Midnight Magic, page 111
The operating room was pristine. Nate had lifted the cage onto the table and snapped away the top and sides. I was astonished, but grateful that we didn’t need to drag the poor animal out of the cage. Looking around, I didn’t see any tool that could have cut through the bars.
He ignored my curious searching. “I’ve called for help,” he said.
I knew no one would be able to get out here in time, so I proceeded on my own.
I set up a breathing apparatus, and Nate brought me an IV kit. I found a vein and threaded the narrow tube into it. Surgery on a big wild cat is fraught with danger. I should have had at least two other vets with me, one to monitor vitals and another to help me repair the break. You can’t put a big cat in a cast, so it’s always a surgical procedure. Normally, I would have had a fleet of assistants to help.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw two women in scrubs enter the room. Unsure of who they were, I continued with my mission.
“Pharmacy?” I asked. One of the women strode to a metal door and entered a code in a punch pad. I gaped at what lay within it. Carts of meds amidst properly labeled shelves of pharmaceuticals. “I’m scrubbed, so you go in there.” I reeled off the list of what I would need. She seemed to know precisely where everything was stored and retrieved it all.
The other woman presented me with a cart of sterile surgical instruments, and I swiveled it to the spot I preferred when operating.
My mouth nearly dropped open when she pulled out a drawer and retrieved the type of oxygen mask that is used to put a large cat under sedation. The whole setup was unbelievable, and moreover, Felidae O2 masks aren’t exactly an item one can buy on Amazon. I turned it over in my hand. “Oh my God, this is a Vercenne mask. I used these when I interned at San Diego Zoo.”
The women shared a knowing glance. “We’ve used them for a few years,” the older one said. My mind boggled, but I had to focus on the task at hand.
“Go scrub,” I ordered Nate. If he was annoyed by my bossing him around, he didn’t show it.
“I’m Clementine,” I said to the women. “Um, a vet. I’m Dr. Jasper, too.” I was babbling, so I shut up.
One of the women had gray hair cut in a stylish bob. “I’m Bay. This is Lupe,” she nodded in the direction of her younger and impossibly beautiful companion.
Nate hurried back. Since he’d snapped open the bars of the metal cage, I knew his hands would be stronger than mine were. He was a skilled assistant; he got the trap off while I struggled to contain the bleeding. I sliced off the curling strips of necrotic tissue and was relieved to see that there was still pink, healthy muscle left. A very good sign.
The two women had astonishing skills of anticipating what I would need. Lupe opened a sterile drawer. “Plates and screws or rods and pins, Doctor?” she asked, referring to which method of fracture repair I was going to try.
“The bone is in two big pieces, so pins and rods, please,” I said. I silently thanked God; I had been afraid that I was going to have to look for splinters for hours. I implanted the pins in the bone.
My patient was a healthy animal with nice thick leg bones. I maneuvered the pieces and the pins snapped together with a satisfying click. The heart monitor continued to beep along at a comforting rate.
“Have you seen many of these traps around here?” I asked, making a mental note to get some rangers and sheriffs up here to scour for illegal traps.
“Too many,” Bay said sadly.
After stitching the leg up, I took a deep breath. “I think we got it,” I said. “But she will need to stay here for a while to build up her strength. She needs to be monitored for infection.” Lupe held up a vial of antibiotic, and when I nodded, she injected it into the IV.
“Where can she go while she recovers?” I wondered.
“No problem,” Nate said and gestured for me to follow him. Down a hall, we found a spacious room set up with individual dens for recovering animals. Nate hit a button above the door to one, and I saw that it had access to an outside run. It was the perfect animal rehab center. “Wow, OK. Let’s set Mama Kitty and her cubs here.”
“Mama Kitty?” he smiled.
“Yes,” I said firmly. “Mama Kitty.” I had no idea where that had come from, and I wasn't about to mention that I generally frowned on cutesy names for wild animals. Glancing around, I said, “So this is my dad’s?”
