Body Games Page 7

  I froze in place. Oh…oh dear. Heat curled through my body at the sight of him, and I felt my pulse start to slam conspicuously between my legs. Nothing like the sight of a gorgeous man to get the libido racing. It wasn't that Jendan was naked. I'd seen him naked several times at this point. It was that he was incredibly sensual in his enjoyment of the water. His head was thrown back, face lined with ecstasy as water dribbled over his head.

  I should have announced my presence, but I only licked my lips and watched as he ran a big hand down one tanned arm, sluicing water off. The more I vowed to play this game celibate, the more this game made me regret it. Sigh. I cleared my throat. "Um, hi?"

  He didn't jerk around like he'd been doing something wrong. Instead, Jendan opened his eyes - those dreamy gray eyes - and gave me a lazy smile that made my ovaries do a flip. "I didn't think anyone was out here."

  "I didn't either," I told him. "This your camp?"

  "No, I don't know that it's anyone's. Mine is a nice long hike that way." He thumbed behind him, and then wiped a bit more water from his face. "I guess we're on the same island?"

  "I guess we are," I said, trying to make my voice light and nonchalant, all the while my loins were crying out like that plant in Little Shop of Horrors. FEED ME, SEYMOUR. "So, um, Endurance Island shower?"

  "Yep. I told Sunnie about it but she doesn't like to hike." He shrugged and stepped out of the water. "Not that there's anything else to do all day."

  I watched his buttocks flex as he turned away and climbed out of the small pool, and my mouth went dry. Man, I sure was thirsty all of a sudden. "Can you, uh, drink it?"

  "Don’t know, but it still makes a decent shower, right?" He grinned at me then raised his chin at the cameraman following me. "Are we going to be in trouble if we talk?"

  "I don't know." I glanced back at him, but he was still filming. "I know people accidentally ran into each other on earlier seasons, and nobody got booted out of the game. I think we're okay."

  "Well, in that case, hi, I'm your neighbor, Jendan." He approached me and stuck his big hand out.

  I clasped it and swallowed the girlish titter that rose in my throat. "Annabelle."

  "I remember," he said, his smile warm.

  “Oh, right.” I grimaced. “The lousy lay.” I wanted to strangle Kip with my bare hands for writing that on my back. I still hadn’t come up with the appropriate revenge yet. Just writing ‘Shrimp Dick’ on his back would be satisfying for all of two seconds, but then it’d be blurred out when the shows aired on television. I needed something better. Something lasting. Something underhanded that he’d never see coming. My mind percolated with possibilities.

  Jendan’s smile faded. “You know I don’t think that about you.”

  “Of course not,” I said lightly. “We haven’t had sex yet.” Then, my face grew scalding hot. Yet? Yet???? Oh sweet Jesus, Annabelle, don’t talk about sex! “You know what I mean,” I said quickly, recovering. “And Kip’s just pissed because I won’t let him grope me on the beach.”

  “He’s trying to grope you?” Jendan stiffened. “Do you want me to say something to the producers?”

  “What? No, no,” I said quickly. That might have been a bit of an exaggeration on my part. “I have it handled.” I didn’t want Kip disqualified from the game.

  I wanted to beat him and grind his nose into his failure.

  Not that I was bitter.

  Jendan still looked unsure, so I decided to change the subject. “How’s Sunnie?”

  “She’s…hanging in there as much as possible. Sick, though.”

  “Why’s she sick?”

  He scratched his head. “We haven’t been able to boil our water and she’s been drinking it.”

  “Oh, yikes. You know it’s probably full of parasites?”

  “I’m not going to tell her that. She’s still horrified there’s no toilet paper on the island.” He grimaced. “I don’t think this was her idea of roughing it.”

  “Has she ever seen the show?”

  “I’m not entirely sure.” He shrugged. “We’ll get fire eventually. It’s no big deal.”

  “What are you drinking?” I crossed my arms over my chest, trying to look nonchalant, but I was concerned. Jendan was a big guy. Already he looked a little hollow around the eyes. If he expected to survive six weeks out here, he was going to have to eat more.

  He gave me a rueful look. “Coconut juice?”

