LITMIR.BIZ

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be for at least a couple of hours. She had some books on her laptop, but it seemed somehow foolish to start wearing down the battery. So she got out the paper maps that were required for small-plane travel, and her pen and notebook and marked the coordinates Dax had given her.

      She learned that they were in the Chiapan wilderness, miles and miles north of San Cristóbal. She stared at the small dot she’d made on the map for a long time, as if just by looking at it, she could figure out how to get them out of here.

      No magic realization as to escape came to her. She yawned and leaned her head against the seat and thought wearily that at last the adrenaline from all this excitement was wearing off. Even shaky, scared crash victims get tired eventually.

      She got up and changed the cold pack on Dax’s ankle again. He didn’t stir and seemed to be sleeping peacefully.

      Then, since she could think of nothing else that needed doing right that instant, she put the rear seat as far back as it would go and closed her eyes.

      Her sleep was fitful. She dreamed of a party in a big, rambling house. She roamed from room to room. Everyone was having a great time and she didn’t know anyone there.

      And then she started dreaming that she was at work, at Great Escapes. No one was there. The place was empty. But then she heard Dax. He was moaning, calling out, saying strange, garbled, things. Words she didn’t understand, nonsense syllables.

      In her dream, she looked for him. She called to him, but couldn’t find him.

      Slowly, she woke and realized where she was, lost in the Chiapan jungle somewhere, in a wrecked plane. And Dax was in the front seat, tossing around, moaning.

      It was dark out. She got the battery-run lantern from the box in back. Switching it on, she craned over the seats and Dax’s agitated form. She set the lantern on the floor in front. The powerful beam, focused on the ceiling, gave plenty of weirdly slanted, glaring light.

      She bent over Dax. He was moaning, tossing his head, scrunched down at a neck-breaking angle against the pilot-side door.

      He mumbled to himself, “No … tired … cold … hot …” And then a flood of nonsense words. He shivered, violently.

      And he was sweating—his face and chest were shiny wet. She was glad she’d wrapped the bandage around his head. If she’d settled for taping it on, so much sweat would likely have loosened it. She reached over the seat to try to ease him back up onto the pillows.

      The heat of his skin shocked her. He was burning up.

      Chapter Six

      Dax was a little boy again. His mother was gone. She had been gone for a whole year now.

      She had “passed on,” his Nanny Ellen said. Jesus had taken her to be with the angels.

      Dax thought that was very mean of Jesus. The angels didn’t need a mother. Not like a little boy did. The angels were beautiful and they could fly. They wore white dresses and had long, gold hair.

      His father got angry when he heard what Nanny Ellen said about his mother going to the angels. His dad said Nanny shouldn’t fill the boy’s head with silly superstition—and then he got his briefcase and went to work.

      Dax’s dad was always working. Always gone. Dax had Nanny Ellen and he liked the stories Nanny told, about the angels, about the loaves and fish that were always enough to feed the hungry people, no matter how many of them there were. He liked Nanny Ellen.

      But he liked his dad more. He loved his dad. Someday he would be all grown-up. He would go to work like his dad and his dad would talk to him because he would be a man, a man who worked, not a little boy who wanted his dad with him and missed his mother.

      There was a hand on his cheek, a gentle hand. The hand slipped around and cradled his head. A woman’s voice said, “Shh, now. It’s okay. You’re going to get better, Dax. Drink this …”

      He opened his eyes. Slowly, a woman’s face came into focus, a tired face, but a beautiful one. The woman had red hair and the bluest eyes.

      He thought that he wanted to kiss her, to touch the soft skin of her cheek. If only he weren’t so worn out.

      So weak.

      He remembered, then. He was a man now. And his dad was dead, too, as dead as his mom. And there had been something … something that had happened.

      Something that was all his fault.

      Wait.

      Now he remembered. He knew what he’d done. They were supposed to fly commercial. She’d had it all set up. But he had insisted that he would fly them.

      And he had. Right into the jungle. Right into the ground.

      He drank from the cup she put to his lips. It was warm, what she gave him. A warm broth. And that surprised him. They were somewhere deep in the jungle, after all, with no stove or microwave in sight. He said the word, “Warm …”

      She smiled at him, a smile as beautiful as those of any of Nanny Ellen’s angels. “I built a fire, in the clearing. I’ve managed to keep it going.”

      He sipped a little more, swallowed, “How long …?” His voice trailed off. Words were hard to come by. His throat felt dust-bowl dry.

      She finished for him. “….have we been here?”

      At his nod, she told him, “This is the fourth day.”

      The fourth day? How could that be possible? He whispered, wonderingly, “So much time …”

      “You’ve been very sick. Drink a little more.”

      He obeyed her. It felt good, the warmth, going down. He realized he was stretched across the backseat. Hadn’t he been in the front before? He asked, “Back … seat?”

      She nodded. “I managed to get you back here the second day. You don’t remember?”

      “No. Nothing …”

      “It’s better for you back here, without that big console between the seats.”

      Outside, lightning flashed. The answering clap of thunder seemed very close. Hard rain pounded the plane.

      “Rescue?” he asked.

      Her smile was tender. “Not yet.”

      His eyes were so heavy. He wanted to stay awake, to talk to her, to find out all that had happened, to make sure she was okay, that nothing had hurt her because of his foolish need to buy big toys and then take risks with them. But his eyes would not obey the commands of his brain.

      He couldn’t keep them open any longer. “Zoe. Thank you, Zoe …”

      “Shh. Sleep now. Your fever’s broken and you are going to get better. Just rest. Just sleep.”

      He dreamed of Nora—Nora, crying. Nora begging him to understand.

      “Please, Dax. I know when we got married I said I was willing to wait. But I’m pregnant now and we are going to have to make the best of it.”

      “Liar,” he said to her, low and deadly. He said all the rotten things, the cruel things he had said all those years ago. He accused her. He’d always known how much she wanted a baby. And he didn’t believe in accidents.

      “I’m so sorry.” The words were a plea for his acceptance, his forgiveness. She swore to him that it had been an accident, her big brown eyes flooded with guilty tears, her soft red mouth trembling.

      He wasn’t ready. He didn’t know if he would ever be ready.

      But he knew it wasn’t right, to be so cruel to her. He was going to be a father. He needed to start learning to accept that.

      So in the end, he reached for her, he wrapped his arms around her and held her close. He comforted her. He dried her tears. He said it would be all right.

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