Chapter 1: Just One Night

 

Diana was pulling her car into the garage. She'd flown back from her trip three days early to surprise her husband. Today was their first wedding anniversary, and there was no way in hell she was spending it away from him. She wanted to see the look on his face when he saw her walk in. She hadn't told anyone she was coming, not even her best friend.

Before she went inside, she decided to call him and let him know she was back in town, that they'd see each other tomorrow. He didn't pick up.

Then why does he always nag me to let him know when I'm landing? she thought, before remembering it was barely seven in the morning. He was probably still asleep.

Diana dropped her phone back in her bag and got out of the car. It was Saturday—she figured she'd catch him still in bed. She let herself into the house, slipped off her heels so she wouldn't make any noise, and headed for the bedroom.

Before she opened the door, a smile crept across her face at the thought of the reunion. Their marriage had been arranged by her family, but somewhere along the way, she'd actually fallen for the guy.

The door swung open. The smile died on her face, one inch at a time.

Her husband was in bed. Naked. Legs tangled up with a woman's.

"What the hell did you do?!" she screamed, eyes flooding with tears.

Izan jolted awake, startled, and turned toward her. He blinked a couple of times, and his face twisted into shock.

"Diana, this…" he said, his voice thick with sleep.

"Don't you dare tell me this isn't what it looks like!" She'd recovered from the first jolt enough to move toward the bed.

Her second scream made his companion lift her head, and the pain hit twice as hard.

"F-friend, why didn't you tell me you were coming?" stammered the woman who, as of that moment, was her enemy for life, pulling the sheet over herself.

Diana's hand flew to her throat, trying to get a breath in. She wanted to hit them. To smash everything within reach. To scream until her voice gave out. Instead, all she managed was one step back and a shake of her head. Tears ran down her cheeks, unstoppable.

"Don't you dare call me friend. I trusted you—you're a snake."

Her husband climbed out of bed, not bothering to cover himself, and grabbed her arm. She shoved him off so he couldn't touch her, and he threw his hands up like she was the one being unreasonable.

"Come on, Diana, drop the drama," he said, pulling on a pair of boxers. "Why show up without warning? This is on you." He said it like she was the one overreacting, like he was somehow in the right.

She stared at them both, stunned.

"Since when?" she hissed, rage bleeding into her voice, eyes locked on the naked woman.

The woman stood, dragging the sheet with her, and wrapped it around herself. "Since when what, friend? Let's talk about this, okay? It was a mistake, it shouldn't have happened—we missed you, we were drinking, and one thing led to another."

"Don't bother lying to her," her husband cut in. "Tell her the truth. We've been together since way before I married her, and we're going to keep being together. That doesn't have to change anything. Just pretend you don't know."

"Are you kidding me right now?! This whole time you've been playing me for a fool!" She curled her fists, shaking with rage.

Izan carried on like this was all perfectly normal. He looked at her like she was the one at fault, like she'd rudely interrupted something. Her marriage had died today. However much she loved him, she wasn't about to let anyone play her like that.

Izan let out a sigh, bored. And that—the sheer casualness of it, the insult of it—was what finally broke her.

"Nobody's playing you for a fool. You are one. Did you actually think this was one of your little fairy tales? God, you're exhausting. Insufferable. Diana, wake up and smell reality—we got married because it was a business arrangement between your father and me.

"You're not anything to me. Just a deal. And your father didn't care—he knew, he just wanted the families joined together. Now drop the theatrics and go make me breakfast."

She shook her head, unable to believe what she was hearing.

"I never want to see you again," she sobbed, then marched to the closet and started hurling his clothes out the window. "Get out of my house!" she ordered, launching the first shirt.

Natalie snatched up her clothes and bolted from the room, but Izan closed the distance and hit Diana across the face before she saw it coming.

Diana's hand flew to her throbbing cheek, and she looked at him, afraid for the first time.

"Go on, throw something else. The next thing I give you is going to hurt a lot more than that did. I run this house." He grabbed her arm and, before she could react, shoved her into the wall. "This is my house, and if you want to leave, then leave. But you walk out with nothing. Just what you've got on."

She lifted her head and looked at him with pure hatred, gathered up what little dignity she had left, and headed for the door. Before she crossed the threshold, she said:

"I want a divorce."

Izan's laughter finished shattering what was left of her heart.

"You'll come crawling back. You're nothing without me."

***

After fleeing the house, Diana had called her family to explain what happened and beg them to let her come home. But just like Izan said, her family didn't care about her situation. Instead of helping her, they'd ordered her to go back to her husband.

When she refused, her father told her to do whatever she wanted—but if she didn't go back to Izan, she could forget she had a family at all.

