Tropical Tiger Spy: BBW Tiger Shifter Paranormal Romance (Shifting Sands Resort Book 1)

by Zoe Chant

  His whole vibe was of a greasy salesman, but the idea was so appealing to Amber that she instantly agreed. “Yes. That is perfect. When are you leaving?”

  “The van is already gassed up and ready to go,” Jimmy said brightly. “Be at the resort entrance in ten minutes!”

  Something about his eagerness left Amber feeling dirty, but she was too grateful for an excuse to escape to examine the feeling.

  She didn't want to think about any feelings, too sure that she had made a terrible mistake in losing her heart altogether.

  “Is his name really Mr. Big?” she had to ask.

  Jimmy laughed. “Not Big,” he clarified. “Beehag. It's an old English name.”

  “Ah!” Amber tried to laugh with him, but it came out very dry and humorless. She suspected the mysterious man was going to remain Mr. Big in her head for a long time.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Tony watched Amber flee with confusion and dismay, not even comforted by the exciting sight of her gorgeous little ass as she ran across the sand. What had he done wrong? He felt the pull of his mate at an undeniable level, but every time he got close emotionally, she seemed to get skittish, and this time he'd managed to scare her right off.

  He scrubbed a hand across his face.

  He'd also managed to tell her more about his agency than he was authorized to, and knew that was going to be some paperwork. There were a few shifters in his chain of command who might be tolerant about the slip due to the fact that Amber was his mate, but there were others who would definitely not.

  And it was going to be a tough fact to prove, given that Amber was hell-bent on running away from him.

  After giving a hefty sigh, he hauled himself up out of the beach chair. A glance down the beach at the watchful dragon lifeguard convinced him to fold up both his chair and Amber's abandoned one, and haul them back to the beach shed.

  Back at the cottage, he booted up his laptop and picked up the cellphone, flipping open the folder that Scarlet had given him.

  The signal was spotty, and if it was cloudy, he'd be out of luck; today he had solid bars. The wifi, on the other hand, was down. That was another conflict he'd had with Scarlet at his arrival. “We encourage our guests to disconnect,” she had told him scathingly. “And we're on a private island off a foreign country reliant on our own solar power; Internet reliability is not a priority. This is made clear in your rental agreement.”

  Tony wondered if there was more to it than that. It certainly was down at perfectly inconvenient times.

  He dialed the cellphone and waited, hoping the signal held. While he waited for the connection to be made, he flipped through the paperwork for a second time, hoping to find something new in the information.

  “Rick,” the voice at the other end finally said with disinterest.

  “Richie!” Tony said.

  There was a slight satellite delay, and Richard asked, “How's Costa Rica, Tony? Is it grrrrrrreeeeeeeat?”

  “Har, har,” Tony said, but he expected the familiar jibe. “Hey, listen up. I don't know how long my cellphone signal will last.”

  “Wow, Tony, you mean you've actually gotten some work done and have information? You're not just lying on the sand in the sun flirting with pretty girls at the clothing-optional resort on the agency dime?”

  “I got the paperwork from Scarlet, finally,” Tony said, without taking the bait. “And believe me, I had to work for it.”

  “Did you flex your muscles for her?” Rick teased. “Make promises? Rise to the occasion?”

  Tony bit back his desire to tell Rick about Amber. He wasn't even sure what to tell Rick–was Amber going to continue to bolt away from him like he'd offended her in some way? Was it just taking her a little time to get used to the idea of a mate? Tony shook his head and brought himself back to the conversation. The satellite delay covered his confusion.

  “There's nothing very helpful here,” Tony said dryly. “Notes about food allergies and preferences, what activities they attended, what shifter type they were. Nothing seems to tie them together at all–they are all different kinds of animals, from different places. Some of them attended morning yoga, some of them didn't. One was allergic to peanuts.”

  “We can put it in a database and feed it to Rochelle,” Rick suggested. “She can pick patterns out of nothing.”

