Still bleary and half-awake, Sam agreed to keep the secret. Cody and Sara left him for another half hour, with strict instructions to finish the pint of water on the table beside him. When Cody returned, he got Sam back on his feet and led him down a white corridor to a kitchen, and between the two of them they carried that morning's breakfast up to the connection tent, ready for the delegates to start filing in.
Well, Sam thought, as he looked at the ovens, fridges, and microwaves lining the kitchen walls, that solves the mystery of the food. Maybe at some point I'll figure out what the hell happened last night and solve that one, too.
Chapter Fifteen
"Where's Sam?" Julia Rose rubbed her eyes. Only a sliver of morning light had made it through the tent flap, but it fell right across her face, making her blink hard. "I didn't think early mornings were his thing. Nina, have you seen him?"
Half awake and not yet thinking straight, Nina looked to Purdue to see whether he could inspire an answer. She could think of no plausible lie, but she did not want to tell anyone that she was worried about Sam until she had had the chance to look for him. Unfortunately Purdue was still sound asleep, sprawled on his back on the reed mat, so no help was forthcoming. "Er… " Nina began, somewhat inauspiciously. "I think he's… he might have… " she trailed off into silence. "I don't know. Sorry. I'm going to go and look for him." She fumbled around in her backpack, looking for her clothes.
"I'll come with you," said Julia Rose, kicking off her blanket. "Just let me get out of my PJs."
Nina wanted to put her off, but in her bleary state she could think of no good reason why Julia Rose should not come with her. Turning her back, she quickly stripped off her nightshirt and threw on a pair of shorts and a tank top, then pulled on her hiking boots and aimed a few swift sprays of sun cream at her pallid limbs. By the time she turned back around, Julia Rose was already dressed and ready to go.
"He's probably dead."
Both women whirled round to see Hunter, flat on his back and staring at the roof of the teepee. Both had completely forgotten that he was there. Nina mentally kicked herself for not being more aware of everyone else in the tent as she changed, and hoped that she had not given him an inadvertent eyeful.
"If he went out in the desert, all by himself, in the middle of the night," Hunter droned, "yeah, he's dead. There's probably a whole pack of coyotes snacking on him right now. Or maybe like a rattlesnake or something. Or maybe he saw something he shouldn't have seen and someone dropped him at the bottom of the canyon."
Nina stared at him, somewhere between bemusement and disdain. "Well, aren't you just a little ray of sunshine? Come on, Julia Rose. We've got better things to be doing than hanging around cheerful bastards like this one."
"Don't be hateful just because I'm right," Hunter said, apparently unperturbed. "See you at breakfast — unless you're dead too by then."
"What the fuck is his problem?" Nina raged, as they walked away from the tent. "Who says things like that?"
"Douche bags, mostly," Julia Rose replied. "Don't worry about him, he's just an ass. I'm sure Sam will be fine — he probably just couldn't sleep or something." She followed hard on Nina's heels, striding across the campsite. It was still early, and only a couple of people had emerged from their tents. Sensing Nina's growing concern, Julia Rose searched for the right thing to say. "For what it's worth, I think it's great that you two still care so much about each other. Were you together for long?"
Nina stopped in her tracks and looked round. "Sam and I weren't together. Why does everyone think that? There's never been anything between us — well, one brief moment, but that's it — and another brief, brief moment on the last trip. Hasn't anyone else ever had a short-lived attraction to a friend? Why does it have to be such a big deal to these people who aren't involved and never were? He's my friend, that's all — don't people usually care about their friends?"
Before Nina's eyes, Julia Rose's confidence crumbled. "I'm sorry… " she said. "I didn't mean to upset you."
Nina sighed, pressing the heels of her hands against her hot, sore eyes. "Of course, you didn't. I'm sorry. It's just… it's hot, I didn't sleep much, I'm in desperate need of caffeine and there's a lot that I'm struggling to get my head around just now. I shouldn't have taken it out on you. It's just… a lot of people ask me that kind of thing about Sam."
"Yeah," Julia Rose half smiled, "I kinda got that. So where are we going? Where do you think he is?"
"I've no idea," Nina admitted. "I wish I had. He was outside the connection tent last time I saw him, so I was thinking that he might have come back down to the river for another cigarette and maybe fallen asleep down here. Or that… " she fell silent. The mental images of Sam's possible fates that were currently tormenting her did not bear mentioning. Deep in the pit of her stomach, she could feel the grip of the irrational fear that speaking those possibilities aloud might somehow cause them to come true.
They walked down to the river and Nina paced the bank, scanning it for any possible places where Sam's sleeping form might be concealed. For the briefest of moments her eyes strayed downriver, alert for any sign of him in the water. I'll give it a few more minutes, she thought, and then I'm going back to the campsite to get help.
As Nina searched, Sam was emerging from the underground facility with Cody escorting him. His eyes were covered by a thick blindfold, leaving him feeling vulnerable and ill at ease as he entrusted himself entirely to Cody's guidance. He was still not convinced that the blindfold was really necessary, but Sara had insisted that this was the policy — only initiates and officials were allowed to know the location of the entrance to the facility, therefore Sam would have to be led out blindly and his eyes must remain covered until he was a safe distance away.
Stumbling after Cody, Sam felt the change from steps to sand under his feet. He heard the soft thud of the door falling shut behind them, and the swish of sand as Cody covered it over, concealing it from view.
"This way, Sam!" The twangy, nasal voice set Sam's teeth on edge even more than usual. There was something about being reliant on Cody that made him even less bearable than Sam had previously found. He felt Cody's hands on his shoulders, steering him away from the door, walking him around in large, looping circles so that Sam would have no chance of finding his way back to the place from which he had been released.
When the blindfold came off, Sam was back outside his own teepee. "There you go, buddy," said Cody. "You've still got time to get yourself cleaned up in time for breakfast. See you in the connection tent!"
Still in a daze, Sam crawled into the tent. Only Hunter was there, apparently asleep. Sam rifled through his backpack in search of clean clothes. He had a vague memory of rolling around on the sand, and it clung to his hair and hid under his fingernails. Changing his clothes was not going to be sufficient for making him feel less grimy. He dug out his towel and headed down toward the water.
"Sam! Oh, god, Sam!" Nina waded toward him as fast as she could, splashing madly. She threw her arms around him in a sodden hug that nearly overbalanced them both. "Where were you? I thought you were dead!"