“The sunshine ratio,” he says, his eyes wide, an expression of awe on his face. “Of course, you would know that, my golden flower.”
Okay, so we’ve progressed to a golden flower. Still, I can’t help a little shiver of pleasure and pride at the starstruck look in his eyes. No one has ever looked at me like that, like life’s a puzzle and I hold all the answers.
Call me Fibonacci, I guess.
“I will try it,” he declares, his fingers whirring over the screen as he dumps characters into the spiral of the snake.
The numbers dissolve into nothing, and I exhale noisily. Damn. I was so sure I’d cracked it. Kanuz places a heavy hand on my shoulder.
“It was an excellent idea,” he says.
The snake collapses in on itself, the jewel of the eye falling out of the screen. Kanuz’s hand whips out, and he catches it before it can hit the stone and gravel ground.
“Holy shit, I did it! I feel like fucking Indiana Jones!” I’m screeching, way too excited about going deeper into this death trap of a temple.
When Kanuz straightens, his expression is dark, iciness replacing the warmth that breathed in his gaze only moments ago.
A seam appears in the wall, and an arched door swings open where the snake and numbers once hung out. Kanuz nods at me.
“Well done,” he says, but it’s cold. I stare up at him, utterly confused at his sudden tone change. Talk about whiplash.
“Thanks?”
His face softens briefly, but then he frowns. The interior of the newly opened chamber is dark, and I press myself closer to him.
“I can’t see in there,” I whisper. I’m not really sure why I’m whispering, but the need to keep quiet steals over me.
“Maybe you should ask your Indiana Jones for help,” he says stiffly.
My nose scrunches up, and I tilt my head in confusion, trying to get a read on him.
“What?”
“The Indiana Jones you want to fuck,” he says.
Realization dawns on me, and I choke back a laugh. It’s not funny, not really. I bite my cheeks. His feelings are hurt because I said I felt like fucking Indiana Jones. I have to clamp my mouth shut to keep the laugh inside.
“That’s not,” I finally gasp out, “that’s not what I meant. Indiana Jones isn’t real. It’s a character. From a story. A movie.”
His brow furrows. “You want to fuck a figment of your imagination?”
I can’t help it. A huge laugh barks out of me, and then I’m gasping for air. If Bex were here, she’d be having a field day with this. She would likewise be fucking the hot alien, that’s for damn sure. I hope my girl is getting hers.
The thought brings me up short, and I blow out a shaky, near-hysteric breath.
“No. Okay, let me back up.” I inhale slowly, forcing myself to calm down. “Indiana Jones is a cool explorer dude, a total badass, although the colonial appropriation is pretty problematic. But regardless! He was an archaeologist, and he went on all these dangerous adventures. I meant that I felt like him. Cool, and smart, and hot, and all that good stuff. The fucking was just… an adjective.”
My lips twist to the side, because I’m not sure how well I’ve conveyed my thought process or whether or not fucking is an adjective at all, and trying to explain my random statement makes me sound fairly unhinged.
“You feel cool and hot at the same time?” Worry tinges his voice now.
Exasperated, I slam a hand against my forehead. “No. It’s figurative. Cool is good. Hot is like… sexy.”
“You are scorching hot, my flower. An inferno.”
“Right.”
“So you do not want to fuck this imaginary explorer?”
My eyebrows go up. He’s jealous. He’s envious of Indiana Jones, which somehow makes him seem more human than ever.
“I cannot stand the thought of you with another male, my golden flower.” He doesn’t wait for me to answer, which is probably a good thing, considering the question and my propensity for blunt honesty. He tugs me closer to him, his huge hand bracketing my shoulder.
Together, we trudge through the archway and deeper into the temple of gloom and doom.
The door slams shut behind us, and a grinding reverberates through the room, rattling my teeth.
I sway as the ground rumbles, and Kanuz sweeps me up into his arms a second later, snarling at nothing I can see.
“What is it?” I whisper. I wish I had my gun.
Light cascades through the chamber, the line of fire igniting in thick whorls and swirls along the stone walls, and I see what it is that has Kanuz’s hackles raised. Literal and figurative hackles.
The walls are covered in spikes. A white ribcage hangs from one, a skull on another.
And they’re pressing closer.
Towards where Kanuz holds me tight against him.
How the hell are we going to get out of this?
CHAPTER TWELVE
KANUZ
I am an idiot. I never should have brought my mate into this temple. What was I thinking?
My father would be so disappointed. Worse, he would be unsurprised.
I grind my teeth together.
“What do we do, Kanuz? Where is the riddle?” My Gen’s voice is even and serious, none of her usual mirth and sarcasm present.
She is counting on me.
I snap out of my self-loathing.
“There,” I tell her, jerking my head towards the far wall. I glance back, just in case, but sure enough, the arched door has disappeared again. The only way out is forward.
“I don’t see it,” she says. “Put me down and let’s run for the other side. From the looks of it, we don’t have a lot of time. That guy is for sure out of time.” She nods at the skull hanging on the opposite wall.
I do not do as she asks. Instead, I carry her to where the newest puzzle lies.
“I am glad you are my partner in this,” I tell her. “You solved the last where I would not have.”
“Nah, you would’ve gotten it together eventually.”
It’s not exactly a rousing endorsement of my intelligence, but I smile at her nonetheless, sprinting to the far wall.
“This is a word puzzle. Child’s play.”
“If you can read the language, I suppose. For me, it would be xenolinguistic’s play. Or doctoral dissertation, more likely. And my crew member who’d kill at this, Michelle, isn’t here.” She chuckles, but the sound lacks her normal humor.
She is frightened. It is my fault for bringing her here. For thinking we could easily obtain the goddess’ blessing and find our way through this temple.
“It is all right, little female,” I tell her, setting her down. Her worried gaze flits between the ancient script on the wall and me. Around us, the sound of stone-on-stone grates ceaselessly, the spikes coming closer with every minute.
This is not just a language test. This is a test of nerves under pressure, something that my father always complained I did not have. That I was too selfish, too cocksure, too inexperienced to be able to manage any tasks to his liking.
But now I have my mate to think of, and I squelch the sound of my father’s complaints in my head. There is no room for his disdain now. There is only my Gen, and our combined need to leave this place.