  Tony was squinting at the pages. “Yeah,” he said, distracted by a sudden thought. “I'll scan these and set them to email as soon as I've got wifi or data again.”

  “Send me photos, too,” Rick laughed. “Selfies that happen to have good beach babes in the background would be preferred.”

  Tony licked his lips. “Look, I have a favor to ask.”

  “One worth a great selfie from the beach? Maybe one that doesn't happen to have you in it?”

  “I'll send you a dozen,” Tony promised, smiling to think of getting the dragon in the shot, or the English boar couple who liked to bask in animal form.

  “What's the favor?”

  “I'm looking for a person, maybe a couple, on the run. One of them might have been an Andean mountain cat. They would have passed through Lakefield, about twenty six years ago.”

  Tony heard Rick typing. The sound was strangely tinny over the poor connection.

  “Lakefield Ontario, or Lakefield Minnesota?” Rick asked.

  “Minnesota, I'd guess.” She had a Midwestern accent, Tony thought. It was outrageous that he could know someone as intensely as he knew Amber and not even know if she was American or Canadian. “Look for a church called Saint Mary's. A baby was dropped there.”

  “Who happened to be an Andean mountain cat shifter,” Rick guessed. “I've never even heard of an Andean mountain cat. Pretty, aren't they!” He must have looked it up on the Internet while they were talking.

  Tony thought about Amber's petite, lush form, and her incredible golden-brown eyes. “You have no idea,” he said. His thoughts were starting to form into a pattern.

  “Pretty and ... rare.” He picked up the paperwork in front of him again, sifting through the pages with a fresh outlook. “One of these missing shifters was a white tiger,” Tony said thoughtfully. “And one was a sand cat.”

  “You don't see many of those,” Rick agreed.

  “Another was a Borneo bay cat, and here's a Northern quoll.” Tony said, unease rising in his throat as he skimmed faster, flipping through the pages, now with a specific field in mind.

  “A what?”

  Tony wasn't sure if Rick didn't know what a quoll was, or if he hadn't heard over the static on the line. “A quoll,” he repeated. “It's an Australian marsupial.” He wouldn't have known that himself, if it hadn't been noted on the form.

  “I'm starting to see a pattern,” Rick said.

  “Rare. All of the missing shifters are rare.”

  “Like someone's ... collecting them?”

  “Amber,” Tony said, ice in his throat. He dropped the phone, not even sure if he'd hung it up first, and bolted for the door. The files spilled off the desk behind him, but he didn't stop.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “A few of the guests” proved to be just three other people–the English boar couple who turned up their noses at Amber's sandy sandals and simple tank top, and a flinty-eyed man who spoke Spanish with Jimmy without acknowledging Amber's presence.

  Nothing less than grateful for his company to spare her Jimmy's attention, Amber went for an empty seat in the far back of the van, even knowing that the bumps would be the worst there. She had a bottle of water, her phone in her pocket, and a straw hat–courtesy of the resort–to keep the worst of the sun from her face.

  Most of the drive was through thick jungle, though, over a rain-pitted road that wandered seemingly randomly through gullies and along ridges, further than Amber would have guessed possible on an island of finite size. She had drained half her bottle by the time the road finally resolved into a driveway and passed through a set of heavy iron gates. To her surprise, there were g
uards at the gate, each carrying a formidable-looking rifle.

  Maybe Mr. Big–Mr. Beehag–just really liked his privacy.

  The van drove past the very large house to a second structure, much more modest, and Amber was happy to escape from the deafening metal box and stretch her legs again. She was glad for her hat here; the jungle had been cleared a good distance around the estate–which looked more like a compound to her eyes–and the sun was beating down. They were higher than she thought they would be, and she could see far out over the jungle, to the distant ocean beyond and below.

  Mr Beehag proved to be younger than Amber had expected of an island-owning eccentric billionaire, with a quick smile that showed perfect white teeth. The teeth seemed odd paired with the sophisticated English accent. Amber couldn't help but compare him unfavorably with Tony, and wanted to kick herself for thinking about him again.

