Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Two
“Connor, this isn’t funny.”
Aila rattled the bars of the back aviary, but the metal didn’t budge. Renovated and sturdy, like everything else in the phoenix complex. By the observation window, Connor tapped on his phone, ignoring her.
“Stop being such a prick!” Aila shouted. “This whole ‘you worry too much’ bullshit is getting old. Let me out!”
Connor flicked an annoyed glance at her before holding his phone to his ear. He stared out the window, arm braced on the counter, boot tapping against linoleum.
Aila jammed her shoulder against the bars and flailed her hand out as far as she could, but not enough to reach the keypad. Connor would have to let her out. Asshole . She should have slapped herself for fawning over him. If this was some kind of dumb power play for her breaking up with him—
“Hello?” Connor spoke harsh into his phone. “About time. How soon can you be here?”
Aila scrunched her face in confusion. The zoo closed hours ago. Why was Connor acting so strange?
“I know.” Connor paused, scowling through the reply Aila couldn’t hear. “I know it’s early… No, the chicks are already out… No, it has to be tonight .” He glanced at Aila, then ran a hand through his hair, messing the dark locks. “Just get here with the portable incubator. Soon . I’ll set up the phone jammer… OK… OK .”
He clicked off his phone and shoved it into his pocket.
Aila’s hands fell slack against the bars, the metal cold on her fingers. Understanding came colder. She looked to the line of incubators humming along the wall, Rubra and her chicks inside. Then back to the window, the hunched silhouette of someone she’d thought was a friend.
“Connor?” she said, quiet. Pleading.
“Why the fuck did you have to be here tonight, Aila?” His words carried that annoyed brevity she’d heard from so many people. Never this biting. “You should have gone home hours ago. Like a normal person.”
Aila gripped the bars tighter, grasping for stability. “Connor, please. Let me out.”
“We both know that’s not going to happen, Aila.”
“You can’t! Not my phoenixes, Connor!”
Speaking the words shattered her composure. Aila yanked at unmoving metal, knuckles white, panicked breaths hitching up her throat. What was Connor doing here so late? Why had he locked her away?
What was he going to do to her phoenixes?
On the counter—across the world—Aila’s phone screen lit up. A cheerful jingle played, the tune she’d assigned to Tanya. Hope lit Aila’s chest. Tanya could help. Tanya always came to Aila’s rescue when she was powerless.
That hope sputtered as Connor clicked the call to voicemail, then tossed her phone back to the counter. Why hadn’t Aila kept the phone with her? Stupid, stupid.
“Connor.” Aila’s voice shook with entreaty as she tried to make sense of all this, tried to fight down the heart racing into her throat. “If this is because… because of what happened between us, I’m sorry. I didn’t want things to end that way. I was selfish, and afraid, and I should have said something sooner, but I did like you. I just don’t think—”
“Skies and seas,” Connor said, “you still think I wanted to date you?”
The barbs hit every mark—the husk of Aila’s chest, the chaos swirling in her head. She gripped the bars. Released. Flexed her hands over and over, yet every movement came numb, her joints like a little toy girl made of wood and straw for a brain.
“What?” she squeaked.
“You think anyone enjoys listening to you ramble about animals all day? You think I wanted to spend time with you when I’m the only one who can hold a conversation?”
Aila’s heart was crumbs cast to pigeons. Bits of dust clogged in the patio corner.
“But… but you kissed me. You asked me on a date. You kept after me for weeks!”
“Yeah.” Connor sneered, his smile no longer gorgeous, but sickly white. Cruel. “Thanks for making things as difficult as possible, making me simp and fawn over you. All that, just to get a fucking hatch date.”
It couldn’t be. Connor had come to their aid with the building renovations, sacrificing his time to help them roll out linoleum. He’d helped cart their fridge inside. He’d tuned up the incubators, lugged camera cables, cleaned purserat remains from under the cabinets.
He’d helped Aila install the new keypad lock on the aviary.
He’d bolted the security cameras in place.
He’d pushed her to get the live camera set up.
Locked behind bars, her phoenixes beyond reach, Aila shriveled at all the things she’d shown Connor. The horror of how close she’d brought him. He’d laughed with her at lunch breaks. He’d celebrated with her after the phoenix transfer got approved, string lights in his eyes and that dazzling smile. Even when she’d shunned him after their date, he’d pursued her as no one ever had.
But, of course, he hadn’t wanted Aila. What made her believe such a ridiculous thing?
He’d only wanted what she could give him.
“You did it to steal my phoenixes?” The truth turned Aila’s tongue to mud, a lump in her mouth. A wildfire roaring in her head. “Those smiles. Those… compliments . They were all fake? This whole time, you were planning to steal my phoenixes?”
“Don’t do this, Aila. There’s no point trying to—”
Her phone rang. Tanya again. Connor scowled and sent the call to voicemail once more.
“How could you?” Aila demanded. “I don’t care what you think of me!” A lie. “But how could you do this to the phoenixes? After all you did to help us. After what happened to your dragon hatchlings.”
Connor braced his hands on the counter. Hung his head.
“It was so much money, Aila.”
Realization hit her like a jolt of thunderhawk static. Sick. She was going to be sick. Or strangle these bars until they crinkled beneath her fingers.
“ You ,” she hissed. “It was you ? You sold your own dragons to poachers ?”
“Do you have any idea what a diamondback dragon hatchling is worth?” Connor’s voice rose. His palm slammed the counter. “My dad dropped himself into so much debt with those fucking stock trades, it would have taken me a decade to get him out of it. A single hatchling paid off the whole thing. The entire fucking thing, Aila!”
She recoiled. To think he could be so desperate. To think she never knew.
“But Vera!” Aila pleaded. “She’s your dragon! Don’t you care about her?”
