Wicked Games
Page 16

Well, of course it looked like that. I had built it for one person. But I was irritated that now I felt like an asshole for being so petty as to build a shelter for one in the first place. “We can both fit and share the blanket. Come on.” When he hesitated a moment more, I added, “I don’t bite, but the sand fleas do. So either sleep out there and be miserable or crawl into bed with me, okay?”
He gestured at the small shelter. “After you, then.”
I knelt and crawled into the small shelter, suspecting that Dean was going to either change his mind or push the entire rickety thing down on me. Something. And to be honest, I totally wouldn’t blame him for doing it, either.
To my surprise, his head popped into the small lean-to a moment later, his broad shoulders barely clearing the tiny A-frame. Dean paused a moment, looking down at the shelter, no more than two (maybe two and a half) feet wide. “Damn, this is small.”
“Cozy,” I agreed, feeling a little ashamed.
“You’d better lay out so I can crawl over you, or I don’t think I’m going to be able to work my way in.”
I nodded and did so, sliding down over the palm leaves that made my bedding. My skin was still slightly oily from the latest batch of the lotion, and I actually slid surprisingly easy. “We’re all greased up, so it shouldn’t be a problem getting in,” I joked, then wished desperately that I could see his face in the darkness. But to make room for him, I turned on my side and faced the frame, trying to suck in and hold my body still enough that he could get in next to me.
It was… interesting, trying to squeeze another full-sized human being in my tiny, makeshift bed. I felt Dean’s big body, all arms and legs and hard chest, and it became painfully obvious that there wasn’t room for both of us to lie comfortably. His skin was touching mine no matter what he did, hot and slightly moist from the lotion. His was slick and slid against my back, his legs brushing up against my own as he twisted, trying to get comfortable.
After a moment, Dean swore, the sound close to my ear. “This isn’t working.”
I wanted to turn over in the shelter but I was afraid of conking him in the nose. “Why isn’t it working?” His body constantly touched mine here and there, and every time it did, Dean backed away again. I kept myself poker-stiff, trying not to flail about and make it worse in my efforts to help him.
“Because,” he began, shifting again. “I keep… touching you… no matter what I do. There’s not enough room for us to both be in here and not touch.” His breath exploded in a frustrated burst.
Oh, awkward. He didn’t want to touch me? “Look, I’m not going to freak out if you happen to touch me the entire night. I’ll feel a lot worse if I wake up and you’re covered in sand, all right?” I reached over and tapped his arm, trying to indicate that he should lie down. “Just pretend I’m your girlfriend and we can spoon,” I joked.
I needed to learn to shut my big mouth. No sooner did I say that, his hand slid over my waist, causing shockwaves to jitter through my body. His big body nestled next to mine, pulling me close in the most intimate embrace that I’d ever had. His legs were pressed to the backs of mine; his cock nestled hard against my ass, his chest plastered to my back. I almost complained, but it felt too nice to gripe. And the man radiated heat. I liked being snuggled up to him a bit too much.
“That’s nice,” Dean said in a low voice. “Much better.” I felt my hair move slightly and could have sworn he inhaled.
Sniffing my hair? Surely not. I probably stank of eucalyptus and coconut and sea salt.
There was still a little bit of sand stuck to our skin, obvious with our bodies rubbed together, but strangely enough, I didn’t mind it. And when Dean pulled the blanket over the two of us and then settled his arm back against my belly—under the blanket—I didn’t say a thing. I only shifted so my head was pillowed on my bent arm and tried to go to sleep.
‘Tried’ being the operative word, of course. Despite the exhaustion of living on the beach and eating almost nothing all day long, my entire body seemed to vibrate from within, and I was constantly aware of Dean’s hand splayed on my stomach, pressing my slick body against his. Our bodies locked together, heated flesh against heated flesh, the only thing separating us being two tiny swimsuits. Part of me hoped that he would move his hand lower, or rub his hard cock against my ass a bit more and let me know that he was interested. Nip my shoulder. Something. Anything.
But he lay as quiet as me, and after an eternity of hoping, I fell asleep.
 
***
 
The next few days fell into a predictable pattern. Each morning we would wake up, clean up camp and stoke the fire, and cook breakfast. We’d work on improving our camp in the morning, and wander over to visit with Lana and Will in the afternoon. When dark hit, we headed back and curled up in our tiny bungalow, together, bodies pressed tight against each other.
It was playing hell with my self-confidence, too. Every day, it seemed that we shared an electrically-charged moment or two. Our fingers would touch and our eyes would lock. He’d spend a moment too long rubbing lotion onto my back. I’d watch him a bit too long as he arose from the ocean, glistening with sea water. The way his mouth would crook up on one side when he smiled down at me. The feel of his hips pressed up against my own at night.
It was making me so incredibly, unbelievably horny. And the man was completely uninterested. If I was sending signals, he wasn’t receiving them. If I smiled at him, he turned away. If I pulled him a little bit closer at night, he snored. It was the uncertainty that held me back from making a full-on move. I was the least attractive woman on the island, sure, but I wasn’t a troll either. How would he react if I flung myself at him? Would he just take what was offered and not think twice about it (which would be bad) or would he recoil in disgust (which would be very bad)? Even worse, how would it change our team dynamic? We were comfortable around each other now and working smoothly as a team.
Smoothly enough that no one suspected our Honeymooners-like display was a total put-on. At each challenge, we made sure to bicker and shove at each other. I gave him open-handed slaps on his arm to convey my disgust, and he settled for withering scorn. In the four challenges in the past week—three immunity, one reward—we’d managed to carefully place just near the end. Lana had suggested that we purposefully lose the next reward challenge to throw people off, and so when it came to another swimming race, I was the one that swam. We lost by a mile, and Dean pitched a fit on the beach that sent cameramen flurrying about us and I rubbed my eyes so much after swimming in the salty ocean that I didn’t have to fake the trickles that leaked from my eyes, especially when Lana and Will walked away with a big plate of peanut butter and chocolate that they devoured in front of everyone else. Back at camp, Dean had given me a comforting, friendly hug and tousled my hair. Like a kid.
That had depressed me far worse than losing the chocolate.
We’d squeaked out of landing in the bottom two spots in all of the immunity challenges, though we’d managed to perform poorly enough that we still looked incompetent. The next three teams that went home were the ‘Mareen Biologest’—which made me smile widely—one of the swimsuit models, and Jody the Intern.