Chapter 3

The room was pitch black.

Night always amplified physical agony.

Waves of blinding pain surged from the amputation site, leaving me so depleted I couldn't even keep my eyes open. Eventually, exhaustion pulled me into a fitful, feverish haze.

Sometime later, a familiar, saccharine voice drifted through the haze.

It was Elena.

I snapped into sharp alertness.

"Just like I told you. Give her the highest dose of the sterilizing compound your clinic has."

"Miss... Miss Vance, that's completely against protocol," a doctor’s voice stammered hesitantly.

"Chloe’s system is already critically compromised from the trauma. The side effects of that off-label uterine sclerosing agent are horrific and totally irreversible. Are you absolutely sure—"

Elena cut him off with icy malice.

"Stop whining and do what you're paid to do."

"Do you see anyone by her bedside? Nobody cares about her. Vincent is going to throw her out on the street any day now. Who do you think you should be listening to?"

"Still..."

"There are no 'stills'! Say one more word, and I'll make sure your medical license is shredded by morning!"

I heard the doctor let out a defeated sigh. He had caved.

I fought desperately to force my eyes open, to throw my body out of the bed, but my limbs felt like lead, pinned down by sheer exhaustion and trauma.

A weak, strangled moan escaped my throat.

Elena turned.

There wasn't a flicker of panic on her face. Instead, she strolled over to my bedside and looked down at me like I was vermin.

Suddenly, she reached out and pressed her palm down hard right over my fresh amputation stump.

A scream tore through my nerves. My entire body spasmed violently.

I could feel warm blood soaking through the sterile bandages, blooming across the clean white sheets in a grotesque crimson stain.

Elena leaned in, her voice dripping with cruel amusement.

"What a shame. You heard all of that, didn't you? Well, I might as well tell you the truth."

"This was Vincent’s idea."

"He said that since you were cruel enough to scrape out his heir just to spite him, you don't deserve the privilege of ever being a mother again."

Paralyzed by agony, I glared at her, my vision rimmed in red.

Elena relished my torment. She bent down until her lips were practically brushing my ear.

"Did you really think Vincent loved you? He’s been sick of you for years."

"You're nothing but a pathetic burden. He only kept you around out of sheer pity."

"Doctor, do it now."

As Elena’s command dropped, heavy footsteps approached.

Primal terror flooded my veins.

Rough hands pinned my shoulders and arms down onto the mattress.

A massive syringe loomed in the corner of my vision, the steel needle catching the sterile overhead light.

I wanted to scream. I wanted to fight them off.

Yet my broken body was pinned like an insect on a board.

The cold liquid was forced into my IV line. Within moments, a searing fire tore through my lower abdomen, as if someone had taken a serrated blade and carved my insides out. Blood began to seep out from between my thighs.

The sheer agony pushed me to the brink of blacking out.

Elena ripped the duvet away completely, watching with cold fascination as the blood pooled against the white linen.

With a smug smile, she reached over, yanked the emergency call cord out of the wall, and smashed the remote onto the tiled floor, shattering the plastic casing.

Still not satisfied, she walked over to the corner where my wheelchair and crutches rested.

*Crack—*

She stomped on the lightweight wheelchair frame until the wheels bent inward at unnatural angles, then snapped the aluminum crutches over her knee.

She kicked the twisted metal under the bed.

A venomous grin curved her lips.

"Enjoy your night, Chloe. Lie there and bleed out."

The door clicked shut behind her.

A desperate instinct to survive flared inside my fading consciousness.

Dragging myself by my elbows, I tried to roll toward the side of the bed, only to lose my balance and crash violently onto the hard floor.

My severed stump slammed directly onto the tiles. The world went black for several seconds as nausea and blinding pain consumed me.

Biting my tongue until I tasted copper, I dragged my bleeding, mangled body toward the door, centimeter by agonizing centimeter.

A thick streak of dark red marked my trail across the white floor.

The door was right there. But the handle was impossibly high.

I reached up, my trembling fingers brushing against the cold wood, failing to find purchase.

My vision began to tunnel.

My arm collapsed to the floor. With the very last breath in my lungs, I let out a broken whisper into the empty hall:

"Help... somebody... help me..."

Darkness swallowed me whole before an answer came.