Wild

by Jill Sorenson

  “Hang on,” Josh shouted.

  His advice was useless. What else was she going to do, jump off? She tightened her grip on the ladder rung, startled when it almost leaped out of her hands. Her boots slipped off the edge and flew wild, connecting with Josh’s head. His grunt of pain was drowned out by her scream of terror as she dangled above him. Knowing that Josh was there to break her fall didn’t help. Her already bruised knees slammed into the lower rungs and her cheek glanced off the side of the pole so hard she saw stars.

  She clung to the ladder for dear life, trying not to kick Josh again.

  Once again, childhood memories assailed her. She was five years old, paralyzed with panic in the back of her father’s single-engine plane. Then she was in the audience at the air show, watching it spiral across the sky.

  After the quake ended, those disturbing images lingered in her mind. She placed her feet on the rung and squeezed her eyes shut, enduring the heartache until it faded. Her biceps felt sore and her palms were raw. But other than a few new scrapes, she was fine. This aftershock had been shorter and less intense than the previous one.

  “Are you okay?” Josh asked.

  She nodded, glancing down at him. His left eyebrow was bleeding. “You?”

  “Yeah,” he said, wiping the blood off his face. The cut welled up and trickled a fresh streak down his jaw.

  “Sorry.”

  “It’s nothing.”

  It wasn’t nothing; he needed a bandage, maybe even stitches. She descended a few rungs to take a better look. He gave her space by bracing his left foot and left hand on the safety guard. When she was close enough, she reached into her pocket for the rag she’d used on Kim earlier. “Put some pressure on it.”

  He held the cloth to his brow. “Thanks.”

  His proximity was oddly comforting. They were sandwiched together inside the guard, his bent elbow touching her hip. Her face heated as she remembered what he’d said about being on top.

  The comment was inappropriate, even for him, but she’d let it slide. He was worried about his sister. They were both on edge. If she’d insisted on him climbing first, she might be the one with the bleeding head right now.

  Their radios sounded with check-in requests. Josh had his hands full so she removed the radio at her belt to answer the call. “This is Helena. How is everyone?”

  “We have a problem,” Kim said. “A police officer stopped by just before the aftershock. They’re evacuating the entire city, effective immediately, because of dangerous chemical spills and gas leaks.”

  Helena’s stomach sank. “How much time do we have?”

  “None. We’re in a high-risk area for explosions.”

  She looked around, blinking rapidly. The park was populated with tall, leafy trees. She couldn’t see over the canopy to assess the damage yet, but the smoky, empty sky appeared ominous. The fact that there were no planes or helicopters overhead didn’t bode well. If San Diego had been declared a no-fly zone, they were in deep trouble.

  Feeling dizzy, she closed her eyes and took a calming breath. “What are the evacuation orders?”

  “Travel east, by foot.”

  “By foot?”

  “The freeways are all messed up. People are gathering at the football stadium and riding buses to safety.”

  Jesus. The stadium was almost ten miles away. Getting there wouldn’t be easy, but the employees couldn’t stay here if the city was under evacuation. Helena didn’t want to keep anyone at the park against their will, Josh included. It was unethical—not to mention illegal—to ask a staff member to risk injury or even death on the job. Although the zoo’s animal collection was priceless, its human employees were more important. These people had families to reunite with, children to take care of.

  “Okay,” Helena said, swallowing hard. “Go ahead.”

  “Should we wait for you?”

  She glanced at Josh. “Do you want to evacuate?” she asked him, taking her finger off the talk button.

  “Do you?”

  “I can’t leave the animals.”

  “I can’t leave the employees.”

  Helena accepted this answer. He was in charge of securing the park. She was responsible for the animals in it. They had to work together and hope for the best. Josh’s commitment to safety seemed as strong as hers—and she was glad to have someone by her side.

  “Don’t wait for us,” she said into the radio. “We’re staying.”

  When Kim spoke again, her voice was strained. “The gorillas are locked away in the night house. Louis and Trent are still rounding up venomous snakes. The rest of us are leaving. We’re taking wheelchairs for the injured.”

