Primal Force (5 page)

“Beats all the hell out of spending the night on the floor, or calling my parents for help.”

“Or using them toddler bed rails,” the man beside him contributed.

After each of the other vets had related a story about his first night with his dog, Jori glanced at Battise. At least he was still here.

She approached and offered him Sam's leash, which he took, if reluctantly. “Is there anything you'd like to share, Mr. Battise?”

“Share with you? Sure, sweetheart.” A toothy grin appeared in his beard. “But right here, in front of God and everybody?”

The other men smirked or tried to hide their smiles. Right. She'd handed him a big slow-pitch softball of a line that didn't mean anything. She just shook her head and moved away.

“All right,” Kelli said briskly. “We'll take a break to allow our dogs to be walked and watered. Then we'll begin our day's one-on-one training. Mr. Battise, you'll be with Jori. Abe, your trainer will be Will.”

As Kelli paired up the remaining vets and trainers, Jori's heart began to pound in slow heavy strokes. Battise was looking at her with the light of battle bright in his gaze. She smiled but made the gesture for drinking. She needed a moment to collect herself if she was going to go one-on-one with him all afternoon. At least he hadn't left.

The drink machine was located in the hallway. Abe and Ginger had beaten her there.

Abe rolled his chair back out of her way while Jori dug in her pocket for change. “That was a nice bit earlier about the soft leads.” He cupped Ginger under the chin, stroking her with the familiarity that one would expect from a longer association. “Did you two put that together to make the rest of us feel better?”

“What are you talking about?” Jori fed the machine her change.

“That business of Sergeant Battise pretending like he doesn't know how to handle dogs. Since the others bought it I guess I'm the only one who recognized him.”

She collected her bottle. “What do you mean?”

“He was all over the news about three years ago. Military K-9 police. CID. Special agent. Wounded in Afghanistan. Got a medal and everything.”

“Oh.” Jori twisted open her water bottle and took a long swallow. The cold hit her stomach like icicles.
Battise was military K-9 police!
Compared with his experience with dogs, she was a rank amateur. That certainly explained his attitude toward her. Even worse, he'd let her make a complete fool of herself, thinking he didn't know or like dogs.

Jori could feel her pulse begin to beat in her temples. Privacy was a top priority at WWP. But Kelli, who personally conducted all intake interviews, would know Battise's history. She could have told her a little about Battise this morning. Instead, she had told Jori to get to know him. As if she'd had the time before and deliberately neglected to. Or had she?

Jori glanced at Abe. She knew the names of his grown children and that he had six grandkids. She knew Seth had gone to college on a baseball scholarship. She also knew that James had fathered two children since losing both legs. And that Joshua was about to get married. But Battise had made her too uncomfortable to make small talk with.

Or maybe she'd avoided getting to know him because she couldn't keep her own emotions under control when he was around.

Furious with herself for letting her issues get in the way of doing her job, Jori turned to find that Battise and Sam had followed her into the hallway.

She gulped, feeling guilty for no good reason. Nothing in his attitude said he had overheard her conversation with Abe. That didn't mean he looked happy to see her.

“You done with your break yet?”

His tone went straight through her, sparking anger she didn't pause to identify. “No, we get two whole minutes per break, Mr. Battise. We're civilians.” She took another long sip from her bottle to cool her annoyance.

Abe grinned, looking from one to the other. “If you lovebirds will excuse me.” He rolled on down the hallway, chuckling.

Jori waited until Abe was out of hearing before she leaned in toward Battise. “You're rude.”

“I know.” He reached out and took her hand, placed Sam's leash in it, then folded her fingers closed with his other and squeezed. Strong even teeth appeared in the middle of his beard. “But you're curious.”

He bent down and grabbed Samantha under the chin and scratched her behind the ears. “You take care of yourself, Sam. I'm sure a nice new owner will be along any day.” He leaned in to kiss her between the eyes and stood. “Give Kelli my thanks but tell her I have somewhere to be.”

