Lester lowered his hand, the knuckles grazed and raw.
“You’re not sitting on it, are you?” he called up to Sophie.
There was no response.
He took a breath and punched again, this time without effect. He punched again, even harder, and only succeeded in drawing blood. It stained the cuff of his pale suit.
Lester swore viciously.
“It’s no good,” Danny said, grunting from the effort. “We’ll have to think of something else.”
“You’d better think of it quickly,” Lester said as he clambered down to the ground again. “Once that creature polishes off the lions, it’s going to come looking for dessert.”
Danny nodded, and walked back down the hallway.
“For God’s sake Quinn, don’t be an idiot.”
“Can’t help it,” Danny called back. “Born this way.” And he budged the bookcase out of the way of the door.
Up on the roof, Sophie sat hugging her knees, her cell phone in one hand. She had called Ted at the gatepost, and he had assured her he would get people over as soon as he could. Sophie hadn’t told him all she’d seen, just that there were lions in the lodge. There didn’t seem to be any point — they’d never believe her until they’d seen it for themselves.
What had she got herself caught up in? She’d been told this would be simple. Just bring the men to the lodge, and the rest would be taken care of.
The building shook beneath her as the remaining lions battled with the... whatever it might be.
No, she told herself, she knew exactly what it was. She’d guessed as much from the tracks it had left. The three-clawed toes matched the imprints they had found in the mud. That thing was a dinosaur... Real and alive and rampaging through her game park.
And the two British guys hadn’t seemed surprised.
She cursed to herself. Then leaned forward and struggled to get her fingertips round the edges of the hatch. A tear escaped her eye and slid down her grubby cheek. She realised couldn’t let these men be killed. If nothing else, she needed answers.
SEVEN
Connor pulled from his pocket what looked to Abby like a snazzy new mobile phone. He held it up above his head, aiming at the sensor for the automatic doors that let customers into Boots. The shop was closed, its lights off, tall shelves of beauty products looming in the darkness on the far side of the glass.
He pressed the enter key and the device buzzed for a moment. Then the glass doors of Boots sighed quietly open, letting the stinking grey water from outside slosh into the six-inch deep pool already in the shop.
“Oh,” Connor said sheepishly, looking at the mess and then back at Abby. “Didn’t think of that.” They stepped quickly though, and Connor clicked the button on his device once more. The river washing in behind them was cut off by the closing doors.
“Are you meant to have that thing?” Abby asked him.
“This?” Connor said. “No one even knows about it.”
“Come on.” Abby tugged his sleeve. “We don’t want to be found here.” She headed down the central aisle, every possible shade of lipstick laid out on her left. The next section of shelves offered an assortment of brightly coloured sponges and shampoo.
Connor grabbed one of the baskets from the stack by the door and ran to catch up. His feet splashed through the shallow pool of water, echoing loudly round the otherwise silent shop.
What a relief, Abby thought, to get out from under the rain.
“You know they shot looters in New Orleans?” Connor said cheerfully. “I read this thing on the net.”
“Yeah,” she responded. “But we’re with the government, aren’t we? And anyway, this is Maidenhead. They won’t shoot us. They’ll just ask awkward questions.”
“Right,” Connor said. “Here we go.”
He stopped at the rack of men’s toiletries. Under-arm sprays and rollons, aftershave gels and ointments, all arranged in neat rows. There was something much stockier, Abby decided, more mechanical and metallic about the packaging than on the same stuff for girls. Like you weren’t buying something that just made you smell nice, but something more like a gadget.
Boys really like their clever toys, she decided.
Connor reached for an aerosol in the centre of the display, tugged off the cap and sprayed a tiny breath of fine white particles into the air just in front of him. He sniffed, tentatively at first and took in a proper lungful. Then he realised Abby was watching him, arms folded, one eyebrow raised.
“What?”
She reached past him to scoop her arms around a whole row of products. Connor dashed in quickly with his basket, to catch them as they tumbled off the shelf.
“That enough?” she asked him.
“They did look like they’ve got a lot of armpit. Maybe we should raid the women’s shelves, as well. But it’s the lady Deinosuchus we want to attract and —” His mischievous grin suddenly faded. “Or maybe this is enough.”
Abby followed his gaze over the tops of aisles of toothpaste, toiletries, and plasters. At the back of the shop, behind the desk where clerks processed people’s photos, a tall grey shadow lurked. It stood upright, on tiptoe, maybe six foot, all alert and listening. Yellow lizard eyes blinked back at them from the darkness.
“Velociraptor,” Abby said quietly.
“Yeah,” Connor agreed, his voice going up an octave.
There were long, prickly spikes up its spine and peeking over the top of its head, like a Mohican haircut. Livid blue markings showed around its eyes, like it was wearing war paint. Its wide, open mouth showed a row of razor-sharp teeth. All in all, not the most gentle looking of creatures.
“Must have found a way in through the back,” Abby whispered. “Come in to get out of the rain.”
“Yeah.”
She glanced quickly back round to the shelves on the far side of the shop, displaying deals on drinks, crisps and sandwiches.
“It hasn’t ransacked the food in here,” she observed.
