Chapter 3 - BEHIND THE GREEN ROOF
Rain covered the sound of their approach. Maya and Daniel crawled through the old conduit while water slapped their knees and roots scraped the concrete overhead.
At its far end, rust had eaten through the grate. Daniel eased it sideways. They emerged behind the observatory, inside the outer fence.
From the loading dock came the scrape of wheels. The covered cage was being lowered into a refrigerated truck.
Through a gap in the tarp, Maya caught a glimpse of tawny fur and a narrow muzzle. A lioness lay inside, breathing slowly. Her collar carried the same crossed sun as the cub's.
Daniel touched Maya's sleeve and pointed to a security camera above the back door. Its motor swept left every twenty seconds. They crossed during the sweep and slipped into an unlocked mechanical room.
Old pipes ran along the ceiling. Beyond the door, men argued about a veterinary certificate that had not arrived.
"The buyer lands tomorrow," one said. "Valdés wants all three moved tonight." The other replied that the male was loose and the cub's tracker had gone dark. Maya held her breath.
Three animals meant the lion outside was the missing third. The family had been kept together until somebody lost control.
They climbed a narrow stair to the first floor. A corridor smelled of bleach and sedative.
Through a window in one locked door, Maya saw transport tags, food bowls, and a stack of crates marked as conservation supplies. Another door bore the painted number 6. From behind it came a faint, deliberate tapping: two quick knocks and one slow.
"Alba used to do that at bedtime," Daniel whispered. His face emptied of color. He answered with the same rhythm.
A chair scraped inside, and the girl's voice said, "Dad?" He braced his forehead against the door. For the first time since the cliff, Maya saw him forget to breathe.
The lock required a key card. Maya photographed it, then guided Daniel toward the office at the corridor's end. They found a desk covered in manifests for Ebro Wildlife Recovery.
The paperwork listed an adult male, an adult female, and juvenile S-17 as rescued animals awaiting transfer to an approved sanctuary.
One document carried an official stamp, but its destination line had been altered. Beneath the correction fluid, Maya could read a private airfield.
She photographed the pages and the refrigerated truck's plate through the office window. If they only freed Alba, the animals would be gone before anyone arrived.
A voice sounded from the stairwell. Maya pulled Daniel behind the office door. Serrano walked in with another man, taller, wearing a gray jacket still dusted with stone. Maya recognized the shooter.
He set a rifle case on the desk and asked whether the father lion had been found.
"The girl saw the cages," Serrano said. "Keep her upstairs until the convoy is ready." The shooter asked about the witnesses.
"If they come here, they can be blamed for opening the pens." Serrano spoke as though completing a maintenance form. Daniel's hand tightened around the edge of the door.
A guard shouted from outside. The male lion stood beyond the fence, his outline visible in the rain. The shooter hurried downstairs.
Serrano followed, taking a key card from his pocket to open the corridor door. Daniel waited until both men passed, then slipped out and caught the door before it latched.
Inside room 6, Alba sat on the floor in her yellow raincoat. Her wrists were free, but the window was barred and the door opened only from the outside. She ran to Daniel.
He held her so tightly that she whispered, "I can't breathe," and he loosened his arms with an apology.
Maya checked the girl for injuries while Daniel tried to explain why he had taken so long. Alba's ankle was swollen, and she had a scrape across one cheek.
She said she had followed the men after recognizing Serrano's park vehicle near her school. She had wanted proof her father wasn't imagining the trailer.
"I saw the lioness," Alba said. "They gave her something to make her sleep. They said she'd wake after the plane landed." Maya looked toward the loading dock.
"Can you walk?" Alba nodded, then winced when she stood. Daniel took most of her weight.
In the corridor, an alarm sounded. Someone had found the office door open or noticed the camera's blind spot. Maya led them down the mechanical stairs toward the conduit.
Halfway there, floodwater erupted through the basement grate. The rain had reached the high basin earlier than expected.
The conduit was now a foaming black tunnel. Daniel tried to push its grate open, but the current slammed it shut. Above them boots hit the stair treads.
Maya spotted a maintenance hatch marked ROOF ACCESS and remembered the gutter beside the blind section of wall. They had one possible route upward.
Alba stopped at the sound of a lion's roar outside. "They're trying to trap him at the fence," she said. Maya held her gaze. "We get you somewhere safe first.
Then we tell the people coming exactly where every cage is." Alba nodded, frightened but listening.
They reached the roof hatch as a guard opened the basement door. Daniel pushed Alba ahead and climbed after her.
Maya hauled herself out last and dropped the hatch just as a hand caught its rim. Rain whipped across the green roof. Beyond it, the valley fell away toward the waterfall.
May you like
From the far edge, Maya saw the truck leaving the loading dock. The lioness was inside. The father charged the fence below, and a tranquilizer dart struck the mud near him.
Daniel gripped Alba's hand. The three of them had found the girl, but the only exit they could see led across a slick roof toward an empty span of air.
