Tiger Queen: Reverse Harem Romance

by Cassie Cole

  “I’m so sorry,” he whispered.

  “I’m sorry too,” I said.

  We shared a quiet moment, then collected ourselves.

  “We have to call the police.”

  Anthony gestured at the table. “He took my phone.”

  “Then we need to tell your brothers.”

  We ran outside and along the path heading back to the house. The crickets and cicadas were silent now, as if they understood that there was danger in the air. The only sound was of our feet crunching on the gravel of the path.

  “He took your laptop,” I said absently. “He thought I would be able to login. When I couldn’t, he smashed it against the wall.”

  “Aw man,” he said.

  He sounded off. Detached. “Anthony, I can’t imagine what you’re feeling right now…”

  “It’s fine,” he said. “We’ll worry about it later.”

  The path turned and we both slowed down. We had accidentally caught up to Carl, who was fifty feet ahead of us. The gun was still in his hand while he ran, so Anthony put a finger to his lips and we followed slowly, from a safe distance.

  “What if he goes into the house?” I hissed. “We have to warn David and Jake.”

  “He wouldn’t hurt them,” Anthony replied.

  “Are you sure about that?”

  His silence was answer enough. Fortunately, Carl climbed up into his monster truck instead. The engine roared to life like a wild animal, and the entire vehicle bounced up and down just from the engine vibrations. Gravel sprayed all over the other cars as the monster truck flew down the driveway.

  David and Jake came running out of the house moments later. “What the hell is—” David cut off as he saw me and Anthony standing there. “Who took the truck? Mary Beth?”

  “It’s dad,” Anthony said. “He’s alive.”

  Jake’s hands clenched into fists and he trembled with rage. David’s mouth hung open, and he looked to me for confirmation that this wasn’t some sick joke.

  “It’s true,” I said. “We have to call the police…”

  Jake jumped into his truck and pulled the keys down from the visor. I knocked on the window and asked, “What are you doing?”

  He rolled down the window. “Going after him. I want some fucking answers.”

  Before he could drive away, I ran around to the passenger side and hopped in. Anthony and David were right behind me and climbed into the back seat of the cab.

  “We want answers too,” David said as an explanation.

  Jake flew down the driveway, through the zoo parking lot, and onto the main road. The monster truck was in the distance, aglow with non-standard lights.

  “What’s the plan here?” David asked.

  Jake grunted. “Plan?”

  “I assumed you had a plan.”

  “The plan is to catch up to dad. I haven’t thought past that.”

  I twisted to look at David. “Do you have your phone on you? We need to call the police.”

  “On it.” David began dialing.

  “I can’t believe he’s alive,” Anthony said.

  “I can.” Jake’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. “This is exactly the kind of bullshit dad would pull. How did you two get downstairs so fast?”

  “I found him about half an hour ago,” I admitted. “He was in the house. He threatened me with a gun and he stole all the GoFundMe money.”

  “That son of a bitch,” Jake growled. The engine noise rose as he accelerated.

  “Yes, I’d like to report… Um. A robbery, I guess?” David said on the phone. “My father, Carl Haines, is alive. He’s currently driving down state road forty-three toward Fayetteville. I don’t know the model. It’s a big-ass monster truck that’s taking up both lanes. It’s impossible to miss.”

  “He threatened to kill Rachel,” Anthony said. “He held her down in front of the band saw.”

  “He did what?” Jake rolled down the window and screamed, “SLOW DOWN YOU PIECE OF SHIT! Your sons want to talk to you!”

  “Shut up!” David hissed, hand covering the receiver.

  We flew through the tiny town of Blue Lake. When we came within fifty feet of Carl’s monster truck, a cloud of black smoke puffed out of the exhaust and Carl accelerated away from us.

  “He knows we’re on him, now,” Anthony said.

  “Good.” Jake swerved our truck around a corner, narrowly remaining on the road without flipping over. I quickly put on my seatbelt and then held onto the door handle.

  “We just drove through Blue Lake,” David said on the phone. “Mile markers? I don’t know. Look it up on a map! Just send some guys out here!”

