Zoo II by James Patterson Read Free Book Online

single luxury home and Chloe’s bedroom was part of the servant’s quarters. She discovered this odd historical remnant as a girl and treated it as a secret cubby, a hiding spot for dolls and diaries.
    Now, as she pries off the wooden plank she nailed over it only a few days earlier, she hopes it just might save their lives.
    She opens the squeaky door and orders Eli to wiggle inside first. “I know you’re scared,” she says. “I am, too. But I’ll be right behind you. You can do it!”
    The boy bravely obeys. Chloe squeezes in after him and the two carefully climb down this dark, dusty chamber, using ledges and splintery boards.
    They finally make it to the ground floor—a former kitchen converted long ago into a garage. Chloe kicks open the trapdoor and she and Eli crawl out.
    The space is cluttered and dark, and Chloe can’t find the light switch. Taking Eli’s hand, she gropes her way to the manual sliding garage door. She strains to pull it open a few feet, and together mother and son slip out onto the sidewalk—the first time either has stepped foot outside the apartment building in almost two weeks.
    Chloe’s heart is thumping wildly as she scans the eerily abandoned, trash-strewn Paris streets. The occasional animal growl or human scream echoes in the distance.
    Now what?
    Her parents are both dead. Their apartment, her only refuge, is overrun with feral animals. Her husband is God knows where, returning God knows when. Her son is cold, tired, terrified. And so is she.
    Choking back tears, Chloe scoops Eli into her arms and does the only thing she can think of.
    She runs.

Chapter 13
    “It doesn’t make any damn sense!” Freitas exclaims, hurling a giant binder full of molecular charts and data graphs clean across our plane’s cabin.
    He’s steaming mad, but Sarah and the other scientists and I are so exhausted we barely react. It feels like we’ve been discussing our recent findings and debating our hypotheses—make that our lack of recent findings and our flawed hypotheses—since the moment we left Bali. Hours ago.
    We’re not far from our next destination. But we’re still light-years away from any kind of solution to the animal crisis.
    “We should have stayed in Bali longer,” Sarah says, “like I wanted to. Those jungles, that sea—they’re home to thousands of different species. We ran experiments on less than one percent of them.”
    “That’s still dozens of different animals,” I say. “Not all of which, let me remind you”—I hold up my arms, showing some painful jellyfish stings and bandaged sea snake bites—“were as ‘friendly’ as we were led to believe.”
    Indeed, my own unfortunate episode in the water turned out to be just the beginning. Over the next few days, two other groups from our team fended off sudden animal attacks. First a swarm of so-called gliding lizards. Then a stampede of banteng, a breed of wild cattle. Can’t say I’m sorry I missed it.
    “We sequenced their DNA,” I continue. “We ran brain scans. Conducted autopsies. If I remember correctly,” I add sarcastically, “ somebody even collected and ran tests on monkey droppings. And we found nothing out of the ordinary. No unusual radiation or electromagnetic patterns, either. No strange chemicals in the water or magic fairy dust in the air. Nil. Nada . We spent ninety-six hours in Bali and all I got was this lousy t-shirt. And, oh, yeah—I almost lost my life.”
    The other government scientists on board all mumble in agreement. Sarah folds her arms. She won’t concede anything to me—I think out of spite. But she doesn’t disagree with me, either. Which I guess I’ll take as a sign of progress?
    Freitas checks his watch and pensively rubs his beard. I’ve known the guy less than two weeks, but I’d swear there’s more gray hair in it now than when I met him.
    Sensing a lull in our endless discussion, I take out my international satellite phone and dial Chloe again in Paris. One of