Either she had never felt the fear before, or she simply had not allowed herself to feel it while there was still something that needed to be done.
But now the cub was free.
The task was finished.
The adrenaline was beginning to fade from her body.
And suddenly she was seven years old again—a seven-year-old girl who had just been kneeling inside a wolf enclosure with her bare hands gripping wire.
Her body seemed to respond all at once to everything that had just happened.
The young guard sat down beside her.
He spoke quietly.
“Hey.”
He gave her an encouraging look.
“You did really well.”
She nodded and wiped the tears from her cheeks with the back of her wrist.
She looked toward the cub.
“Is he going to be okay?”
The guard nodded.
“Yeah.”
He kept his tone gentle.
“He’s going to be okay.”
The guard glanced toward the cub, which had already begun moving farther back into the habitat.
Then he turned back to the girl.
“Because of you.”
Silence settled over the enclosure.
No one asked the question that hung in the air.
Why was a seven-year-old girl inside a wolf enclosure in the first place?
And who had set that wire?
The younger guard finally asked it out loud.
His name was Ethan. He had been working at the sanctuary for six months. He was twenty-four, still green enough to believe that rules existed to protect people, and still stubborn enough to break them when they didn’t.
“Who set the wire, sweetheart?”
The girl didn’t answer. She just stared at the spot where the cub had disappeared. Her hands were shaking now. The adrenaline had drained out of her, leaving her small and cold and terribly quiet.
The older guard, Brody, was already on his radio. His voice was low and urgent. “We need medical and we need the police. We’ve got a child in the wolf enclosure. And a snare.”
