Playing Games (14 page)

I stared at that small paragraph in horror.
Liam had dated Tesla. Shit. Why had I ever thought he'd be
interested in me? Silly little Katy Short, with her cutesy blonde
pigtails and dorky cupcake business. I was nothing compared to the
kinds of girls he was interested in, if he'd dated wild, exotic
Tesla with her tattoos and stripey-colored hair. Feeling sick to my
stomach, I clicked over to 'videos' and began to play the first
one, turning the speakers down so no one could hear but me.

The entire thing was ridiculously dramatic,
done in black and white. The only thing in color, of course, was
Tesla, with her vivid hair and bright red lips. She clutched the
microphone as if she was dying and sang soulfully, her eyelashes
fluttering with each word. Every so often, it would cut back to the
band, and then just as quickly flash away again, which drove me
absolutely nuts. It was like they didn't even count, and Tesla was
the only one they were interested in.

At least, until the guitar solo. Suddenly,
Liam was front and center in the video, blasting into color. He
held the guitar low against his hips, braced there, and his fingers
danced along the strings in a familiar movement that I recognized -
when his hands were moving along the backpack, he wasn't drumming.
He was strumming a song. I watched in fascination as the video Liam
closed his eyes as if in ecstasy, fingers moving along the neck of
the guitar at a rapid pace I couldn't even fathom, as the wild
notes of the song climbed higher and higher. He looked so
incredibly in to the music that it felt intimate just to be
watching him—

"That doesn't look like the Great Pyramid."
Liam's amused voice interrupted my train of thought.

Horrified at being caught, I quickly clicked
off of the webpage, only to expose the web browser search I'd done
for
Finding Threnody
. I clicked off of that too, face
burning, and returned to the Pyramids of Giza page. "I, uh, was
just looking at…stuff."

"Uh huh," he said, but he sounded amused.

I was going to die of embarrassment right
about now. I stared at the computer screen, unable to look my
partner in the face.

Liam pushed a piece of paper in front of my
nose. "Travel itinerary. We have a flight in about two and a half
hours, which leaves us just enough time to get to the airport. And
we should get there tonight."

"Tonight?" I took the itinerary from him and
studied it, glad that it gave me the chance to avoid eye contact.
"Wow, long flight."

"Yeah. Plenty of time to catch up on sleep."
He paused for a moment, then added, "Or watch more
Finding
Threnody
videos."

My face burned. "You suck."

"Apparently you don't think so." There was
affection in his voice, and it made my stomach feel all quivery all
over again.

As we got back into the taxi, I wondered what
Liam thought of me. Had I gone from partner to fangirl in the blink
of an eye? That was distressing to think about, but I couldn't take
it back. The only thing I could do was continue on and act like
nothing was wrong.

Meanwhile, it was starting to feel like
everything was out of control.

~~ * * * ~~

Egypt

"I want to quit," I proclaimed loudly into
the darkness. "I'm serious. I can't do this."

"Looks like we finally found something that
Katy can't do," Liam murmured into my ear, but his hand squeezed
mine. "You'll be okay."

"I'm not so sure about that," I said,
dropping to a low crouch and trying not to hyperventilate.

When we'd first heard that we were heading to
the Pyramids at Giza, I was excited.
Really
excited. If I
could think of places in the world that would be exciting to visit?
The pyramids were high on the list. It'd be such a fun experience
to go inside and see what it was like. When we'd seen the outside
of the pyramids, I'd been ridiculously stoked, practically dancing
up to The World Races flag where a man gave us our next clue.

Visit each of the burial chambers in the
three pyramids and find a clue. String all the clues together to
determine your next task.

Simple enough. And not only were we going to
visit the interior of one pyramid, we were going to visit all
three. Fun!

Or so I'd thought.

We'd lucked into first place somehow - our
stop at the travel agency had put us on a flight ahead of the
others. We'd somehow managed to score the last seats on the plane.
We'd arrived in Cairo late at night and even though the cab driver
had insisted that the pyramids would be closed for tourists for the
evening, we headed out anyhow.