“It is. He is a hero to a lot of folks.”
I was both flushed with pride and skeptical. “Like whom?”
“That is complicated. It’s a long story. Why don’t we talk about it in the truck? Let’s head closer to town so that we can get phone service. I need to make some calls about your dad.”
I took long strides towards the phone mounted on the wall.
“Hey, that’s not what you think,” said Nate as I picked up the receiver with a victorious glance over my shoulder. A loud buzzing emanated from Nate’s back pocket. Loud running steps echoed in the building.
“It’s alright, I’m here. Stand down,” he said firmly. The running stopped.
Nate took the phone from my hand and entered a code. “That is a security system. It calls me and the others who want to protect your dad. It does not connect to a phone service.”
“Oh.” I mean, really, what does one say to that?
“I will explain on our way into town, I promise.” There was something about his presence that comforted me, even amid all the crazy stuff.
We wheeled the gurney close to the den. Lupe had brought the basket of cubs, and Bay had made sure there was fresh bedding on the floor. Nate lifted the cat and laid her down, gently as if she were a newborn. The squalling kittens raced over to her in a jumble of sweet ears and adorable tails. They settled into nursing lustily while their mother snored.
“We’ll feed her in a few hours,” Lupe said. I was impressed that she knew better than to put meat in front of such a recently sedated cat. Seeing a thermostat on the door, I adjusted the heat to about 60 degrees Fahrenheit. I didn’t want anything to stress my patient.
I was content to leave the puma family as they were, although I worried about them being left alone. I looked around. Lupe and Bay had retreated as suddenly and silently as they had arrived.
“I can call a vet student or someone. They shouldn’t be entirely unsupervised.”
“They won’t be,” Nate assured me. “We can go.”
This time I took my things and went into the ladies’ room. I changed back into the clothes I had worn earlier, wishing I had taken enough time to not look like a homeless person before I left the house.
As I took a last glance down the hall at Mama Kitty and her babies, I noticed that a large man was lowered down on his haunches, flipping through a magazine. Nate had been right. They wouldn’t be alone.
“Take good care of them,” I called.
The watcher gave a casual wave, and Nate led me back to the truck. “I will bring you back to your car later,” he promised. I agreed because Mr. Nate Sands had some explaining to do.
He was a fast driver and clearly knew these roads intimately.
I started the deluge with no delay. “So why is my dad doing surgery on animals? You know he’s not a veterinarian, right? I mean, he has more doctorates than anyone else I have ever known, but why does he have that facility?”
As soon as I’d said it, I realized that there were much higher priorities. “Who do you think took my dad, and why are you so sure they won’t hurt him?”
He chuckled at my barrage of questions. “Let’s start at the beginning. Your dad protects some folks that no one else is doing anything for. He was taken by some scumbags who want to use his expertise to exploit that group. We are going to get him out of there. I promise.”
“Why would a protector of some minority population need a state-of-the-art medical facility?”
We had hit a point where cell phone service was available, and my phone went into manic mode. I could see dozens of calls and a series of increasingly pissed off texts from both Boris and Al.
Since Al possessed a badge, I started with him.
“Go back to Boris NOW!”
“What the hell are you thinking?”
“You have to trust me, go back to Boris.”
“At the crime scene. You could have been killed. Get the fuck back where I know you are safe.”
“I can have you held in contempt, do not ignore me, this is serious.”
This continued for many, many texts and the last one said,
“Please just let me know you are ok.”
I hit redial and he answered on the first ring. Before he could say anything, I said, “I’m fine. I’m fine. I went to find my dad, but I am fine.”
“We have people looking for your dad. Now listen to me. Where are you?”
“Just hit State Road 20.”
“Jesus, do not stop. I will meet you at Boris’s. The department is out of luminol powder” he gave a sarcastic laugh.
“That’s the stuff that glows when it touches blood? Like on CSI?” I asked.
