Isla copied her. Or at least she tried to. She closed her eyes and breathed through her nose. One minute turned into two, which turned into five. Then the jokes started.
“Anyone else’s arms tingling?” Josie asked.
“That’s just the feeling of losing,” Barra replied.
“Feels light to me. Everyone can just give up now,” Dominique said.
Isla cracked one eye open. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Dominique’s arms shaking like a leaf in a gale-force wind. She would be surprised if Dominique lasted another minute.
“After you,” Kendall shot back.
Petra let out a laugh, but it was cut short when her disc dipped a fraction too low. The rope slackened. And for one crazy second, the sandstone stack behind her swayed as if it might forgive the interruption. But it did not. The entire thing went crashing to the ground with a splintering clatter.
“Petra and Nadine, you’re out!” Vivian called.
Isla would’ve smiled if sweat wasn’t slipping from her temples into her eyes. The sensation made her squirm internally, but she did not move. Not even when her forearms started screaming in pain. Not even when that pain turned sharp and electric. She wanted the reward badly. The thought of food made her mouth water. A shower with actual soap. All of that sounded borderline life-changing. And yet... that wasn’t the reason she pushed through.
There was another reason. One with dark eyes and locked elbows standing two feet to her right, looking so unbothered by the weight of the disc, she could’ve been a statue.
But Isla barely had time to finish that thought before Aggie’s arms gave out completely. She leaped forward just as the disc dropped. The rope whipped sharply through the pulley with a harsh zip as tension vanished. The sandstone pillar collapsed to the ground.
“And that’s the end for Aggie and Josie!” Vivian called, making a megaphone with her hands. “We’ve got three pairs left.” She glanced at Frankie, who was sitting sadly on thesidelines. Since she was left without a partner after the last Sending, she couldn’t compete in the reward challenge. The pairs that had toppled their sandstone pillars were taking up the space beside her.
Another minute passed, and then ten more.
Isla couldn’t believe Dominique was still holding on. She was just about to say that when, out of nowhere, Barra yelped and let go of the disc. Her pillar tumbled down in a cloud of dust.
“Barra and Dominique, you’re out! Come join the others.”
Now there were only two pairs left. Kendall and Abigail. Isla and Tamsyn.
Kendall’s arms were vibrating so aggressively that the metal handles rattled. Abigail looked far calmer than Kendall, though there were fractures in her composure for sure.
“Just a little longer,” Isla whispered to Tamsyn. “Kendall’s going to drop her disc any minute now. We just have to hold on a bit longer.”
“I can hear you,” Kendall muttered through gritted teeth.
“I know,” Isla shot back, smiling even though her body was close to giving up. But she wouldn’t. She couldn’t.
And she didn’t have to.
Kendall’s arms gave way, and the rope snapped slack with a loud whap. The sandstone stack behind her wobbled violently before collapsing in a spectacular cascade of dust and rock.
“Nooo!” Abigail yelled, and for good reason. They had been so close to winning it themselves. Though Isla barely had time to spare her a sympathetic glance, because the moment she let go of the disc, Tamsyn was at her side. She yanked her into a hug that felt like it could crush a small car. A hug Isla couldn’t help but lean into as Vivian clapped her hands together. “Congratulations, Isla and Tamsyn. You two are going on the first overnight reward challenge.”
Chapter Twelve
Tamsyn could count on one hand the number of times she’d set foot in a hotel. Fine, actually she could count on, well, one finger. And that was nearly fifteen years ago when her recently divorced aunt had taken her on a spontaneous healing weekend to The Joule in Dallas, which at the time had felt as glamorous as Versailles. Her aunt had shown her the rooftop pool jutting out over Main Street, and Tamsyn had gripped the railing so tight because it looked like the water simply stopped and the city began. At dinner, she’d ordered a Shirley Temple because it sounded sophisticated and had carefully folded her napkin on her lap as she’d seen in movies. She’d gasped at the ladies in their silk dresses and pearls and at the men with their shiny gold watches. The next morning, when room service had arrived with silver gleaming domes covering pancakes dusted in powdered sugar, Tamsyn had felt something rearrange itself inside. She’d silently vowed that one day she’d be rich and famous, no matter what.
But life hadn’t worked out that way. Instead of luxury hotels, Tamsyn had become intimately familiar with campgrounds. She camped often, hiked even more, and when she was traveling, she had no problem staying in hostels or bouncing from spare sofas offered by friends of friends.
Still, as soon as Tamsyn walked in through those heavy timber doors, something inside her stirred. The suite felt like stepping into a travel influencer’s Instagram post. Even the air felt different in here. Cooler. Filtered. There were two single beds dressed up in the crispest white sheets Tamsyn had everseen, and pillows stacked abundantly. At the end of each bed sat a neatly folded charcoal throw, and a towel folded into a kangaroo origami. A wide handwoven rug anchored the room, and a low console table beneath a gigantic mirror held a ceramic bowl filled with sprigs of wattle, pale pink eremophila, and ‘spidery’ grevillea. The art on the walls was exquisite. Large-scale canvases in textured strokes of rust and indigo.
“This place is amazing,” Tamsyn said, feeling slightly off-kilter, like she was standing on a swaying boat and not inside the most luxurious room she’d ever seen in her life. “What do you think they’ll do if we lock the door and stay here forever?”
Isla laughed and walked over to a single bed before she threw herself back onto the mattress. Her head got lost between the pillows. “I give them one day before they smoke us out.”
Tamsyn barely heard her. She drifted toward the glass doors as if gravity were tugging her legs. Gauzy white curtains framed the windows, and through those glass doors was the most amazing view.
