She climbed on, summiting the ridge and seeing vast open terrain below. A dusk-to-dawn light from the ranch house came into view. She descended the ridge in the dark, her way helped along by the diffuse glow of the moon. Entering a section of trees, she paused in the shadows there. The house was large, more of a lodge, and was situated at one end of a large meadow, nestled amid a handful of trees. A series of outbuildings lay around it, new ones. Two were big but simple cinder-block structures, and another looked like an old maintenance shed. Two quads stood in front of one of the cinder-block buildings, next to large cans of gas. Utility lines were strung to the buildings. She hoped one of the lines was for a phone. As she got closer, she could smell woodsmoke curling in the air. At least someone was home.
She kept to the trees, skirting the buildings to see anyone lying in wait for her. As she approached the nearest structure, one of the concrete ones, she saw the source of smoke. Three men sat around a campfire, drinking beer and talking. One poked at the flames with a stick.
Keeping the closest building between her and the men at the fire, she approached. With cinder-block walls, a steel door, and no windows, the building had a very utilitarian feel. Before she made her presence known, she had to be sure these men weren’t connected to the ones hunting her.
She reached the two quads in the darkness. If their keys were in the ignition, she could take one of them, get to safety. Disappointment swept over her when she saw the empty ignitions. With her knowledge of engines, she could maybe hot-wire one of them, but she wouldn’t be able to keep an eye on the men from there.
Suddenly a voice spoke up by the fire. One of the men got up and approached from that direction, talking into a squawking radio. She slipped around to the opposite side of the building, crouching there in the darkness. The forest at her back comforted her. From here she could see the men at the fire. Only two sat there now.
“Hell of a week,” one said. His voice was familiar. She peered more closely at him, trying to make out his features. He wore a camouflaged baseball hat, full camo gear, and boots. He turned, silhouetted in the flickering light, and she took in a sharp breath as she recognized Gary from the hardware store. For a second, relief at a familiar face flooded through her. But then she thought of his strange behavior at the lodge earlier and stayed put.
The other man was bareheaded, leaning forward to stare into the flames. He was dressed all in black, with a black hooded parka, black pants, and boots. With a shaved head, he was so pale that he almost glowed in the dark. “Tell me about it. Thought I was coming up here for the usual three days to get everything ready. Instead it’s been a week.”
Closer to her, she heard the man who had answered the radio. “You find it?”
The radio crackled and another man answered. “Yes. At least we have a lead on it. But there’s been a complication.”
“What now?”
“There was a woman. We think she’s the biologist from the Snowline.”
“And?”
“She saw the gorilla.”
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me!” he roared. Alex could hear him pacing, his boots stomping in the dirt. “Where is she?”
“We don’t know. Dwight took a shot at them both, but missed. He’s camped out now by her pack. She’s got no phone, no radio. Not even a good coat, and it’s already snowing over here.”
Alex’s heart started to race again, adrenaline flooding through her.
“You know they’re coming tomorrow,” the man near her said angrily. “You’ve got to take care of this. Where was she seen last?”
“In quadrant four of the preserve.”
She furrowed her brow. Quadrant four? What, these guys have their own system of partitioning off the preserve? Who are they?
“Me and Gary will take the quads out,” the man said. “Radio as soon as you learn anything.”
“Will do,” crackled the other voice.
He clicked off his radio and stormed back to the fire. The man in black saw him coming and sat up straight. “What is it, Tony?”
“That biologist from the resort saw the fucking gorilla. You want to explain that, Cliff?” he asked the man in black. “Why is she out here? I thought you fixed it so she’d be stuck in town.”
“I don’t know. I sabotaged her car. She should have broken down on her way back to the resort. She would have been towed back to town, waiting on a repair until Monday.”
Gary spoke up. “She did come back to the resort that same day. I saw her. Maybe it didn’t break down.”
“And you didn’t think to tell me that she’d come back?” Tony roared at Gary.
Gary looked flustered. “I didn’t know Cliff had done anything to her truck.”
