When the sirens finally filled the air and the adrenaline began to drain, I watched the paramedics swarm the victims with oxygen masks, the heavy weight I had carried since that white van five years ago finally beginning to lift. I visited the hospital two days later, and when the young woman from the first bale hugged me with a strength I didn’t expect, I showed her a photo of Duke on my phone and told her that I hadn’t been the one to see her—he was. I walked back out into the sun feeling lighter than I had in a lifetime, realizing that while the highway will always harbor predators, I am no longer looking for them alone. We saved eight lives that day, but in the quiet resonance of a mended conscience, I realized that Duke had also finally saved mine
K9 Kept Barking at Hay Bales on Highway, Deputy Cut It Open and Turned Pale…//…
