Page 25 of Carnival’s Playground

"Listen up," Dutch forcefully begins, planting his thick knuckles on the table. "The city gave us the green light to open the gates at six tonight, but we are running on modified protocol. Nobody operates solo. We are running paired watches on every sector from now until the final show closes at midnight."

"What about the haunt walk?" Frank gruffly asks from the end of the bench. "That maze is narrow. Two guys in the control corridor will trip over each other."

"Then you trip over each other, Frank," Dutch hot-temperedly snarls. "I am not having another line cut. Pairs stick together, and you check in on channel one every thirty minutes on the dot. If a station misses a check-in by sixty seconds, we pull the main breakers and evacuate the zone."

Avery nudges her knee against mine under the table, leaning in close enough that her breath tickles my ear. "Looks like you are stuck being my bodyguard for the duration, biker."

"There are worse jobs," I quietly murmur back. Her knee presses harder against mine, sending a jolt of pure electricity straight up my spine.

"Assignments are as follows," Dutch loudly barks, cutting through the low murmur in the tent. "Petey, you are with Frank on the midway and main gates. Marcy, you manage the box office and backstage radio logs with Millie. Wyatt, you and Avery take the high rigging, generator hubs, and the haunt walk mechanics. That is the most technical ground to cover, and you two work the fastest together."

"Understood," I tell him, nodding once.

"Dismissed," Dutch gruffly says. "Grab your gear. Pre-show checks start at noon."

We finish our coffee fast, pack our tool belts, and head out into the crisp morning air. The wind has shifted out of the north, carrying the dry, dusty smell of the Texas plains, whipping the red and black carnival flags against their wooden poles.

We hit the big top first. Avery clips her safety harness on, climbs the ladder with that smooth, rhythmic grace that makes it impossible to look away, and hooks her lanyard to the center spar. I follow right behind her, testing each rung with my full weight before moving up.

For the next two hours, we methodically work through every single cable, clevis pin, and safety catch on Marcy's high-wire apparatus. My hands move on instinct, torquing nuts and checking safety wire, but every time I shift position, my shoulder brushes Avery's, and the memory of her mouth on mine four hours ago turns the cold morning air straight into a furnace.

"This secondary line is solid," Avery professionally reports, yanking hard on the braided steel wire near the center mast. "No burrs, no fraying, tension is dead-on eighty foot-pounds."

I lean over her shoulder, placing my gloved hand right over hers on the cable, feeling the steady strength in her grip. "Looks clean to me, spitfire."

She turns her head, her nose barely an inch from mine, her green eyes flashing with that familiar, wicked spark. "You double-checking my measurements, Carnival, or just looking for an excuse to get close to me?"

"Both," I shamelessly admit, refusing to back up.

She laughs, a low, husky sound that vibrates straight through the steel platform beneath our boots. "Keep that up and Dutch is going to dock your pay for loitering."

"Dutch can try," I dryly reply, and she shakes her head with a grin before unclipping her harness to head down the ladder.

We clear the big top, inspect the auxiliary generator bank behind the ticket booths, and move into the winding, dark corridors of the haunt walk maze. The sun is high now, filtering through the black canvas roof in dim, muted shafts of amber light. Animatronic ghouls and rubber skeletons hang frozen in their tracks, waiting for the evening crowds.

Avery moves ahead of me, checking the pneumatic air hoses that drive the jump-scare props, her small flashlight beam darting over every joint.

"Wyatt, hold up," she suddenly calls out, her voice losing every ounce of playfulness in a single heartbeat.

I drop my heavy wrench into my belt loop and close the distance in three long strides, dropping to one knee beside where she is crouched near the entrance fogger. "What is it?"

"Look right here on the lower access panel." She points her beam at the bottom lip of the fog machine's steel housing.

There is a fresh, jagged scratch cut through the black enamel paint, exposing bright, unoxidized silver metal beneath. The scratch leads directly to the primary latch, where the safety cotter pin has been turned ninety degrees from how we secured it yesterday afternoon.

"Someone was in here after we finished our sweep yesterday," Avery tightly whispers, her jaw clenching hard. "This pin was flush when we signed off on the log."

I pull my Maglite, leaning close to examine the steel lip. "They tried to pop the latch to get back into the wiring harness, but something spooked them before they could strip the conduit."

"They are still here on the grounds, Wyatt," she urgently says, her hand coming down on my forearm, her fingers digging through the heavy leather of my sleeve. "They are walking the property in broad daylight."

I do not hesitate. I reach down, unclip my radio, and key the transmitter with my thumb. "Dutch, this is Wyatt. We have got fresh tool marks on the haunt maze fogger. Someone tampered with the safety latch within the last twelve hours."

Dutch's voice crackles through the speaker, tight and furious. "Do not touch anything. I am on my⁠—"

Before Dutch can finish the transmission, Petey's voice cuts in over channel one, loud, panicked, and breathing heavily.

"Dutch! Wyatt! Get over to the west fence line right now!" Petey frantically screams into the mic, static hissing around his words. "Someone cut through the chain link behind the old livestock pens! There is fresh blood on the wire and a boot print heading straight for the trailers!"