This Is War - Chapter 23 – Ramming Speed!
We put our earbuds away and went back to rejoin our team. I had no idea what the score was, but I assumed we were losing.
“Where have you been?” asked Frankie. “We’re getting our asses kicked!”
“How bad is it?” I asked.
“Or what?” I pulled him to the side out of earshot from the rest of our team. “I’m literally going to die if you don’t tell me what happens to the losing princess.”
“Cole’s going to bang you.”
What?! “But he said there were no strings attached when he offered me the princess suite!”
“Well, he lied.”
“Damn it! He’s such an asshole.”
Tanner nodded. “Tell me about it.”
“Well, what are you going to do about it? Are you going to sit back and let him win? Or are you going to save me?”
“This feels like a trap.”
“What? Why?”
“Because a week ago I saved you from getting fucked by Cole. And then you told me that you never wanted to see my face again.”
“You didn’t save me. I drew the right card. And anyway, that was different.”
He raised a questioning eyebrow.
“It was! I hadn’t seen you for months. And then you just showed up and started messing with my life.
It also didn’t help that I was super-duper drunk at the time and extremely horny.
” Shit! Why did I tell him that I was horny?
“I mean, I was horny at the time. I’m not horny anymore.
Not because I masturbated. Fine, I might have taken a peek at Chastity’s porn collection.
But nothing happened.” Why am I still talking!
? Every word I said was making this so much worse.
Tanner laughed at me.
“It’s not funny! I was so mad at you.”
He reached out and ran his fingers through my hair. “Was?”
I slowly nodded. Yeah… was . It was hard to be mad at him when he was standing here smiling at me.
“So…you’re saying that I shouldn’t save you from Cole again?”
“What? No! You should absolutely save me. I’m so tired of him making me get naked at the worst times.”
Tanner’s face got serious at the mention of Cole getting me naked.
I couldn’t help but smile. It really seemed like Tanner was into me. Was that why he had come back? So that we could give it another shot?
“Why are you smiling?” he asked.
“I’m just happy to have you on my team. Now are you going to save me from Cole?”
“And how do you expect me to do that?” he asked.
“I don’t know! You keep pretending like you can do magic. How about you use some of that?”
“Okay.”
Okay? He said it so confidently. Like he would actually use magic to make us win.
“Let’s do this.” He took my hand and led me back to the prize wheel.
Chastity was already there waiting. I was kind of mad at her.
But also not. Because even though she’d seduced Diablo into throwing some events, she’d then recanted and told him that she’d only blow him if he won.
And we were still losing. Which made me think that Diablo really did just suck at everything.
Or maybe Cole was just super amazing at everything…
“Princess Raven,” said Ocelot. “It’s your spin.”
I grabbed the wheel and gave it a tug. Please be an event that Tanner can make us win.
It spun and spun until finally coming to rest on SACK RACE. Oh hell yeah. That was the perfect candidate for magic.
“So what kind of magic are you gonna use?” I asked Tanner on the way over to the field.
“The options are endless. I could fill one of the blue sacks with spiders. Or bricks. Or Nigel. Your choice.”
“I like the Nigel idea.”
“Me, too, Mistress Ash,” said Nigel. “It would be my pleasure to hide in a sack. And tickle a sack.” He held up his hand and demonstrated exactly how he’d tickle the opposition’s balls.
“Eh,” said Tanner. “That’ll be too easy to trace back to us. Might lead to a disqualification. Let’s just go with bricks.”
I could picture it perfectly. Cole and Chastity would be out there with their smug, cheating faces.
They’d be hopping along, about to cross the finish line.
And boom! Suddenly there’d be a big brick in the bottom of their sack.
They’d try to hop, but instead they’d just face-plant right into the grass as my team jumped to victory.
It was the perfect plan.
We stepped into our sacks and pulled them up around our waists.
“Ready?” I asked Tanner.
He nodded with a mischievous grin and turned to Cole and Chastity. “I hope you’ve enjoyed us letting you win…because from here on out, you’re going down.”
“I doubt it,” replied Cole. “But good luck.”
Ocelot fired the starting gun and the race was on.
I hopped as fast as I could, but I quickly fell behind the three other superhumans.
It didn’t even make sense that they were all so good at sack racing.
It was almost like they’d been practicing.
Who in their right mind would practice hopping around like an idiot?
But it didn’t really matter, because I had Tanner on my side. And he had magic. Or something like that. Seriously, his tech was top-notch.
“Uh,” I said to Tanner as Chastity and Cole got way out ahead of us. “You better use that magic now.”
