A tight $\ell$-cycle minus an edge $C_\ell^-$ is the $3$-graph on the vertex set $[\ell]$, where any three consecutive vertices in the string $123\ldots\ell 1$ form an edge. We show that for every $\ell\ge 5$, $\ell$ not divisible by $3$, the extremal number is $ ex\left(C_\ell^-,n\right)=\tfrac1{24}n^3+O(n\ln n)=\left(\tfrac14+o(1)\right){n\choose 3}. $ We determine the extremal graph up to $O(n)$ edge edits.