Burning Bright

Chapter 32

I had the distinct impression this wasn’t going to end well. He raised himself up onto his knees and then into a crouching position.

‘Eoin,’ I whispered. He glanced back towards me. ‘Be careful. I love you.’ He flicked a smile and then turned his attention back to the two men.

As Tim prepared to climb down towards the cub, Eoin launched himself at him, cannoning him into the man in the safari suit, and bringing them both down. As the three men struggled on the ground, I began to slide down the slope of the hollow towards the cub, hoping just to be able to release him. The fighting, and, I have to say, some choice swearing along with me scooching down the slope on my bum towards the cub turned the mother into a frenzy of activity, hurling herself at the barricade. I had no idea what I’d do if, or rather when, she got through as I could already hear the wood splintering.

I reached the bottom of the slope and ran towards the caged cub. It had been a simple mechanism, a simple drop down front, and I hoped would open easily, but it was extremely heavy and poorly made so didn’t lift as smoothly as it must have fallen, or had been damaged as it dropped. And then behind me was a crash that could only mean one thing. I turned to find myself face to face with a very angry tigress . . . and standing directly between her and her cub.

‘Miss Kate! Get in the cage!’ I heard Banjul shout.

I looked up to see him silenced with the butt of a gun being wielded by a familiar figure. Banjul slumped to the ground. Looking back at the tiger, she was stationary, sniffing the air. I glanced back to where Eoin was still fighting with the two men. It was nothing like in the movies. Dirty, scrappy, grabbing clothes and lots of shoving and pushing. But my concern was back on the tiger. She hadn’t moved so I returned my attention to the door of the cage, noticing where it was damaged at the bottom. I kicked the wood back into the runner and could finally lift it a short way, enough to release the cub who immediately ran towards his mother. She leaned down and licked him, but then a shout from Eoin had us all looking up.

Tim had finally extricated himself from Eoin’s reach while he was still wrestling with safari-suited man over the tranquiliser gun. I was expecting the tiger to immediately disappear with her cub, but she hadn’t, although was showing no interest in me whatsoever. Getting into the cage as Banjul had suggested would have been a brilliant idea, but I didn’t actually feel threatened by the tiger which was fortunate as I couldn’t lift the door any higher anyway.

As Tim raised his gun, I moved to stand in front of the tiger, more afraid of Tim than I was of her. If she’d wanted to kill me, she would have done so by now.

‘Move, you stupid bitch,’ he said, raising the gun to his shoulder.

‘No. You have no right to shoot her.’

‘Get out of the way. We want the cub.’

‘Over my dead body.’ I regretted the words as soon as they were out of my mouth, trying to sound braver than I felt, which was still difficult.

It raised a laugh from Tim, but then he yelled, ‘Move!’

I said nothing, but felt my knees trembling as I stood there defiantly. I could see his finger closing on the trigger as I found myself staring directly down the barrel of the rifle. If this was the end for me, then at least I had had the joy of loving Eoin burning bright in my heart and I wanted him to be my last thought.