  “Be careful,” Helena said.

  “You, too,” Kim choked out. “Bye, Josh.”

  After Josh said goodbye to Kim and the others, Helena returned the radio to her belt.

  Pulse pounding with trepidation, she contemplated the upper rungs of the ladder. They’d already come this far. Getting a view of the lion enclosure and the perimeter of the park was essential. “How do you feel about continuing?”

  “Ready,” he said, lifting the washcloth from his brow. The bleeding had slowed and an unsightly lump had formed. It wasn’t a goose egg, like Kim’s, but the swelling looked painful. Helena felt a twinge of sympathy.

  “I am afraid of heights,” she admitted suddenly.

  Something lit in his eyes, a warm assessment she didn’t want to like. He tucked the rag into his pocket. “I thought so.”

  “Why?”

  “Just a hunch. You never ride the Skylift.”

  She shouldn’t have been surprised that he’d noticed. He had a way of studying people and picking up on things. Necessary skills for dealing with the public. She didn’t know why she’d told him. No one else knew about her phobia, not even Mitch. She hadn’t explained her reluctance to fly out to Denver. Commercial jets didn’t scare her as much as small planes, but she avoided both whenever possible.

  Uncomfortable with her impulsive confession, she climbed up a few rungs, putting distance between them.

  It wasn’t like her to spill secrets, but this was an unusual situation. She felt bad about hurting him, and grateful for his presence.

  That was all.

  The space above the treetops was open to the sky, and therefore scarier. She couldn’t bring herself to glance around while she ascended. Flames flickered in her peripheral vision and a layer of smoke shrouded the coastline. The lights she’d seen during the earthquake were gone, maybe a figment of her imagination or some freaky kinetic phenomenon. She focused on the ladder and tried to think positive.

  Going up was easier than looking down. As long as she stayed in control, she’d be okay. Flying in a plane required her to depend on others—the pilot, mechanics, crew. On a ladder, she could climb at her own speed and take breaks if she needed to. The worst was probably over, as far as aftershocks. She didn’t smell any fumes or chemicals.

  The zoo had only been shut down twice in the ten years she’d worked here. Once for a fire hazard, once for a gas leak. Both evacuations had been precautionary, with no damages or injuries reported. They’d never had to relocate the animals. It was possible, even likely, that no further harm would come to them.

  Boom!

  The powerful explosion blew that theory out of the water. She cowered against the ladder, as if shrinking her body would protect her from hurtling shrapnel. Cringing, she snuck a peek at the fire cloud. It backlit a cluster of the city’s tallest buildings.

  “What do you see?” Josh demanded.

  “Fire,” she said.

  “Where?”

  She couldn’t really tell. It looked like the ocean was burning, which didn’t make sense. “In the bay, I think.”

  “Keep going.”

  Helena didn’t move for fear of falling. Her pulse was racing, mind reeling. More eruptions followed the first. She swallowed a scream as orange fireballs burst across the sky, sending plumes of black smoke billowin
g into the air. Anyone near the explosions would have been decimated. The majority of survivors must have evacuated already. The slow, the weak, the injured—they were at the most risk.

  “Go up, or I’ll pass you.”

  Bolstering her courage, she climbed the remaining ten rungs. Her palms were sweaty, her heart pounding. When she reached the top, her vision was blurred. She blinked to clear it, but she was too terrified to glance around.

  The peripheral chaos reminded her of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. She’d been a high school senior at the time. School had been canceled, and she’d watched the events unfold on live television. Horrific images of ash clouds and debris. Bodies falling from the towers. People jumping to avoid burning to death.

  This was like 9/11. Only she wasn’t watching it on TV. She was living it.

  While she clung to the ladder, trembling with fright, Josh ascended to her level. He stood close behind her, invading her space. His left foot was braced on the iron guard, his right hand gripping the rung next to hers. His fingers were darkly tanned, the knuckles scraped raw. The minor abrasions didn’t look as out of place as the lump on his brow. Maybe because he had a man’s hands, strong and capable and worn from use.

