Chapter 5

"Are you insane?" I thrashed against the nurse' s grip. "Get away from me!"

Holly rushed into the room, her face streaked with tears. She fell to her knees beside my bed. "Please, Isabella, I' m begging you. Save my son. He' s innocent. Please."

Gregory gently helped her to her feet, his arm lingering around her shoulders. The gesture was so casual, so proprietary, it made me sick.

"Bella, it' s just a little blood," he said, his voice calm and reasonable, as if he were asking me to pass the salt. "You' d be doing a good deed."

A good deed. I was still weak from the hysterectomy. I was anemic. He knew that. He had sat by my bed for days while doctors lectured me about my low iron levels. But that didn' t matter. His son needed me.

I stopped struggling. A wave of bitter resignation washed over me. I let them take my blood. What was one more violation, one more piece of me sacrificed for him and his other family?

After the transfusion, he promised he' d be back to check on me. He never came. I waited for two days. The nurses would come in, their faces a mixture of pity and contempt. They spoke in hushed tones outside my door.

I heard them talking about Gregory. How he was a doting father. How he had spent an entire afternoon making funny faces just to coax a smile out of his sick little boy. How he had personally spoon-fed Jaden every meal.

Holly made sure I knew it too. My phone buzzed constantly with her texts. Photos of Gregory reading a bedtime story to Jaden. A video of them laughing together in the hospital playroom. A picture of the three of them, asleep in Jaden' s hospital bed, a perfect, loving family. She was systematically destroying any hope I had left.

Then came the text that changed everything.

"We need to talk. Meet me at the cafe across the street. I have something you need to see."

I met her. She was sitting in a booth, a smug smile on her face. She pushed a cup of coffee toward me.

"It' s your favorite," she said. "A non-fat latte. Gregory remembers."

I ignored the coffee. "What do you want, Holly?"

She leaned forward, her voice a conspiratorial whisper. "I want you to understand your place. You' re the past, Isabella. I am the future. I am the mother of his son. That makes me the real Mrs. Thompson."

She slid a small audio recorder across the table. "Press play."

I did. The first voice I heard was my mother' s, weak and frail, from a few months ago before she passed away from a sudden heart attack.

"Gregory, you have to end it with that woman. You are destroying my daughter."

Then Gregory' s voice, cold and dismissive. "Isabella is stronger than you think. And Holly needs me. I can' t abandon my son."

My blood ran cold. I looked at Holly, my eyes wide with dawning horror.

"You were there," I whispered. "When my mother had her heart attack, you were there."

Holly' s smile was triumphant. "She came to see me. To threaten me. We argued. Her heart just... gave out. It was a shame." She took a delicate sip of her coffee. "Oh, and she dropped this. I believe it belongs to you."

She pulled a small, silver locket from her purse and dangled it in front of me. It was my mother' s. The one my father had given her, with their wedding photo inside.

The world went red. "You killed her," I choked out, lunging across the table for the locket.

"Give it back! You murderer!"

The locket flew from her hand, hitting the floor and shattering. Holly screamed and stumbled backward, clutching her stomach. "My baby!" she cried out, even though she wasn't pregnant. "You' re trying to hurt my baby!"

Gregory burst into the cafe, as if on cue. He saw the scene-me standing, her on the floor, weeping. He didn' t hesitate. He grabbed my wrist, his grip like iron.

"What the hell do you think you' re doing?" he snarled, his face a mask of fury. "She' s pregnant!"

"She' s lying!" I cried, pointing to the broken locket on the floor. "That was my mother' s! She killed my mother!"

Gregory' s eyes flickered to the broken silver, then back to Holly, who was now sobbing hysterically. He hesitated for just a moment.

"Kneel," I said, my voice dangerously quiet. "Tell her to kneel and apologize for breaking my mother' s locket."

Holly' s eyes widened. She looked at Gregory, a silent plea in her eyes. He was torn.

But Holly was faster. She scrambled to her knees. "I' m sorry, Isabella," she whimpered. "It was an accident. I' m so, so sorry."

It was enough for Gregory. He saw a pregnant, grieving woman on her knees. He saw me, standing over her, looking like a cruel tyrant.

"That' s enough, Isabella," he said, his voice cold. He scooped Holly into his arms, ignoring the stares of the other patrons. "You' re getting out of control."

He carried her out of the cafe, leaving me alone with the shattered pieces of my mother' s memory on the floor.

I sank to my knees, my fingers carefully gathering the broken silver and the tiny, faded photograph. A sob tore through me, a raw, ragged sound of pure agony.

It started to rain outside, a cold, miserable downpour. I walked out into it, not caring that I was getting soaked to the bone. The physical cold was nothing compared to the icy wasteland in my heart.

My mother. He had let this woman kill my mother.

The grief was a physical weight, crushing me. My legs gave out, and I collapsed on the wet pavement, the world dissolving into a blur of rain and tears.

I woke up in a hospital bed. A nurse was standing over me. "We need a family member to sign the consent forms for your treatment."

I laughed, a bitter, hollow sound. "I don' t have any family."