Chapter 7
CHAPTER 7
M olly's shrill excited voice pierced the air as she chased Elliott back toward Aoife's group. "There's a castle ?! Mom, I wanna go to the castle!"
"We'll need to go to the castle," Cindy Collins said with the casual arrogance of someone whose expectations were always met.
Aoife, bewildered, said, "There is no castle," and Elliott, catching up, said, "I'm so sorry. It's a line from an old movie. 'Have fun storming the castle.' I didn't think Molly would take me literally."
"Oh." Ms. Collins's mouth turned downward. "You shouldn't tease children like that."
"Children," Aoife said evenly, "should learn to live with disappointment, just like the rest of us do. There is a castle hotel on the island, but it's not associated with the wildlife park. You'll have to arrange it yourself, if you want to go there." It felt surprisingly good to tell Molly's mother that she would have to do it herself, or at least not rely on Aoife to make it happen.
Molly wailed, "But I want to see the castle!"
Suddenly, for the first time in her life, Aoife had great sympathy for her own parents and their phrases like I will turn this car around if you don't start behaving, which had always really annoyed her before this moment in time. "Talk to your mum about it, chicken."
"I'm not a chicken!"
" What age are you?" Aoife asked without quite meaning to.
"Eleven! I'll be twelve in September!"
From the way the girl was behaving, Aoife would have thought she was about eight. At the oldest. She took a breath to say something along those lines, and Mr. Mustache, whose proper name was Doug, gave her a brief, pleading look. Aoife cast her gaze upward to the increasingly cloudy skies and had a brief conversation with herself about whether dealing with the Collins was worth twelve thousand jobs and the future of the entire Shamrock Safari Wildlife Park.
For some reason, she found herself looking toward Elliott, as if he would provide her the strength to cope with it all. He was herding Molly along, but glanced up as if he sensed her gaze, and gave her the most gorgeous, rueful smile she'd ever imagined. It was as if he understood one hundred percent of what was going on in her mind, and had decided that it was all worth it…for her sake.
Strengthened by that smile and the strange feeling that he absolutely had her back, Aoife barely came down on the side of 'yes,' and pulled together a smile while ignoring everything she wanted to say in favor of, "So now we're going on to see the rest of the Asian Habitat, including the Asiatic lions. You'll be very excited to hear that you're in luck because we also have an African lion visiting the park right now, so you'll have the opportunity to see the size differences between the two species."
"I thought the African lion was having a nice long nap," Elliott said with a note of panic in his voice.
"Oh, I'm sure he'll manage to wake up for us," Aoife said brightly. "I know he likes walking around in places he's not supposed to be, so it'll be grand!"
"Can I pet it?" Molly asked breathlessly.
Aoife, after a long, somewhat disbelieving pause, said, "No, Molly."
" Mom !"
Cindy Collins had gone back to her tablet and her notes. Aoife knew she should be concerned that the executive was writing down what a terrible person Aoife was and how the wildlife park wouldn't get a cent from ColCor. However, at the moment, Aoife wasn't sure whatever strings were attached would be worth it the company's donations. It seemed likely that Ms. Collins would insist that Molly be allowed to pet whatever animals she wanted to, for example. That was a non-starter.
Aoife also couldn't quite bring herself to believe that Dr. Kelly would fire her. Not over dealing with the ill-mannered-but-wealthy potential donors, at least. Maybe for threatening to feed those donors to the lions, but she hadn't actually made that threat. Not out loud, at least.
Besides, Collins wasn't listening. Molly stomped her foot and yelled, "MOM!" again.
"Yes, dear. Whatever you want, dear."
"See! My mom says I can pet the lion!"
Aoife lifted her eyes to meet Elliott's. His full mouth was pursed like he was trying to fight back a smile, or maybe a comment. In this particular case, they both knew it would be safe for Molly to pet the lion. But Aoife couldn't think of a worse precedent to set, even if she tried. In fact, even though they did know it was perfectly safe, letting Molly pet a lion would probably be grounds for someone to shut the entire wildlife park down for safety violations. A toddler had been injured by a tapir at a zoo while back ago, for heaven's sake. Tapirs were notoriously mellow. Lions were not!