  He had a man’s body, too. She could sense his size and height, the breadth of his shoulders and the deceptive power in his lean muscles. She’d noticed that he was well-built and attractive on numerous occasions, but she’d always dismissed him as boyish. Twenty-one or so. Looking back, this almost seemed like a willful underestimate. He’d been older than that when they’d met four years ago.

  He also had a man’s presence. She’d felt it when he’d gripped her upper arms earlier and she felt it now, larger than life behind her. He was comfortable in his skin. He exuded confidence. She was a tall woman, and she didn’t feel small or diminished next to him, but she liked his size. He could probably lift her up and carry her. He had big hands.

  She released a slow breath, trying to regroup. Her strange reaction to Josh didn’t mean anything. The earthquake must have sent her hormones into overdrive. It was adrenaline, not attraction. They were stuck with each other, and she needed his help. She was relieved that he wasn’t as careless or immature as he let on. That was it.

  When she summoned up the nerve to take in a panoramic view, horror enveloped her. There was fire all around them, not just near the coast. Her gaze skimmed over leaning trees and crumbling rooftops. It looked like the apocalypse.

  The zoo was nestled into a wooded area north of the Gaslight District. Museums, parks and historic landmarks flanked them on every side. She couldn’t get a glimpse of the nearby streets or freeways from this vantage point, but it appeared that the city center had been hit hard. The modern skyscrapers were still standing. Older structures like Casa Del Prado and the California Bell Tower were gone.

  Just…gone. Erased from the skyline.

  Dismayed by the bigger picture, she narrowed her focus to their immediate surroundings. The zoo was divided into five sections: Heart of Africa, Copper Canyon, Rio Loco, Arctic Freeze and Lost Jungle. Leafy trees blocked her view of most of the area.

  She turned her attention to the lion enclosure. It appeared empty, but that wasn’t unusual. There were a number of shady nooks and crannies for the animals to retreat into when they wanted privacy or a nap. One of the enclosure’s walls had cracked open, leaving a space large enough for the lions to slip through. Unfortunately, she couldn’t see what was on the other side. Greg could be there, quietly bleeding to death.

  After thirty seconds of looking around, she almost swooned from vertigo. Stomach lurching, she glanced over her shoulder at Josh. He wasn’t studying the lion enclosure or any structure inside the park. His eyes were locked on something in the distance. She followed his gaze to the bay. Through a haze of black smoke and giant flames, she spotted the reason for his distraction: the Coronado Bridge.

  It was…broken. A section in the middle had fallen apart.

  The bridge was miles away, too far to see individual cars or people. But she could imagine them.

  Josh covered his mouth with his left hand. The knuckles on this hand were scraped raw, just like his right. Veins stood out from his skin in harsh relief, snaking toward a point at the middle of his wrist. His eyes watered with the emotion he was trying to hold inside.

  Helena knew he was worried about his sister. She supposed it would be more polite to look away and give him a moment of peace. Humans also needed privacy, and most men didn’t like to show weakness. She could relate to that.

  But instead of lowering her gaze, she held it steady. His tears didn’t strike her as a sign of weakness. When they spilled over his hand, he wiped them away impatiently.

  “She drives across that bridge with Emma every morning,” he said.

  Oh, God. Not the little girl, too. Helena couldn’t imagine the pain of losing a child. She didn’t know what to say.

  He stared across the ravaged expanse, silent. The entire bay area was burning. His sister and niece might have survived the quake, the bridge collapse, the explosions and the raging fires. But they might not have. Helena couldn’t bring herself to offer him any platitudes. She hated it when people lied and said everything would be fine.

  After a long moment, he glanced at her. “Do you think I’d feel it if they were gone?”

  “I don’t know,” she said, surprised by the question.

  “Because I don’t feel it.”

  She thought back to her childhood, remembering all of the times her father had performed in the air show. He’d done hundreds of daredevil stunts. She’d watched from the crowd, frozen with the certainty that he would fall from the sky. He never had.

