Dale Mayer

  Books in This Series:

  Ethan, Book 1

  Pierce, Book 2

  Zane, Book 3

  Blaze, Book 4

  Lucas, Book 5

  Parker, Book 6

  Carter, Book 7

  Weston, Book 8

  Greyson, Book 9

  Rowan, Book 10

  Caleb, Book 11

  Kurt, Book 12

  Tucker, Book 13

  Harley, Book 14

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  About This Book

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Epilogue

  About Caleb

  Author’s Note

  Complimentary Download

  About the Author

  Copyright Page

  About This Book

  Welcome to the all new K9 Files series reconnecting readers with the unforgettable men from SEALs of Steel in a new series of action packed, page turning romantic suspense that fans have come to expect from USA TODAY Bestselling author Dale Mayer. Pssst… you’ll meet other favorite characters from SEALs of Honor and Heroes for Hire too!

  Rowan hopes that the deep emptiness inside him might possibly heal—if he just finds the retired K9 Hershey, named after an old trainer buddy. Nothing can hold Rowan back from locating his old K9 friend. What he didn’t expect was his old friend had found a new friend, with puppies of her own.

  Brandi had just lost her grandmother, her home, and her best four-legged friend, Lacey, in a horrible forest fire that swept through town. Everyone said to not give up on Lacey, as dogs often disappeared only to reappear later. That one thought calls her to spend every spare moment she has at the site, calling for Lacey. When she realizes someone else has the same idea, she’s happy to join forces.

  When things get ugly, she’s glad to have someone at her side because she hadn’t seen what ugly could really look like … until now.

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  Prologue

  Rowan Chadwick walked into the offices of Titanium Corp. “Hey, somebody called me in?”

  “Hey, Rowan,” Geir said. “Do you have any experience with dogs?”

  “Outside of owning some?” he asked.

  “K9 units, military dog training, that sort of thing.”

  “Some,” he said. “I was a handler for a year, and that was the year before the accident,” he added. “That was one of my biggest regrets. The fact that I didn’t have enough time with the dog.”

  “Understood,” he said. “What dog was it?”

  “Hershey. But he had some big fancy formal name, Harold Guildford II, or some such thing,” he said with a smile. “I just called him Hershey. The problem in my case was trying to separate that owner bond,” he said. “Handlers obviously get attached, but getting too attached is frowned upon.”

  “Right, because the dogs can move from handler to handler, depending on the training they’re set up for, right?”

  “Exactly.”

  “How’s the rehab going?”

  “It’s going,” he said. And he slowly straightened out his foot, bringing it back in again. The muscles stiffened so easily these days. He had to remember to always do his stretches, or else they seized up. “It’s kind of weird missing the front of a foot. Then it’s weird functioning in a body that’s not like it used to be.”

  “Right,” Badger said, walking in behind him. “It’s funny how we can adjust to losing a whole limb, but losing half a foot or half a hand just feels wrong.”

  “And a couple ribs. Plus, I’ve got a mess of screws and plates and who knows what else in my body.” He shrugged. “Like all of us, the fact is, we are Patchwork Kids brought back to life.”

  “I like that,” Geir said, laughing. “More like clockwork kids though.”

  “Yeah, steampunk before it became cool,” Rowan said, cracking a grin.

  “What was the name of that dog again?” Geir asked Rowan.

  “Which one?”

  “The one you used to work with?”

  “Hershey,” he said.

  Geir looked to Badger, who sat down with a thump, and reached for a short stack of files that were on the desk and sorted through them.

  “What would you do to get that dog back?” Geir asked Rowan.

  “That would mean going back into an active military K9 unit,” he said, “and that’s not happening. No matter how much dreaming I do.”

  “Got a point there,” Badger said, as he flipped open the first folder, closed it; flipped open the second one, closed it; reached for the third one in front of him, hoping, and looked at Geir and gave him a nod. Badger handed the file to Geir.

  “What’s this all about?” Rowan asked.

  “I don’t know if you know about a bunch of the guys who have done private missions for us,” he said. “They’ve been looking into the fate of some of the War Dogs supposedly retired but gone missing.”

  “I don’t like the sound of that,” Rowan said, his tone harsh. “These dogs deserve every bit of retirement they have coming.”

  “We agree,” Geir said. “What we do have is a dog here. It was supposed to be sent to California. And it was. It arrived, landed, and was signed off. However, when the military heard of the weather event there, they made a follow-up check to see that everything was still okay, but they found no sign of the people or the dog. Apparently one of the big fires in California had ripped through the place, and everybody was separated. That had been close to a month or six weeks ago. The family in question lost members, not to mention several other furry members of the family that were scattered or died, and, even if the dog can be found again, at this point, they don’t want it back.”

  “Wow,” he said. “I understand, but that’s harsh.”

  “It is, but they also lost their home and had to move to Illinois, I think,” Geir said, checking the file. “The husband is now a single father of two kids because he lost his wife to that fire.”