“Well, our CSI is one guy named Jeff, perils of being such a small department. So officially, they haven’t found any blood yet. But there’s definitely blood there.”
“How do you know?”
“I just have a good sense about this stuff. You need to be in protective custody,” he continued.
“There’s no obvious blood trail, but you guys believe me now?” It was hard not to be defensive.
“I always believed you. I just told you to be sensible. It’s obvious that something happened there, the place was ransacked.”
That was bizarre. “It wasn’t ransacked when I left.”
* * *
“It’s easy to miss things when you are in a panic.”
I was on the verge of saying, “Fuck you and the horse you rode in on,” when he went on:
“We walked in this morning. Lights were all on, drawers emptied, file cabinets open.”
“Panic or not, that didn’t happen while I was there. Wait, are you sure the lights were on?”
He sighed. “Yes, I am sure.”
“But that’s impossible. The power was out last night.”
“And you are sure that you haven’t told anyone but your dad about the tiger claw you think you found?”
“No, Al, I have not,” I said hotly.
Nate looked over at me. “Al? As in Alejandro Maldonado?”
“Umm, I think so. He’s a cop.”
“Who is with you?” Al asked over the phone.
“Nate, Nate Sands. He found a hurt mountain lion.”
“Listen, Nate is an asshole, but,” saying the next part seemed to cause him physical pain, “I think it’s a good idea if you stay with him for a while, just until I figure out what’s going on.”
“I’ll ask him,” I answered weakly.
“It’s not like he’s going to say no.”
I put the phone down. “Can I stay with you for a while? Al thinks that would be best.”
“Absolutely,” Nate said. “Text Boris and tell him you are with me.”
While I was responding to texts from Boris, which were all along the lines of, “Clemka, you must need to come back now, please,” Nate’s phone rang. It was clearly not a pleasant conversation, and more than once he hammered a fist on the steering wheel. He ended with an exclamation of “Zaraz!” and hung up.
“I don’t think yelling at Boris is going to help.”
“I wasn’t talking to Boris.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake! I know Russian when I hear it.”
“Apparently not. That was Ukrainian.”
At that moment, my phone rang. It was an unknown number. “That’s your dad. Answer it,” Nate said.
I was flooded with relief when I heard my dad’s voice. “Filly, I’m all right.”
“Dad, whatever you have been doing, we can help you. We are looking for you. The police are looking for you.”
“Filly, it’s all right. Listen, it’s all going to be OK.”
“Have they hurt you?” Tears of relief were rolling down my face.
“Clem, listen, honey. I am fine. They have demanded my work, and I had to give them the Calumnious-Praevarus-Mendax-Praesepe equation.”
“What? Daddy, I...”
“I have to go, Filly. You stay safe and tell your landlord that the rent will be late. I love you so much. Trust Nate. Tell him to check under the bridge.” Before I could protest that I paid my own rent and I loved him too, the phone was suddenly dead.
“He hung up,” I said, bewildered.
“What did he say?”
“To trust you and I think he was trying to say Boris... he called him my landlord. Do you have a pen?”
“Do you think being kidnapped might have rattled his intellect? I mean, that was a crazy call, “I muttered, worried. “He said to ask you to check under the bridge. What does that mean?”
For the first time, Nate appeared unsure of himself. It passed almost immediately, though. “It’s a security thing. Nothing you need to worry about. “He gestured towards the glove box, and I withdrew a pen. I didn't see any paper, so I rifled in my purse and withdrew a Walgreens receipt. “What are you doing?” Nate asked.
“Hang on.”
I wrote out Calumnious Praevarus Mendax Praesepe. A big part of veterinary school revolves around Latin, and Dad had spent long summer afternoons lazing in the creek with me, quizzing me on invariable prepositions.
We had a favorite spot where he had constructed some sort of heavy iron ring that could hold his soda, suspended in the cool rushing water, while he floated in an inner tube tethered to a tree. His spindly white legs dangled in the water, while I tried to find a spot to get at least a little sun on my fair skin. The sun bleached my hair even paler shades of white, so I tried to maneuver my body in the sun and my head out.