“Probably doesn’t recognise chocolate bars and things wrapped in plastic,” Connor said, edging up the aisle towards the exit.
The Velociraptor continued to stare at them both with yellow, beady eyes.
“I meant,” Abby said, taking very slow steps through the shallow water, “that it’s probably hungry.”
“Yeah,” Connor acknowledged. “I was just trying not to think about that.”
“Okay,” she said. “Just don’t do anything to make it —”
Connor’s basket, overflowing with toiletries, smacked into the aisle beside him. Lipsticks clattered from the shelves, splashing into the water round his feet.
She and Connor looked back to the Velociraptor, still unmoving in the photo-processing lab. Abby realised she was holding her breath and let out a long sigh.
That was the moment the dinosaur came leaping over the desk and across the aisles towards them.
Becker steered his speedboat onto the A308, glancing at the map displayed on the anomaly detector in his free hand, its screen bright in the gathering dark. A red dot showed his own position, marking his way to the turning for the High Street on his right. Two dots, green and blue, marked Abby and Connor’s positions, just a thumb’s width away.
As he steered onto the High Street, the boat suddenly picked up speed, riding the crest of water coming down from Castle Hill.
His keen eyes picked out movement up ahead, in the darkness of a shop. There was a distinct clamour coming from inside. Tucking away the detector, Becker reached for his SIG .229.
Something was happening in Boots.
Becker brought the boat in for a closer look. Ten metres ahead of him the glass doors of the shop slid open. It had the effect of a break in the riverbank, and he was suddenly caught right in the midst of a current veering through the door. He leant his whole weight against the rudder, trying to steer back into the main course of water. But the boat wasn’t having any of it, and he found himself hurtling towards the open doors...
At t
he last second he remembered the driving technique for getting a car out of a skid. You didn’t try to break away, you steered into the spin. He yanked the rudder towards him, heaving the boat sharply left, lifting its nose right out of the water. The engine sputtered, the rotor blades trying to find something to push against.
For a split second he sat perfectly still as the river rushed round underneath him. Then the rotor blades caught again, and Becker shot forward into the shop.
He barely had time to blink before Abby, Connor, and a basket laden with toiletries hurled themselves over the bow of the boat to land at his feet. Behind them, the onrushing water toppled aisles and aisles of shelving. And a Velociraptor leapt nimbly from one to another, hurtling straight for Becker.
He dug the rotor down into the water, lifting the front of the boat. It hit the creature hard, knocking it back into the water. The boat bucked and bumped as it rode over the top of the raptor. Becker glanced back, to see it thrashing angrily in their wake.
The shelves had all been toppled, and they and their contents now bobbed on the surface of what looked like a dirty indoor swimming pool. As the water reached a level with the outside, the current quickly died off. The raptor kicked and shrieked its way out into the river of the High Street.
“Better get after it,” Becker said as he piloted the boat back out into the lashing rain.
Abby and Connor scrambled up on to their knees, both red-faced, both looking exhausted and amazed.
“We’re going to have to have a chat,” Becker told them, “about not wandering off.”
“You wouldn’t listen!” Connor protested. “I said the raptors didn’t like the rain!”
“Which we used to our advantage,” Becker replied. But given how things had gone on the other side of the anomaly, he didn’t feel like elaborating.
“We’ve got bigger things to worry about than raptors,” Abby cut in impatiently. “Much bigger.”
“There could be another anomaly,” Connor began. “Because —”
But before he could continue they heard a great roar from down-stream — and a squeak of terror.
“Oh,” Connor said, sadly. “I think that raptor found the two Deinosuchus.”
“The two what?” Becker said.
“Think giant crocodiles,” Abby explained.
“Ah,” Becker responded with a sigh. “Back to square one.” And he cranked the engine on the speedboat.
EIGHT
Two lions remained, both bloodied but unbowed. They circled in different directions around the scratched and battered theropod, keeping just beyond its reach.
Danny stepped calmly into the mess room. The lions continued to stalk the dinosaur, recognising it as the greater threat. The Winchester rifle lay in the middle of the floor, the creature and the lions circling around it. Flinching at the smell of blood and animal sweat, Danny made his way round the side of the room, past the bloodied, open carcass of a lion, giving the creatures as much space as he could. The theropod swished its head round in his direction and seethed through jagged teeth.
He dodged back, barely escaping a vicious swipe, and one of the lions darted forward, trying to clamp its jaws around the creature’s neck. The dinosaur skipped around like a boxer, kicking the lion as it passed, sending it sprawling right at Danny. For an instant Danny thought he was done for. But it seemed the lion had no interest in him, and lithely leapt back at the theropod. After the initial surprise and bombast of the first attack, it seemed as if the two remaining lions were well-matched against the creature.
Danny needed to break the stalemate.
Taking a deep breath, he picked up one of the upturned chairs and hurled it across the room. It sailed past the creatures and smashed through the window beyond. Glass splashed and tinkled from the frame, and a breath of cool air teased into the mess room. Through the sweat of fear and adrenalin, he hadn’t realised quite how hot the lodge had been.
The theropod raised itself up tall, so that the top of its head brushed the ceiling. It sniffed at the cool air and its eyes narrowed. Then it turned back to the lions.
