Butterflies in Honey (Growing Pains #3) (33 page)

“Krista, can you see me? Look straight,” Sean
said.

Regretfully, Krista raised her eyes from the
void between the two trees. Sean was at the next tree, a rope from
a cable around the trunk attached to his harness. He couldn’t fall
far. Krista could.

“I can’t do this, Sean. I can’t…”

“Listen to me, Krista. Focus on my voice. You
can
do it. Don’t look down. Feel the rope with your feet as
if it were your surf board. Or a balance beam. You can do
this.”

Krista, still shaking, took a deep breath. “I
hate you for this, Sean. I don’t even want a new handbag. I just
said that to get everyone on board.”

“I know, baby, but you do want to win. So
keep coming.”

“It is too airy up here, Sean,” she whined as
she inched out, one foot at a time. She grabbed the rope suspended
above, one-hundred feet of air, and then gingerly placed her right
foot on the rope.

“Good girl. That was the hardest part.”

“Who are you trying to fool?” Krista
mumbled.

She stepped with her second foot and inched
out, a little at a time. She very nearly closed her eyes to shut
out the sight of nothingness around her. Your feet aren’t supposed
to feel a breeze beneath them. It wasn’t right.

“Good. Half way.”

A gust of wind shook her, swaying her whole
body. Krista tried to clutch to the rope but as she leaned forward,
the rope she was standing on went backward. One foot slipped off
and the next thing she knew she was confronting her fears—she was
dangling.

And then she panicked. And screamed.

“Krista, calm down.
Krista
, just
listen to my voice. Just me and you, baby. Me and you. Stay with
me.”

Like the many times Krista freaked out with
Sean, he talked her down off the ledge. Only this time, the ledge
was real. She closed her eyes and regained her balance slowly. She
brought her foot back to the rope and stood there for a minute.

“Take another step, Krista. Loosen those
hands and take another step,” Sean coaxed.

“I think I peed myself a little.”

“I…That’s…I don’t know what to say to that.
Just keep coming. We’ll get you a
Depends
when you get
down.”

Nearly crying, Krista shimmied her foot out a
bit, then shimmied the other closer.

“Great work, baby. A little farther now,”
Sean said. He was definitely closer. She could hear it.

“You shouldn’t call me ‘baby,’ Sean. It is
sexual harassment.”

“All right sweet cheeks, just a bit
more.”

She laughed despite herself. “I hate you,
Sean.”

“Love you, too. A little farther.”

She edged out a little more, then a little
more. As her foot moved, it hit something hard. Before she could
scream she was wrapped in Sean’s arms.

“You did it!” he said as he flattened her to
the tree.

She let go of him and grabbed the tree. She
felt Sean doing something with her harness, then air, and then a
thunk
. Then ‘Next’ from below.

“Alright, we need to keep going. You are
almost there.”

“I don’t want to.”

“I know. But you have to. Let’s go. Just
listen to my voice and trust me, okay? Trust me.”

“Okay.”

They edged along the platform. Sean had his
hand on Krista’s back, making her feel marginally safer as she
clutched onto the tree. All too soon she felt more draft. A peek
told her it was another void.

“Okay, this is a board. Much easier. All you
have to do is cross it,” Sean said close to her ear.

Krista opened her eyes to look, but Sean was
so close to her face, she couldn’t see anything else besides his
lucid green eyes. He leaned closer, and he was kissing her.

She opened her mouth to him, happy to close
her eyes again. Sean encircled her with his arms and pulled her
closer. Krista lost herself in the kiss and his body. His warmth
radiated around her. She felt safe and content…until she got a
blast of wind and remembered where the hell she was.

She broke off the kiss aggressively. His eyes
were bright and soft, which was not more important than the ground,
which was hard and far away.

“What the hell are you doing?” she asked,
outraged. What if she had lost herself completely and pitched over
the side?

“Taking your mind off of things,” Sean said
quietly.

“Sean McAdams, get your shit together and get
away from me. I need to get out of this damn tree! I would push
you, but you probably wouldn’t move and I would get dumped over the
side!”

