Ice Games (Games #3)(13)
Author: Jessica Clare

“You didn’t,” he whispered. His hand stroking my back slowed, and I felt his fingers trail slowly up and down my spine. “You did awesome. It’s her fault if she can’t see that.”

We said nothing for a long moment. His hand continued to move slowly up and down my spine, sending little shockwaves through my nerve endings. To my embarrassment, I felt my n**ples harden. Awareness moved through me, and I felt heat pooling between my legs, my pulse pounding as he continued to lightly brush his fingertips over my back, and I could feel him through the thin material of my t-shirt. I didn’t move, I simply breathed in the scent of Ty from where my head was nestled against his neck. His big neck. Odd that I liked a guy with such a thick neck. I’d thought it was a sure sign of a dumb jock at first, but Ty was clever, and determined, and I really liked him the more I hung out with him.

Which was totally bad news.

I pulled away with a small, reluctant sigh, not trusting that I wouldn’t somehow embarrass myself around him.

“Thanks for the comforting,” I told him, trying to keep my voice chipper and hide the fact that I wanted to crawl all over him and put my mouth on his. I wasn’t his type—a stick with a mouth, he’d called me. Annamarie Evans was his type, and I was nothing like her. “I think I’ll head to bed. I’m going to be useless until they give us the results tomorrow anyhow.”

He nodded and cleared his throat. “Sounds good. You going to practice early?”

Part of me wanted to pout and hang up my skates for good, but I’d learned my lesson about that. “Yeah. I’ll be up at dawn as usual. I figure if we move on, we have to have a new routine learned by next week’s show. We’ll need all the help we can get.”

Ty chuckled. “Good point. I’ll be there, too.”

I gave him a faint smile. “Night.”

“Night.”

Waiting for the live show’s results, the next day passed slowly. We only had a half day of training, since the rest had to be spent getting ready for being on-air that evening. Imelda hadn’t shown up, but she had sent over an assistant with notes for us. Next week’s theme would be ‘theatrical soundtracks,’ and she’d picked a theme from The Maltese Falcon that I didn’t recognize. She’d left a note that she was already working with costuming on our outfits, so not to worry about it.

The element added this week? The pair spin.

We skipped practicing that for now, since it wouldn’t matter if we had to learn it or not if we were voted out. Ty and I took it easy, going through the steps of the new and equally-boring routine that Imelda had picked out for us.

I was starting to wonder if our choreographer was in cahoots with Penelope and if they were determined to make us the most boring team out there.

“We have the results from last night’s voting,” Chip said. “May I have the envelope, please?” He paused for dramatic effect as a young child skated out to him with the big red envelope.

My hand clenched Ty’s sweaty one.

So far, the results show hadn’t been nearly as painful. It was only a half-hour long, which meant there was time for a montage recap of the prior night, some commentary from the judges, a singer to trot out and flog their latest single, and then the results. We’d all paraded around the ice one last time in our costumes from the night before, and then we’d lined up in the order of our scores.

“Before we read the results, I’d like to see who our judges think will go home?” He looked to the judging panel.

Oh no. My lip curled. This was going to be like salt in the wound, wasn’t it?

Penelope played with a pen on the judging table, tapping it as she thought. “I considered this for a little while last night, and I feel like the weakest link is Ty and Zara. They should be the ones to go home.”

I made a gagging face, and then remembered that we were on camera. I hoped they hadn’t caught that. The way the audience laughed, though, they had clearly seen my expression. I’d have to remember that for next time.

“And you, Irina? Who do you think should go home?”

“I feel,” she said in her thick accent, “that all of the teams did well. I don’t think I could choose someone to go home at this point. They’ve all worked really hard.”

Clearly Irina was the softball judge. The audience clapped, agreeing with her.

“And Raul?”

He considered for a moment. “I thought Jon Jon and Julia had no chemistry. My vote would be for them.”

That surprised me. I glanced down the line at Jon Jon, but judging from the look on his face, he’d been expecting something like that.

“Time for the results,” Chip said. “Based on the audience votes and combined with the scores from last night…the first team safe is…Emma and Louie Earl!”

Triumphant music broke out, and I clapped for Emma, glad for her. She hugged her partner and looked thrilled as they skated forward, waved to the audience, and then moved off of the ice.

“The next team safe,” Chip continued, waiting for the clapping to die down. “Is…Serge and Annamarie Evans!”

I clapped, though less enthusiastically for them. Neither one was a surprise there. Louie Earl was an older man who was surprisingly agile on his feet, and Emma was talented. Serge and Annamarie were both graceful and good-looking. They’d never be the first to go.

“The next safe…Toby and Victoria Kiss!” More clapping. That meant we were one couple away from being in the bottom two.

“The last couple safe is…Jon Jon and Julia Mckillip!”

