Chupacabra Read Free

breaths.
    The chupacabra tried to reach him through the mesh with his claws, but the man pulled his feet away and curled into a ball.
    The kid goat bleated. It stood in the corner, shivering.
    The chupacabra jumped on the kid goat, sunk his long fangs into its neck, shook it once, and began to feed.
    As he lapped up the warm, salty blood, he looked at the man curled up next to the wall. He could smell the man’s fear. It somehow made the blood taste better.



“I can’t say I’m sorry to be rid of those vicious prehistoric gasbags,” Luther Smyth said. “But I sure miss Grace.”
    “I miss her, too,” Marty O’Hara admitted. He also missed his parents, who were hopelessly lost in the Amazonian rain forest … or dead. The vicious prehistoric gasbags Luther was talking about were a couple of Mokélé-mbembé babies that had hatched aboard his uncle Wolfe’s research ship, the Coelacanth , on the way to New Zealand to capture a giant squid. Marty and Grace had snagged the dinosaur eggs in the Congo. Luther still had Band-Aids on his fingers where the meat-snappers had bitten him. He also smelled like the meat-snappers, even though he had taken at least twenty showers since the last feed. It was like the stink had soaked into the pores of his skin and the follicles of his flaming reddish hair.
    “Look at all those people!” Luther said.
    The boys were standing on the roof of the brand-new Squidarium at Northwest Zoo and Aquarium in Seattle, Washington. The structure was huge, but not nearly big enough to handle the football-stadium crowd waiting for the gates to open. According to the news, more than a thousand people hadcamped outside the entrance the night before with sleeping bags and coolers filled with food.
    “You think Noah Blackwood is in the crowd?” Luther asked.
    “Fat chance,” Marty said, frowning. Noah Blackwood, Grace’s grandfather, had snatched the hatchlings and kidnapped Grace. Marty would trade a thousand giant squids just to talk to her.
    The NZA director, Dr. Michael Loch, opened the door to the roof and joined them.
    “Quite a crowd,” he said, grinning from ear to ear.
    At fifteen bucks a head, Marty didn’t think Dr. Loch was seeing the crowd like he and Luther were seeing them.
    He’s seeing a stream of endless cash flowing into his zoo , Marty thought.
    “What time do the gates open?” Luther asked.
    “As soon as we finish the media previews,” Loch said. “There must be two hundred reporters down there right now, maybe more. We should be ready for the peds by about one o’clock.”
    Marty had learned that “peds,” short for pedestrians , stood for zoo visitors. He looked at his watch. It was noon.
    “How much did the Squidarium cost?” he asked.
    “Thirty million dollars,” Loch answered.
    “Let me get this straight,” Luther said. “You put up a thirtymillion-dollar building on the off chance that Wolfe would bring in a live giant squid?”
    “That’s right.”
    “Even though this is the first Architeuthis brought into captivity alive?” Marty added, showing off a little by using the scientific name for the giant squid.
    “I have a lot of faith in your uncle and Ted Bronson.”
    Ted Bronson was Travis Wolfe’s reclusive partner, but he’d come out of hiding aboard the Coelacanth long enough to take Marty down into the deep to catch the giant squid. It was lucky they all weren’t killed.
    “Have you ever met Ted Bronson?” Luther asked.
    Marty elbowed Luther in the side. Dr. Loch didn’t notice because he was staring dreamily at the people lined up outside the gate, dollar symbols practically flashing in his eyes.
    “No, I haven’t,” Dr. Loch answered. “I understand he hasn’t been off Cryptos Island in years.”
    Cryptos Island was the secret island where Wolfe and Ted Bronson lived and ran eWolfe, a company that built everything from satellites to robotic flying bugs.
    Luther was baiting Dr. Loch. At that very minute, Ted Bronson was inside the