“You can't just walk out.” Jori took a step after him. He didn't pause, sliding on his shades as he strolled toward the exit door.

“Mr. Battise.”

He didn't even look back.

Jori stopped herself from following him, aware that nothing she could say now was likely to turn him around. But watching him push through the glass doors was an exercise in frustration. Back erect, shoulders squared. The slight limp was subdued once more by sheer willpower. Even from behind he looked good enough to lick.

Jori looked down at Samantha, who was staring after him and whimpering as she strained on the leash. “You, too? We must be out of our minds. Out of our minds.”

She fed Samantha a couple of treats to distract her from the stress of losing her handler, then marched them both straight into Kelli's office.

“Mr. Battise just walked out.”

Kelli cocked her head to one side. “Where did he go?”

“He didn't say. Just to tell you he had somewhere else to be.” She stopped short of voicing her opinion that he wouldn't be back. What little she knew about him made him unpredictable.

To her surprise Kelli just smiled. “Have Maxine put in a request to one of our puppy raisers to take Samantha until he returns.” WWP seldom left their dogs in kennels on the property overnight. Service dogs needed the constant reinforcement of home and family life.

“I could take her for tonight.” Jori wasn't sure why she offered but there it was.

“Suit yourself.”

“One other thing. I'd like permission to read Mr. Battise's file.”

“It's in there.” Kelli pointed to the row of tall file cabinets then reached for her purse. “I have a meeting in Little Rock this afternoon so I'll be out the rest of the day. See you in the morning.”

When her boss was gone Jori shut the office door, not wanting to be disturbed. She searched until she found the folder she wanted from the wall of files. Propping a shoulder against one of the metal cabinets, she began to read.

She skipped the personal information, flipping the sheets until she came to Battise's injury assessment. It was more thorough than she expected.

Amputee, above the left knee. Battise, like many soldiers wounded by a blast that had a thermal element, had spent seventeen months in and out of hospitals, while surgeons dealt with additional injuries, did skin grafts, and reduced heavy scar tissue, all while initially attempting to salvage his leg. Just reading about it made her ache in sympathy for him. He had suffered so much.

In notes added in the margin she read how he had fought the doctors, wanting to maintain all of his ruined leg if he could. Only after he gave in to the need for amputation did his pain become manageable.

Jori paused to catch her breath. Managed pain. That meant there was still pain. All the time. That could erode a man's attitude. She hadn't made room for that possibility in her assessment of him. Maybe because he wanted it that way. Better to be thought an asshole than needy? Sounded like Battise. She glanced back down.

Instead of checking individual boxes, he'd made one big checkmark on top of the list of PTSD symptoms. In the area where he was asked to describe his symptoms, he'd written
HELL.
That covered a lot of ground.

She flipped to his work record. Right after college Battise entered the police academy and was then hired as a K-9 officer with the Arkansas State Police, Troop L, handling drug interdiction. Jori frowned. K-9 officer slots were at a premium in nearly every law enforcement department in the country. Even with the bushy beard, Battise didn't seem much older than thirty. She flipped back a few sheets. Born in Polk County, Texas, 1984. Yep. Thirty-one next month. How had he gotten into a K-9 unit position right out of the academy?

She flipped the pages back to his personal information. Name:
Lauray Bronson Battise.

“Oh crap.” Why hadn't the name clicked in her head before? He was the son of Bronson Battise, one of the most famous trainers of military and police K-9s in the United States.

She had read everything she could find online about professionally trained K-9s once she was accepted in the WWP service dog program at the correctional center. Bronson Battise's name came up often. As the founder and original owner of Harmonie Kennels, he had developed methods now used by other facilities to train specialty dogs for law enforcement, government agencies, and the military.

Jori blew out her breath and reached for her water bottle. A dozen questions chased around in her thoughts. For instance, why had he come here for a service dog when he could have trained any animal he wanted from the famous Harmonie Kennels?

