Playing Games
Page 40

"No, it's okay," I told him, feeling more than a little irritated at Brodie. "He is a shit." And he was totally going to hear a mouthful when I caught up to his ass.
He'd deliberately goaded my partner to try and get us eliminated from the race. And then as soon as he got me alone, what did he do? Played on me to get the Ace.
And I'd fallen for it. I felt like an idiot. I gave Liam a guilty look. Maybe it'd take a while for the Ace thing to hit the air. By that time, hopefully he'd have cooled down and he wouldn't freak out.
Though if he did freak out, I couldn't blame him. I'd fucked this up pretty good.
"So what happened with you guys?" Liam asked Derron. "You're hours behind everyone else."
"I couldn't find the stupid signal," Derron said, his face edging into unhappy lines. "I had to ride that damn balloon four times. Finally found it right under my nose." He shook his head. "I thought I'd cost us the race…."
His words trailed off but I knew what he'd meant. He thought he'd cost them the race until he saw us still sitting here. I glanced over at Joel as he emerged from the changing tent, all hard, compact body and stocky legs. He was a soldier, and incredibly fit. I had no doubt he could do this challenge easily. Judging from the smug expression on Derron's face, he thought the same thing.
The judge cleared his throat. "Liam and Katy?"
We leapt to our feet, all tension returning. "Yes?" I squeaked, my voice sounding ridiculous as I straightened.
"Your penalty is over." He held out the disk. "You may continue on to your next task."
I gave Liam a look of excitement, and he grabbed our bags as I raced for the disk. I glanced over at Derron, who'd gone stiff with frustration, his gaze on his partner in the ring. He wouldn't look over at me. That was for the best, since I couldn't hide my excitement.
As Liam came to my side, I read the disk. "Make your way to the finish line for this leg of the race. Return to the Goreme Open Air Museum and look inside for Chip Brubaker."
"Come on. We need to run it. We gotta make up time," Liam said, grabbing my hand just as the judge blew a whistle. Joel had just finished the task. Already.
We exchanged a look, then ran for the museum as if our lives depended on it. Liam’s hand clasped mine so tight that I thought my knuckles would break, but I couldn’t say that I wasn’t doing the same to him. We rushed back to the Air Museum and circled the grounds, looking for the finish line.
“There!” I spotted it just as Joel and Derron turned a corner behind us. Liam cursed and we surged forward.
We got to the finish line seconds before Joel and Derron did.
 
 
CHAPTER NINE
 
 
"Is it wrong to be so intensely attracted to someone like Katy and hate her brother so very, very much?" - Liam Brogan, Cambodia Leg of The World Races
 
 
Twelve hours later
 
 
"Make your way to the Angkor Wat temple grounds in Cambodia. There, you must search the grounds for the marked mat and receive your next clue. You have thirty two dollars for this leg," I read aloud, then glanced up at my partner. "Guess thirty two dollars won't get us another hotel room."
"Now that's a shame," he said, leaning in to lightly kiss the tip of my nose. "I'm still bummed about this last round."
We hadn't had enough money saved to cover food and a room, so we'd opted on eating. Liam had taken a quick shower at a local hostel and we'd catnapped in chairs at a movie theater. Not the most restful of options, but cheap with our limited money. Of course, it meant that we hadn't been able to have more alone time together. We'd had to settle for furtive kisses and groping in the dark of the movie theater.
And I'd originally thought I'd be fine with us not getting more privacy, but it turned out I was totally lying to myself. Every time Liam looked in my direction, I got all hot and bothered once more, imagining his mouth on my skin and his cock sinking deep inside me, filling the ache between my legs.
It didn't seem that I was the only one affected by this. Liam constantly touched me, his fingers brushing against my skin, as if he needed those quick, soft touches to anchor him. And of course, those touches just made me all fired up all over again. I got caught up imagining his tattooed body over mine, my hands gliding over the black lines on his arms—
"—Travel agency," Liam murmured in my ear.
"Huh?" I blinked back to reality, my dirty daydreams instantly disappearing.
"We should find a travel agency," Liam repeated. "See what flight gets us closest to Angkor Wat."
"Oh. Yes. Of course." I tucked the clue under my arm and took the hand he offered me, and we sprinted away from the starting line to a nearby row of cabs.
An hour later, we arrived at the airport and booked flights to Siem Reap, Cambodia. We'd just missed the prior flight a half hour ago, and ours wouldn't leave for another hour.
We were still firmly in last place, and the other teams would have at least an hour jump on us thanks to the flights. And that was on top of the several hours we'd had to wait out for our penalty.
Liam sat down on the floor at the airport and patted his side. I moved next to him and curled up under his arm, pillowing my head on his shoulder and trying not to think of the logistics of things. "We're screwed unless there's a miracle of some kind," I told him, ignoring the camera-man that hovered nearby and taped our cuddling.
"Mmm. We'll catch up," Liam told me, his fingers idly playing with one of my blonde pigtails. "Don't lose faith."
"I won't," I told him, linking my fingers in his free hand. My other traced the lines of one of his tattoos, even as he stroked my hair and then my shoulder. Crap, now I was getting all turned on again. "I just worry that we're going to get booted before we even get started."
"We'll have a chance," Liam told me. "Worst comes to worst, we can just trade the Ace to Abby and Dean for a chance to get ahead or something. I bet they'd do it."
I said nothing, my stomach giving an awful clench of dismay. For once, I was glad that we were the last ones at the airport, because then no one could tell my partner - my sexy, gorgeous, hard-working partner - that I'd screwed us both and given the Ace to my lying brother.
 
 
~~ * * * ~~
 
 
Abby, it turned out, was right on the money with her advice. Make good TV? The producers will knock themselves over trying to save your asses.
We arrived at Siem Reap on schedule, got in the marked car left for us, and drove out to the Angkor Wat temple grounds. We blew through the first challenge - counting devas listed on the temple walls. It was time-consuming, but not too awful. As we counted, we'd also seen a group of musicians at the center of the temple, and Polly from the Olympian team working on a task. She finished up just as we approached, racing past us to return to her partner.
The first individual task? To select one of the traditional Cambodian musical instruments and learn to play a tune for the nearby judge. Liam had taken the task, and one of the instruments was a stringed instrument - a krapeau. Within a short time, he managed the strings, was humming the melody, and played it for the judge, who handed us our next clue.