Chapter 3

I found them at the hospital. Mark was pacing in the waiting room, his face a mask of manufactured worry. Emily was sitting beside him, her hand on his arm, the picture of a supportive friend.

The moment he saw me, Mark stormed over. "What the hell is wrong with you, Sarah? Your daughter is in an emergency room, and you' re busy signing over her house? Is there anything left inside of you?"

"She' s fine. It was a panic attack, not a heart attack," I said, my voice devoid of emotion.

"Fine? She' s terrified! She thinks her own mother hates her!" he shouted, his voice cracking with just the right amount of theatrical despair. He was good, I had to give him that. "If you don' t care about our daughter, if you don' t care about this family, then we' re finished. I want a divorce."

This was the moment I had been waiting for, the move I had anticipated.

"Fine," I said without a second of hesitation. "Get the papers ready. I' ll sign them."

Mark stared at me, his jaw slack. This wasn' t the reaction he' d expected. He thought I would beg, that I would break. His confusion was a small, bitter victory.

Just then, my parents rushed in, their faces etched with panic. My mother, Susan, saw me and her relief instantly curdled into rage.

"You!" she screamed, her voice echoing in the sterile hallway. "They told me you wouldn' t come! That you didn' t care! You are not the daughter I raised! You' re a monster!"

The door to the treatment room opened, and a nurse led out a fragile-looking Lily. Her eyes, wide and scared, found mine immediately. She took a hesitant step toward me, her hand outstretched.

"Mom?" she whispered, her voice trembling. "Please... don' t you love me anymore?"

This was the ultimate test. My entire plan, Lily' s entire future, hinged on this moment of cruelty. I had to break her heart to save her life. I looked down at her small, pleading hand and then met her gaze with a face of stone.

I pulled my own hand back as if hers were venomous.

"No," I said, the word tasting like poison in my mouth. "I don' t. To be honest, I love Leo more now. He has a future. He' s going to make something of himself."

A strangled sob escaped Lily' s lips. My mother gasped in horror. My father looked as if I' d physically struck him.

Emily rushed forward, wrapping an arm around Lily. "Oh, you poor thing," she cooed, casting a sorrowful look at me. "Sarah, you don' t mean that. You' re just upset." The manipulative performance was flawless.

I ignored her. I took out my phone, and in front of all of them, I blocked my parents' numbers. Then I blocked Lily' s. The finality of the act hung in the air.

"Don' t contact me again," I said to the room at large.

Then I turned and walked out of the hospital, leaving the wreckage of my family behind me. I didn't let them see the tears that started to fall the second the automatic doors slid shut.