She kept moving. When she started to feel lightheaded, she didn’t particularly care to fight it. It was a new sensation, at least. Repetition was worse than the pain. Pain was inherently interesting. Pain was something. She was drowning in nothing. Miles of it crushing down on her, even what few thoughts she could manage going, going, squeezed out of existence—
“You really think this bird is going to water?” Nevada asked, her voice a horrible rasp. Like she had more scar tissue than lungs.
“Of course,” Candice said, responding more to contradict Nevada than out of any conviction. She wasn’t sure of anything. How could anything be as certain as the heat, the sand, the infinity surrounding them on all sides? “Don’t you?”
Nevada coughed. “I’m fucking doing this so when that bird fucking lands, and there’s no fucking water, I can fucking kill it.”
Candice laughed and it sounded like she’d dropped something into a garbage disposal. “You come up with the best plans.”
“Chicken tenders,” Nevada muttered, continuing the conversation on some plane of existence Candice wasn’t privy to. “Hot wings…”
“Chicken tikka masala,” Candice said.
“Candice, you’re losing it.” Nevada stumbled. Candice stood next to her, not sure if she should help her up—it seemed cruel. But, painstakingly, Nevada pulled herself to her feet. “You’re babbling. You’re not making any sense.”
Candice followed along as Nevada set off again. “It’s a staple dish in Britain. I had it twice a week.”
“British cooking? I just want to kill the thing, not torture it.”
“If British cooking is so bad, how come you’re the ones who need Gordon Ramsey to come and—where’s the bird?”
They looked around. The sky was a sadistic blue belying the furnace that was under it. “I think he was going this way,” Candice said, trudging up a sand dune, cataloging the interesting new pains she was feeling in her legs.
“Stupid bird… won’t even let us kill it right…”
Candice wheezed a laugh. “Just as well… this seems like a pretty good time to start a vegetarian diet.”
Nevada laughed like an emphysema patient sucking in air. “It might just be the heatstroke, dehydration, and extreme fatigue, but you’re really funny these days.”
“Don’t forget starvation.”
“Oh, this is nothing. You should see me before bikini season.”
Candice stumbled; Nevada steadied her, a hand on her shoulder blade, and Candice was unmoored in time. She was sharing the jacket with Nevada in the night, she was being kissed on the train, she was thinking of how Nevada’s touch didn’t hurt when everything else did , and she was falling, or the world was spinning, rushing up to meet her, swallowing her into sand.
Then she was being dragged.
“Candice, look. Look .” Nevada’s hand in her hair, pulling her head up. Probably been wanting to do that for a while. “Please tell me that’s real.”
It was right on the other side of the dune they’d climbed. Forty feet of clear blue water, the water they baptized people in, the water they washed babies in. The sand couldn’t even touch it—it became green grass, green shrubs, palm trees ringing the pool, protecting it, keeping it pure. An oasis. A bloody fucking oasis. Candice couldn’t believe her eyes. No, she couldn’t believe her ears—there should’ve been a choir playing. Enya. Something .
“It’s real,” she murmured.
Nevada hauled her to her feet with something like a roar. “C’mon, Cushing—get up —starvation my ass !”
Candice felt like she was flying: running down the slope and having Nevada pull her and being sucked toward the oasis like it was a magnet and she was an iron filing. “Hold on a second… hold on… I need to… think of a way…”
Nevada let go of her at the water’s edge—even that soft, marshy ground felt good under her feet, felt like the water was trying to be drunk by her—and ripped off her clothes, tugged off her boots—
“To tell if… the water’s safe to drink…” Candice muttered, a little before Nevada dove into it.
Candice agreed. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. She let herself kneel down, let herself sag down, and the water embraced her. Cool and… and… and it didn’t matter what else it was. It was cool and it wasn’t the desert.
She felt hands on her, Nevada tugging at her clothes, freeing her from the little weight they had, and with nothing left to hold her down, she floated back into the nothing that’d been trying to claim her for as long as she could remember. At least it wasn’t as damn hot as it’d been before.
