Playing Games (3 page)

"Hurry it up, Katy!" Brodie bellowed at me.
"Flip them and flip them fast!"

I sighed and shrugged off my backpack,
tossing it aside and then diving into the fray. People were shoving
and pushing like wild animals. I charged into the fray, grabbing
the first football and flipping it over. Nada. I tossed it back
down to the ground and headed for the next. And when that one was
blank, the next. And the next.

"I got six," someone called. Another team
yelled out their number - nine - and were less excited. No one
wanted a high number.

I grimly picked up football after football,
looking for a number amidst the chaos. I'd probably flipped about
twenty footballs and dodged the other pushy contestants (and
rolling balls) when I noticed one sitting alone at the back of the
field, clearly overlooked. I could see a hint of white behind the
football stand and a clench in my stomach told me that this was a
numbered ball. Perfect!

As soon as I began to run for it, the rocker
guy did too. Frowning, I picked up the pace, running faster. He
didn't slow down. That son of a bitch had seen it and was going to
race me for it.

We both dove for it at the same time. I
landed on the ball, triumph rolling through me.

He landed on top of me.

The air blew out of my lungs. I groaned,
wheezing, even as the ball popped out from under me and launched
into the air a foot.

It bounced once. The rocker rolled off of me
and neatly plucked it from the ground.

I remained on the ground, struggling to
breathe.

He moved to stand over me and offered a hand
down, ball tucked under his arm.

I slapped it away, my chest burning with the
need for air.

He looked down at me a moment longer,
shrugged, then flipped the football in his hand. "I got number
two," he called out. Somewhere in the distance, I heard his partner
squeal with delight.

Damn it! That jerk had just stolen second
place from me. I clutched my ribs and groaned, forcing myself to my
feet. A camera hovered nearby, no doubt catching my black scowl as
I staggered to the next football and began to flip.

The field was clearing out as teams departed.
Brodie trotted up to me, a football in hand. "I can't believe he
stole number two from you. You should have fought him."

I rubbed my ribs. "Thanks for asking, Brodie.
I'm fine."

He raked a hand through his hair, clearly
frustrated. "Sorry, Katy. You ok? Seriously? Want me to get a medic
or something?"

"No. I just need to suck it up. My pride
smarts more than anything." I nodded at the football under his arm.
"What's that one?

"I found number ten," he told me,
disgruntled. "Keep flipping and maybe we can find something
better."

I rubbed my ribs one more time. "'Kay."

More teams departed around us, and after
about five minutes, I looked up and realized that the team that had
found the number nine was handing in their football to Chip
Brubaker. That left just us on the field. We were stuck with number
ten. Brodie straightened and tossed aside the football he'd just
picked up, as if coming to the same conclusion.

The race had just started, and we were
already last.

CHAPTER THREE

"
Some
of these people are stronger than they look. That short blonde with
the pigtails? She looks all sweet and innocent, but she's scrappy
as hell. The brother's kind of a jackass, though. I hope they go
home soon.
" — Liam Brogan, Greenland Leg of
The World
Races

To my surprise, when we got to the airport
and purchased our tickets, we found all the other teams seated at
the terminal, still waiting and looking not too happy about it.

"Good," Brodie said under his breath. "We're
caught up."

We couldn't really be caught up if nothing
had happened yet. Something wasn't quite right. I watched as Brodie
bee-lined for Tesla and Liam, and then proceeded to greet and smile
at everyone else. He jumped right into the throng of people,
clearly forgetting about his little sister, who wasn't quite as
extroverted as him.

I hung on the fringes of the group, then
glanced around, deciding to get answers on my own. Another person
was hanging back from the boisterous group - Abby. Dean’s wife and
the woman from
Endurance Island
. Luckily for me, she was the
only person I was even halfway interested in chatting with. I
headed toward her. "Hey. What happened? Why's everyone still
here?"

She smiled over at me and waved a hand at the
empty flight attendant stand in front of the rows of seats. "Air
Iceland doesn't fly out until the morning, and we all hit Reykjavik
at the same time. From there, the charter flights are staggered,
but it looks like we're starting this race all grouped together."
She shrugged and stuck out her hand. "It'll give us a good chance
to get to know each other. I'm Abby."

