Chapter 17
“Ohmigod,” Dulcie said, giving Sheri a hug, now that the other police officers were gone. “I’m so glad to meet you. When I moved to Ely, I never thought I would be so fortunate as to meet up with other wolves.”
Sheri hugged her back. “Yes, this is wonderful. I’m originally from Yellowknife but came here with a friend and we’re part of a whole Arctic wolf pack. Slade is my mate. We’re so thrilled to meet you. And you have to see the others. Where did you come from?” She was thinking it would be wonderful to have a wolf in the pack who was on the police force. It just made it easier to explain to a fellow wolf how they knew things that humans normally wouldn’t.
“I’m originally from Minneapolis, but I wanted the slower pace in a small town like this. I wasn’t part of a pack. So you’re a private investigator, Tanner was saying.” Dulcie followed Sheri inside the cabin.
“Yes. I began working here as one with a group of Arctic wolves who are former police officers from Seattle. Slade is a seaplane pilot. Would you like some cocoa?” Sheri walked into the kitchen.
“Oh, sure. Yeah, Conway King said Slade had been involved in several rescue missions and he and Tanner had worked with him on them.” Dulcie removed her hat, gloves, and snow boots at the door. Then she pulled off her parka and hung it on the coatrack. “Wow, I just can’t believe you’re both wolves. Oh, oh, so is that how you found the laptop in the snow?” Dulcie joined her in the kitchen.
“Yeah. We were actually running as wolves and smelled the cardboard, Styrofoam, and metal, and dug it out.”
“So when you said one of the men shot at you two, you were wolves, not in your human forms,” Dulcie said.
“Right.” Sheri added whipped cream to her mug of cocoa and asked if Dulcie wanted some too.
“Yes, thanks. That makes perfect sense. Did they realize you were wolves?”
“That’s what one of the men said, but Fitz told him Arctic wolves don’t live out here.”
Dulcie thought about that for a moment and then said, “You were running as wolves tonight.”
Sheri smiled. “Yep. We smelled the packages—about three of them—but we were afraid of digging them up and having to give details on how we had found them this time.” She explained about going back out as humans and finding part of the wing and hearing Fitz and his men again searching for the goods. “I thought you might have been upset to have to stay with me instead of going with the other officers to capture Fitz and the other men.”
“Normally, I might have been, though my job was to protect you from harm and that’s just as important. But when I realized you were wolves, I knew this was where I needed to be.”
Sheri added a sprinkle of peppermint candy to top off their mugs of hot chocolate, and then they carried them into the living room and sat down to talk.
“Truthfully, the reason I moved to Ely was they had a position open they were trying to fill at the sheriff’s office and I wanted to be at a place where I could really run as a wolf. I just never expected I would meet up with a couple of wolves or a whole wolf pack.” Dulcie took a sip of her cocoa.
“You just missed our Christmas party, but we’ll have a get-together soon. Actually, Slade and I just mated and he’s moving out of his apartment and into mine until my father can build us our home. Several of the wolf pack members are coming to help us move him, though there’s not that much to move. But afterward we’re having a pizza party to celebrate at the White Wolf Investigation Services office building where several of us work.”
“Oh, I’ve seen the office building, but never thought to put two and two together that wolves ran it.”
“Well, I’m sure there are a lot of businesses with a wolf name that aren’t wolf-run, but here, it is. So are you a royal?” Sheri asked. It was important that they added more royals to the pack to help those who weren’t.
“Through and through. We were wolves from so long ago, we always thought we were from the very first wolves that were lupus garous . What about you?”
“Yes, we’re royals. Some of the pack members are more newly turned, so we help them out when they need our assistance.” Sheri drank some of her cocoa.
“Oh, sure. Um, are there any…” Dulcie looked embarrassed to ask. “Bachelor males in the pack?”
Sheri smiled. “My brother, Hans.” She didn’t want to try to matchmake and upset Dulcie or her brother in the event they didn’t like each other. “He’s an accountant. Dad builds homes. My mom is a midwife.”
“Oh, both must come in handy.”
“Yeah, Dad will be building a home for Slade and me. And we just had two new babies in the pack. My good friend from Yellowknife is due in March.”
“That’s wonderful. It’s great having more of our kind here.” Dulcie drank some of her cocoa. “Oh, this is so good. I love the peppermint sprinkles on top.”