With the small suitcase she'd packed for her trip and the car that was the only thing actually in her name, she'd driven to an ATM to pull out cash and disappear. She wasn't going back to him, and if her family couldn't understand that, then Diana didn't want anything to do with them either.

As of right now, she was on her own. And she'd figure it out.

She tried card after card, but her hope died fast—Izan had canceled every single one.

So that's how she ended up in a bar, making terrible decisions, spending the last few dollars she had on alcohol.

Diana had planted herself in one of the darkest corners of the place, the section reserved for couples who wanted a quiet drink, tucked into a row of uncomfortably plush loveseats. She lifted her glass and drained it in one go, swinging between laughing and crying in the same breath. She wanted revenge. She wanted to cheat on that son of a bitch the exact same way he'd cheated on her.

Out of nowhere, a man walked over and nearly sat right on top of her.

"Whadda you thinkkk you're doing?" she slurred, her tongue thick with alcohol. "You're gonna crush me, you idiot!"

The stranger looked at her like she was some kind of apparition. He seemed just as wasted as she was, and despite the insult, he settled in right next to her.

"Didn't see you there," he said, and shrugged like the whole world—her included—could not have mattered less to him.

Diana looked him over, and an idea took shape in her head.

"Well, aren't you handsssome. Pretty damn handsome, if I'm being honest," she said out loud, not particularly caring that it was supposed to be a private thought.

The stranger narrowed his eyes at her and took another pull from his drink. "You talking to me?" He waved a hand at her like he was asking to be left alone, but she'd already decided this man was here by fate.

And fate was screaming at her to give Izan a pair of horns so big they'd put hers to shame.

She got up on her knees on the couch, going for her best seductive pose, and promptly lost her balance and toppled straight into the stranger's lap.

"Why're you so handsome, Mr. Grumpypants?" she asked, watching him stare at her with total seriousness, trying and failing to peel her off. "No, wait, that's not—whatever, same thing. I'm tryna seduce you, hot stuff."

"Is this some kind of joke? Hot stuff, seriously?" The man cracked his first smile since he'd walked in, and his whole face transformed.

He'd been handsome even with that dead-inside expression, but when he smiled, it knocked the air right out of her.

Diana let out a complaint when he lifted her off his lap like she weighed nothing and set her back down on the seat. On any other night, sober, she'd have died of embarrassment over her own behavior and the not-so-subtle rejection—but instead of apologizing for basically assaulting the poor man, she burst into tears.

"I just wanted to cheat on him, the way he cheated on me," she sobbed. "Today's my anniversary, you know? And I found him in bed with my best friend. On my anniversary! In my bed! On my Egyptian cotton sheets!"

The Greek god across from her—looking like he'd bitten into a lemon and found it deeply personal—raised an eyebrow at her and lifted his glass in a toast.

"It's my anniversary too," he said, and she caught the sadness flicker across his face.

"Oh no, I'm so sorry, I didn't know you were married!" she mumbled, reaching for her own glass, only to find it empty and her wallet even emptier. So, with zero shame, she snatched his drink right out of his hand and took a sip. "I want someone to make me forget. I want one crazy night, for the first time in my whole life, and the one guy I find has a wife. Ugh. You should go. I'm not going to be anybody's mistress."

"Had a wife. It's my first anniversary since I became a widower." He took his drink back and ordered her a fresh one. "I wish forgetting were that easy. Look at me—one year since she died, and I'm still drinking just to push the memories away." He said it with so much pain that Diana reached out and touched his arm.

For a moment, their eyes met, and something passed between them. A spark of understanding, born from nothing but a look.

Diana stood and offered him her hand, taking the lead. He took it and followed her.

They kissed their way across the bar, one corner at a time, swaying to the music as they went. With every kiss, every brush of skin, the air between them got warmer.

"They rent rooms upstairs," she whispered in his ear.

"You could at least tell me your name," he said.

She shook her head. "No, no names. This is just sex. Call me your one-night lady, and you can be my handsome stranger." The moment she said it, they both knew the decision had already been made.

That night, Diana did the single craziest thing she'd ever done in her life. She'd never slept with a stranger before, never lost control like that. She was a hopeless romantic at heart, but that day, every one of her happily-ever-after dreams had gone up in flames.

Hours later, after losing herself completely in him, she looked over at the man sleeping beside her.

"Bye, handsome stranger," she whispered. She pulled her clothes on and slipped out of the room.

Resolved, she left, determined to sell her car and survive on whatever it fetched until she found a job. Everything would be fine, she told herself.

She was wrong.

She'd never see the handsome stranger again—but from that day on, she'd never quite stop thinking about him either.