  Feelings were unreliable.

  Josh picked up his radio to give Louis and Trent an update on the explosions. He stayed composed until he mentioned the bridge collapse. Then his voice sounded thin, as if he’d taken a hit off a joint and was holding in the smoke. Trent had to sign off because Louis needed help with one of the pythons. Josh returned the radio to his belt, clearing his throat.

  “Can you check the perimeter?” she asked. “I would do it myself, but looking down makes me dizzy.”

  “Sure.”

  He examined the trees and structures below. He was thorough and deliberate, unbothered by their gut-churning distance from the ground.

  While he searched the area, she contemplated the sunny yellow tram cars, dangling on heavy cables about ten feet away. They carried happy families over the park every single day. Mothers loaded squirming babies into those deathtraps all the time. She couldn’t fathom it.

  “I can’t see all of the fence line,” he said. “Most of it looks okay.”

  “Any sign of the lions or Greg?”

  He shook his head. “What do you want to do?”

  “Continue to the enclosure.”

  His jaw flexed in disapproval.

  She knew that approaching the scene without Louis and Trent as backup would be dangerous, but she couldn’t wait any longer. Greg might still be alive. The clock was ticking. “Do you have a better idea?”

  Apparently not, because he started down the ladder. She turned and flattened her belly against the rungs to make more room for him. His body aligned with hers for a brief moment. The position felt unbearably intimate, like lovers entwined.

  When his forearms touched her rib cage, she sucked in a sharp breath.

  “Are you hurt?” he asked, pausing.

  “No. I’m fine.”

  He seemed puzzled by her reaction, but he continued his descent. He had to skirt around her hips, which were wider than the ladder. She closed her eyes, aware that his face was inches from her bottom, his strong arms framing her thighs.

  A pulse throbbed between her legs where she’d squeezed them together. She had to force herself not to squirm as he passed by. One false move could dislodge him.

  This was an odd response to fear. It almost felt like arousal. Maybe her physical side had taken over because she w
as overwhelmed, mentally and emotionally. Or perhaps the traumatic experience had stripped away her natural defenses, leaving her more vulnerable to human contact.

  Swallowing hard, she followed him down the ladder. The descent was even more harrowing than the climb. After about twenty rungs, she didn’t have to worry about inappropriate tingles. She felt nothing but anxiety and cold sweat. It wasn’t possible to move lower without looking down, over and over again.

  Josh wasn’t oblivious to her struggle. He went slow and murmured words of encouragement. It seemed to take forever. She was thirsty and tired, even though she was accustomed to strenuous activity.

  “We’re almost there,” he said, his voice reassuring.

  She wondered if he was suffering any ill effects from the blow to the temple. His knuckles had probably gotten scraped during the first quake. The impact must have knocked him off his feet, too.

  As they reached the lower edge of the guard, Helena heard a subtle, ominous sound. It was the almost indiscernible whisper of padded footsteps. The vague impression of shifting molecules and stealthy motion; the soft snick of a single twig.

  “Wait!” she cried out to Josh, just before the lion pounced.

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHLOE HELD HER daughter to her chest and wept for several moments.

  It felt odd to have an emotional breakdown with a stranger sitting next to her. Mateo made no move to comfort her. When the moment passed, she rubbed her runny nose against her shoulder and took a deep breath. Emma stared up at her in concern, sucking the first two fingers on her right hand. She was a beautiful child. Golden-haired and brown-eyed, like Chloe, but with Lyle’s signature features. His cruel mouth was a perfect cupid’s bow on Emma. His winged brows gave her an elfish, Tinker Bell look.

  Emma’s angelic face fooled everyone. She was a handful. Her favorite word was no.

  Chloe glanced at Mateo. He was staring out at the water, not at them. His chest rose and fell with labored breaths. The swim had exhausted them both, and he’d done all the work. Her blood was starting to cool. Soon she’d be shivering in her wet clothes.