Playing Games (6 page)

Tesla, meanwhile, looked fresh as a spring
rose as she giggled and cooed and hung on my brother as they
paraded to the starting mat. That ratfink. I narrowed my eyes as
the cameras moved in close to Brodie and Tesla to film their
take-off. One of the Inuit appeared and handed them their next
disk.

I watched as Tesla grabbed the disk before
Brodie could and flipped it over to read. This time? Brodie was
forced to peer over
her
shoulder. Glad to see someone was
turning the tables on my brother, at least. They glanced at each
other and immediately shrugged on their packs and headed back
toward Kulusuk, the small town on the shoreline that held the
airport. Made sense, considering that was the only real town I’d
seen so far. My eyes narrowed as Tesla twined her fingers with my
brother’s and they held hands as they raced off. I glanced over at
my teammate, but he was looking anywhere except at me. That was
fine. I was pretty cranky as it was.

After what seemed like eternity, Liam and I
were the only team left. I huddled in my black jacket - better than
yellow, at least - and headed toward the starting mat as the
cameras zoomed in close. When the Inuit guide offered the disk to
us, Liam gestured that I should take it.

I did, grudgingly, and flipped it over.

"Your next clue is at Blarney Castle in
Ireland. The charter planes will take you back to Reykjavik,
Iceland, and from there you may select your flight to Ireland. One
hundred dollars has been provided for food, drink, and
necessities." The hundred dollar bill was inside an envelope fitted
to the back of the disk. "Have this disk - along with the others
you receive - when you cross the finish line." I held it out to
Liam to read.

He declined with a wave of his hand, glancing
at the distant horizon. "I suppose we should head back to the
airport, then. I'm guessing we're going to be on the last charter
flight again."

"I'd say that's an accurate guess," I replied
sourly. I shrugged on my backpack. "Might as well get it over with,
then."

One trip to Acapulco, coming right up.

~~ * * * ~~

It wasn't surprising to me that when we
arrived at the airport in Reykjavik, all the other teams were still
there. A travel agent had suggested that we fly in to Cork, the
next flight to leave, and sure enough, all the other teams were
waiting at the terminal.

They didn't look happy to see me and Liam,
either. I supposed that if we hadn't caught the same flight, they
would have been assured that we were one of the teams sure to go.
This way, it was a toss-up all over again. I had a hunch that the
producers were deliberately shoving all of us together just to see
how the two new teams – mine and Brodie’s – reacted to each
other.

Too bad for them. I was still in a bad mood,
so I took my water bottle and headed to a seat away from all the
others, not feeling particularly social at the moment. I didn't
care about getting to know the others or 'hanging out' with them,
since they didn't seem to want to get to know me, either. No one
had made any effort but Abby, and she was cuddled up next to Dean,
her eyes closed as if trying to take a nap before the plane got
here.

Brodie was sitting in the center of the group
with Tesla at his side, looking for all the world as if she'd
always been his partner. His arm was loosely around the back of her
chair, and she leaned into him, laughing at everything he said. I
rolled my eyes and ignored them. Sitting down, I pulled my legs up
into my chair and rested my arms on my knees.

Liam glanced at me, and set his backpack down
next to me. Then, he went to chat with Tesla, likely to talk
strategy or to bitch about his partner. I didn't care. This wasn't
fun anymore. If we were the first ones kicked off? I'd be just fine
with that. I'd gone from being genuinely excited about being in
first place and thinking we had a shot at the money to feeling
abandoned.

"Oh, don't worry about her." Brodie's voice
rose above the crowd, and I could hear it from where I sat. "She's
just in one of her Cranky Katy moods. She'll get over it soon
enough."

The teams around him tittered. I narrowed my
eyes as a camera zoomed in on my brother, who didn't seem to give a
shit that I was miserable.

"Maybe she's cranky because her brother
abandoned her to hook up with a hot girl." The voice was deep and
smooth and held just a hint of reproach. "I imagine that anyone
would be in a bad mood if that happened to them. She got sold out
by her partner."

I looked up in surprise. Liam’s back was to
me, so I couldn't see his expression. But that voice had been his.
Was he defending me?