  “Well, I guess, given the circumstances, maybe it is understandable,” he said, “but it’s still pretty rough on the dog.”

  “They’d only had the dog a few weeks, and, according to the first welfare check, everything was fine, but then, when the fire blasted through the area shortly thereafter, the dog took off, and nobody has seen it since.”

  “That’s terrible.”

  “It is,” they said.

  “What’s the dog’s name?” Rowan asked, stretching back in the big old office chair.

  “Harold Guildford II,” Badger said, looking over at him.

  Rowan slammed forward, his feet hitting the floor hard and his fist coming down on the desk. “Hershey?”

  Both men nodded. “Yeah, Hershey,” Geir said.

  Rowan snatched up the file. “I’m taking this one.”

  “We thought you might,” Badger said with a grin.

  Chapter 1

  For Rowan Burlow, this was not where he expected to be at any time of his life. Just the thought that, maybe, Hershey was still alive had sent him careening to the California fire wasteland.

  Now Rowan stood in shock, staring at the blackened hills, the skeletons of the trees, the blackened remains of houses that had all been devastated by the wildfires. He did
n’t even understand just how big this was until he got here, and, now standing and staring at the devastation in front of him, it was almost impossible to get his mind wrapped around it all. So many houses, so many acres, so many miles. … He couldn’t imagine the loss of wildlife, even just the loss of vegetation. He had to hope Mother Nature had a grand plan here, and, when something went wrong, like these fires, it was truly awesome … and terrifying.

  The devastation surrounding him was just so incredible and so widespread, as if Mother Nature had scarred this entire section of the planet with a big black warning to keep out. Everywhere he stepped, the undergrowth crunched under his feet, and, even months later, a musky, smoky smell still remained all around him. He stood at the base of one of the hills, where the fire had come down and had consumed the houses.

  He was still trying to find the house where Hershey had lived. It was a little hard to tell when such complete ruin surrounded him. On the other hand, concrete foundations survived where houses once stood, along with some burned-out car husks, a few other unidentified metal pieces, a camper on this property, and what looked like a garage on another.

  He walked down the street with a backpack on his back, holding several bottles of water, his phone in one hand. He had left his rental car parked on the street. As soon as he assessed just where he needed to be, he could move around with his car as needed. However, he wanted to get out and walk to get a feel for just how bad this all had been. And, of course, the answer was, unbelievably bad. His heart ached as he realized just how many people had been taken, how many pets and wildlife had suffered from this flash bomb of fire.

  He didn’t know if any investigation had been made into whether this was arson, accidental, or a brush fire that had gotten out of control. It was hard to know where it had started. He thought that this one had begun up in the hills, a couple miles from here. And, of course, the fire could easily travel several miles in a day. And that had caught these people by surprise. They’d been evacuated, but, a lot of people had left their pets behind—something that deeply bothered Rowan because those furry friends should have been part of the core family. However, in the panic, everybody grabbed the things that they needed the most. Usually children and spouses and that was about it. Maybe also a few mementos, he guessed. But he’d take his animals every time.

  As he walked around, just the enormity, the sheer size of the fire’s devastation felt a little overwhelming. He walked for the next half hour while he searched for the right house. He found signs of wildlife having returned in the sense that Rowan found tracks through some of the ash marks and fur among the underbrush. However, nothing was recognizable as Hershey, and Rowan didn’t even know for sure that Hershey was alive. That was a whole different issue. Rowan had heard and read stories of dogs returning to their owners, even from thousands of miles away, but, in this case, had Hershey been here long enough to bond with the family? Now that family had moved, what were Hershey’s options?

  Rowan tried to think like his dog, but the dog had been very focused on work. Then, when it was playtime, Hershey had been focused very intently on playtime. Rowan hated to think of Hershey’s devastating end of life in a forest fire and how that would have been for him. Rowan’s heart broke as he considered it. And, if Hershey were still alive, the last few months surely must have been brutal.

  As Rowan walked the area, not really planning on doing a whole lot more than that today, he set up a plan with his map to figure out where Hershey would have gone. To the hills, first and foremost, to get away from the blaze. Water was a necessity, and a couple creeks were farther up. Rowan would check to see if water still ran. Otherwise, Hershey would need to find another water source. He would probably stay close to the fire because that would be the only home he knew. Later, once he detached from that family, Rowan didn’t know for how long the dog would stay in this area. Rowan no longer saw signs of humans living here for as far as he could see. He did see the occasional vehicle, as people stood and stared and took pictures, but really it was just so heartbreakingly sad to take in.

  When he heard another set of steps, he looked up the hill to see a young woman with a backpack and a walking stick in one hand as she slowly traipsed across the hillside. He studied her for a long moment, but, of course, he was not surprised that he didn’t recognize her. He wasn’t even sure what she was doing because it didn’t look like she was particularly enjoying herself. He noted no face tilts to the sun and certainly no smiles. Her head was down, looking around. She was also searching for something. He frowned and called up to her, “Hello?”