Sure enough, the flag had been there, and the
task. The World Races had made special arrangements with the
tourism board and the pyramids were open just for us. Which meant
we could go ahead and start the next task.

Except it was really, really dark. And I
hadn't counted on claustrophobia. Nor had I counted on the fact
that when we entered the Great Pyramid, the first passageway was
narrow and steep. We'd had to bend over - even at my short height -
to go up the steep steps. All around us were tons and tons of rock,
and the inside of the pyramid was oppressively hot, and dark
despite the anchor lights along the halls.

Then it hit me. I was fine for the first few
steps, following behind Liam. But when I looked up into the
darkness and saw nothing but the continually rising, narrow shaft?
My breathing became shallow and I began to sweat, hard.

Just when I couldn't stand it any longer, the
interior passage opened up, and I breathed a sigh of relief. We
continued on into the King's Chamber, and studied the walls. We
found a small group of tiny figurines in the center of the
sarcophagus with a word marked on them – 'the.'

"This must be the clue," I told Liam, and
counted the figurines. "There's five others left, which means
someone got eliminated last round."

"Great. We can head back out and go to the
next chamber." Liam didn't look bothered at all. Meanwhile, I was
all sweaty and flustered and breathing hard as if I’d ran miles
instead of simply walked up a passageway.

Heading back down the passageway was hard,
but not as hard when I knew we were almost out. The queen's chamber
wasn't as bad, but I was still grateful when we found the next
clue. Another figurine, this one labeled with the word "Take."

"At least we're done here," I panted. "I hate
this pyramid."

"Just one more chamber, actually," Liam
corrected. He looked at a brochure he'd gotten in the city.
"There's a third chamber heading down. The subterranean chamber. We
should probably check it just to be sure."

"It said burial chambers," I protested. "Not
all chambers."

"Yeah, but if we miss a clue, we'll have to
come back, and we're already here. Come on."

We'd arrived at the subterranean chamber
stairway, and that was when I had my meltdown. It descended into
the darkness at a steep angle, and as I watched Liam fold himself
in half to try and get his tall body down there, I took a few steps
into the shaft, and then began to tremble. The walls felt like they
were closing in on me. It was hot, and dark, and cramped, and…I
freaked out. I sat down in the tunnel, unable to go further. Panic
was hammering through me, making my pulse pound and my heart race.
I couldn’t breathe.

"I can't do this," I told him, and to my
horror, I felt tears prick behind my eyes. Oh jeez, I was going to
start crying like a baby.

"Yes, you can, Katy. It's not so bad. I'll go
in front of you, see?"

I shook my head. "I want to quit. I'm
serious. I can't do this."

He grasped my hand in his. "Looks like we
finally found something Katy can't do. You'll be okay."

I took huge gulps of too-warm air, my eyes
squeezed shut as I tried to calm myself. I clung to his hand and we
sat there in the middle of that cramped passage as I had my
freak-out.

Liam didn't push me, though. He just sat and
held my hand, waiting for me to get better.

"I'm sorry," I said, and hated when that it
came out so incredibly wimpy.

"Hey, it's okay," Liam told me in a soft
voice. "I couldn't do the mukluk. You can't do this. I totally get
that. Unfortunately, though, we both have to go down to each
chamber."

I sucked in a deep breath, nodding. "I'm
sorry. I'll try."

His hand slid along my leg, rubbing it to
comfort me. We were wearing shorts for this leg of the race, and
his hand felt comforting despite the oppressive heat of the
tunnels. It was night - they should have been cooler, but it was
disgusting inside, and that wasn't helping my panic. "I'm here with
you, Katy. You'll be all right."

"I bet Tesla wouldn't be scared of this," I
said in a miserable voice. "You got stuck with the wrong
partner."

"Nah, Tesla wouldn't be scared of this," he
agreed. "But she's scared of animals."

"Animals?"

His hand continued to rub my leg soothingly.
"Yeah. She freaked out with the dog sled. Big time. She thinks
animals are full of diseases."

I gave a mildly hysterical little giggle at
that, trying to picture sexy, sultry Tesla flipping out over a few
huskies. "I hope there's a freaking camel race for this leg,
then."

