Knifepoint by Alex Van Tol

Chapter One
    Voices, sudden and loud, jolt me out of my dream. Confused, I try to sit up. But I can’t. It feels like I’ve been tied to the bed with a million tiny threads. I force one eye open. Turn my head. The clock radio says 6:44 . The voices keep shouting. They’re coming from the radio. The same radio I’ve woken up to for the past thirty-five days, at the same ungodly hour.
    Except every morning it gets harder.
    I raise my head and look at the wooden walls. A million tiny daggers shoot through my skull. Ugh. I prop myself on one elbow and hit Snooze . The daggers turn into hammers and spread out across my body. About a thousand go to work on the soles of my feet. I swing my feet out of bed, careful not to touch them to the floor. I can’t face that agony yet. Yawning, I reach for some socks. I’ve got to start going to bed earlier. I can’t keep functioning on five hours of sleep a night. Not when my job beats the crap out of me every day.
    The metal bedframe squeaks as I heave myself up. Owww, ow. I could die right about now. If a serial killer poked his head into my room and offered to stab me at this exact moment,
    I’d tell him to go right ahead. I wonder if it’s normal for my feet to hurt this much.
    Well, yeah, maybe. When you spend fourteen hours working and then another five dancing nonstop. But it’s so fun!
    I glance at the clock again. 6:53 . I shove my screaming feet into my cowboy boots. I look at them. They’re filthy, caked in horseshit after the July rains. I’m not supposed to wear them inside the bunkhouse, but whatever. I can’t scrub the crap off either. I’ve tried. It’s all over the bottom of my chaps too. That’s a bummer. I spent a lot to have those custom made. That was back when I thought I’d be making $12.50 an hour.
    Back before I found out that what James really meant was $1250 a month.
    Slave labor, that’s what it is. Kristi and I calculated it a few weeks ago— a couple of days before she ditched the ranch to go find a decent-paying job in the city. Turns out I make about $4.46 an hour. It’s hard work, too, being a wrangler: chucking hay bales, hefting saddles, dragging buckets of grain, pushing and pulling around 1500-pound animals all day long.
    Thinking of the horses gets me moving. The first barn shift starts at seven, and being late sucks. If you start your morning late, you spend all day playing catch-up.
    I leave the rest of the bunkhouse sleeping, closing the door softly behind me.The cold morning air stings my throat as I hobble across the grass to the main lodge. My feet are killing me.
    Heavy dew darkens my boots. God, it feels like winter’s coming already.
    I shiver, wishing I’d dug around to find my gloves.
    I push open the screen door leading to the kitchen. Steve, the morning cook, hands me a muffin on my way through.
    He’s nice enough but looks like he just escaped maximum-security prison.
    Who knows, maybe he did. They’re not particularly strict with their hiring practices around here. Steve has so many tattoos it’s hard to see any un-inked flesh on his arms. I like him though. He feeds me for free. The other cooks make you punch a meal card if you want so much as a package of saltines.
    â€œYou look like shit, Jill,” he says pleasantly.
    â€œKiss my chaps, kitchen boy,” I snarl over my shoulder.
    Steve laughs, then growls at me.
    â€œWith pleasure.”
    Pit stop at the coffee machine. Then straight out to the barn. Hopefully there won’t be a nine o’clock ride. If there isn’t, I’ll be able to come back into the restaurant and eat a proper breakfast after I get the horses saddled.
    No one’s at the barn when I get there.
    I figured as much. Carrie and Laura downed a whole lot of beer last night.
    It’s not the first time they haven’t shown up for their shift. And I’m certain it won’t be the last either.