Cat on the Fence Read Free

kitty-fit and shifted back to human form. She went and got her favorite
pair of warm and fuzzy leopard-print pajamas and crawled into bed, feeling much
better.
    She’d forgotten how good it felt to let the Cat out of its
cage.

Chapter Two
     
    Karabi sat at the conference table with her arms folded. The
two other seated staff members were listening casually to the speaker at the
front of the room, occasionally nodding in agreement. But as far as Karabi was
concerned, the man speaking was full of it. It had been two weeks since the
breakup with Rao and Karabi had only just started to get over the emotional
turmoil that interaction had caused her. Now here was another man—whom she’d
just met and didn’t even know yet—who was getting fully under her skin.
    Alexander McClellan was his name. And he was dangerous. He’d
just been contracted as financial analysis consultant and was on the Operations
Team for one quarter. As far as Karabi could tell, it was going to be a long,
painful three months. From the moment he opened his mouth she knew he was
trouble. This guy had the kind of amazing voice that was so seductive it made
all of his ideas sound good, even his shitty ones. Kevin Green the operations manager
and everyone else on the staff might have fallen for his charm and slick tongue
but Karabi wasn’t going to. So what if he was kind of nice to look at. Scratch
that— very nice. A lion was pretty to look at too but it still might bite
her head off if she wasn’t careful when she entered its cage.
    Two of the lionesses in the Big Cat House at the zoo where
she worked had each recently birthed a trio of rambunctious little cubs but
last week the male lion, Musaka, got a bit too rough with one and severely
injured him. The mother quickly punished the large male—with fatal intent
likely, had zookeepers not intervened as quickly as they did—leaving the zoo
with two injured cats. Musaka was healthy and strong and his injuries
would heal relatively quickly and easily but the cub, Kimba, needed intense
specialized care around the clock. All of which would cost money the facility
didn’t have funding for. On top of the medical expenses was the fact that the
habitat now had six new animals, meaning the already-strained budget was
looking especially bleak.
    So they’d hired this guy to come in and try to tackle their
urgent financial quandary. If Alex did a good job and the staff liked him, they
were going to offer him a permanent position on the team. But Karabi wasn’t so
sure he could see past dollar signs long enough to notice that there were
living, breathing animals in the zoo. At this moment he was talking about staff
cuts, which had Karabi grinding her teeth.
    “I’ve looked at the headcount, expenditures and revenue per
exhibit, and have come up with a potential plan to rebalance the staff based on
where the activity and income is at. The Big Cat House is one of the most
profitable departments here, and should therefore have the lion’s share—excuse
the pun—of the budget. By halving the staff in the Small Mammal and Reptile House
and reducing the Waterfowl Lagoon budget by a third, we’d be able to cover all
identified cat expenses and still have some leftover for unexpected overages.”
    “Except that would put good people out of work in a tough
economy,” Karabi said with a pointed expression on her face. “Not to mention it
would undermine the quality of care for the animals at both of those exhibits.”
    Alex turned his focus to her, his posture remaining straight
and self-assured. “Job cuts happen in a tough economy. It’s to be expected. And
spending less doesn’t necessarily have to mean providing less. I have
confidence that the staff here is fantastic at what they do and are fully
capable of coming up with a plan to continue to provide quality care even with
a lower budget.”
    Karabi shook her head. “All the brilliant planning in the
world couldn’t make up for a shortage of