Tony slapped his forehead in exasperation. “Jesus, Cliff. What do I pay you fucks for? First you failed to scare her off when you ran her off the road. Then we go with your brilliant plan to put the mountain lion in the lodge and she fucking traps it. Now this?”
So the cougar hadn’t gotten in on its own. Alex swallowed.
“Did they get her?” asked Gary.
“No. She’s still out there. Damn it! We’ll just have to round her up. She’s out there alone. No phone, no radio.”
“And then what?” asked Cliff, the man in black.
“What do you think?” Tony barked. Tony seemed to be in charge.
Gary shook his head. “I don’t know about this. This isn’t what I signed up for.”
“Just shut up and stay alert. Cliff, you’re staying here. If you see her, you know what to do. And remember, she’s tricky. We lost her the other night in the dark after she freed that wolverine. So stay alert, goddamnit. Me and Gary are going to check out the old fire road.” He locked an angry glare on Gary. “And you better pray we find her.”
Gary stood up and followed Tony. As Alex crouched, her hand on the rough cinder block of the building, the two men went through the steel door. She hadn’t heard a jingling of keys, and she fervently wished that they wouldn’t lock it on their way out.
She heard the door swing shut again and then the quads started up. The fire road. Where is the old fire road? She tried to picture the map in her mind, but didn’t remember seeing anything road-like, even an old jeep trail, except for the main road to the resort and a secondary road that led from the stable area and bunkhouse where the previous biologist had stayed.
So much for stealing one of the quads. She watched as their headlights cut a swath through the darkness. The smell of exhaust mixed with the crisp scent of imminent snow.
The last man, Cliff, stayed by the fire and pulled a military baton out of a holster in his boot. He gripped it tightly, glancing all around. Then he laid it on his lap and warmed his hands by the fire. At least now there was only one of them.
The quads made a wide circle around the cluster of buildings and then entered the forest not far from where she’d emerged. As she waited for the engine sounds to fade away, the first snowflakes started to fall. They were big and wet, gathering on her shoulders and hair. Cliff remained by the fire, no longer slouching but alert.
Quietly she crept to the far side of the building and the steel door. She turned the knob, finding with relief that it was unlocked. She entered a small room with gray cinder-block walls. A steel shelving unit stood against the closest wall. Loud fluorescent lights buzzed overhead. Some coats hung on a rack, mostly camouflage jackets and a few orange vests. Galoshes and waterproof boots stood in a line beneath the coats. The shelf was full of varied tools: an electric drill, a bolt cutter, some rope, cans of gasoline. She didn’t see a phone.
On one shelf rested a laptop computer. She reached for it, praying that maybe it had a mobile hot spot. She opened it, pressing a key to wake it up. A log-in screen appeared with Dalton Cuthbert on it. She tried a few passwords, but suddenly the battery died, and the computer went black. She looked around for a power cable but didn’t see one.
Dalton Cuthbert. That name was familiar. Dalton Cuthbert w
as the biologist who’d been assigned here before her. She’d only heard his name in passing, when Ben had been here. Had they stolen his laptop? His research? Ben said he’d complained of harassment.
Another door led to the interior of the building, and she crept to it. Her heart thudded in her chest. She had no way of knowing if Cliff was still by the fire. He could have stood up, could be walking toward the building even now. Or there could be another man inside this building.
She gripped the knob and creaked the next door open, praying there wouldn’t be more men inside. This room was cavernous, taking up the rest of the building.
Alex stopped, horrified at what she saw.
Twenty-Two
Alex stared in disbelief at the scene before her. Large cages lined the walls and her nose was instantly assaulted by a riot of smells. Animal feces, urine, hay, and rancid meat all collided, vying for supremacy. With a tentative step forward, she took in the scene. Cold metal bars in front of her imprisoned a rhinoceros, nervously shuffling its feet. Its eyes met hers—brown, watery, sad eyes. She moved toward it, then saw what the next cage held, a tiger with its paw chained to the bars on the far side of the cage. A rancid slice of pork, covered with maggots, lay untouched on the floor. An empty steel water bowl stood next to it.
