Chapter 4

I woke up to the smell of antiseptic and the dull, rhythmic beep of a machine. My eyes fluttered open. I was in a hospital room.

Liam was sitting in a chair by the window, staring out at the city lights. He looked tired, but his face was hard, unforgiving.

He heard me stir and turned his head. There was no concern in his eyes. Only cold, simmering anger.

"You' re awake," he said, his voice flat.

My hand instinctively went to my stomach. The sharp, cramping pain was gone, replaced by a hollow ache. I didn' t need a doctor to tell me. I knew.

"The baby..." I whispered, my voice cracking.

"What baby?" he scoffed, standing up and walking towards the bed. "Don' t start with your games, Ava. The doctor said you' re fine. Just a few bruises. This little stunt of yours, fainting at the cemetery... it was a good performance. I' ll give you that."

He thought I was faking. He didn't know. He had kicked his own pregnant wife in the stomach, and he was accusing me of putting on a "performance."

"You think I wanted to cause a scene at my own mother' s funeral?" I asked, a bitter laugh bubbling in my throat. "You think this is some kind of 'bitter woman' s revenge' ?"

"Isn' t it?" he shot back. "You' ve been nothing but trouble since Chloe came back. You' re jealous. You can' t stand that she' s the one I love, that she' s the one giving me a child."

He pulled out his checkbook, the gesture so callous it made me sick.

"Look, I' m tired of this drama," he said, scribbling a number. "Here. I' m transferring five percent of the company' s shares to your name. It' s more money than your mother saw in her entire life. Take it, and stop this nonsense."

He tore out the check and tossed it onto the bedside table. He thought he could solve everything with money. My mother' s death, his violence, a decade of lies. All of it could be erased with a check.

I started to laugh. It wasn' t a happy sound. It was broken, hysterical, full of ten years of pain and humiliation. I laughed until tears streamed down my face.

I had endured his coldness, his affairs, the constant reminders that I was a second-best replacement. I had swallowed my pride and my pain, hoping that one day he would see me. And this was the culmination of it all. A check for my silence. A payoff for my grief.

The laughter died in my throat, replaced by a chilling calm. I looked at him, really looked at him, and for the first time, I felt nothing. No love, no hate. Just a vast, empty void.

"Liam," I said, my voice steady and clear. "I want a divorce."

The word hung in the air between us. He stared at me, his jaw dropping in genuine shock. He had expected tears, pleading, maybe even another outburst. He had not expected this.

"A divorce?" he repeated, as if he' d never heard the word before. "Don' t be ridiculous."

Before he could say more, the door creaked open. Chloe glided in, carrying a bowl of some steaming, dark liquid. She wore a look of angelic concern.

"Liam, darling, don' t be angry with her," she said softly, placing the bowl on the table next to the check. "She' s just upset. I made her some herbal tonic. The doctor said it would help her calm down and rest."

She turned her sweet, poisonous smile on me. "You should drink it, Ava. It will make you feel better."

She then glanced at the check, then back at me, and added with a hint of steel in her voice, "You' re refusing to take the medicine. Is there a reason? Perhaps you' re worried it might affect something? You' re not... hiding something from us, are you? Like a pregnancy?"

The threat was clear. She was testing me, pushing me into a corner. Liam' s eyes narrowed, a flicker of suspicion crossing his face. He remembered my previous pregnancies, the ones he' d forced me to end. If he thought I was pregnant now, he would drag me to the operating table himself.

He snatched the bowl from the table. "She' s right. Drink it," he commanded, his voice leaving no room for argument. "Or do you have something to hide?"

My heart hammered against my ribs. I had already lost one child. I couldn' t lose this one. But if I refused, he would know.

So I made a split-second decision. I took the bowl from his hand, my eyes locked on his.

"Fine," I said.

And I drank the entire thing. The liquid was bitter and foul. Chloe watched me with a satisfied smirk. Liam looked relieved, his suspicion fading.

As soon as they left the room, promising to return in the morning, I stumbled into the private bathroom. I knelt before the toilet and forced my fingers down my throat. I retched again and again, until my stomach was empty and my throat was raw.

I leaned against the cold tile, shaking and sweating, praying I had been quick enough. Praying I had saved my baby.

I spent the rest of the night in a state of high alert, every twinge and cramp sending a jolt of terror through me.

Around 3 a.m., it started. A sharp, debilitating pain in my abdomen. It was different from before, more intense. A cold dread washed over me. Something was wrong.

I pressed the call button for the nurse, but no one came. I tried again, my hand shaking. Still nothing.

I needed Liam. Despite everything, I needed help. I fumbled for my phone and called him.

It rang and rang. Finally, he picked up. "What is it now, Ava?" he slurred, his voice thick with sleep and annoyance.

"Liam, something' s wrong," I gasped, the pain making it hard to speak. "The baby... I need a doctor."

"I' m busy," he snapped. In the background, I could hear Chloe' s soft voice.

"Is that Ava again, darling? Just hang up. She' s just trying to get your attention. Come back to bed."

"You heard her," Liam said, his voice cold. "Stop calling. I' m with Chloe."

And he hung up.

The finality of it, the absolute, crushing indifference, broke something inside me. He was with her. He was choosing her, even now.

I knew then that no one was coming to save me.

Desperation gave me a surge of adrenaline. I pulled the IV from my arm. I had to get out. I had to find a doctor myself.

I swung my legs over the side of the bed, but the moment my feet touched the floor, the pain intensified, and my legs gave out. I collapsed onto the cold linoleum.

I started to crawl.

I crawled out of my room, down the silent, empty hallway, leaving a trail of blood behind me. The world was a blurry tunnel of pain. I just had to get to the nurses' station. I had to save my baby.

But the hallway seemed to stretch on for miles. My strength was failing. The black spots were back, clouding my vision.

I collapsed on the floor, the cold seeping into my bones. My last conscious thought was a silent, desperate plea to a child I would never get to hold.

I' m so sorry.

When Liam came back to the hospital hours later, expecting to find me sleeping, he found an empty room and a trail of blood leading out the door.

He followed it down the hall and found the commotion at the end. Doctors and nurses were surrounding a still figure on the floor.

It was only then, as a doctor shouted about a severe hemorrhage and a second-trimester miscarriage, that the truth finally, brutally, hit him.

I had been pregnant.

And he had lost our child.