Yep. Bottom two. I wrinkled my nose and looked over at Ty with an I-told-you-so expression. Next to us were Michael Michaels and Tatiana. Tati looked pissed as hell, though she was smiling with gritted teeth. Poor Tati. Evidently she wasn’t happy with the results. I didn’t blame her. I knew Tati was a perfectionist, so her partner falling down mid-routine had to be bothering the crap out of her.

The spotlight focused on Ty and I, and another on Tati and Michael Michaels. My stomach churned nervously, and my hand clasped in Ty’s was trembling.

“The team going home tonight…is…” Chip paused for dramatic effect.

I dug my toe-pick into the ice, ready to skate forward. I took a deep breath and sighed, closing my eyes. Goodbye, second chance.

“I guess the audience isn’t a fan of sequins, either! Tatiana and Michael Michaels, you will be going home. Ty and Zara, you are safe for one more week!”

The orchestra began to play, and I opened my eyes, looking at Ty in shock. We were safe? Ty the MMA Biter had been saved by the audience vote? Holy crap.

He grabbed me around the waist and swung me around, grinning, and I clung to him. Holy crap. Holy crap, we were safe!

The audience clapped, and Ty and I were shuffled off the ice so Tati and her partner could do a last lap around the ice while the credits rolled and Chip yammered into his microphone.

We were safe one more week, despite everything. Maybe we stood a chance after all.

The next morning, I studied the boring routine paper and frowned at Imelda. “There’s only one lift in this entire thing.”

She sniffed and texted something into her phone, seated in a folding chair away from the ice, as usual. “This week’s required element is the sit spin. Lifts aren’t until next week.”

“I know. But lifts are flashy and the audience always loves them.” I skated toward her, a little frustrated. “Ty’s a big strong guy. We can do more than one lift.” I looked over at Ty. “Don’t you think?”

He shrugged. “I can bench press two hundred. What do lifts involve?”

“We can always do an Ina Bauer for you, and I can do a handstand, or we could do a crouch and horizontal, or…” I stopped at the glazed look in his eyes. “Just trust me. You can pick me up, right?”

He snorted. “Duh. You weigh nothing.”

“I’m not sure this is such a good idea,” Imelda said in a prissy voice. “We need to keep things easy.”

“This will be easy,” I told her. I skated to Ty’s side, and then turned my back to him, standing in front of him. “Can you lift me up?”

“How high?”

“Put your hands on my waist and pick me up as high as you can go.”

Big hands grasped me at the hips, and he hefted me into the air as if I weighed nothing. I held my breath as he held me up to shoulder height. “You want higher?”

“That’s good,” I told him, keeping my body as straight as possible. “We could do something like this, or I can do the splits.” I extended my legs outward as an example. “Or if he can hold me on the thighs, I can pull one leg over my head.”

“So you can put a leg over your head?” Ty asked. “I thought you were joking when you told me that. Damn, girl. I think I want to see it for myself.”

I blushed, dropping my legs, and patted him on the hand. “Put me down now.”

He did, lightly, and I hopped away on the ice, hoping to hide my flustered sensibilities. “See?” I told Imelda. “We can work a few more lifts in there, and if we increase the difficulty, we should score better.”

“I don’t think so,” she said again, and turned back to her phone.

I wouldn’t be deterred. “We need more flash in this routine,” I told her. “You basically just have us circling around on the ice for a minute and a half with two lifts. No one’s going to be interested in that, especially not if we’re dancing to the Maltese Falcon.”

She ignored me.

“What about the costumes?” Ty asked, skating to my side and skidding to a stop (rather artfully, I noticed).

“Just a pinstriped suit for you and a white dress for her.”

“Sequins?” Ty asked.

“Not many,” Imelda said quickly.

He gave me a pained look.

Ugh. It was like she was ignoring everything we wanted to do. “You do realize we almost went home last night? This,” I shook the printed out routine at her, “is going to ensure that we go home. It’s boring!”

“I’m trying to keep in mind his capabilities and give the audience something appealing,” Imelda said easily, and then she went back to her chair.

I wadded up the paper in disgust. She wouldn’t come onto the ice with us. She had zero enthusiasm for her job. She made decisions without consulting us, and they were bad ones. “You know what? You’re fired.”

Her head popped up at that. “You can’t fire me.”

“Sure I can.” I pointed at the door. “You’re fired. Get out.”

“The network appointed me,” she said with a frown. “You don’t get to decide.”

The cameraman zoomed in on my face. I didn’t care that they were filming. She was doing nothing but dragging us down. “The Maltese Falcon is boring. You didn’t ask us if we wanted to dance to that, you just picked it. You’re ignoring our requests for the routine. You’re putting sequins on the costumes even though we’ve asked you not to—repeatedly. At this point, if we follow your routine, we’re going home. At least if we do our own routine, we’ll stand a chance. So if the network doesn’t kick us out, we might have a shot in hell of staying. Like I said. You’re fired.”