"A friend of mine got bit by a lion," Hippie Girl said unexpectedly.
Molly's jaw fell open. "Really?"
"Yep. They were on a wildlife safari and the lion—well, lioness—stuck her head in the window and my idiot friend tried to pet her. She bit him. They had to amputate his hand," Hippie Girl said with dark glee. "Do you know what amputation is? They cut it off. It was so mangled by lion teeth that they had to cut it off because it could never heal. It bled all over everything. Great gushing spurts of blood." She made a theatrical gesture to animate the image.
Molly went so pale she turned green, then tossed her hair in weak defiance. "Nobody wants to pet a stupid lion anyway."
"Yeah, I figured you were probably smarter than my friend," Hippie Girl said very solemnly. She also caught Aoife's eye when Molly turned away, and winked.
Aoife clapped a hand over her mouth, unable to hold back laughter any other way. Molly spun toward her at the sound, and Aoife, faintly, said, "Weak stomach, chicken. The idea of all that blood spurting everywhere almost made me sick."
Molly went even greener. Apparently sick was even worse than blood. But for the next half hour or so, at least the girl stayed quiet and didn't try to pet anything or enter any enclosures. Aoife was able to give her talk uninterrupted except by questions from Doug, aka Mr. Mustache, who seemed to have done his homework on the species they were seeing today. Of course, he was the man doing ocean cleanup, so he probably had a specific interest in conservation.
Cindy Collins didn't seem to pay any attention to any of it. Her tablet dinged regularly, except at one point when they went out of signal reach, which visibly annoyed her. Elliott kept slipping behind her and making gestures and faces that indicated he was ready and willing to accidentally knock the tablet into an enclosure, or a puddle, or possibly turn into a lion and eat it. Aoife didn't really think that would improve matters, but it made her smile, and that did improve matters. She wasn't sure how she'd have gotten through dealing with Cindy and Molly Collins without him.
Which was silly, since they'd only just met. Still, he was right there on her side, without hesitation or question, and he was so astonishingly handsome.
"All right, lads. We're going around to the back half of the park now, where we'll see a number of our free-ranging animals. They may approach you, but please do not approach them . Interactions should only ever be initiated by the animals themselves. Molly, do you understand me?"
Molly looked like she understood all of the words, which wasn't the same thing as intending to obey them. Still, she nodded, and that was all Aoife could ask for. "Grand. Do be careful at the bridge, which is an uneven surface." Fortunately they passed it without incident, although an ostrich did poke its head over the fence to look at them curiously. There was a little ways to go before they reached another enclosure, so Aoife fell back to walk with Elliott. "I didn't really get a chance to ask if you were okay. Like, emotionally."
"I probably wouldn't make a habit of throwing myself into a bison herd," Elliott murmured in response. "But no, I'm fine."
"I've never seen anybody leap like that," Aoife whispered. "Is that a, uh, you know, is that a thing ?"
Elliott lifted his shoulders one at a time in rapid suggestion, creating the most wriggly shrug Aoife had ever seen. "It would have been a lot easier to do in, you know, other circumstances. But it's not not a thing, like, there's, uh, there's like skills you can tap into. We just don't, usually."
Their circumspect attempts to discuss shifting while possibly in earshot of other people made Aoife want to giggle. "No, I can see why you wouldn't. That was pretty extraordinary. You must be really strong, too?"
He flexed, which had the remarkable effect of making Aoife forget what they were talking about entirely. His biceps were tremendous, and his chest was so broad she wanted to measure it with her own handspans. Or maybe she just wanted to put her hands on him. That seemed like a grand idea altogether.
"Pretty strong," he murmured, reminding her she'd asked a question. "I guess we can kind of tap into, you know, something a little extra, if we need to. At least, us bigger ones can. I don't know if it works the same way for the birds or the otters or whatever."
He looked thoughtful, bug Molly bounced up, demanding, "Otters? Are we gonna see otters?"
"There are no otters at the park right now," Aoife replied. "There are capybaras, though."
"Are those like otters?" the girl asked hopefully.
