John Gaveneau buys a tiger as part of his plans to set up a safari park. Meanwhile, John's stepdaughter, Kelly Taylor, takes her autistic younger brother, Tom, to a special hospital to be cared for while she is at college. However, Kelly's payment to the hospital is rejected and, upon calling her bank, she is informed that John withdrew all the money and closed the account.
After bringing the tiger home, John instructs his workers to board up the house in preparation for an approaching hurricane. Kelly confronts her stepfather and begs John to give her the remainder of the money, only to learn that he spent it all on the tiger. She protests that her mother (who committed suicide by taking an overdose of pills sometime prior to film) wanted the money to go to Kelly and Tom, but John justifies that there was no official will, so he took the funds for himself. He tries to assure Kelly she can still leave Tom in his care.
Upset, Kelly calls her college to defer her start until the second semester, citing family issues; however, as she has already deferred twice, Kelly's professor warns her that if she does not start college that semester, her scholarship will be given to someone else. Meanwhile, Tom is struggling with their mother's death; he frequently watches a home video of her at his 8th birthday and keeps her possessions with him.
Kelly puts Tom to bed. Later that night, the front door is observed open by an unknown person letting the tiger loose into the house. At 6:18 am, Kelly wakes up from a nightmare in which she suffocates Tom with a pillow. The radio informs her of Hurricane Isbael making landfall. She walks down to the kitchen for a drink and finds a sticky note on the refrigerator from John claiming to have gone to the store. While returning upstairs, Kelly hears a rustling sound and spots the tiger crossing the foyer beneath her.
Kelly discovers all the windows and doors have been boarded up, leaving her and Tom trapped inside the house. To her shock, Tom is nowhere to be found in his room. Upon realizing that her phone is missing from its usual spot on the charger, she suspects that she may have accidentally dropped it down the laundry chute along with her clothes. Kelly sneaks down to the laundry room, where she makes an attempt to call Montgomery County Emergency Services, but is greeted by an automated voice informing her of a high volume of calls due to the ongoing hurricane. Undeterred, she decides to contact John, who is busy drinking beer and gambling in a bar and has left his cell phone in his car.
Several close encounters follow. When the tiger breaks into the laundry room, Kelly narrowly escapes by climbing up the chute. She finds Tom and struggles to protect him due to his hypersensitivities and meltdowns. Kelly tries to use the computer in the master bedroom to call for help, but fails. When the tiger breaks in, she spills perfume to mask her and Tom's scent and hides them under the bed, but they are still attacked and barely escape. Kelly is unable to break down the boarded up front door so she leaves out raw meat laced with sleeping pills to distract the tiger. Back upstairs, she finds the attic nailed shut, much to her confusion, so she and Tom hide in a storage room instead. When the tiger corners them, Kelly uses a crowbar to break a hole through the wall for them to crawl out into the hallway, but not before the beast scratches her leg.
An injured Kelly and Tom hide in John's study. While trying to break the windows, she finds five bullets but not John's handgun. In despair, Kelly bandages her leg but then discovers that John has taken out life insurance policies on both her and Tom, and intends to collect the money upon their deaths. Meanwhile, the sheriff questions John on keeping the tiger at his property, to which John insists he can control the tiger by starving it and that the safari park will enable him to take care of Tom once Kelly leaves for college.
Reinvigorated, Kelly manages to find and load the gun. She sneaks out to go to the laundry room, but Tom goes to watch his birthday video. As the tiger approaches, she fires the gun, but the first chamber is empty and Kelly is forced to flee while shooting. She manages to briefly lock the tiger in the dining room but Tom refuses to leave the TV and hits her with the remote. The tiger chases Kelly into the kitchen and laundry room. In the laundry room, Kelly is able to break the board-covered window and climbs out just as the tiger breaks in and leaps to attack her. She makes it to her car in the hurricane, but as she is trying to start the engine, she remembers that Tom is still alone with the tiger.
Kelly returns to the house by climbing back in through the window. Upon finding Tom, Kelly comforts him over their mother's suicide and promises that she will never abandon him. With Tom's cooperation, Kelly regroups and creates a makeshift torch. She intends to lead him to the laundry room, but the tiger attacks. Kelly fights the tiger off with the torch and last bullet. She instructs Tom to climb into the massive chest freezer John had bought upon deciding to open the Safari Ranch, and climbs into it as well. Safe from the tiger, Kelly hums a lullaby for Tom, and he falls asleep.
The next morning, Kelly wakes to John removing the board from the front door with a drill. She and Tom climb out of the freezer and walk into the foyer to see John wielding a rifle, intending to kill the tiger. Kelly tries to implore John to let them go. John reveals Kelly and Tom's mother was going to leave him so he actually killed her, then removed her children from her life insurance. Suddenly, the tiger attacks and mauls John. It then proceeds to eat him, allowing Kelly and Tom to sneak out of the house. Standing outside among debris from the hurricane, Tom takes Kelly's hand and they begin to walk away.
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