The crowd went quiet. Tesla wriggled in her
seat, as if uncomfortable, and Brodie scowled at Liam.

I glanced away, pretending not to notice that
Liam abandoned their little crowd and came to sit next to me in the
empty seat. He didn't look over, just grabbed his pack, put his
headphones on, and began to drum a beat on his backpack, acting as
if nothing in the world bothered him.

Me, I was full of confused thoughts. I'd been
nothing but nasty to the guy and he'd defended me. Meanwhile, my
brother, who was supposed to have my back? Had been calling me by
the childhood nickname that he knew drove me crazy – Cranky Katy.
Brodie and I argued - that was just how siblings were - but on TV?
It was kind of embarrassing.

And yet Liam hadn't sat around and laughed at
Brodie's words. He hadn't joined in the little party that was
trying to make me feel bad for being unhappy. He'd chided Brodie to
his face and then turned and left.

At least
someone
had my back.

~~ * * * ~~

"Blarney Castle, just up ahead," I told Liam,
folding up the map I'd been reading. I was in the back seat of the
small car with the cameraman, given the task of navigating while
he'd drove, since Liam was better with a stick shift than me.

We'd more or less reached an uneasy truce
since getting off the flight at Cork. While we weren't exactly
friendly with each other, we'd fallen into a working relationship
of a sort. We were polite and efficient as we'd gotten into the car
rented for us, bought a map, and found our way to the next
location. Liam was a rather quiet sort, so I didn't know what he
was thinking.

Not that it mattered, I supposed, since it
was still looking as if we'd be the first ones kicked off of the
race anyhow. We'd had the bad luck to have seats in the very back
of the airplane since we'd arrived last at the ticket counter, and
Liam wasn't the type to shove his way to the front of the plane in
a hurry to get off. He'd simply sat in his seat and waited for his
turn, and I'd followed his lead. By the time we'd gotten off the
plane and found the rental cars marked for the racers, we were the
last ones to leave the airport.

"There," I said quickly, pointing as we drove
over a tiny bridge. "Parking is in that direction." The castle was
a fair distance away, the tower of it on the horizon. "Looks like
we hike it from here."

"Looks like," he agreed, and then gestured at
the line of identical silver hatchbacks already in the parking lot.
"All the others are already here."

"Not surprising,” I said. We’d known we were
in last place and nothing had happened to change that.

We parked our vehicle and grabbed our
backpacks out of the trunk. To my surprise, he grabbed my pack and
swung it onto his back next to his own, doubling up.

I gave him an odd look. "I can carry my own
bag."

"I know," he said easily. "But it's a long
walk to the castle and we can make up time if I carry it."

I hesitated. "I'm not helpless."

Those dark eyes lit on my face. "Never said
you were."

Okay, then. I nodded and we sprinted up the
winding path toward the castle.

Ireland was really, really green. I'd
expected that, but I was still surprised at how brilliantly pretty
the grounds of the castle were. Abundant plant-life was everywhere,
and flowers were blooming - a wild contrast from the cold snow of
Greenland. As we arrived at the front of the castle, The World
Races mat and flag came into view. A man in a black jacket and a
short green kilt with white socks was there to greet us. He held
out a disk as we approached.

Liam gestured that I should take it, so I
did, and flipped it over. "Blarney Castle is known for two things -
its remarkable gardens and the Blarney Stone,” I read. “As a team,
your task is to plant an appropriate item in each of the four main
gardens of the Blarney Castle gardens. Only plant in the marked
sections. Once you have planted all four items in the correct
spots, a gardener will give you your next task." I flipped over the
disk to make sure I hadn't missed anything else, then looked up at
my partner. "Ten bucks says that someone has to kiss the Blarney
Stone while we're here."

"I'm not taking that bet," he told me, and
his mouth curled on one side in a hint of a smile. He really did
look like a rock star just then, especially with the lip
piercing.

I found myself smiling back, and I tucked the
disk under my arm. "Well, let's find these gardens, shall we?"

