Chapter 60.
Death Valley
Jimmy and Carlos Lopez begin to make their way back to Alek and Marcelo. Jimmy hopes they aren’t too late. They might be.
Leave me, Alek had said. A command. From a natural leader.
Jimmy and Lopez are moving more slowly than ever, both of them weakening fast, feeling the heat hit with the force of strong wind blowing dead against them.
But there’s another reason their progress is so slow, and it has nothing to do with the heat. It’s the water they’re carrying.
Lopez used the knife to cut open the sealed plastic liner from the supply case they were issued at the start—thick plastic. He twists it into a bag, ties it shut with strips torn from his own shirt, and makes a second smaller pouch from a second liner.
It leaked.
Every few steps Jimmy feels water run down his wrist, and it makes him want to scream.
Because that water is Alek.
That water is Marcelo.
That water is the difference between “we finish” and “they die.”
It was Lopez’s idea.
Maybe he isn’t a gangster, Jimmy thinks. Just a competitor who never loses. Either way, Jimmy is glad that Lopez seems to know his way around a desert.
They keep walking.
Jimmy is almost certain his body is on the verge of shock. From the heat, dehydration, blood pressure, sheer exhaustion. His head is spinning. His mouth is so dry it feels like glass.
He’s worried about Alek. He can’t imagine losing her like this. But he knows it could happen. It’s happened before.
Finally, they make it all the way back around the farthest dune. When the mesquite trees finally come into view, Jimmy’s hope spikes so hard it makes him dizzy.
Jimmy stops again. But not because of fatigue or dizziness. Not because of the heat.
“They’re gone,” he says, his voice a raspy whisper. “They were supposed to be here.”
“Maybe they kept going,” Lopez says, scans the sand. “Or turned back.”
“I can’t speak for Marcelo,” Jimmy says. “But Alek wouldn’t turn back. You heard her.”
Is this where he left them? Has he become delirious?
Lopez’s voice goes colder. “Then she pushed her button.”
“She didn’t,” Jimmy says. He doesn’t know if that’s faith or denial.
He and Lopez keep walking toward the trees. They need shade themselves, and some rest, if only for a few minutes before they decide what to do next.
In the distance, they can see the tall dunes that were supposed to be the halfway point of this insane journey.
Jimmy stumbles into the shade and drops to a knee, forcing himself to think like a planner. He looks down.
There are prints. Dragged heels. Two sets. Leading away from the trees toward the dunes.
Jimmy’s heart kicks.
“They tried to finish,” Jimmy whispers.
Lopez nods once. “Then we go.”
They leave the shade and head into the open again.
A mile later Jimmy sees something dark against pale sand—fabric tied low on a branch.
Marcelo’s shirt. A marker.
Jimmy’s relief hits so hard it almost buckles him.
Then he crests a small rise and sees the second shock.
A drone. Low over the sand, circling, patient, camera pointed straight at the trail. Waiting. Watching. The real test isn’t “can you survive the heat.” It’s “what will you do when you realize someone has been steering this the whole time.”
The last shock doesn’t come for another mile.
Patrick Arrasmith