Part 2
“Set them in the snow,” Mack said.
Tom did not obey. His gaze stayed on the female, whose head had dropped again.
“You want to arrest me, do it after she’s loose.”
“You’re not going close enough for me to arrest you, and you’re not touching that cable. Put the cutters down.”
Tom looked toward the northern ridge. “How long until Lena gets here?”
Hearing his daughter’s name confirmed that Tom had been monitoring agency traffic. Mack pressed the emergency button again without taking his eyes off him.
“The pressure on that leg may be the only thing controlling the bleeding,” Mack said. “You open it without sedation and medical support, you may kill her.”
Tom’s grip shifted on the handles.
He knew animals. Whatever else he had become, that knowledge had once been honest. Mack saw him understand the warning and hate the person delivering it.
At last Tom dropped the cutters. They landed open in the snow.
“Back against the vehicle,” Mack said. “Hands where I can see them.”
Tom obeyed slowly. “I built it to hold the black one.”
Mack glanced at the transport crate. It was too heavily reinforced for a dog.
“You watched this happen?”
“The alert came at 4:18 yesterday morning. She was standing then.”
“And you left her.”
“I couldn’t get near her. Not with the cub moving in and out and her still strong enough to lunge.”
“So you waited for her to weaken.”
Tom’s jaw tightened. “I waited for the cub to enter the second restraint.”
The admission came without pride. That made it worse, not better.
Tom looked toward the ledge. “I came back when she stopped getting up. I thought I could release her and take the equipment before anyone found it.”
“And the crate?”
Tom said nothing.
Mack could imagine the price attached to a melanistic jaguar. He could also imagine the buyers who would pay it, the animal sedated in darkness, the border crossed through places no inspector watched. He did not need Tom to complete the picture.
“You used to bring lost people home,” Mack said.
“I used to have work.”
“You had clients.”
“I had a mortgage and a sister living in a trailer with a roof I patched every monsoon.” Tom’s voice roughened. “The agencies turned these cats into grants and court filings years before I put a cable in the ground. Don’t pretend money only contaminates the person who doesn’t have any.”
Mack had attended meetings where an animal became a budget request, a colored corridor on a map, or a photograph used to justify decisions already made. Tom’s criticism contained enough truth to protect him from hearing the rest of it.
The female shifted. Her injured paw jerked, though the leg itself did not move.
Tom flinched. “You think the difference between us is that you care more.”
“No. The difference is the cable.”
The northern ridge answered with the low grind of a tracked engine.
Tom turned toward the sound. Mack told him to keep his hands visible. For a moment, Tom appeared to calculate the distance to the vehicle, the cutters, and the trees.
Then the cub cried beneath the ledge.
Tom lowered his head and remained where he was.
The tracked rig stopped above them. A county rescue truck followed as far as the snow allowed. Deputy Devin Shaw descended first, while two rescue workers unloaded shields, a litter, oxygen, and veterinary cases.
Lena came behind them in insulated coveralls and an orange shell. Her dark hair had been tucked beneath a knit cap, and a headlamp crossed her forehead. Marisol Vega followed with the portable monitor, her healed left forearm moving stiffly in the cold.
Lena took in Tom, the open cutters, and Mack’s position.
“Is the scene secure?”
“It is now,” Deputy Shaw said.
He searched Tom, cuffed him, and retrieved his phone without opening it. Tom did not resist.
Lena approached only as far as the granite observation point. “How long has the female been down?”
Tom answered before Mack could. “Sometime yesterday afternoon. The camera recorded every few minutes.”
“Was she standing at noon?”
“Yes.”
“Four?”
“Not all the way.”
Lena looked at the deputy. “Preserve the images and timestamps. Don’t unlock anything here.”
Then she turned back to the animal. Tom had supplied a fact that might help her treat the jaguar and help investigators convict him. She accepted it without offering gratitude or absolution.
Through binoculars, Lena studied the female’s position. Marisol assembled an oxygen line and checked the monitor while the rescue workers erected portable screens.
Lena gave the plan in short instructions. She would immobilize the female from behind the granite shoulder. Mack and a rescue worker would use shields to form a corridor toward a covered crate for the cub. Nobody would approach the mother until Lena confirmed adequate sedation.
Lena looked at Marisol. “Stay behind the shield until I call you forward by name.”
Marisol checked the oxygen connection. “Call before you move, not while you’re moving.”
“I will.”
Mack studied the slope above the ledge. “The direct carry route crosses wind-loaded snow. We should take her west around the rock fin.”
“I haven’t assessed either route yet,” Lena said.
“The western route is longer.”
“I know the map.”
“The eastern shelf could move under a litter team.”
“And every extra minute matters if her temperature is already falling.” Lena met his gaze. “I’m directing the medical operation. You assess the ground and give me both risks. You don’t decide for everyone before I’ve heard them.”
Marisol kept working, but Mack saw the muscles in her shoulders become still.
He wanted to say the eastern route was obviously wrong. He also knew the old report had begun with the same certainty: Mack identifying a danger, then moving from observation to decision without leaving room for Lena’s judgment.
“I’ll inspect both approaches while you prepare,” he said.
Lena nodded. “Stay within sight.”
The distance between that answer and agreement was small enough to cross.
Mack inspected the snow shelf from solid ground. A thin fracture line ran beneath its upper lip, partly hidden by powder. The western route was rougher and added several hundred yards, but the rock fin protected it from the loaded slope.
When he returned, Lena listened without interruption.
“West,” she decided. “You lead the terrain. I call every medical stop.”
Tom spoke from beside the deputy. “The restraint has a swivel near the anchor. If she turns when the pressure comes off, the loose cable can wrap the other leg.”
Lena looked at him. “Anything else?”
“The lock closes under load. It won’t reverse.”
“All right.”
Tom stared at the female. “I didn’t mean to catch her.”
Lena had already turned away.
Mack took his position behind a shield. The cub had left the coat and pressed itself against its mother’s throat. Lena waited until its body cleared the line she needed.
The dart struck the female’s rear quarter.
Her roar hit the granite and came back from every direction. She lunged, the restraint stopped her, and snow fell from the edge of the overhang.
Mack stepped out from cover.
“Hold your position,” Lena said.
His body wanted to continue. He stopped instead.
The female twisted toward the dart, then toward her cub. Gradually, her movements lost force. Her head sank, lifted once, and settled on the snow.
Lena waited, watching the jaw, the ears, and the rise of the ribs. When she finally signaled, Marisol moved forward behind a shield.
The cub hissed and struck the clear panel. Then it crawled across its mother’s chest, planted its small body over the injured leg, and bared its teeth at anyone who approached.
The cable lay beneath him…
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