Ineligible Bachelor (9 page)

“So why won’t you tell me where we are going?” He raked her with a look, taking in her T-shirt, jeans, and sturdy brown
shoes that were a cross between sneakers and hiking boots. Her hair was back in a ponytail, and she had on the barest amount of makeup—some mascara and pink lip gloss that made her mouth look amazing. She didn’t need all the makeup the artists put on her last night. She looked equally as great this morning without it. “If not football, then what?”

Freddy shrugged. “I guess it couldn’t hurt to tell you. We’re almost there anyway. We’re all going to play a little game of elimination paintball. Last one standing gets a one-on-one date with you tomorrow.”

As promised, the women were already at the paintball field when Freddy and Logan arrived. The show’s host stepped forward, and a secondary set of cameras began to roll, augmenting the ones that filmed Freddy and Logan pulling up and getting out of the limo.

“As you can see,” the host began, “the ladies are already dressed and ready to play.” He gestured to two young men dressed in uniforms who handed Freddy and Logan some camouflage pants and jackets, along with the required safety masks and goggles. “Put these on, and I’ll explain the rules.”

As everyone gathered around the host, he began. “Basically, this will be a game of teamwork and strategy. Logan and Freddy and one of the professional team players will have the show’s flag.” He reached down and picked up a triangle-shaped red flag with a large white heart in the center. He handed it to Logan. “The other professional will join the bachelorettes. The ladies will have to find and capture the flag while Logan and Freddy try to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

Freddy raised her mask so she could talk. “Not counting the professionals, aren’t we outmanned six to two here?”

The show host laughed. “Only one of the ladies can claim the flag. They’ll have to use both teamwork to find it and strategy to be the last one standing.”

“So we can shoot them, and they can shoot each other,” Freddy reasoned aloud.

“If that’s the strategy they decide to use. But ultimately, the one with the flag at the end of the day wins the date with Logan.”

Freddy pointed to Logan. “And he can eliminate anyone he wants by shooting them also, right?”

“Or he can show any of them where the flag is if he wants to spend more time with one of the contestants.”

Freddy snapped her head toward Logan. She couldn’t see much of him with the mask and goggles he wore, but she could see his eyes were crinkled in a smile. She took the flag from his hand. “I’ll take that.”

Logan’s eyes crinkled even more.

“Now I’ll let Max and Jerry, the professional paintball players, give out the rest of the equipment and explain the rules.”

“Cut!” Roberto appeared from behind one of the shelters. “We don’t need to shoot the boring stuff. We’ll pick it up once everyone is in place for the game to start.” He wore what could only be described as a seventies warm-up suit in dark blue fabric with white stripes down the sides of the pants.

“Borrow that from your grandfather?” Freddy asked when Roberto was next to her.

“Dolce and Gabbana,” he said, snapping his fingers to show his disapproval. He looked her camouflage pants and jacket up and down. “Very G. I. Jane.”

“Hooah,” she replied.

Logan handed her one of the paintball guns. “Listen up, or you’ll be the first to go.”

Everyone crowded around the professional paintball players and listened. Max then held up his paintball shooter.

“I don’t like guns or war,” Stacy said instantly.

“We don’t call it a gun, we call it a marker. This isn’t war. It’s a game.” Max continued, pointing as he spoke. “This is the hopper on top. It holds one hundred paintballs and the compressed air bottle here for propellant.” He took some paintballs from his pockets. “Anybody play before?”

Freddy raised her hand.

“You never played,” Logan whispered to her.

“How would you know? You’re always working.” She raised her voice. “Three times.”

Max held out his hand, the paintballs in his palm. “So then you know these are carbowax with some other nontoxic, water-soluble stuff and dye, and while they are soft enough,” he squeezed one between his thumb and forefinger, “they can hurt like the dickens if you get gogged or shot point-blank.”

“Gogged?” one of the ladies asked.

“Getting hit in the goggles as opposed to ‘eating paint,’ which is getting shot in the mask. So no shooting at anyone’s head. Being marked, or shot by a paintball, can leave a welt at close distances.”

“So if anyone gets marked, they are out?” Freddy asked.

