“So winner gets what?” I asked, kinda dreading what he would say and wanting to hear it more than I wanted my next breath.
“Winner decides what they get,” he said with a slow grin.
Well, all right then. I grabbed an axe from the bucket, forcing him to step away from the line, a new-found determination pulsing through me. My brain had like ten years of stuff it’d fantasised about Fen doing, and I wasn’t about to walk away from the chance of getting them all fulfilled.
I took a breath as I stood on the line, trying to do what Bjorn had said and centre myself. Shut out the noise, the guys shouting down in the other lanes, the music, even Fen. Shut it all out and just feel my body, feel the axe in my hand.
I wish I could say that some ancient wolfish ancestor rose up and directed my hand, but it didn’t. Instead, I was forced to shove my overly analytical mind to one side and just feel the science rather than apply it. Forward momentum, speed, thrust, angle, grip. I drew the axe back, my eyes entirely on the blue balloon that bobbed slightly, and then I let go.
That same feeling I’d felt when I finished my year twelve exams, when I completed my degree, when I worked on something really tough at work, rushed through me as the axe went flying through the air, and thenpop!The balloon exploded.
Admittedly, it was the yellow one, not the blue one, but still.
“Well done!” Bjorn said. “Next thrower up.”
Chapter 28
Somehow, I was winning.
I frowned as yet another of Fen’s axes got close but not close enough, staring up at him as he turned to me, some of his cockiness gone now.
“You’re not choking on purpose?” I asked, scanning him intensely, as if I could see evidence of that on his body, which of course, I couldn’t.
“Why would I throw the competition?” he asked, looking faintly irritated. “I had ideas, many, many ideas of what I wanted.”
Ulp.
I was about to ask what, needing to know like I needed my next breath, but then I saw that Bjorn was waiting patiently behind Fen’s shoulder and thought better of that. My body however… Something was different about today. Apart from the buzz of being given an orgasm just from twiddling my nipples, I felt a spring in my step as I walked up to the axe bucket, a strength in my arm, and a certainty in my body as I lined myself up to take my next throw.
If I got this balloon, then I’d win. Fen had taken out one balloon, me two, and there were only five in total. I took a deep breath and settled myself before letting the axe fly.
“Yes!” I shouted, throwing my arms in the air as I heard that pop. “Yesssss!” Fen smirked, then shook his head as I did a little victory lap, running around the table he was leaning against. “Winner, winner, chicken dinner and you’re the loser, loser, chicken… How does it go?”
“It doesn’t,” he said, yanking me closer, those green eyes flaring. “You’re not supposed to rub it in the loser’s face.”
“Oh, shit.”
“Well done, guys!” Bjorn said, coming over. “I’ve just got some people I need to get started. We’re down a man today, but I’ll send one of the other guys over to keep an eye on you. Just remember, no throwing without a staff member present.”
As he moved away, Fen’s hands slid lower, cupping my arse.
“I’m gonna go and get us some water,” he said. “Keep you hydrated. Just sit tight.” He lifted me up and placed me on one of the stools facing the lanes. “I’ll be back in a sec.”
I missed him and the warmth of his body the minute he pulled away, some part of me wanting to reach out, drag him back, and not let him go. I wasn’t that girl, I knew that, but… I watched him go, that biteable arse showcased in perfectly fitting jeans as he walked over to the small bar they had set up, then pulled my phone out, tempted to take a photo and show Candy, when something else occurred to me.
The changes to my body. I frowned as it felt like I focussed on that for the first time. I’d been walking around in a haze of post-orgasm bliss since the shopping centre, and it felt like that popped only now. I opened up my texts and sent a quick one off to my partner in crime.
R: Stop sucking dick and ring me. Urgent.
One, two, three…
My phone obediently started ringing, and I accepted the call.
“How the hell did you know that’s what I was doing?” Candy said. “Are you stalking me again? Because if I liked girls, I assure you it’d be your muff I’d be diving on into, but while you don’t have a dick, it’s a no from me.”
“Because the minute five PM Friday rolls around, you’re gobbling cockmeat sandwich right up until Sunday night,” I shot back. “Now, enough about your predilection for hoovering dick, I’ve got something for the study.”
“Of course you do,” she said with a groan. “Repeat after me—all work and no dick makes Riley a very dull girl. Say it.”