  Surprisingly, he all but ignored the English couple, who introduced themselves as the Bellinghams, and took Amber's hand.

  “Welcome to the arboretum,” he said smoothly. To her befuddlement, he kissed it. “You would be Amber, and you must call me Alistair.” It wasn't so much a suggestion as a command.

  “All right,” Amber said, raising eyebrows at him. “Alistair, then. Thank you for having us here.”

  She tried to include the others in her statement, but found that Jimmy and the Spanish-speaking man had both vanished.

  The English boar couple looked unimpressed, but made vague polite noises.

  “I assure you, the pleasure is mine!” Alistair's smile was distractingly white, and anything but vague.

  Something about the way he looked at her made the tiny hairs at the back of Amber's neck rise, and she was glad when he led them all to the doors of the arboretum and unlocked them at a very modern-looking keypad.

  The arboretum, at least, was everything that Jimmy had promised, and Amber was just as happy that he didn't reappear while Alistair showed them around.

  The eccentric billionaire was an educated host, and he knew all of the plants in his collection. He had entertaining stories about most of them, and was clearly proud of some of the very exotic and rare flowers he had convinced to blossom.

  Amber quickly forgot how oddly attentive he was, and found herself in easy conversation about fertilizer choices and the use of blooming chemicals. Costa Rica had a reputation for ecotourism and going organic, and Amber couldn't help but approve of the fact that Alistair was following that trend.

  They were standing at the base of what Alistair insisted was one of the rarest palm varieties in the world when Amber realized that she hadn't noticed the other couple in an unusually long time–and also, she was starving! The sun was just beginning to descend towards the ocean.

  “Did we lose the Bellinghams?” she asked. “And goodness, I should be getting back to the resort for dinner ...” Her water was long since gone; she had been using the empty bottle to keep her hands from fidgeting for some time.

  “I am a shameful host,” Alistair said, with a glint in his eyes that made Amber suspect nothing was an accident. “We bored the Bellinghams back to the resort some hours ago; Jimmy took them. You must stay to supper with me while he returns, and I will show you the rest of my collection.”

  Amber's curiosity was piqued; they had passed several sets of electronically locked doors that she had wondered about, and the walls were all much higher than privacy strictly demanded.

  “I ...” she thought about Tony; was he wondering where she was?

  I don't owe him anything, she told herself fiercely. It isn't a real relationship.

  He hadn't even been honest about his profession, at first. She couldn't help but remember his face as he told her she was beautiful, and the way his thumb made circles on her hand.

  “I'd love to have dinner,” she said firmly.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Tony sprinted for Amber's cottage, and when he found a locked door, knocked ferociously.

  “Amber!” he called. “Amber, answer me!”

  When she didn't, he circled the place, and easily climbed onto the porch without resorting to shifting. His tiger roared for release, but he was a little afraid of the intensity of the fear mounting in his chest. The big glass doors were uncurtained, and the rooms inside were dark and empty. Unless Amber was cowering in the bathroom ...

  She is not, his tiger snarled at him.

  He stalked back along the path, first trying the dining hall, then the pool. He didn't want to believe the tiger inside, who was insisting that Amber wasn't here, that she wasn't anywhere nearby. He stood at the upper entrance of the dining hall, breathing in the delicious scent of whatever Chef had invented for dinner and hating his helplessness.

  Scarlet.

  Scarlet would know where his mate was. Tony wasn't sure if Scarlet was behind the disappearances or not, but he knew to the bottom of his soul that she had secrets, and that she knew whatever was going on within the borders of her resort.

  The path to Scarlet's office was half steps and half steep path, and he nearly collided with a curvy woman in jeans and cowboy boots who made Amber look diminutive but still barely came to Tony's shoulder. She was carrying her own luggage and she was on a cellphone.