I wanted to be at the pool with the cool kids, and even though none of them had invited me, I still took it out on my dad, who never seemed to notice. There was nothing about being with me that he didn’t relish, even helping ungrateful me learn words that my tongue tripped over. It was a sweet memory. I realized that I didn’t really give my dad enough credit. He was clearly Looney Tunes. But every girl should, just once in her life, have a man who loved her the way that Zebadiah Jasper, professional crackpot, loved me.
I gave a shuddering breath and vowed to focus on the Latin.
Nate was still driving fast, and I was getting motion sickness from peering so closely at my scrawling. I closed my eyes. Calumniousprae… I opened my eyes. I used my pen to divide the words.
Calumnious: dishonest.
Praevarus: unreliable.
Mendax: meant to deceive.
Praesepe, I had to look up on my phone. It meant ‘animal enclosure’.
I snapped my fingers.
“He said that he had given them the dishonest, unreliable, meant to deceive… umm, animal enclosure equation.”
“Animal enclosure? Like a fence?”
“A stall!” I shrieked so loud that my voice reverberated throughout the cab of the truck.
Nate threw his head back and laughed. “So, he’s bought us time. Until they figure out, he’s fed them a line of bullshit! There is no one like your dad.”
“No, there really isn’t.” For the first time in what seemed like forever, the pressure around my heart released. He was OK. I could trust Nate. I should have been shouting with joy from the rooftops. Instead, I burst into loud, gulpy sobs. Burying my face in my hands, I wept as if all the tension of the recent events could drain from my tear ducts.
THE EMPTY WOODBOX
Nate rested a gentle hand on my thigh.
“I have been anxious since I was jumped last night,” I finally managed to whisper.
“Who attacked you?” He asked me, horrified.
“I don’t know.” I held out my bruised arm, and a look of fury crossed his handsome face.
The whole story tumbled out of me: the claw, the man in the vet station, running to Al and Gordon.
“And Al will tell me to keep quiet about what I know, and furthermore, I am not a pretty crier,” I said, and then cried some more. I could feel his fury radiating through him as I spoke. It was like a pulse of rage. He fought it down and tried to distract me.
“Nah, I’ve no doubt that you are the prettiest crier I’ve ever seen.” I had now gone from sobbing to trembling from head to toe and couldn’t seem to get it under control.
“I just can’t get warm,” I said, rubbing my arms. Nate cranked up the heater. Although it was spring and not cold in the least, my teeth started to chatter.
Nate picked up his phone. He suddenly turned the truck off the interstate, down a small road. “Al has everything under control. Why don’t I get you something to eat? And then we’ll go somewhere safe so that you can rest a little bit.”
“Where?” I said suspiciously.
“Didn’t your dad tell you to trust me?”
“He did, but Nate, I think he might not be a totally innocent pawn in all this. It looks like he’s involved in the exotic animal black market.”
He hit the brakes so hard that only my seat belt tightening prevented me from sailing headfirst into the windshield.
“No, he isn’t.” Nate sounded certain.
“Well, there might be things you don’t know. I found Mason jars of teeth, Felidae teeth. That’s a big cat in-”
“Trust me, I know what Felidae means. Do you seriously think Zeb would ever do such a thing? Honestly?” I was shocked at how furious he was with me.
I threw it right back at him: “Look, I don’t know what to think. No, I can’t imagine my dad exploiting endangered animals, but, you know, I thought he lived in a mobile home donated by someone who felt sorry for him. He certainly didn’t ever tell me he was doing unlicensed surgery on animals! He doesn’t say a word to me about being in danger, but has a whole security detail? How the fuck does he afford that facility?” I was so mad that I literally started kicking the glove box of his car. It sprang open, and I kept kicking at the dangling door until it hung drunkenly by one screw.