  We pursued Carl down the small, winding road. The trees on either side leaned over the road, making it feel like we were driving through a tunnel. I glanced at the truck clock. It was a good thing that it was four in the morning or other cars might have been on the road.

  “Hold on,” Jake said.

  “What are you going to do?” I demanded.

  He swerved the truck into the oncoming lane and accelerated. He was trying to pull up alongside Carl’s monster truck, but the vehicle was so big it was taking up most of the other lane. Jake blared on his horn and flashed his high beams on and off.

  “PULL OVER!” he shouted out the window. “YOU OWE US A GODDAMN EXPLANATION YOU DEADBEAT ASSHOLE!”

  “Be careful,” Anthony insisted. He sounded afraid. “If we crash trying to catch him…”

  Jake snarled like an angry tiger. “Fuck safety. He’s not getting away with—”

  Everything seemed to happen in slow motion.

  We rounded a turn and the headlights of an oncoming truck swept across the trees and blinded us. I screamed. Jake swerved back into our lane and slammed on the brakes. David’s phone flew through the air and clattered onto the dashboard. The seatbelt dug into my waist and chest painfully, but it kept me in the truck. Anthony hit the back of my seat and groaned.

  The vehicle coming in the opposite direction was a large box truck, and it tried to swerve off the road. Carl spun his huge truck but it was too late, and he was going too fast. The monster truck smashed into the back side of the box truck, sending its contents flying in all directions as the box truck crashed. The collision sent Carl’s monster truck into a roll, and it tumbled end over end three times before coming to a stop upside-down.

  The contents of the box truck began falling around us. Huge red carcasses exploded on the road and smashed into the hood of Jake’s truck. Smaller, slimier objects rained down on the road and our windshield like long pieces of hail.

  Still gripping the steering wheel, Jake peered forward. “What the fuck is that?”

  I let out a delirious laugh. “That’s a chicken neck. And those are cow carcasses in the road.”

  The box truck had come to rest on its side, smoke drifting out of the hood. The driver-side door opened and Bobby John climbed out. He stumbled a bit when he hit the ground, but managed to walk toward us without any apparent injury.

  “What the fucking shit! Jakey?” he said in his thick accent.

  “Bobby John! Are you okay?”

  He touched his mullet, his gut, and then his groin. “All the important parts seem to be intact. I ain’t no cat, but I think I just used up one of my lives.” He peered into the truck. “Damn, Jake. You takin’ the whole family for a drive?”

  “We were chasing our father. He’s alive.”

  Bobby John poked a finger in his ear and twisted it. “Yeah, I must have brain damage or some such. It sounded like you said your dad’s alive.”

  “He was driving the monster truck…” Anthony began.

  “Look!” David pointed. Carl was climbing out of the smashed windshield of the upside-down monster truck. “He’s alive!”

  Carl marched toward us. Our headlights reflected off of something shiny in his hand.

  “And he’s got his gun…”

  “Gun! Aw shit…” Bobby John looked in both directions and then took
off at a dead sprint down the road, in the opposite direction of Carl. I couldn’t blame him.

  “We should have gotten some weapons out of the supply shed,” Jake said.

  “And do what with them? Shoot dad?” David demanded.

  “Right now, after hearing what he did to Rachel?” Jake replied. “I’m not opposed to it.”

  Carl’s left arm hung limply at his side and blood trickled from a dozen cuts. His red mohawk was bent over, like a wave about to crash. He stopped a hundred feet away and raised the gun.

  “Get out of the truck!”

  “The police should be on their way,” David whispered. “If we can stall him…”

  “Stay inside,” Jake told me, and then the three of them climbed out.

  “Nice to see you, dad,” David said bitterly.

  “I need that truck,” Carl replied. His words were slurred, and he swayed on his feet.

  “That’s it?” David shouted. “We thought you were dead, and the first thing you say to us is that you need Jake’s truck?”

  “Kind of fitting,” Jake said, voice taut with rage. “Never been much of a father. No reason to start now.”

  “How could you, dad?” Anthony demanded. I thought he meant the whole faking-his-death thing, but then he added, “How could you threaten Rachel like that?”