“Find anything interesting in there?”

Jori hadn't heard a sound but looked up and right into the black-gold glower of Lauray Battise, aimed at her from the open doorway.

 

CHAPTER FOUR

Samantha sprang to her feet and woofed happily, her long Cheez Doodle tail swishing back and forth as she padded over to greet him. Battise bent and scrubbed under her chin with both hands, murmuring words only they understood.

Jori's reaction to his arrival wasn't nearly so welcoming. When he straightened and looked at her, her voice was cool as ice. “Why are you back?”

Law wasn't about to tell her about his sister's text. She had sent him three words as he was climbing into his truck:
Bring the dog.
Yardley was spooky.

Instead, he looked down at Sam, who was leaning against his pant leg. “Sam. Down. Stay.”

Samantha plopped down on her belly but continued to look up at him with adoring eyes.

Law glanced again at Jori and pushed the door shut behind him.

When he closed the gap between them he could see his name typed on the tab of the folder she held. She was checking up on him. He couldn't decide whether that was a good or a bad thing. He poked the file. “Know enough now?”

Jori shook her head. “Why didn't you tell me you're Bronson Battise's son? Your family's famous!”

His eyes narrowed. “Is that important to you?”

“It's important that you're a professional dog handler.” She smacked the folder against his chest. “You let me spend three days instructing you as if you've never owned a dog. I want to know why.”

“Maybe I was curious about your technique.”

“But other people knew. I must look like a fool to them.”

“You've nothing to be ashamed of.” Those dark eyes of his were shifting over her again, as if he thought he had missed something the first two times he'd stared at her today. This time his gaze dropped all the way to her feet, where it stayed for a few seconds. “Well, maybe there's something. Your shoes don't match.”

“So what?” She deliberately wore one red sneaker and one yellow one.

“You wear mismatched shoes or socks every day.” His accessing gaze came back to her face. “That must mean something.”

“Only to me.”

“As long as you aren't ashamed of it.”

His expression softened a bit. With humor? It was the closest thing to a real conversation they'd ever had.

He took the file from her hand and closed it. “Anything else you want to know about me? Ask.”

“Okay.” There were things. Lots. She just couldn't think of any of them with him standing so close.

She backed up a step, trying to be casual as she draped her elbow on top of the file cabinet. She gained only six inches. “With your background, you could have gotten a service dog from any breeder in the country. You came here. Why?”

His lids lowered to half-mast over the dark-gold brilliance of his eyes. “I was blackmailed.”

Jori couldn't imagine anyone who could force this man to do something he didn't want to do. There had to be another reason. “Is it because we specialize in PTSD dogs?” She glanced at the file he held. “The extent of your injuries indica—”

“—I got blowed up. That's not exactly news to me.”

He dropped the folder on top of the file behind her and braced his hand beside her arm on the file cabinet, effectively enclosing her between his body and the cabinet. “Next question.”

Jori tried to ignore his attempt to dominate her space. “Samantha's specially trained to help with PTSD episodes. I've been working with her for four months so I know she's good at her job.”

“That's not a question.”

“Do you think she's well trained?”

“Very.”

Jori thought about that one-word answer for a second. The only way he would know that was if he had seen her in action, too. “Did you experience an episode last night?”

He stared at her, every muscle in his face gone Mount Rushmore hard. Then he jerked his head to the left, as alert as if Kelli's desk had reared up on hind legs and snarled at him.

For a split second Jori didn't understand his reaction. Then she realized she'd heard the sound, too. A pile of papers on the desktop had shifted. Nothing to alarm even Samantha. But Battise was blinking as his head swiveled slowly right and left to scan the corners of the ten-by-twelve-foot office space. Though he wasn't touching her, she could feel the tension making his body rigid.

She'd read about and watched other trainers working with service dogs simulate it. But she'd never seen a real exaggerated startle response in anyone.