Sean smiled, those beautiful eyes twinkling.
“Follow me.”

They got to the plank.

Yes, a plank is better than a rope.
This
plank, however, was not.

“Sean, there’s nothing to hold on to.”

“If you fall, the rope will catch you.”

“Then I’ll dangle one-hundred feet off the
ground! What the hell is going on here? Are these people sadists?!
Who thinks this is fun?!”

“You’re holding us up, Krista,” Donald yelled
from somewhere behind them.

“Shut up, Donald!” she screamed into his
general direction.

“You can do it, Krista,” Dean said, nearly
right behind her.

Where had he come from?

Sean, seeing Krista terrified but ready,
turned toward the plank and walked across. He had great balance and
loved heights—nothing to it. Krista put him on her ongoing hit
list.

“Krista, you have excellent balance.” Dean
edged up behind her. “Just look at Sean, keep your head up, and
walk.”

“I’m going to have to look down, Dean. Or
else how am I going to see where I am walking?”

“It’s a straight line,” Dean said. “Just walk
in a straight line toward Sean. Easy.”

“The next person that says this is
easy
is going to get punched in the mouth.”

“Atta girl, Krista. Take no prisoners!”
Georgie shouted up. He thought this was hilarious.

“How many points am I getting for this?” she
asked logically.

“One,” Donald shouted.

“I am doing all this for one lousy point? I
have to change my underwear! I might not have any more clean ones.
Then what?”

“Krista, you’re getting hysterical. Finish
strong,” Sean prodded.

Krista looked up and glared at him. She was
answered with a sexual smile. He liked when she was riled up. He
liked the sex that followed.

If there was ever a time that she was not in
the mood, it was, hands down, right then.

Centering herself, because that was a good
thing to do before a person died, Krista inched out onto the board,
petrified. Her hands were up for balance, but she didn’t need it.
This wasn’t a physical problem she was having, it was all in her
head. If that beam were one foot off the ground, she could probably
do yoga on it, or dance on it, and never waver. The air beneath her
feet had her shaking. But she was braving it. She was facing it.
For him. For their team.

She didn’t care that Sean got that loving
look. Not right then.

“Damn you all. You’re nothing but a bunch of
assholes!” she yelled.

“Half way, Krista!” Georgie shouted.

“I think I peed myself again,” she whined. “I
have bladder issues this high up.”

Sean was leaning out toward her with his hand
out. Krista inched, slowly but surely. Little by little. One step
at a time.

“Almost there, Geegee!” she heard Marcus
shout.

“Marcus? What are you doing here?” She asked
the air.

“Just watching you on your death bed,
doll.”

“C’mon, Krista. Listen to my voice. Almost
there,” Sean called softly.

She kept inching to that hand. Then she took
a big step and grabbed it. She was quickly reeled in and put on a
large, hard surface. She wasn’t held this time. She wasn’t kissed,
either. She was sad and glad at the same time. With the audience,
though, it wouldn’t have been a good idea.

Krista hugged the tree and waited. Dean
showed up two seconds later.

“That was fast, Dean,” Krista mumbled into
the bark.

“Yeah. I like heights.”

Dean moved around Krista, hooked up his
safety rope to another part of the torture chamber. The next sound
was a
zzzzzzz
and a yodel.

“What the hell is going on?” Krista asked no
one.

“Dean just zipped out. Your turn. Or do you
want Donald to go first?” Sean asked next to Krista’s ear.

“Just get me out of here, Sean. I need solid
ground.” Krista was out of stamina.

Sean led her along the tree. The platform
they were on was the largest yet, though still not large. Two
people could walk abreast around the tree in most areas, and there
was a long haired man sitting next to a rope leading out into the
abyss. He held it out to Krista.

“I hate my life,” she said weakly.

Sean basically pushed her to the man and held
her still while he exchanged her safety rope for a zip line
rope.

“Okay Krista, choose your flight. You want to
sit on the edge and fall off, or jump?” The man asked with a
smokers gravelly voice.

“Leaping. Screw it.”

