Holding On To Love
 

Julian’s heart raced. Fear gripped his body as tightly as his hand to Eve’s forearm as she dangled from the racing jet plane, thousands of feet above ground. “Please, Eve, hold on. Hold on, and I’ll pull you up.”

“No, Julian, you have to go back,” Eve pleaded. “It’s too dangerous. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

“I don’t care about me!” he shouted above the roaring engines and whipping winds. “Just hold on. Whatever you do, don’t let go.”

“I’m is so tired. I can’t feel my arms.” Eve closed her eyes for a long moment. “I’m scared,” she murmured.

The words were said so softly, but Julian heard them. She was beginning to slip. Dread tightened his chest. He reached back into the plane, desperate to grab hold of any fixed surface for support. “You have to be strong, Eve, okay?” he said, trying to reassure her. “I’m here with you. I won’t let anything happen to you, I promise. Hold on! You have to hold on.” Finding success in his struggle, his fingers brushed against the cool metal of a sturdy object inside the plane.

“You’ve been so good to me, Julian. I wish things could have been different.”

Tears burned his eyes. His heart stopped. Inside the plane, his fingers stretched for a firm grip on the handle. Why did this feel like a goodbye? He didn’t want to hear it. He wouldn’t let her open her heart to him then tell him goodbye in the next breath. “Stop talking, Eve. You need to save your strength.”

Anger mingled with the fear that coursed through his veins. Damn that TC! If that arrogant golly had let him help from the beginning, Eve would be safe inside the plane. His peripheral vision caught sight of the man sprawled on the floor. Knocked out cold from flying objects in the air. Julian shook his head. What kind of man would put hatred toward someone else above the love he had for his wife and her security?

“No, I need to clear my chest,” Eve insisted. “I have to tell you how I feel.”

Julian worked feverishly to pull her into the plane. He tightened his grip around her arm. “Uh-uh. There will be no last words. You’re going to be fine, Eve.”

“But if I’m not, I want you to know--I need for you to know how I feel about you.” Eve started to slip. A frightful gasp passed her lips. “Julian, I --”

“No! Damn it!” How long had he waited for Eve to make this confession? But not like this. Never like this. “I won’t hear it. I won’t let you go, Eve. Not ever!” A primal scream summoned every ounce of strength in Julian’s body. Battling the angry winds, he managed to pull Eve waist-wise to the plane, before pulling her in the rest of the way.

Safely inside, Eve collapsed to her knees and fell to Julian’s arms in a fierce embrace. “Julian. Oh, Julian. Thank you.”

He tightened his arms around her, returning Eve’s intense embrace while smothering her tearstained face with kisses. Not a breath of space separated them. They clung to each other as though their two bodies were one. “Never again. I’m never going to let you go again,” Julian swore.

“I don’t want you to,” Eve professed, somehow managing to hold him closer. “I love you so much, Julian.” She pressed kisses to his neck. “I love you.”

“You are my life, Eve. I don’t know what I would have done if I lost you. If you were gone from this world, I couldn’t go on. I wouldn’t want to. I love you so, so much.”

Their lips met in lingering kiss, sealing each of their heartfelt declarations. So lost were Julian and Eve in the sweetness of the other’s mouth, the disbelieving looks on the faces of Liz, Rebecca and the now conscious TC faces as they watched the scene unfold went totally unnoticed. All that mattered was they were in each other’s arms. Together. The way they belonged and would always remain.