He laughed at that. "You know what? Me
too."

We sat there for a moment longer, and then
Liam’s fingers stroked my hand comfortingly. "You know, we have
plenty of time before the next team arrives. Do you want to try and
scoot down the tunnel on your backside? That might make you feel
better."

I squeezed my eyes shut, picturing that
horrible stifling blackness and having to descend into it. "I…I
don't know."

"How about I hold your hand, and you keep
your eyes closed. You can keep one hand on me, one on the railing,
and just kind of scoot down at your own pace." His voice was a low,
soothing hum. "We'll take all the time you need."

I sucked in a deep breath, trying not to
imagine the walls pressing in around me. If I kept my eyes closed,
it was better, but only a little. Panic still threatened to
overwhelm me.

"Come on," Liam coaxed in that soft voice. "I
moved down a step. Can you move down a step toward me?"

My eyes tightly shut, I reached out and found
the railing again, and slid down a bit, toward his voice.

"That's it," Liam told me, encouraging me
onward. "Take your time. We can do this."

And a few seconds later, I gave another
half-assed shuffle downward.

"Good job, Katy." His voice was warm and full
of pleasure that I was trying.

"You probably think I'm the world's biggest
idiot," I told him, doing another blind little slide down to the
next step.

"Actually, no. I find you pretty damn
sexy."

My eyes flew open at that, but then I saw the
yawning black behind him and gave a frightened meep, squeezing them
shut tight again. "You're distracting me!"

"Is it working?" He chuckled, the sound low
and delicious, and gave my hand another encouraging tug. I followed
him down another shuffled step.

"Maybe a little."

"You're doing great. Just hold on to me."

"This…this isn't freaking you out?"

"Me? Nah. A bowl of mukluk freaks me out.
Going on stage freaks me out. Holding the hand of a pretty girl
that I like kissing? That's not freaky at all."

"There you go, trying to distract me again,"
I said breathlessly, even as I slid down another step or two. "You
don't like going on stage?"

"Hate it," he said in an easy voice, and
tugged my hand to encourage me along. "Some people love performing.
That's their favorite part of the gig. I hate it. I'd much rather
sit in a studio and write songs all day long, but the rest of the
band likes to tour." He gave a soft chuckle. "The label likes that,
too. Imagine that."

"You should tell them you don't like
touring," I said, sliding down another step. "It doesn't seem right
that you have to tour if you hate it."

"I do. I have the worst kind of stage fright.
That's why I'm perfectly happy to let Tesla get in front of
everyone and make a spectacle of herself. It means all I have to do
is sit in the back and play guitar. Another step. Come on."

I slid down a bit more. "You looked like you
were having fun in your video."

"Of course. And another step. There you go.
Videos are shot in a studio. And they're shot over and over again
until they get just the right look for what they want. No one's
going to be excited if they see the guitarist looking like a deer
caught in headlights at the sight of a crowd."

I slid down again, and stifled another
giggle. "I can't picture that."

"It's not pretty," he said, and his voice was
wry. "So I noticed you're avoiding the subject."

"Subject?"

"I called you pretty and sexy and told you I
like to kiss you, and all you want to ask about is how scared being
on stage makes me. Come on, another step. There you go. I kind of
think you're avoiding the subject, Katy."

"Nah," I said nervously. "I…kind of thought
you liked kissing me because it made good TV."

"You were the one that said you wanted to
make good TV. I was just going along with it because it got me some
alone time with you."

I felt that prickle of awareness on my body,
of his hand holding mine, even as I slid a bit further down the
stairs. "Oh."

He chuckled. "That's all you have to say?" I
heard his feet hit something and then he gave my hand a small
shake. "You can open your eyes now. We made it to the chamber."

I slid down just a bit more, and then
squeezed one eye open. Sure enough, the narrow passageway had
opened up to a much larger stone chamber that was lit with electric
lights strung up along the walls. The room wasn't all that
interesting, except for another narrow crawl-hole in the far end of
the room and a railing around the center of the chamber that
protected a deeper hole.