  Carl turned his head and spat. “That’s what I think of your girlfriend. Tearing down my zoo. My legacy!”

  David spread his arms with exasperation. “What’d you expect us to do? You left us with a bankrupt zoo and hundreds of animals to feed and care for. Moving them to real zoos and sanctuaries was the best thing for everyone.”

  “That zoo was for you,” Carl replied. “All of you. Everything I did was for you! My boys! I cared about you…”

  “You never cared about us!” Anthony said in a voice that was so anguished that it made my heart ache. “You treated us like unpaid labor you could boss around. Sixteen hour days until we were old enough to leave. You used me as bait to catch a tiger, dad! Don’t deny it—don’t you dare try to deny it. I was eight years old and Hans escaped, and you used me as fucking bait so you could tranq him. That’s how much you cared about us!”

  Carl still held the gun in our general direction, but his arm was shaking. “Because you three were the most ungrateful, spoiled brats. None of you wanted to work at the zoo! You abandoned me as soon as you were old enough! Leaving me to die in that zoo!”

  “I stayed for years,” Jake shot back. “Five years I remained as your whipping boy.”

  Carl scoffed. “And yet you still left. Just like them. You left your zoo to struggle and go bankrupt…”

  “It was your zoo,” Jake shot back. “Not ours. It was your shitty zoo with illegal breeding and terrible living conditions and drugged up animals taking photos for people to post on Facebook and Instagram. You chose to make it what it was. We never had a choice.”

  Carl trembled with rage, or anguish, or maybe adrenaline. “I got a choice now. Give me your truck.”

  “No, dad.”

  “I said give me your goddamn truck or I’m gonna fucking shoot somebody.”

  Headlights shone behind us as a car came around the corner. I prayed that it was the police, but they wouldn’t have been coming from that direction, and there were no lights or sirens. It was an old Volkswagen Beetle with so much rust you couldn’t see the paint. It pulled to a stop next to our truck and the driver hopped out.

  “Mary Beth?” Anthony said.

  I scrambled to roll down the window. “RUN! Mary Beth, get out of here! You have to go!”

  She stood there with a confused look on her face. Like she didn’t understand what the big deal was, even though there were two wrecked vehicles, a man holding a gun, and thousands of pounds of frozen meat all over the road.

  “Mary Beth, please, you have to listen to me…” I begged.

  She reached inside her vehicle, down beside the seat. Suddenly a gun was in her hand. She took cover behind her open door and aimed the gun at Carl.

  “US FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE!” she shouted into the night. “DROP YOUR WEAPON!”

  43

  Rachel

  Five sets of jaws dropped at the same time. Mary Beth, the ditsy zoo guide with the bubbly personality of a cheerleader, was aiming a gun like a professional.

  “I SAID DROP THE WEAPON!” she repeated with shocking authority. “DO IT NOW!”

  “What the fuck…” Jake said.

  Carl lowered his gun, and then he did the last thing I expected. He started laughing. Long, belly-aching laughs like someone who had just been admitted to the insane asylum. His merriment echoed off the surrounding trees and into the dark sky.

  “I told you,” he said to no one in particular. “I told you the feds was watching me. Sneaking around, bugging my phone, inserting themselves into my organization. I told you I wasn’t crazy. There’s your proof right there! Ah hah hah!”

  “THIS IS YOUR LAST WARNING,” Mary Beth boomed. “IT DOESN’T HAVE TO GO LIKE THIS, CARL HAINES. DROP THE GUN.”

  “Now that’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard,” Carl said.

  And he raised the gun.

  The gunshot was a violent sound, sudden and painful in my ears. I gasped and whipped my head toward Mary Beth, expecting to see her collapsed on the road with blood oozing from a wound. But she remained in the same place as before, her arms outstretched in the A-frame position.

  Carl cried out and clutched his hand, which was covered with dark blood in the light of the truck headlights. The gun was on the ground now.

  “My hand!” Carl cried. “You shot my hand.”

