Rachel Alexander 03 - A Hell of a Dog

down at his key to make sure.
    “Right,” I said, nodding like one of those dogs people put on the dashboards of their cars. Then I stood there in the empty hall for a few minutes after Chip and Betty had disappeared into 307.
    This wasn’t exactly how I had imagined things would go when I was wrapping the black lace teddy in tissue paper and packing it carefully in one of the pockets of my suitcase.
    Man plans. God laughs.
    So much for the sex part
    Or so I believed at the moment.



DON’T SAY A WORD, SHE SAID

    I ’d been reading the fashion section of the Sunday Times, most of which gets delivered on Saturday morning, when the phone rang. I liked being up on the important news a day ahead of people who bought their papers at the newsstand. Nails are big, the article said, especially in unreal colors.
    The phone rang again. I picked up my toasted bagel and took a bite. The model’s nails were considerably longer and bluer than mine. I heard Dashiell bark three times, my outgoing message. Then I heard that it wasn’t my sister, so I picked up. “Alexander,” I said.
    “Oh, good. You’re there,” a deep, whiskey voice said. “Well, here’s the story in a nutshell. I’ve arranged a weeklong symposium for dog trainers in New York City, the first of its kind, but it seems the participants all absolutely detest each other, and I’m afraid it’s only going to go downhill from there. You know how these things are, I trust. So I got in touch with Frank Petrie, who
    I know from way back, because I decided that what this situation needed was a guard with a gun, you know, just to keep things from getting out of hand. Perfect solution, right? Wrong. He said what I needed was you.”
    “Can I get your name?” I asked, pulling over a pad and a pen. “Of course, Samantha Lewis.”
    Sam Lewis, I thought. I’ll be damned.
    “Look, Rachel, I’ve got a problem here—can I call you Rachel? Please call me Sam. Everyone does. The symposium starts in just two days, and I’m beginning to panic here. I’m still dealing with totally annoying last-minute changes in the program, and I’ve got to get this security business nailed down, too. God, I hope you’re available. Maybe I ought to explain what I’ve done here. Do you have a minute?”
    She actually stopped and waited for an answer.
    “I do,” I told her.
    I had a lot more than that. The only thing in my calendar was an appointment to get my teeth cleaned, and that wasn’t until the middle of next month.
    “I’ve been running individual seminars for years now,” she said, which was sort of like Lassie calling to tell me he was a dog, “and I decided to see if I could get these people together, if I could encourage them to stop the methodology wars and form a community so that people could share information the way they do in other professions.”
    That ought to work, I thought.
    “But the more I thought about it, die more I thought I was asking for trouble. I wondered what on earth I could’ve been thinking when I dreamed this up. So I figured, okay, it’s not lost yet. I’ll play it safe. I’ll call Frank, get a uniform. It would be well worth the expense. But Frank said no, he said I should hire you, get you to work undercover. ‘You don’t want your people to know why she’s there,’ he said, ‘they won’t open up. You’d be surprised what people say to each other. Sometimes you can stop some nasty business before it gets going. Stick her on a panel. Have her teach,’ he said. ‘Let her walk the walk, talk the talk, pal around with people, listen to what’s being said. She’ll fit right in. She’s a dog nut.’ ”
    “You’re actually concerned?”
    “I am. I was hoping I could get them to bury the hatchet. Now I need you there, to make sure they don’t bury it in each other.”
    “Look, Sam, true, the lack of community is appalling, the attitudes less than professional, the bad-mouthing rampant, but—”
    “I make a substantial amount of money doing this, Rachel. I can afford the peace of mind I’ll get just knowing I have someone troubleshooting for me. Since you used to be a dog trainer, you are the logical choice. And Frank said you were a pretty decent operative, for a girl.” She laughed. “That’s when I knew it had to be you.”
    “His words?”
    “Precisely,” she said. “I guess that’s why I’m still looking for Mr. Okay. There are too many Frank Petries in this world, too many annoying nerds, too many