"No." Aoife cast a glance at Elliott, confident he'd understand her next reference: "They're more like rodents of unusual size."
Elliott absolutely beamed at her. Molly, however, squealed, "Ewww, rodents , MOOOOOM, she's gonna make us look at rodents !"
"My daughter must not be exposed to vermin." Collins didn't otherwise look up from her tablet.
Molly folded her arms smugly, and every other adult, even Hippie Girl, exchanged glances but said nothing. Aoife, with what she felt was great restraint, said, "And here's the butterfly house," in her perkiest voice. She ushered them through its humid, sweet-smelling rooms and back outside, where Molly ran ahead and then shrieked with glee.
"Mom! Mom! There are giant guinea pigs over here! They're swimming! They're so cuuuuuuute! MOM!"
"And here," Aoife said, pitching her voice to carry even to the squealing tweenager, "are the capybaras, which are the world's largest rodents, and are indeed related to guinea pigs, which are also rodents. "
It had the desired effect of making Molly skid to a halt. It also had the less desired effect of making her turn back to the adults, her face the very picture of distress. "They're not! They're not! Mom, tell them guinea pigs are cute little guys, not yucky rodents!"
"My daughter says guinea pigs aren't rodents," Collins said in a forbidding voice. "Please don't distress her with such nonsense."
Aoife had a sense of the entire world coming apart in pieces and spinning around her. She thought she might actually have swayed, because Elliott put a steadying hand in the small of her back. His hands were very large and very warm, and she felt both comforted and strengthened by the gesture.
She also felt like this entire tour had taken on a truly surreal edge. Somewhat faintly, she said, "But they are rodents. Both of them. Guinea pigs and capybaras alike."
"Don't be ridiculous," Collins said to her tablet. Apparently she'd glanced up at some point, because she added, "Look at them. They're huge and fluffy and cute, not like rats at all. Their tails are short. Their faces are flat. Really, you must stop telling people such absurdities."
Doug and Graham were both staring at the ground very intently. Hippie Girl had wandered closer to the capybaras and crouched, putting a hand out toward one to see if it would come say hello. Elliott, right at Aoife's side, made a small, supportive noise that she thought might mean 'I could eat her.'
Of course, it might also have meant 'I could eat those giant rodents.' Aoife bit the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing at herself, although the pulse of humor was short-lived. On one hand, she knew she shouldn't engage any further. Every word she said could endanger the grant that the park was hoping to get.
On the other, she really desperately had to know: "Ms. Collins, rats aren't the only type of rodent in the world. You do understand you can't just rewrite entire scientific classifications based on your personal preferences, right? You know that's not how it works?"
Cindy Collins lowered her tablet briefly and gave Aoife a rather cold glare. "I understand that I've made everything I've ever set my mind to happen. I'm sure I could have the classifications revised if necessary."
Aoife blinked at her for a while. "What a remarkable person you are."
The CEO of ColCor smiled for the first time. "Yes. I'm glad you understand that now." She went back to her tablet.
Aoife blinked some more, as Elliott duck his head against her shoulder, muffling laughter. The other two businessmen had their lips pressed together hard, obviously making efforts not to speak or laugh themselves. Aoife relaxed a little. Apparently no one else had missed that her comment hadn't been meant as a compliment, although she'd phrased it carefully so it wouldn't seem actively insulting. Elliott breathed, "I can't imagine being that rich," into Aoife's shoulder, and she nodded rapidly.
That had to be it, she thought. Ms. Collins had to just be so rich that she'd never encountered anything she couldn't adjust to her satisfaction. Therefore, capybaras weren't rodents. Neither, apparently, were guinea pigs. And Molly was growing up to believe the same things.
Aoife had no idea how to deal with that. And after another minute of standing there, stunned, she decided not to. "Right," she said, back in her perky voice, "right, of course, nothing that cute could possibly be a rodent, whatever was I thinking. So if we'd like to move along, there's a picnic area at the back, and I'd love to buy Molly an ice cream."
Elliott whispered, "You're amazing," beneath Molly's new delighted shriek, and Aoife marched off to buy ice cream feeling surprisingly good about herself.