“Yeah. And ‘wiping’ is an automatic disqual. That’s when you attempt to remove the spot where you were marked. But a bounce is legal, and you can stay in the game.”

“Define ‘bounce,’” Freddy said.

“It’s when a paintball hits a player but does not break.” He pointed to his partner. “Jerry will take the ladies back to the far edge of the field beyond the woods, and we’ll find a place to protect the flag.”

Everyone moved to join their teams.

“Stay inside the base for now.” Max gestured to the large rectangle they stood inside, outlined with red landscaping paint. “Once we start, and you’re outside the base, anything goes. A few more things. If you get tagged, you raise your marker over your head to signify
that you’re out and move straight to the dead box.” He pointed to a second red-outlined rectangle at the edge of the field. “That’s it over there. When you’re hit, you get there and stay there until the match is over. And do not give in to the urge to shoot anyone coming by.” He nodded to Jerry and then turned. “Everyone ready?”

Cheers went up from the women.

“Then let’s play some paintball.”

They all began to walk away from the base when Jade’s marker went off, shooting a paintball straight onto the ground. She shrieked in surprise as dirt rose from the dry ground around her. “Sorry,” she said, “my bad.”

Jerry started toward her when Lori waved him off. “I got this,” she said and then proceeded to instruct Jade on how to shoot, along with proper safety measures.

“Hey,” Freddy called out. “You’ve played before?”

Lori shook her head and continued to help Jade.

“She’s army. She knows how to shoot,” Logan reminded Freddy.

Freddy nodded. “Oh yeah. I almost forgot.”

Once the instruction was over, Max raised his hand. “Let’s try this again. Ready? Game on!” The ladies shouted in delight and began walking off with him to their starting point.

Freddy looked down at the ground. “The game is on now, right?” Max nodded. She dropped to one knee, pretending to tie her shoe. “You two go ahead, I’ll catch up.”

“You sure?” Logan asked.

“I’m a minute behind you.”

She watched them walk off, and once they were out of sight, she took off running in the direction the women had taken.

She had no trouble finding them. Their laughing and chattering like chipmunks made them all pretty noisy targets. Staying back enough for her not to be heard, she tested her paintball marker on
a tree, hitting it with three shots. At least now she knew what it felt like to fire it. Then she approached the ladies as quietly as possible. To her luck, Lori was last in line as they followed a pathway. Perfect, because the war vet had to go first.

Taking aim at Lori’s rear, Freddy got off four quick shots, two of them hitting the mark. “You’re out, soldier-lady,” Freddy shouted before turning and running off as fast as she could, hearing paintballs fall well short of her retreat as the women fired back at her.

So much for the marksman,
she thought triumphantly as she sped off to find Logan at the opposite end of the course. One down, five more to go. No one was capturing Logan’s flag today if she could help it.

Freddy peeked around the side of the structure in which she had hidden the flag. About eight feet high and ten feet wide, it was basically a box with a three-foot-square opening in front. It had been peppered with paintballs over the years, giving it a psychedelic eighties feel.

“Do you see anyone?” Logan asked. He dropped to one knee beside her, paintball gun in hand.

Freddy suddenly let out a few blasts from her gun, the paintballs hitting the small bushes across the way. From the underbrush, a rabbit scampered away, apparently scared, but not hit.

“Nice shooting, ace,” Logan quipped, seeing a blue spot on the rabbit’s side.

Freddy laughed. “Guess he’s on his way to the dead box.”

Logan stood and took off his mask and goggles. “We’ve been out here for two hours already, and not an opponent in sight. Our pro has disappeared, too. What do you say we take a break?”

Freddy shook her head. “What if someone gets the flag?”

Logan turned in a circle, one hand out, one hand gripping the paintball marker. “No one’s here.”

A small rivulet of perspiration ran down his cheek. It was hot in the getup they wore. Maybe a fifteen-minute break wouldn’t hurt, she decided. “Okay, but inside this box thing. I don’t want to be ambushed.”

Logan signed to the camera crew following them that they were going inside. “How can anyone hide with a shoulder cam and boom mike following them around?”

“We’re not supposed to hide,” Freddy said, ducking inside. “We’re supposed to give good TV.”

