Page 60 of The Healer and the Wolf: Part One

Since everyone was distracted, it would be the perfect time to make my way to the zoo and see if I could find Ricky.

After one more moment to gather myself, I trudged to where I thought the zoo was. I hadn’t been able to get inside since I didn’t “have the credentials”, but from what I could tell it, was more akin to a small, exotic petting zoo than anything official like in the city. It certainly wasn’t AZA accredited.

I’d grown so used to the sounds of battle, they had largely faded to background noise by the time I actually reached the front of the zoo. There was a guard station, but unsurprisingly, it was abandoned. Its staff were either dead or currently fighting Leo.

I hurried inside and headed toward the control room. At least, I hoped it was a control room. The bars of the enclosure were quite thick. There was no way I’d be able to break it open, and since I didn’t have a key, some sort of electronic lock was my best bet.

Thankfully, that door wasn’t locked, and I stepped into a room filled with tons of screens, display panels, and potentially a million and one buttons. All the buttons were labeled with abbreviations or messy handwriting I could hardly make out. Whoever had written it could have had a great career in medicine writing prescriptions.

I looked through all the camera feeds, but I didn’t have to get far before I found a wolf. I had no way of knowing if that was Ricky, so I carted through all the rest of the screens, and sure enough, he was the only one of his kind.

He looked so sad, so defeated, as he lay motionless on the ground. If it weren’t for the slow rise and fall of his flank, I would have thought he was dead.

But what if it was just a regular wolf with improper enrichment or stimulation, and Ricky wasn’t here? Now Chadwicke was dead, we couldn’t exactly question him on the whereabouts of Leo’s beta.

There was only one way to find out. I had to figure out how to unlock the enclosure and get to the wolf.

The important buttons would probably be red or something else noticeable. Their labels were more likely to have exclamation points in them. So, those were the buttons I pressed, watching the screens to see if anything changed. When I pressed one button, the console let out an alarming little beep, and an artificial voice began talking to me.

“Warning, you are about to release the locking mechanism of exhibit C. Do you wish to continue?”

“Yes!” I answered quite emphatically, feeling like I had definitely gotten lucky. Nothing happened. Damn it, I’d have to find another button.

Nothing could ever be simple.

Scanning the entire console, I found three color-coded buttons clustered together: one green, one red with an X one it, and one yellow with an arrow pointing to the left. Were we going by ATM rules?

There were stranger things in life, so I hit the green button.

“Lock for exhibit C disabled.”

Had I really done it? Looking back to the screens, I saw the wolf hadn’t moved at all. Either he was unaware the door had unlocked, or it hadn’t. Guess I had to go check.

As I hurried out of the control room, I made a mental note to call some rehabilitation centers and tip them off about abandoned zoo animals. Perhaps the authorities would take proper care of them when they showed up, but I didn’t trust them as far as I could throw them. At least if there were animal experts around, it was less likely the cops wouldaccidentallygun down any caged animals inself-defense.

I wished I could free them, but from what I’d read about animals, they’d either die in the wild or attack each other immediately and never actually leave the estate, or heaven forbid, end up hurting an innocent as they fled in terror. So, now I needed to be patient and send help when it was safer.

That would have to wait, though, because my priority was Ricky, and only Ricky.

It didn’t take me long to reach the wolf’s cell—it was far too meager to call it an exhibit. Practically holding my breath, I went to the door, placing my hand on the cold bars and giving it a determined push. Sure enough, it opened. I paused for a beat, thinking how best to approach a very confused wolf.

That turned out to be a mistake on my part.

Suddenly, the nearly lifeless wolf was on his feet and lunging toward me, his teeth bared in a vicious snarl. Belatedly, I realized that just because Leo was kind to me when I had first run into him didn’t mean that Ricky would necessarily be.

Shit.

It would be quite ironic if I had managed to survive so much of the vicious battle outside just to be ripped to pieces by Leo’s righthand man. But I couldn’t run, and I couldn’t fight off a wolf shifter, so what was left for me to do?

Survive.

My body moved entirely on instinct. I brought my forearm up and shoved it into the starving wolf’s mouth. I screamed as he bit down, and for a moment I was sure he would tear my arm clean off. What was I supposed to do in such a situation? I was smaller, weaker, and not magical, despite what that stupid warlock had thought. Did I just lie back and accept the fact I was about to be mauled by the very person I had risked my life to save? What a stupid way to die.

That’s when Leo’s words echoed in my mind from that very wonderful and informative conversation we’d had over breakfast in bed.

If Ricky was here, I’m sure you could break his curse, too.

Well, maybe that wasn’t it word for word. I remembered thinking it was preposterous at the time. After all, I hadn’t broken Leo’s curse. That had been mere coincidence. But now? Well, I suppose this was the perfect time for that sort of Hail Mary.

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