“You sure?” he asked. “I thought it would be more exciting if I let them get out to a big lead first. The more they’re winning by, the sweeter it will be when they eat bricks.”
“Okay. I don’t hate that idea. But you better not mess this up…”
The blue team rounded the cones on the far side of the field and started heading back to the finish.
Cole gave me a cocky wink as he passed. I just smiled, thinking about the horrible fate that was about to befall him.
Tanner and I hopped along leisurely while Cole and Chastity sped towards the finish.
“Tell me when,” said Tanner.
“Wait for it…wait for it…” When our enemies were ten yards from the finish, I yelled, “Now!” Eat bricks, suckers!
Tanner snapped his fingers and… Cole and Chastity just kept hopping as if nothing had happened.
Tanner looked at his fingers in confusion. He snapped again, but still nothing happened. The blue team cheered wildly as their leaders crossed the finish line.
“What the hell, man?” I asked. “You were supposed to put bricks in their sacks!”
“I tried!” yelled Tanner. “I don’t know what…” He stopped midsentence and went pale. It looked like he had seen a ghost behind me. “Shit,” he muttered.
I turned around to see what he was looking at. Or in this case, who. It was a little man in a cropped purple vest and a matching fez. “Is that Nigel?”
“Give me a minute.” Tanner jumped out of the sack and ran over to the guy. He was definitely dressed strangely enough to be Nigel. And was about the same size. But it didn’t completely look like him…
I started to climb out of my sack but part of my sneaker caught on the fabric.
“Need help?” asked Angel. He didn’t wait for an answer. He just picked me up while Diablo pulled the bag free from my sneaker.
“Thanks,” I said. And then I ran over to where Tanner had been. I couldn’t see him anymore, though. They must have gone behind a tree to talk.
I looked around when I got to the spot they’d been in. Sure enough, he and Nigel were standing behind a tree in a very heated discussion.
“Hey,” I called.
They both looked over at me as I ran over.
“What’s going on?” I asked. And then I realized that Nigel was still in his red cotton onesie. Which meant it hadn’t been him in the purple vest and fez. “Who was that guy?”
“What guy?” asked Tanner.
“The one who you ran over to talk to.”
“You mean Nigel?” he asked.
“No. I mean the guy in the purple vest. And the weird fez.”
“Right. Nigel.”
“Did you like my outfit?” asked Nigel.
“Yeah,” said Tanner. “What’d you think? We thought it could be a good distraction for him to wear that during the next event.”
I eyed him suspiciously. “Where’d it go?”
“Over there,” said Tanner. He pointed behind a tree. And Nigel pointed behind a different tree.
“You’re both lying. But I’m more concerned with why you didn’t even try to win the sack race.”
“I did try. But…” Tanner shook his head.
“Do you want Cole to fuck me? Because now if we lose one more event, I’m fucked. Literally.”
Tanner ran his hands through his hair. The only time I’d seen him look this frustrated was when he’d run away from our make-out session at the Odegaard boutique. “I won’t let that happen.”
“With magic?”
“No. I don’t need magic to kick Cole’s ass.”
Please let that be true. “Then what are we waiting for? Let’s go win this thing!”
The next event was a tug of war. That was both good and bad. It was good because I was pretty sure our team was stronger. But it was bad because we were only stronger if Diablo was giving it his all. If he didn’t pull his weight, we’d be screwed.
Ocelot and his striped-onesie-clad assistants watered down a patch of dirt to create the biggest, most disgusting mud pit I’d ever seen.
I would have rather died than compete and possibly fall into that filth.
But luckily, I didn’t have to make that choice.
This was a men-only event. And for some wonderful reason, the guys all decided to compete shirtless while us girls just got to sit on the sidelines and enjoy the show.
“Come on, red team!” I yelled.
Tanner looked over and smiled at me. He was at the very front of our line, and Cole was at the front of the other. The two men locked eyes and the tug of war began.
Neither team made much progress at first, but I wasn’t complaining. With them pulling on the rope, all their muscles were fully flexed and shimmering with sweat.
Eventually Cole lost his footing. The second he slipped, Tanner pulled hard on the rope. It was just enough to tilt the scales in our favor. The entire blue team went face first into the mud pit, led by Cole.
“Wahoo!” I screamed, jumping up and down.
Tanner walked over and gave me a big high five.
“That was amazing! I knew you could take him!”
“Of course I can,” said Tanner, as if he was insulted that I ever thought he couldn’t.