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that took time. Grace knew this was a lie, but she hadn’t pushed the issue. She hadn’t pushed any issue with him … yet.
    “Let’s go,” Butch said grumpily.
    He started walking. Grace followed slowly so Butch wouldhave to stop and wait for her. What Noah had really meant by You can go and do anything you like was You can go and do anything you like as long as Butch, or Yvonne, or I am with you.
    No matter what time of day or night Grace left her room on the second floor of the mansion, Butch, Yvonne, or Noah would bump into her within a minute or two and accompany her wherever she wanted to go.
    Grace had spotted the surveillance cameras inside her bedroom as soon as she was through the door. They were sophisticated and cleverly concealed, but they were not nearly as clever as the ones Ted and Wolfe had invented. The only place she hadn’t found a camera was in the bathroom, which was only decent, but she supposed this wasn’t beyond Noah’s capabilities if Wolfe was correct about him — and she was beginning to believe he was.
    Noah had been friendly, polite, and accommodating, but there was something dangerous lurking beneath his cheerful exterior. “A wolf in sheep’s clothing,” Wolfe had called him.
    Grace was determined to uncloak the real Noah Blackwood and find out why her mother’s dying wish was to keep her away from her grandfather.
     • • • 
    Noah Blackwood completed his morning rounds by firing only two people. After he returned from a trip, he usually fired a lot more people than that, so it was a good day for the staff at the Ark. The first person he fired was a keeper who had no idea who Noah was. He’d bumped into Noah in the keeper area beneath the Ark and had the audacity to ask Noah who he was and what he was doing in the restricted area. The second person Noah fired was the assistant curator who had tried to defend the keeperwho Noah had just fired. Noah had never trusted the curator anyway — trust being defined as someone who wasn’t afraid of him. This was especially true at the Seattle Ark. His other Arks scattered around the world were what they appeared to be … zoos. But the Seattle Ark was different … very different.
    Noah stopped at the security complex where six employees were glued to flat-screen monitors. They knew better than to glance away from the monitors when he entered.
    “Where’s Butch?” he asked.
    “Level Two with the girl,” the shift supervisor said without taking his eyes off the screen. “Lab 251. No surveillance cameras inside.”
    There were cameras in 251, but Noah was the only person who had access to them, and only a few people at the Ark knew what was inside.
    “That girl is my granddaughter,” Noah said, an edge to his voice. “Her name is Grace.”
    The supervisor tensed, but still didn’t look away from the screen. “Yes, sir,” he said.
    “Let me know the second she leaves the lab. Call my private line.”
    “I will.”
    Noah scanned the monitors and the watchers one more time before leaving. As he closed the door behind him, he could almost feel the relief sweeping through the surveillance team.
    It brought a small smile to his face.
     • • • 
    Grace and Butch were inside Lab 251.
    Yvonne was tossing chunks of bloody meat to the two Mokélé-mbembé hatchlings. The baby dinosaurs snatched thedripping pieces out of the air with lightning speed. They stood four feet tall now, most of it neck, and food passed through them almost as fast as they were able to gobble it down, their feces creating an eye-watering odor that was strong enough to collapse lungs. Butch grimaced and choked back a gag. He hated going into 251, which was one of the reasons Grace insisted on a visit every few hours throughout the day.
    Yvonne, on the other hand, did not appear to mind the smell at all. She always had a smile for Grace when she walked into the lab — now the dinosaur nursery. Grace trusted Yvonne less than she trusted Butch and