  “Want me to show you how to make a fire?”

  His gorgeous face lit up, doing terrible, naughty things to my hormones. God, that man had a gorgeous smile. But then he shook his head, slowly. “I wouldn’t want to impose on you, Annabelle. I know you’re playing to win, too. And you already bailed me out once, if I read things right.”

  “You did,” I told him. “And I need allies in this game. You’re no good to me if you’re falling over on your feet.”

  He considered it silently, rubbing the bristle on his jaw.

  “Come on. Take what I’m offering. Being nice and fair in this game gets you nowhere.”

  His gray eyes fixed on me. “So how come you’re being nice to me?”

  I blushed. I couldn’t say that I was a nice girl, could I? And it was stupid of me to be nice to him, on some level. “Like I said, I need allies. My partner is useless.”

  His mouth curved into a wry smile. “Sunnie’s not much better. Nice girl, but I wish she’d do something around camp.”

  “Maybe we should be secret partners, then,” I suggested. “Work with each other to get to the end.”

  He studied my face, then nodded slowly. “That sounds good to me. Shake on it?”

  I spit on my hand and offered it to him.

  Jendan eyed it. “Well, I wasn’t expecting that from you.”

  “Spit makes everything more serious,” I told him, and then turned beet red again. Damn. Why was it everything I said to him sounded like innuendo?

  But he ignored my blush, laughed, and spit in his own hand, then smacked it against mine.

  We shook.

  My first secret alliance. Excellent.

  Something beeped. Both Jendan and I looked over to the cameraman. He picked up a walkie-talkie from his belt. “Yeah?”

  “Reward challenge time and we’re missing two players,” came the tinny voice, followed by a beep.

  The cameraman looked at us and spoke into his walkie-talkie. “I’ve got them.”

  I looked back at Jendan and gave him a sheepish look. “Guess we’ll have to save the fire-making for another day. Television calls.”

  “Come back here tomorrow?” His gaze was intense, his eyes the most stunning shade of gray I’d ever seen. “I want to see you again.”

  Music to a girl’s ears. I was riveted despite myself, and nodded, trying not to smile like a loon and failing. “Yeah, okay.”

  “See you then.” He waved as he turned around and left.

  With a dopey grin on my face, I hustled back to my own beach. There’d be time enough tomorrow to take a dunk in the waterfall and go looking for my forked tree. Maybe Jendan could help me. The thought made me blush and giggle, and for a moment, I hated myself for having a crush on a guy while filming the show. A crush would do zero good. I couldn’t act on it, and if I had to, I’d still vote Jendan out to further my own game.

  This time, I was not going home.

  ~~ *** ~~

  “Welcome to today’s reward challenge!” Chip waved us in as we walked to our places in line. When everyone was settled in, he gestured at the set-up behind him. “As you can see, this challenge is a fun one.”

  I stared up at the gigantic fake tree behind him. Big wooden palm fronds were painted bright green, and the ‘trunk’ of the tree was easily twice as big around as a normal coconut tree. Nestled in the branches of the fake tree were dozens and dozens of coconuts. Some littered the ground already.

  “Your object in this challenge is to match coconuts. Each individual will have a chance to do one of two things
- either throw a coconut to knock others down from the tree, or to pick up two coconuts on the ground. If you get a match, your team scores a point. The first three teams to ten points win a reward. All the other teams, I’ve got nothing for you.” He gazed at us. “And it’s an important reward.” He went to a nearby podium with a covered basket and pulled off a colored cloth, revealing the prize.

  Fire-making implements. “Flint. Steel. Matches. Everything you need to make fire.”

  A chorus of cheers went up from down the line. I guessed that less people had fire than they let on.

  “This time, rewards are going to come with a twist. You can opt not to participate and eat instead.” He pulled the covering off of the other basket and showed us its contents - donuts and orange juice.

  My mouth watered. I looked over at Kip to see if he was thinking the same thing I was, and he was wiping his mouth.

  “But just be warned - if you opt not to participate, you’re sending a very clear message to the other participants. Now, is anyone confident enough in their fire to want to sit out of this challenge?”