  Mary Beth sprinted forward, kicked the gun away, and then kicked out the back of Carl’s knee. He crumpled, but before he hit the ground she was on top of him, pinning him to the pavement and using a zip tie to bind his wrists together.

  “What kind of a bitch shoots someone’s hand off!” Carl wailed.

  Mary Beth let out a chuckle. “Quit your whining. It’s only your pinky! That’s the most useless finger. You’ll be fine.”

  The police arrived a few minutes later with their sirens blaring. They took stock of everything, loaded Carl into a cruiser, and drove him away. Cleanup crews arrived and began pushing the meat to the side of the road with brooms and shovels. A US Fish and Wildlife vehicle appeared with two of Mary Beth’s coworkers. One of them handed her an official USFWS jacket.

  Bobby John came walking back up the road after that. “Hey y’all!” he said with a friendly wave. “I wasn’t scared back there. No sir. I just had to pee. Got a weak bladder.”

  “You were the driver of this box truck?” Mary Beth asked.

  Bobby John grinned from ear to ear. “Hi there, miss. I’m Robert Jonathan Cartwell, but you can call me Bobby John.”

  “We’ve met,” she said. “I was an employee at the zoo.”

  “Right, right, but that was before I knew you was a cop.” He leaned a hand on her car. “Ya know, I like a woman who has authority. Some men are intimidated by it. Not me.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Are you seriously hitting on me? Your truck is on its side and thousands of pounds of meat are strewn all over the road.”

  “Can’t do nothin’ about that now,” Bobby John said smoothly. “Say. You got any handcuffs?”

  She sighed and turned to me. “We need to take you in for questioning. Get your statements on everything. I promise the questioning will be gentle. Unlike the interrogation you gave me in the trailer.” She smiled to let me know it was a joke.

  “Can I come?” Bobby John asked. “I got lots to say!”

  I rode with Mary Beth while the three Haines sons took one of the other cruisers. Bobby John was left behind to give his statement to the local police.

  After a few miles of silence, I said, “You’re Fish and Wildlife, huh?”

  Mary Beth grunted in the affirmative. “The service has been trying to get someone on the inside of Crazy Carl’s Zoo for years. Tough to
do when the owner is a paranoid psychopath!”

  “We weren’t as thorough with the hiring process.”

  “Nope! It’s funny, because I was disappointed at first. You guys were doing everything right. You ceased all breeding, closed the zoo, and stopped the dangerous photos. You even insisted on moving the animals to accredited locations, instead of just selling them to whichever private buyer you could find. Working undercover is boring when nothing illegal is going on!”

  “Sorry to disappoint you,” I said with a grin.

  “We were going to drop the case entirely, but one of the analysts back at the office was certain that Carl Haines was still alive. It wasn’t the first fishy plane crash death out of Costa Rica, so they let me stick around at the zoo in case he popped back up. Good thing I did, huh!”

  “Wow,” I shook my head. “This makes me feel better about yelling at you in the trailer. I knew you were hiding something all along.”

  “Oh man, yeah!” she replied. “I thought I was caught for sure! It would’ve looked really bad for me to blow my cover. The boys back at the office never would have let me live that down. I’m glad Brandon finally tipped his hand and got you guys off my back.”

  “Me too.”

  We drove to a police station outside of Fayetteville. I was led into an interrogation room where Mary Beth and another US Fish and Wildlife agent questioned me about everything that had happened. I spent an hour answering their questions and detailing the events of that morning, from finding Carl in the house to almost being decapitated by the band saw to the car crash on the main road. It was an intimidating process even though I knew I was innocent, and I was when it was over.

  While the boys were questioned, Mary Beth brought me some coffee in the police waiting room and told me what they knew. Carl had been using a fake name in Costa Rica: Carlos Vaquero. He returned to the United States four days ago, driving up through Mexico before crossing the border. It turned out that he had been using the fake name for over a year to siphon money into a separate bank account to use after he faked his death. It wasn’t just a spur-of-the-moment plan.

  “He even had a safety deposit box at a bank in Fayetteville,” Mary Beth told me. “We’re waiting on a judge to sign a warrant to let us open that up. God knows what we’ll find inside.”