The Dragon Keeper Read Free Page B

slits for eyes staring ahead, reflecting nothing. Everything inside her beamed at him. “You can’t put evolution in a cage.”
    He blinked and rustled weakly against her palm. Not a philosopher.
    “What are you un-caging now, Yancy?”
    She jumped and squeezed the hatchling too tightly, making him squirm.
    “Jesus. You scared me.”
    Antonio pushed away from the door against which he’d been leaning for who knows how long and walked over to pet the hatchling’s head with a fingertip. “Jesus saves, not scares.”
    “Jesus doesn’t stalk either.” She jerked her head toward the door.
    “Are you kidding? Who do you think finds out if we’re being naughty or nice?”
    “Santa Claus.”
    He chuckled, a tired, rumbling laugh without a beginning or an end. “I didn’t know anyone was still here.”
    “It’s a good thing I was. Look what I found.” She couldn’t take her eyes off him. Every detail was so perfect, from the yellow streaks shot through his markings to the incubator dirt clinging to his tail.
    Together they weighed and measured him and put him in the second tank, next to his brother’s. He wobbled a little and took a few steps before plopping down next to a tree branch and closing his eyes. She’d set up three newborn incubators in a row that pumped heat through at a warm twenty-nine degrees Celsius, and she’d outfitted each with individual water troughs, foliage, and just enough room to recover from being born.
    “I can’t believe management’s going to let you put them together in the exhibit. They’ll tear each other apart.” Antonio rested his forearms on the table, staring into the last empty incubator.
    “I don’t think we’ll see any grudge matches.”
    “A little idealistic, aren’t you? It’s only a matter of time before they try to eat each other.”
    “Let them freaking socialize.” She rubbed her eyes, trying to clear sleep and frustration. It was unbelievable, every time she turned around. “They’ll be auctioned off in a few months and spend the rest of their lives in isolation. Then you’ll all be happy.”
    They both shut up for a minute. There were a hundred good reasons to group the hatchlings together, but she was too tired to think of a smart way to say them. Yawning, she stretched out the cramping muscles of her back.
    “Why don’t you go home and get some sleep?” Antonio asked.
    “Why don’t you?” There was still one egg left and hell if she was going to let him get the first look at her hatchling.
    Another minute passed. Finally he took a breath and pushed away from the table.
    “Okay, I’m going to run home and grab a change of clothes, and then when I get back you can go.”
    She glanced over at him, and he smiled hopefully. Why didn’t he just leave? He wasn’t their keeper; he was just a hotshot vet who wanted … something. She wished she knew what. Another yawn bubbled up, but she bit down on it.
    “Fine, but you’re bringing back coffee, too.”
    ~
    Ben was watching the news when she got home. His notebooks were spread out on the coffee table around a jumble of beer cans, reptile studies, National Geographic magazines, and empty plates crusted over with grease spots and petrified crumbs. He hunched forward in the middle of the sagging couch, legs splayed, thighs almost straddling the coffee table. At six foot two, Ben was often mistaken for an ex–college footballer going to fat, at least until he started talking. Even now, he had that puffy look of faded glory as the neon shadows from the tube flickered over his face, igniting his eyes with that for-the-win concentration.
    Ben didn’t watch the news the way other people watched the news. He studied it and charted it as meticulously as Meg watched her animals. Filling notebook after notebook with major world events, he measured how each network presented coverage, looking for differences. If an earthquake hit Southeast Asia, how many variations were there in the body count? Which