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The ship moans. Grinding with metallic noises it shouldn’t be making.

I shiver. “How do you make everything else disappear until all I see is you?”

He inhales sharply, then exhales slowly. “I could ask you the same question, Dr. Azalea Clark. Ever since you nearly killed us both to save your tree, I have been able to think of nothing else but you. Your smile. Your laugh. Your lust for life.”

My eyes travel down his body. I can’t help it. “I lust for more than just life right now. Or at least I did until we were rudely interrupted by an impending crash on Mars.”

His laugh is warm and melts me to my core and I just want to crawl into his lap, not stay strapped in my seat like a toddler. I also obviously want to survive the landing, so sacrifices must be made.

“We must remedy that once we land and sort ourselves.” His voice, low and husky, sends shivers up my spine. His words carry a promise I hold close to my heart, so close I dare not ask what this means. What this means for the community living by the rules he set. The rules he’s breaking with me. What this means for us. For Robert. For everyone else. Am I the only unhappily paired couple? Are there more? My relationship opens a big can of worms, but I don’t want to deal with it right now when I can’t actually do anything about it.

I need him. I need to be with him as we land on Mars. That’s all I know.

“We’re about to set down,” Captain Millard’s voice announces. “Time to say whatever prayers you think might help you on the other side.”

Joking or not, her words make me feel like my stomach is full of rocks. I look at Marek and he squeezes my hand. “We will survive this, Azalea.”

He’s the only one I can stand calling me that.

The name only my grandmother called me.

I close my eyes and try to think about anything other than what’s happening with the ship.

“My grandmother, she would like you,” I say. “I mean, she hated billionaires even more than I do, but she’d make an exception for you.”

Marek chuckles. “I know I would like her.”

“How?” I ask, trying not to screech as I’m pushed forward, my body fighting against the unmovable metal harness.

“She raised you.” Three words. So simple. Exactly what I needed to hear.

The ship shakes harder than ever. I can feel the engines fighting against gravity and inertia and whatever else that’s trying to break this vessel apart.

“Try not to tense,” Marek says as the feeling of motion increases. “You will suffer less if you are relaxed, should we crash.”

“Sure. Nice and relaxed. No problem.”

There’s a pause, then Marek sighs. “Shall I sing to you a song my mother sang that always relaxed me?”

I don’t think this will relax me but no way am I going to say that if the man is willing to sing to me in Russian. If this is how I die, I’ll take it.

“Yes please.”

I close my eyes and let his voice distract me.

He has a beautiful tenor, and though I don’t understand the words, the lullaby is soothing. There’s so much emotion and depth in his voice, and I am seduced by him all over again.

I want us to live.

I want us to survive.

I want us to find a way to be together forever.

I know the moment we land because we hit hard.

The wind is knocked out of me. My bones shake beneath my skin. We twist to the side, and I feel my body press tight against the restraints. The entire ship is flipping. Spinning round and round like a corkscrew. And then…

Silence.