"I know," I said with a grin. "I saw you on
Endurance Island
last year."

She groaned. "You probably saw way too much
of me, then. I swear, I'm never going to live that down." She
thumbed a gesture at her spouse a short distance away. "That's
Dean, though I guess that was easy to figure out."

"I do. I'm Katy." I pointed at my brother,
who was shaking hands with the black-dressed duo. "That's my
brother, Brodie."

"Ah, the brother-sister team." She nodded, as
if this answered some things for her.

"That's us."

She glanced over at me. "Not sure why we're
sharing names. We're practically tattooed with them." She gestured
at the bold ABBY written across the chest of her shirt. "They think
viewers won't remember who's who unless they brand us."

I chuckled at that. Abby didn't seem dazzled
by all of this, and I liked that about her. "We can at least try
and be normal about it.” I studied her. "I'm kind of surprised to
see you and Dean here. I thought after watching
Endurance
Island
that you guys were done with this sort of thing."

She sighed, as if suffering. "I thought so,
too. But we do strange things for love." Her gaze warmed and she
watched Dean's back with affection. "It's not so bad, though. At
least in this, no one can backstab us out of the game." As a
cameraman circled close, she grimaced. "Though I can't say I missed
that aspect of things much."

I didn’t blame her. It was getting a little
weird for me, too. I carefully stepped aside as a cameraman zoomed
past and headed for Liam, Brodie and Tesla. I guessed they were
more exciting than we were. "You're old hat at this sort of thing.
Any advice for me?"

Abby tilted her head, thinking. After a
moment, she gave a calculating grin and leaned in. "Make good
TV."

"Good TV?"

"Yep," she said, and flipped one of my perky
pigtails. I flushed at that - she must have guessed that it hadn't
been my hairdo of choice. "Make good TV," she repeated again. "Dean
doesn't believe me, but I know I'm right. You make good TV and the
producers will tweak things to go in your favor so you last longer.
Not all of the challenges are random."

Interesting. As we stood there, I heard
Brodie burst out into a wild laugh, and it was joined by Tesla's
flirty one. I glanced over at them and they seemed to be having a
grand old time. Well, except for Liam, who was ignoring my brother
as Brodie proceeded to make a fool of himself all over Tesla. Liam
stared out the window onto the tarmac, his fingers drumming a beat
on the bag across his lap, as if he were writing a song.

"Looks like your brother's already decided he
wants to make good TV," Abby commented. "Unless he's wrangling for
an alliance with them."

I snorted. "He's more likely trying to get
her phone number." Though I did frown a little in Brodie's
direction as Tesla flipped her red and black hair and giggled at
whatever my brother was saying. We were
not
about to ally
with those two. Not when the guitar-playing jerk had knocked me to
the ground and stolen my number. Forget that. I glanced back at
Abby. "I don't want to ally with them."

"Well," she told me in a low voice. "You look
harmless and you’re not hamming it up for the camera, so you’re on
my good side. We could always have a private alliance just between
us two. Help each other out if we get the chance and all." She
raised a pinky in my direction.

I locked mine with hers and grinned. "Now
you're talking. Us wallflowers can stick together."

She laughed. "I knew there was a reason I
liked you."

~~ * * * ~~

Abby and I ended up chatting for hours off to
one side as the others played social butterflies - including her
husband, Dean. She didn't seem to mind that, though. She was
relaxed and comfortable in her own skin, and it showed. Dean didn't
ignore Abby the way Brodie did me, though. He flirted with her,
teased her, brought her snacks, and pulled her into his lap when
the seating area got full. She would give me tolerant looks, as if
she were enduring this for his sake, but there was a constant smile
on her face and a glow to her that bespoke happiness.

Me, I was content to people-watch and chat
with Abby. People came up and slowly introduced themselves, but I
let Brodie be the chatty, friendly one. That was what he was good
at. The others were nice enough, though, and I chatted with all of
them while we waited for our flight. The strong girl team? I
learned Summer and Polly were Olympic beach volleyball players. The
strong guy team, Joel and Derron, were vets from Afghanistan. Hal
and Stefan were the other guy team, both TV weathermen and married
to each other.

