Page 7 of Hell of a Thing

This man was unhinged, and I was at his mercy.

“What are you doing?” I asked, my voice far weaker than intended.

Without a verbal answer, he slid the knife along my exposed collarbone from one side to the center of my chest. I sucked in a breath and held it, not daring to breathe lest the movement press the blade deeper. He trailed the knife along the curve of the cleavage of my left breast, where it stopped at the strap of my camera resting in the neckline of my catsuit.

“Take it off.” It was an order. One spoken by his deep, rough voice, as though his vocal cords were sewn together like the rest of his gruesome face.

“What?” My heart thumped against my chest.

Someone behind me shuffled back a few steps, clearly wanting to avoid the situation. A sobering reminder that even in an area filled with hundreds of people, many wouldn’t stop to help if something genuinely bad happened.

But nothing bad would happen to me at this carnival, right? This was all for show. I was beginning to wonder if the risk ofdeathon the contract might not have meantaccidental death. No, no, contract or not, straight up murder was still illegal.

He had to follow the law like everyone else.

I just had to remember that. As scary as this man was and as real as his knife was, he was still a carnival worker, anemployee, not some monstrosity like he appeared to be. The jagged breaks in his skin must’ve been drawn on by a talented makeup artist. Or maybe they’d used prosthetics. That seemed more likely, and I found myself studying the gashes for some sign they were latex.

“Take. It. Off,” he growled, his patience growing thin. I wasn’t sure if he meant the camera or my clothes, but my refusal remained the same.

“No.”

His pupils dilated. His brows raised. The stitches in his top eyelids pulled taut, the skin puckering around the coarse thread. It took only a flick of his wrist to cut the strap of the camera, which rested safely in my hands.

Pain, like electricity, pulsed through my shoulder. Glancing down, blood seeped from the paper-thin cut he’d left behind. His other hand grabbed the tattered straps and yanked. In my attempt to hold on, I stumbled forward, nearly bumping into his broad chest.

“Mine. You signed the contract,” he stated.

Looking into his eyes once more, I got the distinct impression they really were dead. The brilliant blue sheen on top I’d mistaken as the color of his eyes now reminded me of cataracts. He shouldn’t be able to see through the milky film and yet, he stared straight at me and grinned as though pleased I’d noticed. My breath caught, my mind racing.

A bloody thumbprint flashed through my head, and the weight of realization made myshoulders stiffen.

I’d signed the fucking contract.I was at his mercy. Glancing around only confirmed it. Every single carnival-goer nearby who caught sight of my situation either shrank away with fear or, worse, they laughed.

Didn’t they realize I was hurt? Didn’t they care he held a knife to my gut, even now?

No. Of course not. They probably thought I was in on it—a paid actor. Were some of them paid to laugh? Certainly, but all of them couldn’t be. Flushing with embarrassment and anger, I relented and released my precious camera. Maybe he’d be adding it to the cellphones.

Grinning, the wretched clown stepped back and began to whistle, spinning the camera by the straps, his gaze never leaving mine.

Still reeling from the encounter, I decided this place might be too dangerous. Risking my life by jumping out of planes and off cliffs was one thing, but willfully putting my life in the hands of demented carnival workers was another. Not to mention, I wanted to claim my camera before someone else could, if that was an option. The spell from earlier broken, I made to step out of line.

“Next!” the woman at the gate called. When had the line advanced so much? I was near the front, the black of the entrance’s mouth steps away. A firm hand gripped my shoulder, shoving me forward. From the corner of my eye, I caught the patchwork face, partially obscured by my camera, as he snapped a picture of me stumbling through the mouth. I barely caught the jagged ridge of one of the clown broken teeth, steadying myself even as the plywood dug into my palm.

People poured around him, waving the credulous sight away as cheesy Halloween attire. They threatened to trample me, forcing my release of the wooden anchor, and shuffled me into the haunted house even as I protested, trying to squeeze through them.

“No, stop, please. I don’t want to go in,” I called out, but the sound of excited chatter around me drowned out my voice. Once I was past the door, I pressed myself against the wall until the crowd passed, but when I turned to leave, the door swung shut with a deafening bang, and the room filled with a flickering, dim red light. Any attempt to push the door open failed.

The air inside was thick and heavy. Clutching my chest, I struggled to force it into my lungs. A feeble bang on the door yielded no result, and with the haunting image of that hateful clown and his terrifying eyes still in my mind, I knew that even if it did, I was fucked.

My breaths came short and quick, growing more ragged as the panic built. Forcing my eyes shut, I pictured landscape all around. Instead of absolute darkness, I could see green grass and tan fields coming closer as cold air whipped strands of hair across my face with a soothing sting. Somehow, free-falling towards the earth seemed more feasible than inching deeper into this musty building. There was a time, though, on my first jump when I hesitated, just like now, but I never let that fear stop me. The payoff was always worth pushing past my nerves. I just needed to breathe through the panic, just like I did then. There were safety protocols in place here. There had to be. Even if I couldn’t see them.

Something tickled my nose. My eyes shot open as quickly as my hand smacked my face, expecting a bug of sorts, only to find my hair as the guilty culprit.

There was a breeze. It didn’t feel like it, but there was. There was air here, even if it felt like I was suffocating. I took what should have been a deep breath and choked, curling forward with a cough.

Where was my parachute now?

My clip?

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