We followed the marked path, and there was a
spot with another
World Games
flag flying overhead. There
were rows of potted plants lined up, guarded by a pair of gardeners
in the same green kilts that our greeter had worn. We set down our
backpacks next to the pile of the others, and I tucked the disk
into mine, then we each grabbed a potted plant to start the
task.

I stared down at my pot. Mine looked…well,
like weed. I giggled and showed it to Liam.

"Pretty sure that's illegal in most states,"
he murmured to me as we walked to the nearest garden. His was a
plain fern of some kind. "Hope there's not an Irish cop around to
watch us plant that."

There were signs all over the extensive
grounds, and from what I could tell, there were four main gardens -
the Fern Gardens, the Poison Gardens, the Irish Garden, and the Bog
Garden.

"No smoke garden," I joked. "Maybe we should
plant yours first. It's obviously the one that goes in the Fern
Gardens."

We headed for the Fern Gardens and found a
pair of shovels, the marked area, and two other teams still digging
away at their marked plots. I got excited at the sight of that,
especially when I realized that one team had no clue what they were
doing, since they were planting their cannabis in the Fern
Garden.

I set my pot of, well, pot down next to
Liam's fern and grabbed a shovel. "Come on," I told him in a low
voice. "We can catch up right here." I pushed ahead and began to
shovel dirt. It was soft and loose, not hard packed, and already
wet. This wouldn't be hard to dig at all. I tossed the shovel full
of dirt to the side and stuck my shovel in again.

"I should be the one digging," Liam told
me.

"Why's that?" I asked, even as I hopped on
the edge of my shovel to dig it into the ground even deeper.

"Because I'm…bigger than you."

"You were going to say 'because you're a
guy,' weren't you?"

He said nothing.

As if sensing an argument, a cameraman zoomed
in on us working.

“Admit it,” I told him. “You think I’m weak
because I’m a girl and that’s why you’re being all weird.”

“I never said you were weak or girly. You’re
just…short.”

I tossed the shovel-full of dirt on Liam's
buckle-covered, expensive boots.

He snorted. "Fair enough. I deserved
that."

"You did," I said in a cheerful voice. "And
you can dig the next one. Now, hand me your plant."

"Yes, ma'am," he told me, and he sounded
almost amused at my bossiness.

We planted our first two quickly, electing
the Poison Garden for the cannabis, and then heading back for the
last two. We planted something that looked like a water lily in the
bog garden, and the last plant, I had no idea what it was, but we
just guessed at that point, and then flagged over a gardener.

Apparently we'd guessed right, because the
gardener immediately handed over a disk. “Congratulations.”

Whooping with excitement, we quickly flipped
over the disk and read it, heads bent. My hand brushed over Liam’s
as we flipped, but I didn't have time to focus on that. We read the
next clue together.

"
Make your way to the Blarney Stone
,"
the disk read. "
One team member will need to volunteer for the
kiss, and receive the gift of gab.
"

He glanced over at me, and I noticed how
close our faces were for the first time. "Well, you called it."

"I did," I told him, unable to stop looking
at his mouth, so close to my own. "I figured they'd use every
opportunity to make someone kiss in this game." Abby's comment
about making good TV was permanently stuck in my head. I began to
get flustered as I thought about kissing him. He was tall, and,
okay, if I admitted it to myself, good looking. Sure, he had
tattoos and piercings, but he was pretty hot if I was paying
attention to that sort of thing.

Which I wasn't. Theoretically.

"Do you know much about the Blarney Stone?"
he asked me.

"Just that it involves kissing. Maybe you
have to stand on it and kiss someone for this gift of gab thing," I
told him, and felt my body get all flushed again. Was I going to
have to kiss him for the next clue? Why did that make me feel all
weird and kind of excited instead of reluctant and unhappy?

"Only one of us is mentioned, though," he
said thoughtfully. "What if we have to kiss a stranger?"

"Oh," I breathed. I hadn't considered that. I
elbowed him in a playful manner. "Well, you're the one that could
use the gift of gab, if you ask me."

He stared at me, eyes narrowing. "Fine. I'll
do it." Then, he turned away, clearly angry.