Chapter 3

A team of nurses rushed out to help George, getting him onto a gurney.

He grabbed my arm, his grip surprisingly strong. "That Tiffany woman," he gasped, his breath ragged. "She ran off with three hundred million from the company ten years ago, causing it to go bankrupt! Now she' s back, causing chaos in our family, and she' s so manipulative that Liam has even killed his own child! I will never forgive that woman."

His eyes were filled with a terrible, helpless rage.

"I' ll call Liam right now," he choked out. "I' ll make him come back and apologize to you on his knees."

He tried to dial his phone, but his fingers were clumsy. His calls went straight to voicemail. Liam was ignoring him.

Instead, my phone rang.

It was Liam.

I answered, my hand shaking so hard I could barely hold the phone to my ear.

"Sarah, are you deliberately trying to cause trouble today?" His voice was low, suppressed with anger. "Tiffany had a miscarriage because of you. What' s wrong with me spending some time with her to make her feel better? Do you have to make such a scene and involve Grandpa?"

I couldn' t speak. I could only listen to the sound of my daughter' s blood dripping onto the ground.

"And your daughter," he continued, his voice rising. "She' s so spoiled and willful because of you. She' s just bleeding a little, and you' re making a fuss like she' s dying. I' m not a doctor, what good is calling me?"

A little bleeding.

"You wanted the amusement park, and Tiffany and I gave it to you. You say the child is bleeding, and I sent band-aids. What more do you want?" he raged. "If you use any more excuses to disturb Tiffany and me today, I won' t go easy on you."

His words faded into meaningless noise. I couldn' t hear him anymore.

I looked down at Lily. Her little hand was already stiff and cold. I caressed it, whispering her name over and over again.

"Liam," I said, my voice empty of all life. "Believe it or not, I never faked anything, and I never harmed Tiffany."

I took a breath. The air felt like glass in my lungs.

"You killed my child. I want a divorce."

There was silence on the other end of the line. Just for a few seconds.

Then, a cold scoff. "Trying to play dead again to trick me? Sarah, your acting is too much."

He hung up.

I was alone with the dial tone and the cold weight of my dead daughter in my arms.

George had been stabilized and was now sitting in a wheelchair, a nurse by his side. I walked over to him, my steps heavy.

He took one look at Lily' s face and understood. All hope was gone. Tears streamed down his wrinkled cheeks.

"I' m so sorry, Sarah," he wept. "I' m so, so sorry. I shouldn' t have used the favor of saving you years ago to force you to marry Liam, to force you to save the struggling Miller Corporation."

His words brought back a flood of memories.

Ten years ago, Liam was in a severe car accident. Tiffany, his girlfriend at the time, cleaned out the company accounts-three hundred million dollars-and disappeared. The Miller Corporation went bankrupt overnight. The family couldn' t even afford Liam' s hospital bills.

George found me. I was a vice president at a successful company. He knelt before me, a proud old man brought to his knees, and begged me to marry his son. He had rescued me from my own abusive father when I was a teenager and paid for my college education. I owed him a debt I could never truly repay.

So I agreed.

I spent three years rebuilding the Miller Group from ashes. I sat by Liam' s side, nursing him from his sickbed to a wheelchair, and finally, back onto his own two feet. After Lily was born, I stepped back from the company I had built and became a full-time mother.

For ten years, I gave everything I had to Liam and the Miller family.

And this was my reward. My daughter, the only gift the Miller family ever truly gave me, was gone.

"But Sarah," George pleaded, his voice thick with tears. "I hope you' ll consider our past... give Liam another chance."

He looked at me with desperate hope.

"Before Tiffany returned, you three were so happy. Liam did care about you. He' s just been manipulated by that wicked Tiffany again..."

I looked at the old, weeping man and slowly shook my head.

"I gave him ten years of my marriage and my hard work. He shouldn' t have treated me with such contempt."

My voice was flat, devoid of emotion.

"What I owed the Miller family, I repaid ten years ago. Now, I want to reclaim what Liam owes me."