“Double the chocolate. It’s the only way to go. And the sprinkles are perfect for the holidays.”
“I’ll have to try that the next time I make it. I’m so glad to meet you and Slade. I’m sure I’ll be seeing more of him when he’s doing rescue missions in the future. Arctic wolves.” Dulcie shook her head.
“Yeah, the pack ended up getting a couple of large white dogs, a German shepherd and a white Alaskan malamute. They stay mostly at Cameron and Faith’s home because their triplets love playing with them. But if anyone sees our kind running at the lake where several of our homes are located, we can show off the dogs and say it was just them. The homes are right by the Wolf Investigative Services office building so it’s convenient for going home and such. So do you have any family?”
“No family,” Dulcie said.
“Well, you’ll have plenty with us if you don’t mind that we’re Arctic wolves.”
“Not at all. You are gray wolves too.”
“That’s true,” Sheri said. “More cocoa?”
“Oh, absolutely. I hope the others catch the thieves, but I’m glad I got to safeguard you.”
Sheri laughed and they both went into the kitchen to make some cocoa. She was hoping Slade and the officers were all right though.
***
Since Slade was an unarmed citizen, two of the police officers took the lead, following Slade and Sheri’s snowshoe tracks, keeping quiet, while two flanked Slade and another took the rear. Slade didn’t like that they had to use flashlights, which could alert Fitz and his cohorts that they were coming. But at least the officers were keeping quiet.
Then they heard Fitz say, “There! Damn, we found a laptop.”
All the officers turned off their flashlights and moved toward the area where the three men were digging into the snow, using a couple of lanterns, headlamps, and flashlights. Slade smiled. They finally had them now and the men had been caught in the act.
Slade stayed put as the police officers moved stealthily forward, guns drawn. As soon as they were in place among the trees, Tanner called out, “St. Louis County Sheriff’s Office. Everyone put your hands in the air.”
Fitz made a run for it in one direction, the other two men splitting off from each other. It was a good move, rather than everyone running in the same direction. They were all wearing snowshoes, but anyone could walk or run in them just as well as walking or running without them. They just had to use a slightly wider stance and lift their legs higher. Slade had done it at times so he knew how to do it, and as soon as the men took off running, he joined the officers. It was so instinctive for a wolf to chase its prey. As long as the man he was trying to take down—which was the leader of the gang, Fitz—didn’t pull a gun on him, Slade could safely make a citizen’s arrest.
Tanner was hot on Fitz’s tail, but Slade had been closer when Fitz ran in his direction, a huge mistake on Fitz’s part. The other officers had taken off after Otis Risotto and Daniel Danbury. Slade hoped they nailed them as he got closer to Fitz by the second. He trusted he wouldn’t annoy Tanner if he took Fitz down first, but if he could land him, Fitz couldn’t shoot and that was the main thing.
Slade could hear Fitz’s racing heart, his hurried breath, the crunch of his snowshoes against the crusted snow, and smell his anxiety showing just how fearful he was. Which Slade was glad for. It was time for them to be under the gun, so to speak.
Slade was nearly touching the back of Fitz’s snowshoes with the toes of his own when gunfire sounded about an eighth of a mile away. Four shots rang out. Damn!
Was it one of Fitz’s cohorts shooting at the police, or the police shooting at one of them? He couldn’t worry about it for now, but he was sure Tanner wanted to go to his fellow officers’ aid. Still, he was close behind Slade, and he couldn’t leave him with a suspect on his own. Slade gained on Fitz, actually stepping on the back of Fitz’s snowshoes, tripping him up. Slade tackled him down into the snow, burying him enough that he couldn’t reach for a gun if he tried.
Tanner was right there then, and Slade got off Fitz so the officer could yank Fitz’s arms back behind him, cuff him, and give him his Miranda rights.
Slade helped Tanner get Fitz to his feet, his beard and eyebrows covered in snow, his dark eyes narrowed with hatred as he glowered at Slade. If he could have, Slade was certain Fitz would have shot him right then and there. Tanner relieved Fitz of two handguns, a .45 and a 9mm. “Serial numbers removed on both of them.”
“Figures.” But that meant they were illegal weapons, and the police could charge Fitz with more criminal offenses.
Slade and Tanner took hold of Fitz’s arms and headed in the direction where the shots had been fired. Slade hoped none of the officers had been shot.
