Before you were hurled from the burning jet fuel and swallowed whole by the charcoal night; before the crimson from the bodies sprawled out in ghastly angles soaked into the earth, your mother had been briefing you on the corruption investigation currently plaguing their empire.

Their being the elusive family you were preparing to marry into.

"Now, darling, we have a meeting with the SK Group this afternoon, I need you to attend," she says pointedly, eyes never leaving her papers but voice aimed at you. "I want you wearing the silk lavender number that makes you look like a young lady. I can't have you embarrassing the family name again with that Gucci dress that made every streetworker in the city look damn classy."

"But it was Gucci?" you whisper, aware that simply talking back to the woman could mean trouble but you were tired, you'd been traveling in the family private jet all day to attend these meetings with her.

"Excuse me?" She snorts, pointing her chin in the ear. "I don't care if it's Gucci or Chanel, it made you look classless. Tasteful designer fashion, please. Never show the knees or the shoulders unless, in the bedroom, you hear me?"

"I-I will be wearing something more conservative, I promise."

She finally looks up at you, her soft brown eyes melt into yours. Her voice is soft but authoritative and you knew to keep your responses short. "Thank you."

You nod, tentatively rubbing your hands down your thighs. It was all about appearances for her, never anything skin deep unless you count fat zeros on a cheque deep. "Yes, mother."

"Governor, please, tell me how is your wife?" she turns away from you, her voice lowering in tone. She drops the document into her lap as you watch the animated expression on her face. She was one tactful woman and you were an innocent witness to her deceit.

Sitting comfortably with your puffer jacket wrapped protectively around your frame. With an airpod stuffed into one ear hidden by your hair as you listened to classical music.

You had forgone the seat belt, trusting in the family pilot for the millionth flight of your life. You were 20 years old, fresh into college studying a degree in Political Science and International Relations and working in a high paid position with your father.

And this was supposed to be a routine trip back from Singapore.

No one was supposed to die that night.

Your mother had sat in front of you, seat belt trapping her against the mahogany leather seat behind piles of legal paperwork. Other than your mother and you, a party of 6 politicians and a Samsung paralegal sat beside you, listening attentively to every word your mother dripped from her venomous tongue.

Words that you'll never remember but so desperately wish you had.

Her French manicured fingers had been tapping against the pile of documents in front of you, ones that entailed what you presumed to be another detailed plan of corporate engineering. Your mother was as corrupt as they come, a well-educated woman, a Queen of Commerce in her own right.

She was on top of the world.

Additionally, she had just finished explaining her ten-year plan currently in progress, where you would be used as a pawn to marry the son of the SK Group, in an attempt to merge and consolidate more power to the family name.

Both parties had agreed on the financial benefit when you were 16

And you were to marry their son when you turned 21 and presume activities as the Chief Marketing Officer.

You hadn't even met your fiance yet.

It was no secret, chaebol families like yours, dominated the economy and at the time of the crash, your family had amassed immense political power with enough sway to encourage the impeachment of President Park Geun-Hye and influence the countries next president.

It was black money and your family was loaded with it.

The pristine private lives of each and every one of your well-mannered family members, neared impossible for others to manipulate. And it was all thanks to the mother who proved to be adept at keeping control over everyone and everything, even if it meant making potentially problematic people disappear with a snap of her fingers.

It was dirty power, why you didn't think your family would ever be the target of assassinations, blackmail, and terror, was beyond you. Maybe it was naivety secondary to having had lived a sheltered life, who knows.

But you should've known how much danger that put you in.

People in power really only have one way to go when they've reached the top.

And the plane sure as hell went down.

You've described it countlessly being the sole survivor. It had been raining heavily but the flight attendant and the pilots had all shown no sign of distress or malice in their attempts to sooth the governor's anxiety.

There was no turbulence you'd expect in a storm, just a sinking feeling as the plane dropped in the pit of your stomach.

There was nothing out of the ordinary that you had identified.

Sinking into your chair, you had watched the rain slide down the window and the angry thunder clap and crash it's bolt through the sky, threatening to tear the night apart.

It was at 1 AM, half an hour later when the scraping of metal and the sound of shattering glass the plane made as it had hit a hillside in Jeju when everything went wrong.

And you were going to die.

The pressure in the cabin was mounting, you could feel it as the oxygen masks fell above you but the screeching sound of steel twisting and tearing apart ripped through your head before you could even think of grabbing a mask.

The lights had shrouded you all in darkness and the force of the crash had thrown you against your mother in the seat in front of you.

She had tried to wrap her arms around yours, panic sweeping through her body when the plane began to rip apart.

Alarms blared, people screamed, it was deafening.

Why you hadn't worn a seatbelt, no one will ever know.

There wasn't even enough time to register just how bad it was about to become as you tried to hang onto something, as you tried to hang onto your mother, and latch your hands onto her.

Your heart raced in your chest.

Fear screamed in your body.

You weren't going to live through this.

You should've worn your belt.

"Don't let me go!" You shouted as the plane hit the trees. "Don't let me go!"

Your mother stared back at you with an unforgettable amount of utter terror on her usually stoic face as she moved to try and shove you against her.

"Hold me!" she screams back. "Hold on to me!"

But her hands could only touch the ends of your jacket when the plane suddenly hit the ground, hurling you out of the hole in the ceiling and throwing you straight into the downpour in the middle of the dark jungle.

Your life never flashed before your eyes like they said it would. Sure, you were terrified but an alien feeling of calm had taken over your body before you had landed onto the wet earth with a loud thud yards away from the jet, the impact loud as the cracking chorus of broken bones filled the void.

And all you could see as your vision grew hazy, were the ball of flames suddenly erupting from the plane and the warmth it enveloped you

Blood-curdling screams were the last thing you could hear before the numbing sound of the plane exploding burst your eardrums.

And it's the last thing you remember.

Everything after that was a fucking nightmare.

Even from her burning grave, your mother still controlled your life.

You see, broken bones and broken hearts can be mended but contracts your mother sign, last for life.

It was in every world newspaper and all people could talk about. You had been the girl with the money, then you were the girl who had survived the unsurvivable.

But now, four years later, you were the heiress about to have the world's most expensive wedding in the UAE.

Who gives a shit about money when you have no time?

No-one.

Your phone vibrates in your palm as you all wait for the elevator. Checking around you, you sneak a glance at the coded message on the screen. "See you soon. Meet at ground zero. We will wait for you." You watch the message disintegrate as a red apple appears on screen.

The elevator dings above you, alerting you to its arrival.

The doors open.

Tossing the now defunct phone into the bin adjacent to the elevator button, you walk comfortably into the elevator knowing everything was going according to your plan.

"Has it hit you yet that today is going to change your life?" Eloine asks innocently as she presses the ground floor button.

Smirking, you shake your head as the doors close. "Oh, you have absolutely no idea."

No one did.

Because no-one saw it coming.