  “Jenna,” the blonde was saying with vinegar. “Their mother, Jenna Bruin. Don't make me fly from Costa Rica to set you straight. Those are my kids, and if I have to, that is what I will do. You will not enjoy it if I end up leaving my vacation because of your incompetence, and your school will not be happy with the lawsuit I slap you with, so I suggest that you get it fixed immediately.”

  She was clearly enraged, and Tony's already activated tiger recognized the riled up bear barely contained behind her fair skin. They glared at each other a long heartbeat on the path while whoever was at the other end of the phone sputtered and folded like a wet paper towel, and Tony, with gritted teeth, took himself carefully around her on the narrow walkway.

  Even he wasn't going to mess with an enraged momma bear.

  Scarlet was sitting behind her desk, frowning at paperwork with a familiar expression, and she didn't paste on a customer service smile when Tony burst into her close office without knocking.

  “Can I help you?” she asked acidly.

  “Where's Amber?”

  Scarlet didn't even blink in surprise, only narrowed her eyes a small amount and gave Tony an appraising look. “She left with a group of visitors for a tour of the arboretum at the Beehag estate.”

  “How long ago?” Tony glanced at his wrist, and realized he still wasn't wearing a watch. Scarlet didn't have any clocks up in her office.

  “About five hours ago,” Scarlet said without having to check. “They should be back right about now.” She was all business, green eyes narrow and thoughtful.

  Tony wanted to break something, destroy Scarlet's office or smash something valuable. It would serve the smug bitch right if he unleashed his furious tiger right now.

  It took all of his restraint to instead grind out, “Where?!” and let Scarlet, moving infuriatingly slow, lead him out to the front gates of the resort.

  The van was pulling up just as they got there, and Tony didn't even have to watch the British couple climb out. He knew Amber wasn't there as surely as he knew that the sky was above him. Jimmy, on the other hand, was there, getting out of the driver's seat as if nothing at all in the world was amiss when everything in the world clearly was.

  It was only a few steps around the ugly van, and Tony could pull Jimmy the rest of the way out of the driver's seat by the lapels.

  “Where. Is. Amber?” he demanded stiffly.

  Keeping his tiger inside was like trying to keep a hurricane in a bottle.

  Jimmy, all big eyes and clearly rising panic, stammered, “She was invited to dinner with Mr. Beehag. I was just told to drive these nice folks back to the resort.”

  The boar couple was clinging to each other, staring at the conflict with big, alarmed eyes. The gardener had materialized f
rom nowhere and was watching them with a dark look, and a construction worker who had been working on the stonework had stopped his work to observe in interest and alarm.

  “I will kill you if she is even the tiniest bit hurt.” Tony said the words through bared teeth, very close to Jimmy's face, aware that he was holding most of the man's weight in his clenched fists.

  “I swear,” Jimmy wept. “I was just told to drive these people back, that's all I know!”

  Lies! Tony's tiger insisted.

  Jimmy changed underneath his fist into a squirming, snarling weasel, all clashing, razor-sharp teeth as his clothing fell away in Tony's hands.

  Just as fast, Tony was changing, his clothing ripping from the striped fur and Jimmy's clothing shredded before his claws. The weasel was ripping at his front legs, all teeth and claws and crazed frenzy, and Tony swiped at him with a paw and missed as it swarmed at his face, snapping teeth across his sensitive nose.

  Before he could react, Scarlet was moving forward with more speed than she ought to have in human form and she had the weasel by the scruff of the neck. Then she was suddenly holding a very naked, terrified-looking Jimmy with one hand at his neck as if he was no more than a misbehaving schoolboy.

  “You!” she said ferociously. “I will deal with you myself!”

  She met Tony's eyes and Tony could not figure out what animal he was seeing there, beyond sheer power.

  I am going for my mate, he told her, in the silent animal speech that some shifters could use. He had no doubts that she would understand him.

  Scarlet's eyes narrowed, as if she was going to argue with him, but instead, she only said out loud, “You will go faster through the jungle than the road. Follow the ridge east. The estate is on the opposite side of the island.”