Tanner got on his radio and called the other men. Conway answered, “I’ve got the guy named Otis Risotto. Daniel Danbury is still running. Sanchez, Peterson, and Miller are chasing him down.”
“Who fired the shots?” Tanner asked.
“Danbury, but none of our guys were hit.”
“Good.” Tanner called it in to the sheriff’s office and warned that shots had been fired at the officers and two of the men were in custody, but they needed backup to take in the shooter.
More shots were fired, sounding like they were from the same gun as before—which meant that Danbury was shooting at the other officers again.
The officers returned gunfire and then there was silence. Slade wished he knew what was going on with the other officers and the suspect.
Hauling Fitz with them, Tanner and Slade finally reached Conway.
“Hold on to this guy,” Tanner said to Conway, who was standing over a cuffed Otis, now sitting on the ground. Tanner looked torn about helping out the other officers who were getting shot at.
“I’ll help Conway with these two,” Slade hurried to say.
“I hereby deputize you then,” Tanner said. “I’m going after them. Slade, you’re authorized to stay here with Conway and keep the two men under arrest or assist him to move them back to the patrol cars parked at your cabin.”
“I’m good with heading back to the cabin if Conway is.” Slade didn’t like that Danbury was still on the loose and wanted Tanner to help with the apprehension of the shooter. Besides, he preferred going back to the cabin, should Danbury head that way.
“Yeah. We’ll go together,” Conway said. “I need to take these guys back to the patrol car anyway and the two of us can manage it. It’s better than standing idle here in the cold.” Conway and Tanner always treated Slade as though he was on the force with them because he was so helpful, and they had deputized him before in situations where he was needed.
“Yeah, that works for me.”
Conway could use his help hauling these two guys back there to the patrol car.
“Okay, good.” Then Tanner took off running to catch up to the other men.
Slade wondered where Fitz and his men had come from. They had to have parked a vehicle as close as they could to the site and then hiked in. He was certain that Danbury was going to try to reach the vehicle and tear off from there.
Slade glanced at the area where shovels and metal detectors were lying in the snow and a hole had been dug surrounded by flashlights and lanterns. Next to the hole, Fitz and his cohorts had unearthed one of the laptops. “Do you want me to get it?” Slade asked. “There are others there too still buried in the snow.” He wasn’t going to say why he knew that, but hoped the officers would trust in Slade’s instincts.
“Yeah, sure,” Conway said, since he needed to keep a free hand to reach his gun if he needed to. “We’ll come back for the others once these guys are locked up.”
Slade grabbed the box and tucked it under one arm and then took hold of Fitz’s arm and pulled at him to walk through the snow to the cabin. Conway had hold of Otis’s arm and was tugging him along too. It was one thing to walk in deep snow on their own, but when forcing a reluctant prisoner to walk with them? This was going to take forever.
Conway called Dulcie and gave her an update so as not to startle her when they arrived at the cabin. “Hey, we’re bringing two of the men in. Other officers are en route to reinforce us so they should be arriving at the cabin soon. Tanner and the other officers are in pursuit of the last suspect. They’ve exchanged gunfire. Yeah, hopefully, they’ll take him down without any injuries or worse. Okay, see you soon.”
When Conway ended the call, he said, “Dulcie said reinforcements have just arrived at the cabin. We’ll turn these two over to them and I’ll return to search for Danbury and, after that, look for more of the stolen goods.”
“I can help you if you want,” Slade said. “I’m sure Sheri and Dulcie would also want to.” He figured the more wolves searching the area, the more they would find. He decided they could say they saw odd indentions in the snow. And the officers could use the metal detectors the suspects had left behind. Slade was afraid that the suspects would get bonded out and they could be right back here again. He wondered if they already had buyers for the merchandise and that’s why they had risked coming back here to look for it. Or maybe they had the notion that if the police didn’t find the other merchandise here, they wouldn’t have enough evidence to get them on much of anything.
Slade and Conway were still fighting with Fitz and Otis, who were giving them grief the whole way back. Slade swore if he’d just knocked Fitz out and carried him to the cabin, it would be easier than fighting with him to take him to the cabin this way. Here he had thought taking the two injured men, Lionel and Morgan, to their cabin had been difficult. But at least they were agreeable, and when Slade, Trenton, and Andy hadn’t been lifting the sleds over the downed trees, it had been smooth going.
Which made him think about how it was going to be to get these two over fallen trees when they would fight them every step of the way.