Page 55 of Hollow Forest

My whisper was stolen by a gust of wind.

How the hell did he get free? And he’d found me? I hadn’t been in this maze for thirty minutes. And I was going to lose Ferretti—if I hadn’t already.

His head tilted, and he took a step forward.

I scrambled back.

He started running.

“Oh, shit!” I spun and ran.

My boots pounded over the packed dirt as I flew around the corner. Corn leaves slapped against my arms when I clipped the edge of the path, and my breath burst from my lungs in sharp clouds.

His footsteps came fast and heavy behind me. The masked monster wasn't pretending to chase me. He was actually coming for me, and the realization sent a bolt of fear straight through me. There might have been the teeniest drop of lust, but I ignored that.

I wasn’t out here to play.

I ran faster as a scream gurgled out between my frantic breaths, half panic and half desperation. Adrenaline burned through my veins and sharpened everything around me. The cold air hurt my lungs. The darkness seemed thicker than it had moments ago, and every scrape of dead leaves and snap of stalks made my heart slam harder.

I glanced over my shoulder and found him right behind me. “Fuck!”

This couldn’t be happening! I was the hunter tonight. Me. Not him! I shrieked as his hand reached for me. Jerking to the left, I veered off the path and crashed into the corn.

The neat dirt trail disappeared beneath my boots as I shoved between the rows. Stalks scraped my cheeks and snagged my sweatshirt, while dry leaves crackled so loudly around me that I couldn’t hear his footsteps anymore.

Losing track of him should have made me feel safer, but it only made my pulse race faster because I knew he was still coming.

I forced my way through another row when something moved behind me.

I screamed and sprinted harder.

My boot sank into soft earth, and I stumbled before catching myself on a corn stalk and continuing forward. A dark shape appeared through the rows to my right, so I changed direction.

I cut left, only to catch another glimpse of him through the stalks.

Oh my word….

He wasn’t chasing me. He was herding me.

The realization should have stopped me cold, but instead, I ran faster, trying to escape him. Tonight wasn’t about us! We’d had our fun.

A sob choked me. I have to leave!

The sounds of the festival had faded while I ran. I couldn’t hear the music anymore or the other people wandering through the maze. Even the actors jumping out from behind corners had disappeared, leaving only the wind moving through the corn, my ragged breathing, and the man stalking me through the rows.

I pushed through another dense patch and nearly fell when the ground suddenly changed beneath my feet.

I had found another path.

I stumbled onto it and stopped, my chest heaving as I looked around.

Something was wrong.

The maze had been wide and clean when I’d entered. Signs drenched in fake blood marked the intersections, and red lights hung periodically from wooden posts, casting enough glow to keep everyone moving in the right direction.

None of that existed here.

This path was narrower, and the corn grew taller and more tangled on either side. Some of the stalks had even been tied together overhead, creating a crooked tunnel that blocked most of the sky.