  She didn’t appear to hear him. He headed in her direction, aiming for a spot just in front of her, so that he could head her off. When he was about twenty feet away, he called out, “Hello?”

  She looked up, startled. Immediately she frowned and glanced around to see if she was alone, if anybody else was here.

  He stopped in his tracks, not wanting to make her feel threatened. At least not any more than she was already. And wasn’t that something? He was just outside, walking, and she was apparently intimidated by that. She looked at him, stopping a good fifteen feet away, and said, “Good morning.”

  “Do you always walk this area?” he asked.

  She nodded slowly. “I have, since the fire came through here, yes. … Why?”

  “I’m looking for a missing dog,” he said. He was hoping that maybe the subject of the conversation would make her more relaxed, but instead she seemed to eye him a little more suspiciously. “He was recently adopted by a family at that spot down there,” he said, pointing to where the old address was for Hershey.

  She looked at the area in question, frowned, and shook her head. “That must be tough,” she said. “So many people here lost their pets.”

  “True,” he said. “This Hershey is a War Dog, so I’m not saying that he is smarter than other dogs, but he’s had more training. If there was any way for him to get out and to stay alive, he would have.” Rowan added, “So it’s a little hard for me to walk away and to not come looking for him.”

  “It’s been weeks and weeks,” she said, studying him with a frown. “If he was around, he would have gone already.”

  “And that’s possible,” he said. “I only heard about him yesterday, when I was asked to look into his case—either to make sure that he was gone or to do my best to find him.”

  She gave a broken laugh, her open arms swinging wide around the blackened world that they stood in. “Nothing to find.”

  “Well, you’re looking for something too,” he said gently. “What are you hoping to find?”

  Her back stiffened, and she glared at him.

  He held up a hand. “I’m not trying to be intrusive,” he said. “I’m sorry, and I also don’t want to put you on your guard. I was just hoping that maybe you had seen the dog.”

  She looked at him in surprise and then immediately shook her head. “I haven’t seen anything alive here for weeks.”

  “Damn,” he whispered. He took several more steps back, losing his footing. He reached out and managed to save himself. Nothing like an ignoble fall in front of a pretty woman to make his day.

  “Oops,” she said. “You’ve really got to watch your step here. Particularly with all the brush having been burned away, it’s hard to see the potholes underneath the ash.”

  “I see that,” he said. “I’ll bring a walking stick with me tomorrow.”

  “Are you coming back?” she asked in surprise.

  He gave her a hard look. “I certainly don’t consider walking up and down the street, calling out for the dog, to be an adequate search. I will grid this area and slowly and carefully go through each and every section of it looking for him.”

  “Are you doing this because it’s a job?” she asked. He hesitated; she appeared to notice and pressed her point. “A lot of people have lost a lot of pets here, but I don’t see them anymore.”

  “I think most people wait to see if the animal comes back,” he sai
d. “In Hershey’s case, the adoptive family moved to Illinois, and there’s nothing to come back to.”

  “So why do you care?”

  There was such a challenge and a forthrightness in her voice, but he didn’t take offense. He’d much rather people said what they were thinking, instead of hiding stuff. “Because I think it’s the same dog that I worked with over in Iraq,” he said. “I was involved in a bad accident and was shipped out one step away from a pine box. My recovery has been long and slow, but I’m back on my feet. I understood that the dog was completely fine and had heard that he’d been adopted because I did ask. It’s only now that I heard Hershey seems to have slipped through the cracks in the system. So, when the War Dogs division phoned to check up on him, and they found out that he was located where this big fire was, they contacted me and asked if I could come take a look for him. And, of course, I would have searched for him earlier, if I had only known.”

  He said all this, hating that Hershey was likely on his own for many weeks to months. He also knew the dog was quite capable of surviving on his own if need be. But it was hardly the retirement Rowan wanted for the dog. And, in this day and age, so many people would just up and shoot Hershey if they couldn’t get close enough to him.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, her tone softening.

  He gave her a hard glance. “Feel sorry for the dog,” he said, his tone clipped. “Not me.”

  “I wasn’t feeling sorry for you,” she said, “but I’m sorry for any animal that’s lost and at loose ends like that.”

  “Will you tell me what you’re searching for?”

  She gave a bitter laugh. “My life,” she said, and, with that, she turned and walked in the opposite direction.

  Brandi Malcolm hoped that he wouldn’t follow her. She wasn’t ready to answer questions, her heart still aching with pain, and she wondered if it would ever stop. Like him, she was searching for something. Although she had given him a flat-out answer, it was partially the truth. Something was just so wrong with the way her world went right now. Her grandmother had perished in that fire, in a home they shared not too far from the one that he had pointed out. Brandi had been at a special seminar overseas. And had come home to the news of the wildfire, hoping to get her grandmother out of the house, only to find out it was already too late.