Chapter 5 – Sasha
Two months.
That’s how long it’s been since I last saw Lev Rusnak.
In that time, I’ve flown more miles than I can count. London, Paris, São Paulo, Tokyo—the endless carousel of airports and faces blurring together until my body no longer remembers what it feels like to stop. That’s what I wanted. To keep moving. To let the sting of him fade somewhere between takeoffs and landings.
But it hasn’t.
I still remember the exact moment he told me to leave. His voice cool, detached, as if I were just another passenger on his endless list of fleeting indulgences. It was sharp enough to slice through me cleanly, and yet I’ve been bleeding ever since.
I tell myself I shouldn’t care. I barely knew him. One night—two nights—doesn’t mean anything in the grand scheme of my life. But my chest still tightens at the memory of waking up to him leaning against the doorway, coffee in his hand, looking at me like I was…more. And then tearing it all away with a few simple words.
So I’ve buried myself in work. In polished smiles and crisp uniforms. In professionalism so airtight that no one—not Maya, not Tom, not any of the passengers who try to charm me—could ever guess how raw I still feel underneath.
And still…at night, when the world quiets, I see him.
Lev Rusnak. The man I can’t seem to fly far enough to forget.
It wasn’t just that he took my virginity and sent me away. That part, brutal as it was, I could have eventually understood. Men leave. People leave. My whole life has been a string of exits.
No, the wound came from the words.
Mine.
You’re mine now, Sasha.
No one else. No man touches you. No man even looks at you again.
He said it like a vow, over and over while he was inside me, while his hands held me down and his eyes pinned me in place. He said it like he meant it—like I was his, not just for that night but for always.
And then, the next morning, he sent me away without a backward glance.
How do you reconcile that? How do you hear a man whisper you’re mine against your skin and then watch him cut you loose as if you were nothing at all?
I told myself I’d file it away as a mistake, a lesson. But here I am, months later, still stuck on him, still hearing his voice in my head when the cabin lights dim and I’m alone in the galley.
And God help me, a part of me still wants him, even though I know I’ll never see him again.
Damn it. I snap my book shut so hard it echoes in the quiet, then fling it onto the couch beside me. The words blur together anyway, no matter how many pages I force myself through. They don’t drown out the memory of him. Nothing does.
With a huff, I grab the remote and jab the power button. The TV flickers to life, filling my apartment with noise and movement—something, anything more interesting than the carousel of thoughts circling my brain.
Maybe if I lose myself in someone else’s story, I can stop replaying mine.
The late afternoon light filters through the blinds, striping the walls in gold. My Chicago apartment is exactly what I wanted when I signed the lease years ago—clean lines, uncluttered, anonymous. A place to crash between flights,nothing more. But today, it feels too still. Too quiet. Especially since my housemate, Noelle, isn’t here anymore. She got married, moved out, and left me to sulk here all alone.
I sink back into the sofa, pulling the throw blanket tighter around me, trying to pretend that the buzzing under my skin is just jet lag. As if on cue, my phone buzzes across the coffee table. I snatch it up and see her name.
“Noelle!” I grin as I swipe to answer.
“Finally!” her bright voice spills through the speaker. “I haven’t seen your face in forever. Come have lunch with me, please? I’m dying for some girl time.”
I grin like a fool. “I miss you so much. Honestly, I’ve been craving some friend time too. Say no more—I’ll come right over.”
By the time we hang up, I’m already tearing through my closet. I slip into a girly yellow sundress, light and summery, the kind that makes me feel like myself again. My mood lifts with every step as I head out the door.
Noelle’s home is a mansion that sits in one of Chicago’s deserted neighborhoods, a gleaming white stone beauty that screams power and money. The gatehouse is swarming with security—men in dark suits, radios clipped to their belts—but after a tense moment of checking names and IDs, they wave me through.