Feeling like she couldn’t breathe, she moved to the next cage.
From the far end, an elephant blasted out a deafening trumpet. She could see its trunk swaying restlessly through the bars. In a daze she moved down the line of enclosures, the smell of urine overpowering. A panda sat in the next cage, its face to the corner, huddled. Its black and white coat was covered with mud, and a raw, bleeding wound surrounded a leg shackle binding it to the far side of the cage. Its water bowl was also empty, and there was no sign of bamboo for it to eat.
A garden hose trailed along the floor, ending at a drain in the center of the room. Supposedly this was used to spray out the cages and refill the water bowls, but the hose nozzle, drain, and floor were completely dry.
Her throat tightening painfully, she moved from cage to cage, finding a malnourished woodland caribou, a grizzly bear with fresh wounds across its back, a female lion pacing her cage, and a magnificent white Dall sheep with a handsome set of horns. A black wolf panted in the third-to-last cage, and it froze when she approached, its yellow eyes staring at her warily. It, too, was shackled to the far wall. A wolverine paced in the next cage, restlessly climbing around. Alex bent down, looking at its ventral pattern as it placed its front paws against the neighboring cage. She recognized it as the first female wolverine she’d imaged on her cameras. They must have trapped it recently. It watched her with wary eyes, then bared its teeth, threatened and scared. She closed her eyes, steeling herself to face the rest of the room.
When she reached the elephant at the end of the row, it stretched its trunk out to her. She held her hand up, stroking the animal’s rough skin. The cage was far too small for it, and one of its feet had been bound in shackles like the other animals. She looked into its unblinking eyes, her own eyes tearing.
The cougar they’d set loose in the lodge had obviously been one of these suffering creatures.
None of the animals had water or food except for the rancid pork with the tiger. Behind her, a couple of cages were empty, their doors standing open, but one of them had dried urine in it and a pile of feces that looked like it belonged to a bear. She stood, numb and staggered, as the elephant wrapped her trunk around Alex’s arm. She gave it a soothing pat, then looked to a walk-in freezer on her left.
She pulled on the cold handle. As she closed the door behind her, a harsh, flickering light revealed a scene of horror.
From a meat hook in the ceiling hung a grizzly bear, its tongue lolling, its skin, claws, and innards removed. And beside it hung a nightmare. The bloodied and shredded remains of a man dangled from the ceiling. Both legs were gone, the arms hanging stiffly in front of the torso. Pieces had been cut away from the stomach and chest, long slices taken off his bones. The muscles of one upper arm had also been harvested. Frost collected in the man’s short dark hair, his jaw hanging slack, eyes closed. A nasty hole had been blown in his chest, hitting his heart and surely killing him instantly. The glint of metal flashed off one hand as his body swung slightly. She leaned toward him, seeing a ring on his right hand. A blue jewel was set in a thick silver decorative band. She peered closer. It was a class ring that read, Biology. Boston University.
The biologist she’d replaced had gone there. What had Ben said? That he’d gotten an email from the man, saying he had to leave due to a family emergency? Ben hadn’t talked to him, hadn’t heard his voice. His laptop was out on the workbench. They could have easily sent off messages to the land trust and any concerned family, pretending they were him.
Alex suddenly felt numb, the cold from the freezer nothing compared to the gripping panic that crept now into the pit of her stomach. Dalton had never left here. Never returned to a waiting family for some emergency. They’d succeeded with him where they’d failed so far with her, removing him as a problem. And now he was hanging here as they got rid of the body. She thought back to the tiger’s pen and the maggot-encrusted slice of what she’d assumed was pork.
It hadn’t been pork.
She swallowed back bile that rushed up her throat just as she heard the outer door open. Someone was coming inside the building.
Twenty-Three
Alex fought down panic. She had to hide. On the floor of the freezer, thrown in a heap, lay several carcasses. A dead cheetah’s sightless eyes stared up at her, a gunshot wound through its chest, jaw hanging slack. Slumped between them was the body of a male lion, its mane frozen and stiff. Someone had removed its innards and started to skin it, but had stopped partway through.
