AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I thought about that question for a long moment before saying, “Well, I guess it all started when my mom met my dad. My mom was young and influenced easily, and my dad had this weird grand notion that he was hot shit. That everyone wanted to be with him, and everyone loved the circus as much as he did. Which my mother did not. She just loved him.”
Pausing in my story as we headed to the tiger area, I pointed to the large bunny that took off like a shot, and his eyes followed it as he kept rolling. Seconds later, Coco appeared chasing after it. She took one large leap toward it, and seconds later the poor bunny took his last breath.
“Um…” Slone came to a rolling stop. “Are we sure they are allowed out?”
He sounded somewhat alarmed, so I stopped my original story and explained.
“See that collar around Coco’s neck?” I asked.
He studied the big cat that was now enjoying his meal. “Yeah.”
“That isn’t a shock collar. It’s a perimeter collar. When they get too far away from home base, which is in the bus, it starts emitting a very high-pitched sound which they hate. Their ears are very sensitive.”
“Do they roam free like that when there are people here?” he asked curiously.
“They do sometimes.” I shrugged. “It really depends on how many people. If there are just friends, like Banner’s friends and y’all, we let them go out. But we do tell those people that they’re out. Today, the others let them out after we left, so that’s why we didn’t ask y’all first.”
“Ah.” He nodded. “Do you want to say goodbye to them?”
I clicked my seat belt in place.
“No.” I shook my head. “Coco’s eating. I do not interfere or stop her from eating, even to say bye. The prey drive is high when she’s in hunting mode, and I know better than to mess with her. I don’t want her to confuse me with prey.”
“You sound knowledgeable in the subject,” he surmised.
“I am.” I shrugged nonchalantly. “I have a degree in zoology.”
His brows went up high, as if he was surprised to hear me say that.
“You have a degree in zoology, and you’re working at a circus?” he asked. “Is that what you want?”
I was already shaking my head.
“Back to my story from earlier,” I said as I pointed to the top of a tree where Melon was snoozing. “There’s Melon. Very top branch.”
“Wow,” he breathed. “Still freaky to see them out, though. Do you want to see her?”
I giggled, then said, “Melon’s sleeping, and I doubt I could get her to come down at all, even if I wanted to. She’s stubborn and has a will of steel.”
He nodded, looking slightly bummed.
He wanted to see them up close.
I would get him to them one day, even if I had to take them to him myself.
Everyone loved the idea of tigers, but actually getting out and interacting with them was a no-go.
“My mother was under the impression when she first met my father that she was in love with him deeply, and him her.” I rubbed my temple. “But the problem is, my dad was a roamer. He didn’t love anyone or anything but himself and his kids. Not a single woman that he knocked up was the love of his life. They couldn’t be when the circus was the love of his life.”
“Wow.” He winced. “I’ll bet your mom didn’t handle that well.”
I again watched his muscular hands and forearms as he started to pull back onto the road and head toward his friend’s place.
“My mom didn’t know about the other women—just like those women didn’t know about the previous women—until he moved on to the next one. My mom only found out that he definitely wasn’t in love with her, and in fact had already been seeing Zip’s mom, when she was a few months pregnant with Hades and me,” I said. “And needless to say, she didn’t take it well. When she tried to leave and never look back, my dad hired investigators and threw money at his problem until she came back. She tried to stay with us, tried to ignore my father, but my mom’s a very emotional person. She freakin’ hated being put on the back burner, and eventually, after a bit of time trying to stick it out, she decided that for her happiness and emotional wellbeing, she needed to leave. She was unfortunately stuck with leaving us behind, though. Again, my dad had a lot of money and power, with tons of friends in high places in his back pocket. She left, leaving us behind. And my dad guilt tripped us all into staying despite the majority of us wanting to find something beyond the circus life.”
“Oh,” he blew out a breath. “Why don’t y’all leave now?”
I gestured toward the circus behind me, even though it wasn’t in sight.
