After the Plane Crash, I Became the Woman He Couldn't Forget

The city lights, shredded by the downpour and distorted by the rain-slicked floor-to-ceiling windows, cast eerie, floating splotches of light, like jellyfish, across the enormous bedroom. The room was filled with a humid heat, a commingled scent of sweat, lust, and the metallic tang of rain.

Sloane’s nails dug into the tight, sweat-slicked muscles of Everett’s back, leaving behind a series of hungry scratches. She was like a strand of seaweed caught in a storm, her legs wrapped tightly around his waist, rising and falling passively with each of his powerful, unyielding thrusts.

Everett’s kisses were scalding, tasting of hard liquor and an unyielding possessiveness. He kissed her deeply, fiercely, as if to smother her every off-key, broken moan, as if to drain all the air from her lungs, leaving her no choice but to depend on him.

This was not the calm, perfectly controlled lovemaking he usually orchestrated.
This was war. It was plunder. It was a desperate, spiraling entanglement where both were on the verge of losing control.

Sloane could clearly feel the violent, irrepressible tremors running through the man beneath her. This wasn’t from lust; it was from fear. The arms holding her were so tight the muscles threatened to spasm, as if he weren’t embracing a lover but clinging to a piece of lifesaving driftwood, terrified that if he let go, he would sink into the bottomless abyss of what was called

He loved her.
Sloane knew it more clearly than ever before.
And it was because she knew that it hurt all the more.

Her hands did not push him away, nor did they scratch. Instead, they moved gently, soothingly, stroking the tense ridge of his spine again and again. She was calming a wounded, dying beast.

In the tangle of their shared breaths, she whispered his name in a tone that was almost holy, like a sigh.
Like a prayer.
Like a spell.

The man’s frantic movements, by some miracle, stilled at her sudden tenderness.
He buried his face in the crook of her neck, like an exhausted animal, motionless. Only his heavy breathing and the thunderous drumming of his heart proved he was still alive.

Sloane’s heart was in her throat.
Their contract had one week left.
This was her last chance.

she gathered all her courage, her voice a trembling, dreamlike whisper in his ear,
She could feel the man in her arms stiffen instantly.
But she didn’t stop.
Her fingers traced his sweaty temple, a light, pleading touch.

Dead silence.
It was as if a colossal block of ice from outer space had crashed into the humid bedroom, freezing all the heat, all the lust, all the warmth in an instant.

Everett slowly, inch by inch, lifted his head from her.
The eyes that had just been filled with a frenzy of love were now a hollow void, darker and colder than the night outside.

He pulled away from her, so swiftly that Sloane didn't even have time to react. The mattress on his side of the bed settled, as if nothing had ever happened.
She heard his footsteps, clear and calm, as he walked into the bathroom.
A few minutes later, Everett emerged. He was naked, casually towel-drying his damp hair. Droplets of water trickled down the sharp lines of his abs, disappearing into the mysterious terrain below.
He walked to the bedside, holding a glass of water in one hand. In the palm of his other hand lay a small, white pill.

He held the water and pill out to her, his tone as flat and emotionless as a doctor fulfilling his duty.
Sloane stared at him, at the handsome face that had just been buried in passion against her own. The flush of lust had completely faded, leaving only his usual cool composure.
Her heart, in that moment, turned to ice.
her voice was painfully hoarse.
Everett didn’t answer her question.
He just looked at her and stated a fact in a calm, temperature-less voice:

…A mistake.

Sloane’s mind went blank with a deafening buzz.
She looked at his handsome, cruel face, but her thoughts drifted uncontrollably back to a boring business gala a year ago.
That day, too, she had been hiding in a corner of the ballroom in an ill-fitting dress, staring blankly at a giant tropical fish tank.
Then, a man had walked up beside her.
His voice, like the man himself, carried a hint of condescending, casual scrutiny.

Sloane had glared at him, annoyed, and pointed to a school of royal blue fish.
She had rambled on, completely unaware that the man beside her was no longer looking at the fish, but at her.
When she finally finished, she found him staring at her with an intrigued curiosity she had never seen before.
And then he said,
…

So, that was it. The distance between  and  was exactly one year.
Sloane’s body, which had just weathered a storm of passion, was now completely cold. The man beside her, this bedroom, the city outside—everything lost its color and sound, fading into a silent, meaningless black-and-white photograph.