“Nice work, Quinn,” Lester called sarcastically from the far side of the room. “I hope you have a Plan B.”
Danny grimaced, and continued around the perimeter of the room until he reached the broken window. Cool air licked around him pleasantly. He wanted to stand there, close his eyes, surrender to that breeze. Instead, he steeled himself for what he was about to do.
I shouldn’t be scared, I should be pissed off, he said to himself. Danny recalled the cramped flight, his knees up against the seat in front of him for all eleven hours. They’d not brought the right equipment, they’d not been fully briefed, and now a dodgy clasp on a loft hatch had left him to fight three bloodthirsty predators single-handed. He had been sure leaving the police force and joining the ARC would open up a world of possibilities and answers. Yet it just seemed to offer ever more complex frustrations and insanity.
He squared his jaw, feeling the rage welling up in him.
“Oi,” he shouted at the dinosaur. “You, ugly mug! Call yourself a T-rex?”
The dinosaur bobbed its head round to regard him curiously. Danny had expected the lions to choose that moment to pounce but they, too, turned to look at the source of the unexpected noise.
“You can’t even take on a couple of jumped-up pussy cats!” he yelled at the top of his lungs.
“What are you doing?” he heard Lester hiss from the far side of the room. And, really, the man had a point. But Danny had started this now, and there was no going back.
“Why haven’t you finished them off?” he bellowed. “They’re just two dumb cats. What are you, chicken?”
The dinosaur regarded him coolly, still motionless, towering over him.
Danny grinned up at it.
And then he was sprawling forward, diving for his life. Some sixth sense had seen the dinosaur tense, just before it pounced. A blur of brown coming at him fast, and then Danny was smacking hard into the floor. He twisted around, and just saw the whip of the creature’s long tail vanish through the broken window.
It took most of the window frame with it.
The two lions sighed with exhaustion. Then they looked up at Danny, strewn there, completely defenceless, the Winchester rifle still well out of his reach. There was no way he could get to his feet before they were on him. So he smirked wickedly, just like he imagined James Dean or Brando would have done.
“Go on then,” he told them. “After him.”
There was a roaring outside, as the young lions encountered the embattled theropod. That decided things. The elder felines bounded out through the broken window, the night outside punctured by their own gleeful roaring.
Danny slumped against the floor, exhausted. “Exactly as I planned.”
“So that was Plan B,” Lester commented, standing in the doorway, arms crossed, and making no move to come over.
“Yeah,” he said, and he sighed. “Figured the thing was just as cornered as we were. Just needed to be shown a way out.”
“Hm,” Lester muttered. He collected the rifle from the floor and walked cautiously up to the great hole that had once been a window.
“I wouldn’t get too close,” Danny told him as he got wearily to his feet.
“You don’t say,” Lester said. “Well, we can’t possibly stay here now.”
“You want to go home already?”
“No. We’ve got a job to do. But we can’t stay here.” He waved generally at the mess room — the mess of upturned furniture, dead lions, and dead people.
“Maybe we can find somewhere with a pool.”
Of course, the hatch in the roof opened relatively easily when it wasn’t a matter of life or death. Sophie reached her legs down to put one boot on Danny’s shoulder, then half jumped, half wriggled back to the floor.
“Saw them run off,” she said. “Whatever you did, well done.”
“Thanks,” he said. They stood there gazing at eac
h other, both amazed to be alive. And something had changed about her, too. Like maybe he’d broken through the wall of her resistance.
“What happened with the hatch?” Lester asked pointedly.
The light switched off behind her eyes and she was back to the tough cookie who had picked them up from the airport.
“I must have knocked it as I got my feet out. It’s all rusted on top from the sun. But look —” She showed him raw, scratched hands — “I tried to get it open.”
“I see,” Lester said, but he didn’t sound entirely convinced.
Danny grinned at her.
“It’s okay. If you wanted to kill us, there are easier ways.”
“I guess so,” she said, and again he thought he saw that strange resistance in her, that need not to like him.
Maybe she’d had bad experiences with men in jeans and leather jackets, he surmised. Maybe there was something else. He had a policeman’s instinct for spotting someone who was withholding information. And he knew she wouldn’t tell him anything if he pushed her too hard. Best to lay off, get busy with something else, let her learn to trust him.
“There’s a lot to sort out in there,” he said. “Can we call up some of your lot? That bloke we met on the gate. Get them to give us a hand.”
“Already did,” she said. “Rang them on my cell up there. Be here in maybe half an hour. Maybe a bit more. The guys who were meant to be on duty...” She glanced down at the body lying in the hallway. “Well, they were in here.”
“I’m sorry,” Danny told her.
“Yeah,” she said, not lifting her eyes to him.
“Well,” Lester said. “Might as well get started then.”
They cleared the broken chairs and furniture, and the detritus from the window, then, heaving the heavy bodies between them, they laid the park rangers side by side. There were three of them: two men, one woman — two black, one white.
“Who were they?” Danny asked quietly.
“Last of the old guard,” Sophie said simply. He’d meant what were their names, what were the details of their lives, but he didn’t press her.
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