POLICE DOG BARKS DESPERATELY AT MAFIA BOSS’S SON AT AIRPORT SECONDS LATER,THE AIRPORT WENT SILENT!

Chapter 2

Officer Declan Cole had walked this terminal a thousand times. Gate C12 to Gate D7, the same route every early shift, the same polished floor, the same coffee smell, the same faces. It was the kind of routine a man could do in his sleep, and most mornings, Cole more or less did.

Apollo was the one who never slept. The German Shepherd moved beside him with a precision that bordered on arrogance, ears swiveling, nostrils drinking in the air, cataloguing every traveler, every suitcase, every untouched corner. Five years on the force, three at the airport, and Apollo had sniffed out more contraband than Cole had seen in his entire career. Explosives residue. A brick of heroin inside a teddy bear. A knife taped to a grandmother’s cane. The dog was never wrong. That was the thing people didn’t understand about working a K9 unit. The dog wasn’t a tool. The dog was the truth.

So when Apollo froze — a full-body stop, four paws planted, every muscle locked — Cole felt the tension travel up the leash before he even looked.

“What is it, boy?”

Apollo’s head snapped toward the security line, and the low rumble that started in his chest was like a far-off engine. Cole followed his partner’s gaze and saw them.

A man in an expensive black suit stood near the metal detectors, one hand resting on the shoulder of a small boy. The kid couldn’t have been older than seven. Dark hair, pale face, shoulders hunched around a faded backpack that looked too big for him. He was crying. Not dramatically, not loudly — the boy was crying the way children cry when they’ve learned it isn’t safe to be loud.