“Of course I care about Vera.” Connor stepped closer, brow pinched. Tone condescending to a stupid animal. “I cared about those hatchlings, too. I stayed up all night while they were in the incubators. Hand-fed them when they hatched. All that, just for the zoo to send them away?”
“They were babies ,” Aila said. “They were supposed to go to Vjar, released into the diamondback dragon preserve.”
“What—so poachers could snatch them up from the wild instead?” Connor threw up his hands. “It’s pointless, Aila. You can have playtime with your precious animals in the zoo all you want, but none of them are going to survive in the real world. At least I made sure my dragons went to private collectors, rather than cut up for parts and scale dust.”
Collectors? How chivalrous of him.
“Fine,” Aila gritted. It wasn’t fine. It was about as far from fine as a glop of shit to the face. “You sold your dragons. You paid off your debt. Leave my phoenixes out of it.”
She thought her clenched teeth might crack when Connor pointed at the incubators.
“Do you know what those chicks are worth?” he said.
Unimaginable. Aila’s heart rioted to even humor the calculation. Five perfect peeping chicks, defenseless, not an hour old. Some of the last of their kind. What monster could put a price on them? A paltry amount, nothing beyond the cost of their feathers.
“I would never,” Aila said.
“The dragons were a lifesaver. But a single Silimalo phoenix”—Connor held up a finger—“enough to retire. Enough to escape to some island in the Naelo Archipelago, stop scraping fish guts and dragon shit all day.”
A meaningless life, built on bones.
“That’s what this is about? Scraping fish guts? You knew what you were signing up for when you went to zoo college !”
“Of course I did. And we all thought the work would be worth it, when we were young and naive.” His voice cracked. “What are you doing now, Aila? Delaying the inevitable. Holding on to a species that’s already headed down the drain. Might as well make some money off it while we can.”
“You’re disgusting .”
“And all you care about is a bunch of stupid birds that couldn’t cut it on their own.”
If only shouting could open bars. Aila’s vice grip made no headway against the metal. She contemplated spitting at Connor instead, that slithering orchid viper. But no, that wasn’t fair to orchid vipers. At least they had a symbiotic relationship with their host trees—venom that boosted flower growth. Connor was nothing but trash.
For a third time, her phone rang.
Tanya. Beautiful, persistent Tanya. Through Aila’s boiling rage at Connor and his flat champagne personality, a sliver of hope returned. When she didn’t answer her phone, Tanya would worry. Not like a normal person would worry. This was Tanya-level worry, direct as an afternoon sunbeam to the retina. She’d drive back out here, cussing the whole way, just to drag Aila home herself. Maybe, she’d even bring help.
Connor must have realized the same thing.
He stared at Aila’s phone, cheerful jingle playing from the speaker. He held it out to her, too far to grab, finger poised over the “answer” button.
“Tell her everything’s fine,” he ordered.
“Or what?”
His voice dropped low. A warning. “Or I’ll take the chicks now, and fuck the portable incubator. We roll the dice on how many survive.”
Aila’s stomach twisted like kraken tentacles. Connor had one trump card: she’d do anything to keep those birds safe. When she conceded a nod, Connor clicked to accept the call.
Focus, Aila. Don’t fuck this up.
“Hey, Tanya.” She couldn’t stop her voice from quivering. Connor’s glare didn’t help.
“Ailes?” Tanya snapped back. “Are you home yet?”
Her voice exploded from the speaker, fighting a background of screams and unicorn neighs set to slasher music. The reprimand oozed venom, dripped with loving concern. Aila choked back her tears.
“I, uh…” Think, Aila, think . Something to say. Something to let her know what’s wrong.
“You’re still at the zoo?” Tanya accused.
Aila never could lie to her, like her best friend had a radar for when Aila was working too hard. “Yeah. I am.”
She glanced at Connor. He circled his finger in the air, signaling her to wrap up the call. Aila didn’t have much time.
“The live camera’s down,” Tanya said, a hint of worry. “Every-thing all right?”
“Sure. I checked the wiring. Purserat must have gotten into the box. We can fix it.”
Come on, Aila, that’s not good enough!
“Tomorrow, Aila,” Tanya said. “Time to go home now.”
“Sure. I… just need to take care of that leaky water tap in the exhibit, then I’ll head home.”
A long silence played over the speaker.
Aila held her breath, hands locked around the aviary bars. In her head, she begged, pleaded. Come on, Tanya. She’d never let Aila down before.
“You sure everything’s all right?” Tanya said at last.
“Totally.” Aila used the false chipper voice reserved for patrons she couldn’t wait to escape from. “Thanks for checking, Tanya. You’re… a lifesaver.”
Another pause. “All right, Ailes. Take care.”
“Bye, Tanya.”
When Connor ended the call, Aila slumped against the bars.
Connor powered off her phone and stuffed it in his pocket. He grabbed her radio from the counter as well, yanked the internet cables from the computers, then slung a bag off his shoulder and pulled out a black box crowned in antennas. As he fidgeted with the dials, Aila cursed.
A cell phone jammer.
And the live camera cut.
Bastard copied the entire playbook from the Jewelport break-in. All their updated security, useless against someone who knew it in and out. Their planned police patrol, scheduled for the expected immolation window days away.
“Connor,” she called a final time. Even then, she wasn’t sure if it was anger that shook the words, or her pleading heart, frail to the last.
On his way out the door, Connor paused. Faced her. “For what it’s worth, I didn’t want you to be here tonight.”
Not out of compassion. Out of convenience. Aila heard that finality in the slam of the door. She sank to her knees, hands clasped around the bars of her aviary. Tanya would understand. She had to understand.
Help still might not arrive in time.