“I don’t know. Talk nicely to it?” Hannah’s voice inflection rose, unsure if the choices she had made were wise or not.
“I’d like to see you try that.” Joe huffed his displeasure. “Let’s go get the antibiotics then we’ll go our separate ways.”
“Have you already forgotten about the petting zoo?”
“Alright. You lead me to where the antibiotics are kept, then I’ll escort you to the petting zoo.”
“Thank you,” Hannah said with great mirth.
Joe cast a suspicious glance at Hannah. “You’re still holding something back, aren’t you?
“No, I’m not.” Hannah felt Joe’s eyes bore into her.
“I can smell BS a mile away so tell me what it is.”
“I am what you see,” Hannah said.
In fact, Hannah was holding something back, something she had overheard when very few people were left at the zoo one day. It was after closing time, and she had been rummaging around in a conference room where she didn’t have the clearance to be when several people walked in. If she had been caught, she would have been fired on the spot. She hid and didn’t make a sound for two hours. She listened to a group of several men and one woman discussing a plot so horrific she thought they were Hollywood screenwriters. At the time she mused that was the only logical explanation of what they were doing. She thought she recognized a couple of the voices, but without seeing their faces, she couldn’t be sure. Yet it was common for high-powered people to use the zoo as a meeting place since it was easy for them to disappear and not be hounded by the press.
Hannah had filed away the event until she had met Joe, because if what he had said was true, then she had overheard the people responsible. Too scared to admit the revelation to Joe, or to anyone else, she kept quiet.
“There’s more to you Hannah Hammer, and I’m going to find out what it is.”
Chapter 22
As promised, Hannah led Joe to where the veterinary medicines were kept. The building housing the veterinary clinic had all the latest bells and whistles, including an MRI and an ultrasound machine. Surgical supplies, swabs, sheets, antiseptic, and gauzes of all types were neatly categorized on shelves, and the smell of the clinic reminded Joe of the animal clinic where he used to take his dog. Cabinets were labeled according to the specific needs of animals. The glass cabinet holding the antibiotics and controlled substances was locked. Using the hammer he procured earlier, he broke the glass, shattering it and sending shards of glass in all directions.
Staying focused, he read the labels on the medicine bottles, decided what he needed, and tossed a plethora of bottles in a plastic bag.
“I found what I needed,” Joe said. “Time to feed the baby animals. And don’t talk until we get there. The less noise we make, the better off we’ll be.”
The entire foray to locate a firearm and the necessary meds had taken twenty minutes. In the big scheme of the number of minutes in a day, twenty minutes amounted to a little over one percent of the day. It wasn’t a significant percentage, yet it allowed ample time for the sun to slip beneath the horizon, and when the sun went down, the predators came out.
Stepping out into the main part of the zoo, Joe hesitated. His sixth sense told him to say the heck with the baby animals, save himself, and tell Hannah to beat it. Unfortunately or fortunately, depending on the perspective, Joe was a stand-up kind of guy. He always kept his word, and his word dictated him to escort Hannah to the petting zoo. When he was done with helping Hannah, it was adios, and back to Lexi.
They quickened their pace, keeping as silent as possible.
The elephant exhibit was dark and barren, smelling of fresh elephant dung. In fact, the entire zoo smelled of elephant dung. The location of the elephants worried Joe because if they became spooked, even a months old elephant could trample a person. Lions would prey on elephants given the chance, so at this point, anything could go wrong.
Joe and Hannah’s quick pace allowed them to reach the petting zoo in ten minutes. So far so good, and Joe breathed a sigh of relief.
The area was cordoned off by a flimsy wooden fence, only high enough so the baby animals couldn’t escape, and low enough for a four-year old to peek over it.
To conserve the flashlight battery and keep their eyes accustomed to the dark, they had walked with it off.
Joe opened the gate and stepped into the area covered with hay.
“I wonder where the baby animals are?” Hannah asked. “They normally greet me.” She shut the gate behind them.
The rustling of hay caught their attention.
Joe raised the rifle.
Hannah flicked on the flashlight.
“Come here, baby. Are you hungry?” A baby lamb tentatively emerged from the pen area where the animals slept at night. Hannah offered her hand for the lamb to sniff. “Where are all your friends?” She rubbed behind the lamb’s ears and stroked the little guy along its back.
The lamb bleated its approval, then joyfully skipped to the side of the pen, and—
A lioness sprang over the fence, and before Hannah or Joe had time to react, draw a weapon, run, or scream, the lioness snatched the baby lamb, clamping down on the hapless animal in one swift, lethal bite.
With the lamb dangling limply from its mouth, the lioness casually sauntered to a corner of the pen where it placed the lamb on the ground. Using its massive tongue, the lioness licked the lamb, paying no attention to Joe or Hannah.
Breathing shallow, Joe whispered to Hannah, “Don’t move.”
Trembling, Hannah was as pale as a sheet of copy paper.
Joe
