Recommended Playlist:
Cover by Max Schneider and Megan Nicole – Let's Stay Together
Lana del Rey — Young and Beautiful
Dionne Warwick – Walk On By
Angela Bofill – This Time I'll Be Sweeter
Michael Jackson – I Just Can't Stop Loving You
Bending down to give her shoelaces one last yank, making sure they were tied tightly, Willow straightened and clicked Play on her watch.
As light but soulful music floated into her ears, she put her hood up and began to jog.
Her feet pounded on the street, unconsciously falling in rhythm with the beats of the song and the drops of water hitting the pavement. The world was a haze, people, objects, and structures reduced into a mixture of blurry colors that her tear—filled eyes couldn't quite comprehend.
She kept running, freely, unthinkingly.
Or at least she thought it was so until Willow realized where her feet had taken her. A café, empty now because of the storm that threatened to make its way across the Mediterranean.
Willow stumbled to a stop.
Rain continued to pour around her, making the café's interior indistinct. She pressed her hands to her eyes, but it was no use. She could see just fine with her mind, lost as she was in the memories.
Stavros was seated in front of her, a look of puzzlement in his eyes as he asked, 'I thought you were ordering for both of us?'
She remembered how beautiful he looked, especially when he had that bemused expression on his face, which almost no one was able to see. She remembered her heart racing at the look, and her heart started to race now.
'I did.' That had been her answer, and she remembered smiling slyly as she dropped the bomb on Stavros. 'We're sharing.'
And, oh, the look on his face when he heard the words – it was as if Stavros wanted to haul her into his lap and either kiss her senseless or give her bottom a good beating.
Either way, she would have welcomed it.
Then.
Or now.
Slowly, she started to jog again, leaving the memories behind, where they belonged.
The next day, Willow took another route. The rain hadn't really stopped, falling in intermittent bursts and casting a dreary atmosphere all over the city. The same song played in her ears as she ran. It was an old song covered by emerging artists whose roots came from YouTube, and their soft, crooning voices soothed her, lulling Willow into thinking today would be different.
But it wasn't.
When she paused for breath after half an hour of jogging, her face whitened when she realized where she was.
No.
Please, no.
But there it was, the hotel where Damen and Mairi Leventis had their party – and where she and Stavros had met for the second time.
And before she knew it, she was remembering. Even when she didn't want to, the memories were there, an inescapable agony that never really stopped hurting.
I want you, Willow Somerset.
His smoldering eyes, his low, growling voice, and the heat of his touch as he held her hand when saying the words. She remembered all of it, and the agonizing clarity hurt.
Her fingers trembled as she reached for her player and hit the Pause button. She had something so much more beautiful to listen to.
Willow closed her eyes.
I want you, Willow Somerset.
I want you, Willow Somerset.
I want you, Willow Somerset.
The tears fell once more, mingling with the rain.
It happened again and again. Each day she took a different route, but there just seemed no way to hide from the past. The restaurant where she bungled her first job as Stavros' secretary. The hotel where she redeemed herself. The racetrack where she and Stavros met again…
Each and every place had its own memories, but nothing – nothing hurt more than finding herself in front of Stavros Manolis' corporate headquarters and remembering the last words they had spoken to each other.
The moment she realized where she was, her limbs lost all its function, rendering her pale and motionless as she stared up unseeingly at the skyscraper that belonged to one of the word's most successful billionaires.
Stavros.
In the back of her mind, silence buzzed.
There was no jackhammer drilling threateningly in the background, and it was all because she had no heart left to destroy. She had torn it to pieces herself the last time.
'You're right not to trust me.'
She remembered the way Stavros' head had shot up at her tremulous admission, and her knees started to shake.
'Everything was a lie.'
Willow choked at the memory, her hand burning as if it remembered the feel of the envelope she had taken as proof of her betrayal.
She tried to stop crying. She almost succeeded. Until she remembered the way Stavros had stopped her from taking the envelope, his grip on her wrist as desperately tight as his voice when he asked her, 'What are you talking about?'
She remembered the pained disbelief in his eyes, and it was all over for her. Even with no damn thunderstorm to hide her tears, it was all over. She started to cry, in broad daylight, in public, in front of his own damn building.
Hand shaking, she reached for the player attached to her wrist to turn up the volume to max. She wanted to drown her ears with the music so she couldn't hear anything else, couldn't think or feel anything else except the song filling her ears.
But it didn't work.
And soon, she couldn't hear the song at all.
Soon, all Willow could hear were her own despairing thoughts, voiceless prayers that she recited every night as she cried herself to sleep.
I love you.
I love you.
I love you.
Please don't go to someone else until you realize that I never stopped loving you.
Please.
