Chloe
Chloe’sstomachchurnedas the Range Rover parked on a dirt side road a few minutes’ walk from the apparently secret entrance to the caves. Jesse had told her where to find it, claiming to have been to a “dope as hell” rave there once. Chloe couldn’t think of anything more awful. She hadn’t eaten all day in her anxiety about their expedition, but she was determined to put on a brave face in front of Maxwell. He seemed to think she was some kind of superwoman who could handle anything, and she didn’t want to ruin that image.
“How are you feeling?” Maxwell asked. “I like your torch.”
Chloe managed to laugh, even though she didn’t feel like laughing. She tapped the light that was strapped around her head. “This baby will keep me calm,” she said, her voice a little too loud.
“It’s okay to admit you don’t feel good about this,” Maxwell said. “I wouldn’t think any less of you.”
“Which is very kind of you,” Chloe said. “But I’m fine. Really.” She pointed to a boulder that dwarfed the surrounding rocks. “I think Jesse’s secret entrance is just behind there.”
“A secret door in the rocks,” Maxwell said. “All very Tolkien, I like it.”
“You’re a Tolkien fan?” Chloe was surprised to hear that.
“Are you going to think I’m much less cool if I admit that?” Maxwell turned to her with a grin.
“Anyone who collects that many poker antiques has definitely lost their claim to cool,” Chloe teased, trying to ignore the sick twisting in her stomach. Her stomach often played up when she was with Maxwell. It was just that usually, it was dizzying somersaults of excitement rather than nauseating twists of panic.
“Ouch,” Maxwell put a hand over his chest. “I’m wounded, Chloe.”
“Would it help if I told you I thought being cool was seriously overrated?” Chloe said, dragging her feet as they approached the boulder.
“Definitely,” Maxwell said, moving ahead of her to look behind the boulder. “Yep, there’s definitely an entrance here. But wow, that’s low. Did Jesse mention we’d have to crawl in?”
Chloe felt like she might throw up. Crawling into a cave sounded like her worst nightmare. “No,” she said tightly. “He didn’t.” She swallowed hard. “Hope you’re not wearing your good jeans.”
“I’m not,” Maxwell said, poking his head out from behind the boulder. “You ready to do this? I’ll go first, of course.”
“Thanks,” Chloe squeezed her eyes shut and counted to three. She hoped to wake up in her own bed to find a text message from Tilly telling them that the next ritual ingredient could be found in a wide-open space. Like a beach. She could handle a beach. But when she opened her eyes, all she could see was Maxwell’s legs as he crawled into the narrow opening in the rocks.
I can do this, Chloe told herself, swallowing hard. Wincing, she dropped to her knees and followed Maxwell into the dark crack in the rocks. The only good thing about this experience was that she was in an ideal position to see Maxwell’s arse in his tight jeans as he crawled in front of her. The sight of his arse, beautifully lit by her headlamp, was almost enough to make her forget that she was going into a goddamn cave. Almost.
“It opens up here,” Maxwell said, and Chloe breathed a sigh of relief as she saw Maxwell rise to his feet, reaching a hand out to help her. And she could stand up on her own; of course she could. But she took his outstretched hand just the same. Why deny herself a tiny bit of comfort in this horrible place?
“I know you hate caves,” Maxwell said quietly. “But it’s beautiful.”
Chloe looked around the cavernous space, the floor blackened from the footfall of tourists and ravers alike, the roof covered with glistening stalactites and what seemed like hundreds of pathways leading off into more caves, more passages, more narrow spaces where she couldn’t get out and—
“It’s pretty,” she said instead, squeezing her hands into fists. “So, coral gradient stalagmite. None of those looks very coral to me.” She pointed at the stumpy stalagmites that lined the floor of the cave. They might one day reach the ceiling. That’s how she remembered the difference, anyway.
“No,” Maxwell agreed. “We’ll have to go in a little further. We should probably take one from somewhere inconspicuous anyway.”
“Great,” Chloe said tightly. “That sounds great.”
Maxwell shot her a sympathetic look, his handsome face illuminated by her headlamp and making him look otherworldly, too beautiful to be real. “We’ll make this quick.” With an encouraging nod, he began walking towards one of the wider passages. “Let’s try this way.”
Chloe followed him, wishing she had a pen to chew on. As it was, she was grinding her teeth so hard she was probably going to wear a hole in her jaw. We’ll make this quick, Maxwell had said. Chloe really hoped he was right.
Coral coloured stalagmites were hard to come by, it seemed. They found one, but as it was right by the side of the concrete path used by official tours, Chloe had begrudgingly admitted that it would definitely be missed. That was why she had accepted Maxwell’s suggestion that they leave the tourist path to go down a steep slope further into the depths of the cave.
They hadn’t been in the caves for more than thirty minutes – Chloe kept checking her watch – but it felt like a lot longer. Chloe didn’t like the silence, nothing but their footfall, her breathing, and the steady drip of water through limestone. She didn’t like the horribly still air. And Chloe really didn’t like the way that she couldn’t see her way back to the tourist path, even when she craned her neck and turned up the beam on her headlamp to its brightest setting. Maxwell was confident he knew the way back, but Chloe felt like she might just scream if she had to spend much more time in here.
“Look!” Maxwell’s voice was a welcome break in the silence. “That one. I think we can get it off easily too.”
Chloe followed his pointed finger with her beam of light and let out a breath of surprised relief. A stalagmite with rich coral bands, tall and thin, standing up from a sea of its dwarfed cousins. “That looks like the one Tilly had,” she said. “What do you think, saw or—”
“Give me your hands,” Maxwell said, and Chloe obediently put her hands around the stalagmite, trying not to think about just what part of the male anatomy the jutting stalagmite resembled. Maxwell’s hands were just below her own, gripping it tightly.