Lucky finished quickly and turned toward Emma. She set down her fork and took one of the newly purchased bones from her space. Lucky braced its front paws between the two seats, its tail swishing furiously.
She held out the bone. Lucky clamped down, and its sharp teeth snapped it in two. Once Emma had finished eating, she started the engine again.
She searched the navigation app for nearby fish farms. She'd stocked fish for one person. Now she had Lucky to feed, too. She'd need to stock more.
Following the directions, she drove to a fish farm and bought plenty of large fish, small fish, and fry. Her phone rang just as she returned the truck to the rental company.
"Hello?" She answered.
"Ms. Bennett? We're from the fitness equipment company. We're outside Crown Heights now." Emma checked the time. They were fast.
"I'm out right now. Could you wait about five minutes?" She was already in a cab. Fortunately, she wasn't far away.
A large truck waited outside Crown Heights. Two middle-aged men sat in the cab smoking, flicking ash onto the roadside now and then.
Emma got out of the taxi, walked straight over, and knocked on the window. "Hi."
"Ms. Bennett? Your equipment's in the back. Take a look." Both men climbed out with friendly greetings and opened the cargo doors.
Only then did she realize there were four of them. Two younger men were sitting in the back playing games. They put away their phones when they saw her.
"Enough games. Let's unload," one of the older men called. He peeled the foam wrapping off a corner. There was a treadmill, an elliptical, an exercise bike, a rowing machine...
All four brought the equipment into the complex. Emma led them into the elevator and up to the twenty-second floor. The men stopped short when she opened the doors. With security like that, they might have been walking into a prison.
An absolute fortress. "This way. Just put it in this room."
She directed them to the positions she'd already chosen. Even a room of a few hundred square feet was a tight fit for all that equipment.
The rest went into another room. She could put it in her space after they left.
When everything was inside, she tipped them for the work. Moving all that machinery took effort. None of them refused.
They took another look at her two iron doors on their way out.
After locking up, Emma contacted a nearby plant nursery and ordered several dozen foam boxes filled with soil, to be delivered to Crown Heights.
Then she stored the spare exercise machines in her space. She hadn't bought that many—just two of each type.
There was no need to hoard these.
Lucky had curled up on the couch. When she sat down, it came over, licked her arm, and settled into her lap. She stroked its fur absently.
She took a photo, but image recognition couldn't identify it. Searching videos for jaguars brought up animals in dark gold, tawny yellow, and black. They could weigh more than 330 pounds, rival a tiger in size, and move fast.
Emma looked from the huge animal on-screen to the little creature in her lap. Were they really the same species? Lucky did look like a jaguar cub.
She scrolled through several more videos, then stopped. This one covered albino tigers, lions, and finally jaguars.
She watched the little white cub grow. Its spots became more visible as it got bigger. It looked remarkably like Lucky. Then the jaguar in the video called out.
Lucky stood up in her lap, suddenly alert, and answered the phone with the same sound.
Emma set the phone down and gathered it into her arms. "It's okay. You're okay."
She took out a litter box, poured in some litter, and started teaching Lucky to use it. The little animal watched her movements curiously.
She'd tried everything short of demonstrating it herself. After two or three attempts, Lucky finally understood. With an encouraging look from Emma, it peed in the box.
She took a dried fish from her space as a reward. Lucky carried it in its mouth and circled her feet several times.
Her phone rang on the couch. She walked over. Riley's name filled the screen. Emma answered. "What?"
"Emma, aren't you at the Ziyuan villa? Where are you?" Riley sounded as gentle as ever. Taylor and Jordan were with her.
They'd come to Ziyuan to try their luck, hoping to find Emma there. The guards wouldn't budge. Without a resident's permission, they weren't letting anyone in.
"Say what you want or I'm hanging up." Emma had no patience for any of them. Lucky jumped onto the couch and curled into her lap.
"Wait, Emmy. We grew up together. You might not trust them, but don't you trust me? I'm your older cousin. I only want to know if Blue Star Technology pressured you into selling. You're young. You don't understand these things. If you've made a mistake, there's still time to fix it."
Emma cleared her throat. "First, we didn't grow up together. Second, my parents had one child. Me. Third, those shares belonged to my parents, and they put them in my name. What I do with them is none of your business."
"And most importantly, if you keep harassing me, I'm calling the police. Do you understand?"