Something growled. It chased Candice into wakefulness, where she realized the sound was her stomach, tightening itself into nothingness. She put a hand over her belly in aching sympathy as she took in her surroundings.
It was almost dusk, the sun laying itself down behind the horizon, shadows lengthening, the sky a hazy shade of purple. There was heat, but the roving wind took away its sting, and she’d been placed under shade that further limited it. She was on the shore of the oasis, at the very tip of the water, two date palms growing together over her, providing the pool of shade she was in. She’d been undressed, her underwear the only thing preserving her modesty, and as she moved to cover herself, her body started in with a litany of complaints, her stomach the loudest of all.
“You’re up,” Nevada said, and Candice turned to see that she was reaching up to pull the medjool dates from one of the palms that grew all around the water. She wore the flak jacket. Nothing else.
Candice looked away. “Where are my clothes? Where are your clothes ?”
“I rinsed them out and hung them up to dry on that palm tree that’s growing all horizontal. See it?”
Candice looked around until she found a date palm whose trunk pulled a hard right as soon as it was out of the soil, growing sideways out over the water. Her clothes and Nevada’s had been hung over the trunk.
Candice got up, wincing as she did, but she’d barely taken a step before she crashed back down to the sand.
“Easy there, soldier.” Nevada walked back to sit cross-legged beside her. She’d pried loose a huge piece of bark from one of the trees and then piled it high with dates, which she set down in front of Candice. “Eat up. And maybe drink some water. I hear it’s good for you.”
Candice could barely manage to roll her eyes before she stuffed her face. The dates were about the best thing she’d ever tasted.
Curiosity warred with hunger and they fought to a standstill. Her politeness was the real loser; she talked with her mouth full. “How long was I out?”
“Six hours at least. I took a catnap myself, once I’d eaten. Slow down. You’re going to choke yourself.”
Candice didn’t slow down. “Why are you naked?”
Nevada shrugged. “Figured I’d spent way too long wearing pants.” In acknowledgment of Candice’s discomfort, she pulled the jacket closed. “Sleeping in the nude in a desert oasis. That’s one for the bucket list.”
Candice wanted to keep shoving dates down her throat until her stomach begged for mercy, but the slosh of the cool water was even more of a temptation. She got onto all fours and pulled herself to it, dunking her head in, scrubbing her face, and only then starting to drink. Mother’s milk couldn’t have tasted so good.
Candice rolled onto her back, dropping her head into the water until it was up to her ears. It felt like her brain was cooling. “So now what?”
Nevada snitched one of the dates Candice hadn’t eaten. “We have food, we have water—a place like this, tourists or a caravan will have to show up sooner or later. When they do, we hitch a ride back to civilization.”
“That’s it ?” Candice sat up, her body protesting less than before. With food in her belly and water lubricating her throat, she felt almost human again. “What about Nazir? What about the tomb?”
“Nazir will get his. I’m sure the Air Force has a million drone pilots just itching to get their joysticks on h
im.” Nevada placed the dates closer to Candice. “Eat. They’re free-range organic.”
Candice smiled slightly as she put another in her mouth, this time savoring the taste, slowly chewing before swallowing and only then speaking. “And the tomb? We’re so close!”
“We were close to getting killed. You getting killed. That’d be on me, and it’s not happening.”
Candice felt an almost irrational anger. It was like Nevada was giving up. Giving up on her . “I’m a big girl, Thea. I knew what I was getting into.”
“I didn’t,” Nevada said. “I’m ready to die. I’ve been ready for a long time. But for the past day , I’ve been watching you die, and I can’t take it. I couldn’t do it at the crash, and I can’t do it now.”
“But what about—”
Nevada held up a hand, face flushing, knowing immediately what Candice would bring up. Who she would bring up. “Que sera, sera.”
Candice shook her head. Maybe she was too tired to muster up anger, denial, all the other emotions. She could only manage a weary acceptance now. “That’s it? Whatever will be, will be?”