Alex swallowed hard.
Outside, she heard the second door open and shut. Cliff was in the cage room.
Terror seized her, and she forced it back down. Lying beside the cheetah, she squeezed herself into a tiny ball and shoved her body under the stiff lion. A second later the freezer door opened. She held her breath, waiting for what felt like an eternity. Then the door clicked closed. She wasn’t sure if he was inside there with her, so she remained still, holding her breath lest it frost in the air, giving her away. She ached to take a lungful of air, but resisted. Finally, when her vision started to tunnel, she knew she had to breathe. She hadn’t heard anyone moving inside the small freezer, so at last she exhaled quietly. Moving a millimeter at a time, she craned her head to see if she was alone in the room. She was. She heard the muffled click of the door in the cage room closing, and suspected Cliff had just been doing rounds and left to resume his position by the fire.
Her teeth starting to chatter, Alex shivered next to the animals, feeling despair wash over her. Finally, when the shaking grew violent, she stood up and crept to the freezer door, listening. She could hear the animals pacing, and the elephant bellowed again. After another minute, and with a regretful glance back at Dalton’s body, she slipped outside to the cage room.
The lump in her throat made it hard to swallow as she walked past the animals, searching for a phone or radio. Nothing else was in the room. She crossed to the last door and paused, thinking about the layout of the building. It was possible that this door led outside, and she could emerge right in front of Cliff back at the fire.
She felt the metal door. It didn’t feel particularly cold, like an exterior door would. She knelt down and peered under the crack. No firelight streamed through. It was dark in there. Stilling the fear inside her, she turned the knob and opened it barely a crack, listening. When she didn’t hear anything, she stuck her head through.
The room was completely dark, but she didn’t dare turn on the light, even though she felt a switch against the wall. Another metal door stood on the far side, with a big enough crack beneath it to allow the wind to whistle through. Any light would stream out, making her presence obvious if Cliff had returned to the bonfire. She unders
tood now why he was out there by the fire instead of indoors. It was freezing in here. Feeling along the walls, her hands found a workbench and a shelf full of tools, then she accidentally kicked a metal trash can. She froze, barely breathing in the darkness, waiting for the exterior door to fly open and for Cliff to find her. But it didn’t happen. Getting her courage back, she moved again, hands outthrust in the darkness, inching her feet along a little at a time. Her hand found the bare cinder block of the wall, and then grazed a skinny plastic-wrapped cord coming down from the ceiling. A phone line! She closed her fingers around it and traced it to another workbench on the far side of the room. A cordless phone sat there, and gratefully she pulled it out of its cradle. Green numbers glowed reassuringly on the keypad, and she started to dial 911.
Suddenly the exterior door next to her slammed open, banging against the wall. Cliff stood there, framed in the firelight, the military baton in his hand.
In the second it took him to pinpoint her in the dark, Alex felt adrenaline course through her. Get moving, she heard her Jeet Kune Do instructor say inside her mind. Don’t let your feet turn to lead. Breathe. Move. Fight the instinct to freeze.
She darted toward him, stepping into Cliff’s space. Using a circular move of her arm, she sent his baton sprawling to the floor. Firelight streamed into the space, illuminating the room.
He cursed in response and struck a meaty fist out at her. She deflected it with her left hand, bobbing to the side. He came at her, all fists. Once again, the voice of her teacher came to her, crystal clear inside her adrenaline-charged body. If your attacker comes in like a boxer, then take him to ground. Don’t fight him in the style he’s most comfortable with. She gave herself some distance, waiting for the opening to deal a crippling blow that would allow her to finish the fight. He stepped into her space, throwing another fist toward her head. She ducked under it, deflecting the blow. Then she grabbed his arm as it swung by, using his momentum to propel him off balance, sending him to the ground. She held on to his arm as he fell, twisting it painfully and then hyperextending his elbow with a blow from her other hand. He cried out in pain and she stepped down hard on his shoulder. But he was quick, and he managed to grab her leg and throw her back. Fumbling, he got to his feet.
A Solitude of Wolverines Page 22
