I’d make him talk to me with that gorgeous husky British voice, and tell me everything he’s going to do to me…
A loud explosion shook the earth, jolting me out of my dirty thoughts.
I pitched forward. Mr. British caught me in his arms. A sizzle of electric current flared through my body from his touch, immediately extinguished by the searing pain in my ears as the world around me shattered.
The earth pitched, knocking our feet from under us. We slammed hard into the ground, the force driving the wind from my chest. Mr. British wrapped his body around mine, his weight reassuring against me, protecting me from… what? I tried to see through the throng of stampeding, screaming people. An intense wave of heat swept over me, like someone had opened an industrial oven right over top of us. I gasped for air. Mr. British yelled something to me but I couldn’t hear it over the roar in my ears.
Mr. British yanked me to my feet, his other arm around a sobbing Kelly. We were swept along with the rest of the crowd fleeing back through the midway. I craned my neck around and finally saw what had happened.
My blood froze in my veins.
The Ferris wheel was on fire.
Flames licked their way through the spokes and darted from carriage to carriage. People hung out of the buckets, screaming and crying for help. The whole thing groaned as it buckled in themiddle, shooting sparks in all directions. Someone leapt from one of the top gondolas, and more people screamed as his body slammed into the top of the coffee truck and bounced to the ground. People rushed to him, but he didn’t get up.
My heart leapt into my throat. The only parents I’d ever known were on that wheel.
I wrenched my body from Mr. British’s grasp and took off toward the burning ride.
“Maeve, no!” Kelly yelled after me, but her words were swallowed up by the fire and the fury.
I shoved my way through the crowd, screaming my parents’ names. I hit a lull in the crowd and sprinted across the field just as the ground beneath me buckled. With a groan, the whole Ferris wheel toppled over, like it had been shoved by some invisible giant.
No. No, no, no.
I crawled toward the corn dog cart as the Ferris wheel crashed into the ghost train building, sending a shower of sparks down into the midway. Fires leapt from awning to awning, consuming the flimsy fabric of the petting zoo tent in one giant inferno. I noticed someone pulling a sobbing child from a mangled ghost train cart. I picked myself up, ignoring the trembling in my legs, and raced toward the wreckage again.
Mom and Dad are in there somewhere. I’ve got to find them. I’ve got to?—
I’d just swung myself under the outer ring when a fire leapt up from the ghost train, sending another wave of heat at me. Thick smoke rose from the fires – it wasn’t thick here on the ground, but it stung my eyes so badly tears obscured my vision. Everything smelled like a charcoal BBQ.
I stepped back. How the hell was I going to get inside? Loose wires sparked on the ground. In the distance, I heard the faint ring of the fire department’s siren.
My weeping eyes caught sight of a figure standing on the other side of the field. While everyone around him ran in all directions, he stood still, his arms folded, his expression placid as he watched the horror unfold around him.
It was the black-haired bellend who harassed me and Kelly earlier.
His eyes met mine.
He lifted a hand and waved at me.
What the fuck?
He smiled, his white teeth reflecting the glow of the fire.
My blood turned cold. A cloud of smoke billowed in front of my face, burning my eyes so I turned away.
When I looked back, the guy was gone. All I could see was an enormous black dog loping across the fairway.
With a sickeningCRACK,half of the ghost train building fell away. The Ferris wheel groaned. The outer ring slid off the edge of the collapsed structure. I ducked as a live wire swung dangerously close to my head. A gondola dangled just above me, two pairs of legs hanging over the edge of the wooden seat. The owners of the legs weren’t moving or crying out.
That could be my parents. I have to?—
The Ferris wheel lurched again. I rolled away just as the beam above my head crashed to the ground.Shit, that could have crushed me.
I scrambled back as the entire outer ring collapsed, folding in on itself like some kind of terrible accordion. Burning hot debris rained down around me as the whole ghost train collapsed. Both structures crashed into the ground.
The force knocked me off my feet, slamming me hard onto the packed earth. My head hit something hard, and stars appeared in my vision. I tried to get up, but the heat rolled over me, paralyzing me in place. Moving only made my head spin worse, and the world around me bubbled and blurred.