“I don’t see another option here. I have been thinking and thinking of some way out of this, some trick, some scheme, but all I can think to do is keep you safe. You shouldn’t be here. I never should’ve brought you.”
Candice guffawed. “Come off it, Nevada. It’s not like you pushed me out of a plane or anything.”
Something of Nevada’s indomitable personality cracked her face into a smile. “I might have entertained the possibility.”
“I knew it,” Candice grinned.
“But then you put on a parachute, so…”
Candice flicked a date at her. Nevada caught it and popped it in her mouth. “Don’t waste food.” She got up, dusting herself off. “It’ll be dark soon. Wanna see me start a fire?”
It didn’t take long for Candice to become exhausted once more. She dressed herself against the coming cold, as did Nevada, and managed to stretch a little before her body was ready to give out again. So much for cast-iron toughness. If it was still there, Candice would be happy never to need it again in her life.
The campfire Nevada had built lapped at the darkness, its orange light shooting out over the water. The wind stirred waves as gently as a mother rocking an infant, and the fire glinted off them as they sloshed. Candice lay looking at the water, taken by how beautiful it was. She wasn’t surprised when Nevada lay down behind her—spreading the jacket over both of them and wrapping Candice in her arms.
“I never thought I’d say this, but—this is a better Oasis than the Wonderwall guys.”
Candice groaned. “Why is it Yanks can only appreciate Oasis for Wonderwall ? Noel’s had ten straight number one albums…”
She felt ridiculously at ease considering the circumstances. It was a perfectly ironic reversal of being stranded on a desert island. She and Nevada had washed up from a sea of sand onto an island of life-giving water. Scant supplies, little hope of rescue—all she had was Nevada. It seemed like enough, and she wanted to thank Nevada for that. At least show Nevada she didn’t blame her for getting them into this. It seemed the least she could do was be honest.
“Back at the crash, I was going to ask you if you wanted to get a drink when all of this was over.”
“Oh.” For once, Nevada sounded genuinely taken aback. “Okay. I’d like that.”
Nevada put her hand on Candice’s hip, not squeezing, but clearly feeling the firmness of the flesh and the heat of Candice’s body through her clothes. Candice looked out at the water. The fire was dying now, casting less light to reflect off the waves. When Nevada kissed her cheek, it was so soft that Candice felt like she was blushing. Nevada ran a finger from Candice’s hair to the line of her jaw. She cupped Candice’s chin, fingers brushing her lips with the same admiring touch, and kissed behind Candice’s ear, below it, her tongue slipping inside—
“Thea, I haven’t brushed my teeth in forty-eight hours,” Candice said plaintively.
Nevada nibbled on Candice’s earlobe. “I can avoid your mouth.”
“I’m not wearing any make-up.”
“You don’t need it.”
“I don’t even have on deodorant!”
Nevada stopped, drumming her fingers on Candice’s hip. “I don’t know what you expect me to do with your armpit, but I feel like we should discuss it first.”
Candice sighed and turned over onto her back so she could face Nevada. “I just don’t want our first time to be right on the heels of a death march. I want to wear a nice dress and have a nice meal—put on a CD, maybe…”
Nevada grinned. “You wanna wear a dress for me?”
“It’s not a romantic thing,” Candice insisted, shaking her head. “I’m not the kind of girl who shags in alleys and backseats… and there is an awful lot of sand here.”
Nevada took a deep breath and lay back down, resting her head on Candice’s chest. “Okay. I would hate for you to think I’m wearing my usual underwear. I dress much cuter when I’m not expecting anyone to shoot at me.”
Candice found herself wrapping her arms around Nevada, holding her with a degree of comfort she wouldn’t have expected. On a whim, she slid her hands under Nevada’s shirt, touching the bare skin of her back, and heard Nevada breathe a little heavier.
“So, what are we gonna do after we get that drink?” Nevada asked.