They sat down, leaning against the back wall. Freddy slid off her mask and goggles and set them down. “This is cozy.”

Logan didn’t agree. “If you like hot, humid boxes. You’d better hope no one comes up on us. We’re sitting ducks.”

“My strategy exactly. Since I eliminated the soldier, no one will think to look in here. Too obvious.”

“When did you eliminate Lori?”

“Before I got here. She would have aced this course. Couldn’t have that.”

“Ah, so that’s why you were tying laces that didn’t exist on your shoes.”

Freddy looked down at her feet. “Didn’t think you’d notice shoes unless there were three-inch stiletto heels attached.”

Logan winked. “I notice a lot of things.”

But not me
, Freddy thought.

“Why the long face?” Logan asked.

She shrugged. “This isn’t coming out the way I thought it would.”

“And what way was that?”

Now’s your chance. Tell him.
But she couldn’t seem to do it. Instead, she looked around the bunker. “Oh, I don’t know, sitting here waiting to pick off your girlfriends one at a time isn’t really the way I thought I’d spend the day.”

“They’re not my girlfriends.”

“They think so.”

Logan laughed. “It is an odd situation.”

She angled her eyes toward him, but said nothing.

He arched an arm around her shoulders. “Hey. C’mon. It’s not so bad. We get to spend sometime alone in here away from the cameras. And at least we don’t have to wear the mike-packs because of the face masks.”

“That is a good thing,” she agreed. Especially because with some creative editing, anything they said could wind up on the show, and she wanted to say a lot to him right now.

She burrowed into him as much as she could without having it feel too cozy, but enough for it to feel like heaven to her. His strong arm felt solid across her back, and she could feel his warmth seep into her.

She turned just enough to gaze up at him, and the contentment she saw in his eyes struck her as though someone hit her with a concrete block. He held out his hand, and she resisted the urge to tangle her fingers with his. Instead, she placed her marker in his palm. He turned and set it against the wall, but his arm stayed around her shoulders.

“Maybe we should stay armed,” she said, “in case someone sneaks up on us.”

“We have to end this game sometime. I’d rather get the first date over with.”

She straightened. “You’re in a hurry or something?”

“Maybe. I haven’t dated anyone in a while. It might feel good to get back into the game.”

“Glad I could help with that.” She tried to dilute the sarcasm in her voice, but knew it still encased her words.

He pulled her back to him, and she didn’t resist. “This was your idea, and there seems to be no way out until it’s over.”

She sighed. “I guess not.”

“Second thoughts?”

“And third and fourth.”

He cocked an eyebrow at her. “You were always the impulsive type.”

“How would you know? You haven’t paid much attention to me.”

“And how would you know that?”

“Because I pay attention.”

“Is that so?”

She nodded, enjoying the rock-hard solidness of his shoulder. Her heart ached with the thought of one of the other women enjoying the same feeling if she let them into the circle of his arms. And she died a little inside knowing she would have to put one of them there.

When his fingers started to move up and down her arm, she could hardly breathe. “Stop that.”

“Stop what.”

“Scratching my arm.”

Immediately, he complied and took his arm away. “Sorry. I didn’t realize I was annoying you.”

She looked into his incredible eyes. “You weren’t. It felt kind of nice.”

As soon as the words left her mouth, her chest tightened in alarm. What on earth possessed her? She had no business saying things like that. In a few weeks, they would be on national TV—he as the world’s most eligible bachelor, she as the world’s most inept yenta, or at least that’s how she’d describe herself now. Yentas did not feel the way she felt sitting next to Logan. Yentas did not try to figure how to be the
yentee
.

This was bad, really bad. Spending time alone with him made her hormones race, flipping all her feminine switches to the
on
position.

“Are you saying that you like me holding you?” she heard him ask. His voice seemed to be coming from somewhere in another time zone, and she had to shake her head to register what he said.

She was sure her face showed all the shock that settled inside her once she realized he wanted her to answer the question. Her mind screamed,
Yes
, but she made a face as though he had said the most ridiculous thing in the world. “No. I had an itch.” One that was getting larger and harder to ignore.