  I hesitated. Looked over at my partner.

  Kip didn’t even have to think about it. He grabbed my hand and dragged me forward. “We do, Chip.”

  “Us, too.” Leslie and Emilio moved forward.

  “All right, that narrows the field for the remaining players. Those of you opting out, step aside so we can do the challenge.”

  As I watched giddily, production set up a folding table and folding chairs off to one side and put the basket of donuts and orange juice bottles there. My mouth watered at the sight.

  I glanced over at the other players. Some were looking at us longingly. Sunnie was frowning in our direction. Jendan stared straight ahead, not looking at the food.

  I felt a twinge of dismay, but it disappeared when the others surged forward to sit down and eat. I pushed my way next to them, sat down in one of the chairs, grabbed a donut and orange juice, and began to feast. The sugar icing the donut melted on my lips and I moaned. It was the best thing I’d ever tasted, after five days of coconuts.

  “All right,” Chip said. “Looks like we still have Teams Two, Three, Four, Five, and Six playing. Seven and Eight sat out, so that means that three teams will go home with fire. Two teams will go back to their beach, empty handed. We ready to play?” He nodded at the silence. “All right, Team Two, you’re up first!”

  I cheered silently as Jendan and Sunnie stepped up to the throwing line, scarfing another donut and washing it down with orange juice. I wanted them to win…but a small, selfish part of me wanted them to lose. If they lost, Jendan would still need my help to make fire, but that was a terrible reason to wish a loss on them. I shoved that thought down with another donut. At my side, Kip was pushing entire donuts into his mouth, his cheeks bulging as he chewed. His gluttony made me eat a little daintier. I didn’t want to look like that on camera.

  As we ate, the challenge wore on. The sugar I’d devoured made me nauseated quickly, and I switched to sipping orange juice as I watched players alternately knock coconuts down or try to match them. Alys quickly cleaned up. She got to go last and had no partner, so she just swiped coconuts as others knocked them down. She was the first to ten, then Summer and Polly, and then Jendan and Sunnie squeaked into third.

  When they won, Jendan’s face lit up into a jubilant smile that made my heart pound…and Sunnie flung herself at him and wrapped her arms around his neck, which made me considerably less happy. The clump of donuts in my stomach churned uncomfortably as I watched him hug her back.

  I didn’t know why I was jealous. She was his partner. I wasn’t in this game to hook up with anyone so it didn’t matter if he was attracted to her or not.

  But I didn’t want him to be attracted to her. I wanted him to be attracted to me, which was all kinds of stupid and wrong.

  I wouldn’t win the game of Endurance Island by hooking up. I already knew that particular strategy was a failure.

  Chapter Eight

  “I…almost didn’t want to win those fire-making implements. Almost.” — Jendan Abercrombie, Day 6, Endurance Island: Power Players

  “Tell us why you’re heading out into the jungle today.”

  I hugged my legs and faced the camera, adjusting my body so that my knees covered my tits and my feet blocked any uncomfortable views of my girly parts. Confessionals were a nice break-up in the day. It felt a lot like my own personal diary, and I could rant and rave to my heart’s content and know that no one would ever hear it…until it aired, of course. So you still had to be careful what you said.

  “There are a ton of reasons why I’m heading out into the jungle today. I boiled water this morning, so my canteen is full.” I patted it at my side. “I want to check out that waterfall for myself, because my hair feels grungy and sea water isn’t helping. And I want to look for that tree. I need Pandora’s Box. Badly.”

  I didn’t mention Jendan. I didn’t know if he’d be out there today, to be honest. He had fire. There was no reason to come meet me again, not really. Not unless he just wanted my company.

  “Tell us about your partner.”

  I grimaced. “Kip is frustrating. I can’t explain it more plainly than that. He doesn’t do a thing around camp. I have to feed him. I have to fill his canteen. He steals into my shelter if I don’t get there before he does. At least he’s not staring at my breasts any longer. But he’s a liability I have to put up with until I figure out what’s in Pandora’s Box. Then, if it’s something I can use to get rid of him, I’m going to at the first opportunity available.”

  “Do you think it’ll make you vulnerable to get rid of Kip?”

