She didn’t answer for far too long of a time. “Ava?” he prodded.
“I’m here, ummm, no, neither of us have any physical injuries.”
Something about the way she’d said it made him nervous. “Is there something else? Something you’re not telling me?”
The pause that followed made his stomach twist into a tight knot.
“The thing is…” Her voice trailed off for a moment before she spoke again.
"Alex, there’s something else," Ava’s voice wavered, and Alex’s stomach dropped.
"What is it?"
The silence stretched for an agonizing beat.
"I have the flu too."
His heart stopped. For a moment, the world seemed to blur around him.
"No," he whispered, shaking his head in disbelief. "No, Ava. You can’t. You can’t have it."
"I’m sorry, babe." Her voice broke. "But we don’t have time. We have to get the cure now—before it’s too late for both of us."
The weight of her words crushed him. His mind spiraled through every bad thing that could happen. She couldn’t die. Not her. Not like this. He wouldn't let it happen.
CHAPTER 18
AVA
Ava rolled her neck from side to side in an attempt to ease the ache in her neck, but none of it did any good.
Her back hurt like someone had stuck a knife into the small of it and twisted, and every muscle in her body felt weak.
She couldn’t tell what came from the flu raging through her body and what stemmed from the plane crash, but she felt awful.
She glanced sideways at Kyle as they trudged along through the jungle. He didn’t look great, but he didn’t look as bad as she felt.
A wave of heat washed over her before a shiver shook her, and she wondered if she’d ever make it out of this jungle alive.
But she had to. They had to find the cure for this.
Kyle turned to her, concern shadowing his features as heslid an arm around her. The warmth of his touch irritated her feverish skin, but she resisted snapping at him. Every step felt like a battle, but stopping wasn’t an option. If she collapsed now, she might never get up again, and that wasn’t an outcome she could accept—not with Alex waiting for her to come back. She needed to keep moving, even if her body was falling apart.
“Hey, you’re not looking so hot,” he said.
“I’m not feeling it either,” Ava groaned. “But I don’t know where the plane crash ends, and the flu begins.”
Kyle slowed to a stop, reaching for her.
“Let’s just keep going,” she said with a shake of her head as she stopped a few steps away from him and turned around.
He shook his head. “Ava, we need to know how sick you are.”
She shook her head. “No, we don’t. Because it doesn’t matter.”
“Yeah, it does, Ava,” he argued, setting his hands on his hips.
Sweat beaded on her brow, not just from the warmth of the jungle, but from the fever, too. She stretched her neck, her back aching so badly she wanted to lay on the ground just to ease it.
