Chapter 3
Titan knew Victor’s scent.
That was obvious.
What I needed to know was why it frightened him.
Sophia answered before the trainer arrived.
“He hurts his neck.”
Every adult turned.
Elena went pale.
“What?”
Sophia pointed toward Titan.
“Uncle Victor pulls.”
I looked at the heavy leather leash around Victor’s arms.
Then at the dog.
Titan’s ears flattened.
Victor laughed too loudly.
“Dogs get corrected.”
Sophia frowned.
“No. Bad.”
I almost smiled.
Three-year-old judgment.
Useful.
Dante brought the kennel attendant, Mark Ellis.
Twenty-eight.
Terrified.
He admitted Victor had visited the kennel twice in the last week.
Both times he claimed I ordered additional obedience work.
“What work?”
Mark swallowed.
“Guard-positioning.”
I looked at him.
“Explain.”
Victor wanted Titan trained to remain over a downed body and block approach until given a release cue.
My jaw tightened.
“You trained my dog to keep a doctor away from me.”
Mark looked sick.
“I thought it was a hostage drill.”
“Did you verify with me?”
“No.”
“Dante?”
“No.”
Good.
Fear should be precise.
Mark had been careless.
Victor had been deliberate.
“Who gave the release cue?”
Mark looked toward Sophia.
“That’s the strange part.”
Sophia had not.
Her words were not the trained cue.
Titan simply trusted her.
Why?
Elena answered.
“She sits by his kennel.”
I turned.
“What?”
“When I clean the west hall. She draws him.”
Sophia nodded.
“He lonely.”
Of course.
The enormous dog everyone treated as a weapon had accepted the smallest person in the house because she asked nothing from him.
No command.
No training.
No fear.
Just company.
That explained why Titan stepped aside.
Not magic.
Trust.
Victor stared at her like that made things worse.
It did.
His plan had been defeated by a relationship he never considered useful enough to notice.
I looked at Mark.
“What cue did Victor choose?”
The attendant hesitated.
“Family first.”
I felt something cold move through me.
Family first.
My father’s phrase.
My grandfather’s before him.
Victor had turned it into a command for a dog.
I looked at my cousin.
“You really do love inherited slogans.”
His face hardened.
Then Dante’s tablet chimed.
He had found another camera gap.
Not the kennel.
My private council room.
Three nights ago.
May you like
Victor had been there too.
And this time he had not gone in alone.