“O-kay. At your pace.” The man sat back on
his tiny stool and watched the proceedings in boredom.

At the edge of the platform was nothing but
air. Oh, and a bird flapping by. She was standing at the height
that birds flew with nothing but a bit of rope and some straps
keeping her from falling to her doom. How unnatural was that?

The zip line had a steep fall directly off
the platform, then bowed out to a distant tree. Krista had only
four words available to her at the sight, “I hate my life.”

Nothing to it. She closed her eyes, prayed,
and felt a surge of panic and fear as she forced herself to step
off the platform.

The world fell away.

She was falling. Her stomach wasn’t falling
with her—it was tossed up into the air, along with all the blood in
her body, causing an unbearable tickling sensation. Then the rope
caught and she was rushing,
zooming
downward at a million
miles an hour, screaming the whole way. Air was rushing by her
head, whipping at her face. Her fingers were painfully clutching
the rope attached to her harness, her toes were tingling. She felt
like she was in a wind tunnel, falling. Always falling. Falling and
zooming. Until she slowed and wasn’t falling. She was climbing.
Slightly but not slowly, climbing.

She slowed to a fluffy stop, the wind
subsiding and her body recollecting itself.

Then she started falling backward.

“
WHAT THE HELL?!”

She zipped back down, eyes still shut tight,
until she hit the lowest point in the line again, went up a ways,
and slowly started back down again. The demon ride was nearing its
end. Krista waited, tensely, until it finally stopped for good, and
then with eyes still shut, said, “Someone get me down.”

There was clanking, there was movement
nearby, there was talking—Krista saw none of it. She wasn’t opening
her eyes for anyone.

“Kay girl, you gotta climb down,” a man’s
voice said.

Krista peeked open her right eye. There was a
ladder next to her feet with a gruff looking nature man next to
her. He had dreads and a shirt with a pot leaf on it.

“I’ll help you on the ladder.” He put his
arms in the air for her to grab.

Krista was down so fast she left the guy at
the top with wide eyes. She flattened herself onto the ground,
closed her eyes, and enjoyed the dirt.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Later that evening Krista was showered,
napped, and rested. She’d left the ropes course to a crowd full of
cheers—apparently everyone could hear her screaming and yelling
from up in the trees, and they wanted to check out the ruckus.
Marcus led the cheering team that wanted her down safe. He wouldn’t
comment on those who didn’t.

He did comment on Bob being absent, however.
Krista filled him in on the way back to her room. He had looked at
her knowingly, but didn’t comment. He knew it was coming—apparently
everyone did—and his reaction was no surprise.

When Krista got back to her room, she had a
good cry. It was an emotionally draining day on top of an
emotionally draining weekend. She was making progress, it was true,
but it was just so much work. She felt like she was walking the
proverbial uphill slope in the snow. And while her team was
starting to warm toward her, which was a huge plus, the rest of the
managers weren’t. She had a tiny group of supporters in a large
crowd. It was draining.

So with the help of a pep-talk over the phone
from a riled up Kate, who hated her in any sort of turmoil, she
decided to put on her
chic
, sexy dress and just be
Krista.
She wasn’t putting her differences in their faces,
but she was no longer holding back, either. She didn’t have an
angle and she wasn’t hiding—she was coming right at them in normal
Krista style.

It was the awards night, and they would hear
who won and who placed for the weekend’s events. There were team
trophies and individual trophies. Krista didn’t realize about the
individual ones, and was glad for it. She didn’t need any more
pressure.

Janice came, showered, got chastised by
Marcus for her outfit, ignored him, and went. Sean came by to talk
to Janice, but when she was leaving, he had no excuse to stay. He
gave a farewell to Krista and said he’d see her later.

Speaking of Marcus, he was all for her
wearing the dress she chose. It was a black tie affair. Everyone
would be in their best. The men in tuxes, the women in evening
gowns. Krista’s dress was long, down to her ankles, but there was a
slit up one side to her mid-thigh. It was a strapless number, and
her bra boosted her boobs up and out. It was a shimmery blue color
shifting material. It was unique, expensive looking, and set off
her coloring perfectly.