Chapter 6 - THE CASE IN THE TUNNEL
Emergency lights clicked on around the quarry, turning the wet ground amber. Inés assigned an officer to guard the truck and asked Leila to assess the lioness through the cage vents.
Her breathing was slow but regular. The locked crate could be shifted onto specialist transport when the support team arrived.
The adult male remained at the treeline with the cub. Leila warned everyone to keep a safe perimeter, then arranged food and water far from the truck to draw them away.
Maya watched the father test the air. He would not understand uniforms or warrants; only the familiar scent behind the steel door mattered.
Inés opened the quarry office with Maya behind her. The desk was empty except for torn packing tape and a ledger page caught under a chair.
Valdés had carried the hard case into the tunnel, but the page listed coded transfers from the observatory to private buyers across borders. A freight elevator descended beside the office. Its power was out.
The rail cart had used a separate battery line, and the old track ran through the rock to a second entrance on the far side of the mountain. Daniel's map marked that outlet as collapsed. Inés sent officers overland to check it.
Maya photographed the ledger page in place. One name leaped out: Serrano.
He had authorized park gate access on six dates and billed Ebro Wildlife Recovery for "emergency habitat assistance." The first payment came before Daniel reported the overturned trailer. The supervisor had been involved from the beginning.
A voice crackled over the radio. Daniel, calling from the hospital, reported Alba's ankle was sprained and that she was safe.
She also remembered something from room 6: men carried a hard case into her hallway and argued about deleting camera backups. The case might hold the videos that showed exactly how the animals arrived.
Inés asked whether Alba could describe its color. Dark blue, she said. A bright silver clasp. Valdés's case matched. Maya looked down the tunnel.
"If he gets out," she said, "he can destroy the one record that proves they captured the family rather than rescued it."
The captain had her own recorder running when she replied. "We have your photographs, the manifest, the child, and the truck.
We don't need to risk your life for one case." Maya accepted the answer, though it hurt. The stronger evidence already outside the tunnel deserved to be protected.
At dawn the wildlife transport team arrived. With Leila directing from a shielded position, they placed a baited crate near the treeline and sedated the injured adult only when he was at a clear distance from the cub.
The cub retreated into another temporary enclosure. Both were monitored continuously for breathing and stress.
The examination revealed a graze beneath the male's shoulder and a deeper tear from an earlier trap. The cub's leg was swollen where the plastic tie had cut into it.
Leila treated the wounds without removing the collars until the veterinary team had recorded every tag and its position.
When the lioness was transferred, she stirred and gave a hoarse call. The father lifted his head inside his crate. The cub answered.
Maya felt relief so abrupt that she had to sit on a cold stone step. All three were alive. That simple fact had seemed impossible on the cliff.
Another radio call broke the moment. Officers at the far tunnel exit found a freshly cleared access track. Valdés had escaped in a pickup, driven by someone who knew the old road.
A regional traffic unit was moving to intercept. The hard case could already be beyond the valley.
Inés questioned the surrendered driver separately. He admitted Serrano had supplied gate codes and a list of patrol hours.
He also claimed the shooter had acted alone when he fired toward Maya and the lion. Inés did not accept his version without corroboration, but she recorded the claim with the rest.
Maya reviewed her camera images on a dry bench. One frame taken from the lookout showed a man beside the green-roofed building before the alarm, his face obscured by a hood.
His wristwatch reflected the sky. In a later image from the quarry, Valdés wore no watch. The driver of the pickup might be a fourth organizer.
She enlarged the first photograph. On the man's sleeve was a ranger's insignia, partly hidden by rain. Daniel's missing report had been deleted inside the park system, and Serrano had controlled access.
But the man in the image was shorter than Serrano. Someone else had worn the uniform at the building.
Maya showed Inés. The captain copied the image to the evidence drive and sent it to her team on the road. She had already requested park duty records, dispatch logs, and gate entries.
If the image proved real, its timestamp could place another employee at the site during Alba's captivity.
The regional unit reported an abandoned pickup at a rest area. There was blood on the seat and no hard case. Valdés might have changed cars.
Inés widened the search, told the team to check cameras along the highway, and returned to the quarry. Her voice stayed even; her jaw did not.
Daniel arrived from the hospital after Alba was settled with her aunt. He had her permission to help identify the park insignia.
He recognized the stripe on the sleeve as belonging to maintenance staff, not patrol rangers. The only employee on the night roster who fit its size was a woman named Clara Beltrán.
"Clara drove the school safety visits," he said. "Alba knows her." The realization cut deeper than his earlier suspicion of Serrano. Someone his daughter had trusted had been close enough to know her routine.
Inés ordered a search of Clara's assigned vehicle and notified the unit watching the highway.
May you like
At the quarry, the father lion slept beneath a warming blanket while his family breathed in separate crates nearby. Maya put down her camera and called Alba at the hospital.
The girl asked whether all three lions were together. "Close enough to hear each other," Maya said. Alba was quiet, then answered, "That's a start."