“Well, I can take you to my council flat, which I’ve been subletting to my friend Marsha, who will need lots of advance notice to get out before I come back.”
“What if I slip the cheeky guv’na a quid to get lost for a few hours?” Nevada asked, showcasing what had become of Dick van Dyke’s accent after he finished filming Mary Poppins .
“If this is gonna work, I’m gonna need you to stop doing British accents. Forever.”
“I can live with that. So then I get you alone in your flat…”
“Please, you’re American. Call it a hovel.”
Nevada scoffed. “Oh no, my brother’s boat, that’s a hovel. There’s no way you sleep in a hovel. I bet you fold all your clothes and put them in drawers.”
Candice’s brow furrowed. “Do… is there something else you do with them?”
“Well, in your case, I rip them off you and run an ice cube over your body until it melts.”
“Mmm,” Candice purred happily. Credit Nevada for coming up with good post-desert ideas. “And then what?”
“I want to taste you.”
Candice felt a horribly nauseating giggle rising up in her. Her plan to defuse the situation was not getting along with her plan not to have sex outdoors. “I was picturing more foreplay…”
“No, right now. I wanna taste…”
Nevada’s hand brushed over her hip again, delved between their bodies. It stopped at Candice’s belly and Nevada looked up to meet her eyes. Candice found herself winking. She could’ve cringed hard enough to erase herself from the space-time continuum, but Nevada seemed to find it charming.
“You’re adorable,” she said, flashing a smile that made Candice feel more than that—feel beautiful.
Her hand crept slowly under Candice’s waistband. Candice knew Nevada was giving her time to think it over, object to it, but she was unable to resist, which made the painstaking slither under her panties feel maddeningly tantalizing. Nevada seemed to wait until the last possible second before finally letting her fingers slide against the lips of Candice’s sex, and the touch made Candice gasp—tingling at her opening, with shockwaves going deep inside her to places where she could only yearn to be touched. Nevada didn’t enter her, though. Her fingers ran, almost perversely soothing, over her labia, following its little twists, the slight tremors going through it. Candice ached to spike her hips up and take those fingers inside her, where they belonged, and she shook with the determination not to do it. She held no illusions—she was thoroughly seduced. It was only stubbornness that had her clinging to the rules she’d set.
Her clitoris stung, swollen and craving to be touched, and as Nevada’s fingers approached it from below, Candice let out a low moan that made her cheeks flame in embarrassment. Nevada chuckled deep in her throat and took her hand away before it could reach that tender little place, either sparing Candice further humiliation or denying her as peevishly as Candice had denied her. She brought her fingers to her mouth and Candice closed her eyes, knowing that watching would be too much—it was bad enough hearing it , the relish , when Nevada could be smacking her lips and moaning her pleasure between Candice’s legs.
Nevada swallowed like she’d had a glass of lemonade at the end of a hot day, then snuggled back down against Candice’s burning body. “Not bad. Night, Candice.”
Candice stared up at the night sky, feeling so aglow that she might be seen from one of the stars up there in the firmament, and knew it would be a long time before she slept.
Candice woke up to Nevada’s hand covering her mouth, swallowing up any noise she might’ve made. “Don’t move,” Nevada told her in hushed tones. “Don’t make a sound.”
Candice’s heart raced, the blood flowing hot in her veins—she felt like steam would come off her, going from the chill of the night to this sudden, blushing warmth. Then she heard footsteps in the sand.
Moonlight was bleaching the sand white and making the water pitch black. Where the surface was moved by the wind there were silvery ripples like buried bones being uncovered. Her eyes adjusting to the sublime light, Candice saw a dark figure creeping through the oasis, visible only as an absence of stars.
Nevada’s other hand sank into the ground, taking up a fistful of sand. They waited—Nevada keeping her palm over Candice’s mouth, Candice letting it stay there, actually finding it reassuring as the figure came closer and closer. The sand sinking under his boots, his breath coming with a wisp of condensation into the chill air.
Candice Cushing and the Lost Tomb of Cleopatra Page 19