And after Brodie had gotten to know everyone,
he zoomed right back to Tesla's side. She seemed to take all his
attention with a pleasant smile, and I couldn't tell if she was
just tolerating Brodie, or if she was genuinely interested in
him.

Her bandmate was sitting right there, so it
was awkward for me to watch Brodie hit on her right in front of
him. Were Tesla and Liam in a relationship? I guessed not, but I
had no way of knowing. He glanced over at Tesla and Brodie
occasionally, but seemed bored by them.

Actually, he seemed bored by pretty much
everything – cameras, teams, airport, you name it. He ignored
everyone. He just put a pair of earbuds in, listened to music, and
stared out the window. I thought I was kind of unfriendly, but out
of all the racers, he was the only one that hadn't come by to say
hello.

And I certainly wasn't about to go over and
get friendly with him.

"Flight 1222 to Reykjavik, now boarding," an
airline attendant said in a smooth voice, interrupting the hum of
voices.

I yawned, remaining in my seat as everyone
else leapt to their feet. I had never understood the rush to get
onto the plane. After all, seats were assigned. It wasn't like
shoving to the front of the line changed your priority. So I sat
and waited for the crowd to disperse and for Brodie to
reappear.

After a few minutes, the sea of legs cleared
and I noticed only two people still sat, waiting for the congested
crowd to disperse. Me, and Liam. I ignored him, getting to my feet
and shrugging back on my heavy backpack.

Brodie returned to my side in a cheery mood.
"Isn't this awesome? We're on our way to our first
destination!"

"It's pretty exciting." I studied my brother
as we got to the back of the line. Tesla had moved to Liam's side
and was nudging him with one of her metal-covered boots. "You
didn't make an alliance with them, did you?"

"Tesla and I talked about it," Brodie told
me. "They're in second place, so it'd be smart."

"Brodie Short," I hissed at him. "Did you or
did you not see that guitar-playing asshole knock me to the ground
and steal second place from me?"

"I’m sure it was a mistake," Brodie said
easily. My brother had zero killer instinct. "And Tesla told me
that Liam was pretty remorseful about it."

"So remorseful he didn't even bother to come
over and apologize? Oh, I'm sure he's just dripping with regret," I
snapped back to him.

"He can hear you," Brodie told me in a low
voice.

I glanced over and saw both Tesla and Liam
staring in my direction. Tesla seemed to be amused, but Liam was
impossible to read. For some reason, that just made me more
irritated. "I know they're listening," I said, in an even louder
voice. "And in case they didn't catch it all, I said,
the
guitar-playing asshole knocked me to the ground and stole second
place
."

I was so loud everyone turned and stared. The
look Liam shot my way could have withered foliage. And cameras
swung in my direction.

Brodie shushed me again.

I elbowed him. "Why are you taking their
side? I'm your partner!"

"You're my sister," Brodie said, and reached
out to rub a noogie in my blonde pigtails.

I yelped and backed away from him.

"You're also holding up the line," Tesla
called from the back.

I danced away from Brodie's grasp and we
pushed forward with our passports and tickets.

The plane was a big one, though because of
the rules of the game, we couldn't fly anything but coach. Since we
had last-minute bookings, we ended up with whatever seats were
available – which meant the ones that no one else wanted. Single
seats spread all over the plane, and middle seats.

Brodie and I were split apart. Brodie was
somewhere in the back, and I was a middle seat towards the middle
of the plane. I stuffed my enormous backpack into one of the
overhead compartments and sat in my seat, twitching nervously at
the sight of the two empty seats next to me. Maybe neither one
would be filled and I could relax on the flight. It was going to be
a long one - over ten hours in the air.

An elderly man came and sat in the aisle
seat, squashing my hopes of having my small row to myself. I closed
my eyes and rested my head on the headrest of my seat while waiting
for the plane to take off as people milled around us, pushing bags
into overhead bins and getting comfortable.