  “I honestly don’t care. Getting rid of Kip is the biggest goal I have in this game. I want to make him pay for how he treated me last time. If I win, great. If I don’t and Kip doesn’t either? Great. But being his partner is what makes things tricky. I need to somehow get rid of him without kicking myself out of the game first.”

  “What about what he wrote on your back in the last Judgment challenge?”

  I smiled tightly. “I’m trying not to think about that.”

  ~~ *** ~~

  Once the interview was done, I took my canteen and headed out into the jungle along the same route I’d taken yesterday. There was no path, but with nothing but time on my hands, I had time to explore a bit. If I went the wrong way, it was no big deal, really. We were on a small island; I couldn’t get that lost.

  Eventually, I heard the familiar sound of falling water and followed it to a sparkling shallow pool. There, like a glorious shower of Mother Nature, was the trickling waterfall. It tumbled off of a rocky cliff above, a sight for sore eyes if there ever was one. I stood beside the pool, hesitating. It felt weird to not have to undress to get in, but I shucked off my shoes, dropped my canteen and stepped into the flow, giving a little moan of pleasure at how good it felt. Sure, it was cold water and there wasn’t a ton of water pressure, but it was clean and crisp and not sticky with salt. In short: it was amazing. I stood under it for what felt like forever, rubbing my sandy, sweaty, salt-crusted limbs clean, and then just rinsed my hair over and over again. Man, I’d be here daily, because this waterfall was amazing.

  By the time I stepped out and wrung my hair out, Jendan still hadn’t showed. I felt a little twinge of sadness that he hadn’t bothered to show up. I shouldn’t have been surprised, though. He had fire; he didn’t need me for help. I slung my canteen back over my shoulder and started to head away to look for the forked tree. This was water, so maybe the tree where Pandora’s Box was buried would be somewhere nearby.

  My shoes were dirty and I hated the thought of putting them on my nice clean feet. Going barefoot through the jungle seemed like a more appealing option than putting on grubby sneakers, so I took my shoes in hand. I’d walked a few steps, picking my way across the terrain, when I nearly ran into Jendan’s naked chest.

  “Oh!” That was what I got for staring down as I walked.<
br />
  “Hey.” He grabbed my arm to keep me from stumbling. “You all right?”

  “Just focused on my feet. Didn’t see you there.” God, I sounded all breathless. “I didn’t think you were coming.” I looked down and his thumb was mere inches away from one of my wet breasts.

  Which made me all the more intensely aware of his naked body so close to mine.

  “Not coming?” He laughed. “It’s not like my schedule’s full.”

  “Actually I think we’re due to have a Judgment challenge today. It’s still early, though.” His hand was so warm on my arm, distracting me. “Um. How’re things at camp?”

  “Much better now that we have drinking water instead of just coconuts.” He smiled at me, teeth white in his tanned face, and I felt my heart give another little flip.

  “So you were able to get the fire going? That’s great. I’m really happy for you guys.”

  “It probably doesn’t beat donuts, but one step at a time.”

  I flushed uncomfortably. “We looked like real assholes eating those, didn’t we?”

  “Not at all,” he said. “I would have done the same thing in your shoes.”

  “I doubt that,” I said. “You’re too nice.”

  His mouth twisted into a half smile. “So everyone tells me.”

  Huh. It seemed like Jendan didn’t care to be referred to as a nice guy. Still…he was. He was one of the nicest I’d ever met. “Was that the wrong thing to say?”

  “Nah. Just seem to be stuck with a case of ‘nice guys finish last’ lately.”

  “Oh. Did you finish last on your other show?”

  “House Guests? Came in second, actually.” His smile turned rueful. “First loser.”

  “Ouch.”

  “Tell me about it. I lost to a guy that played dirty. I guess that’s the kind of game play people respect.”

  “Seems like it.” I studied him. He was handsome, but more than that, I liked his face. I liked the way the edges of his eyes crinkled just a bit when he smiled, because it told me he smiled often. So he wasn’t a ‘bad boy.’ Kip was, and look where he’d gotten me. “So are you going to try and play rough this time so you can take home the money?”