Chapter 4

Eliza POV:

The world outside my small hospital room dissolved into a blur of frantic activity. Nurses and doctors rushed past, their voices urgent. I heard snippets of conversation. "...head-on collision... losing a lot of blood... Rh-negative, we have no supply..."

Hadley Mccall stood like a stone pillar in the middle of the chaos, his face grim. He pulled out his phone. "A million dollars," he said into the receiver, his voice cold and clear. "To any hospital, any blood bank, that can get us O-negative blood in the next thirty minutes. Two million if it's here in fifteen."

Rh-negative. The words echoed in my head, pulling a memory from the fog of my past. A charity doctor, visiting the compound. He'd pricked my finger. "You've got special blood, little one," he'd told me, his smile kind. "Very rare. You have to be careful, but it means you can be a hero to someone someday."

A hero.

Maybe... maybe this was my chance. If I could help him, the man my mother loved, then maybe she would see me. Maybe she would finally want me.

I slid off the bed, my bare feet cold on the tiled floor. My wrist throbbed, and my head felt fuzzy, but I shuffled out into the hallway. "I can help," I said, my voice barely a whisper. I tugged on the sleeve of a passing nurse. "I can help him. I have the special blood."

Kylie, who was crying dramatically into Dionne's expensive coat, spun around. "Shut up! You're making things worse!" She shoved me, and I stumbled back against the wall.

My mother's eyes, empty and cold, finally landed on me. "Stop it, Eliza," she said, her voice flat and tired. "Just... stop. Haven't you caused enough trouble?"

Her words hit me harder than the vase, harder than the dog's teeth. I had caused this. The accident, the pain, everything. My existence was the trouble.

Just then, a cheer went up from down the hall. A courier had arrived, a cooler in his hands. They had found a donor. Derek was going to be okay.

The Mccalls surged toward the operating room, a wave of relief washing over them. Eleanora collapsed against the wall, sobbing with gratitude. Kylie and Dionne hugged each other. They were a family, united in their joy.

And I was forgotten.

Almost.

As the family celebrated, Hadley Mccall turned back. His eyes, sharp and calculating, met mine. He didn't smile. He didn't offer a kind word. He simply gestured to the nurse who had been kind to me. "Test her blood anyway," he commanded quietly. "I want to know."

The next day, the Mccalls came to take Derek home. He was bandaged and weak, but alive. They fussed over him, a whirlwind of activity and concern, before sweeping out of the hospital in their fleet of black cars.

They left me behind.

I sat on the edge of the hospital bed, dressed in a paper gown, and watched them go. It wasn't a surprise. It didn't even hurt anymore. It was just a fact, like the sky being blue. I was a thing to be discarded when no longer convenient.

A few hours later, the kind nurse came in, a file in her hand and a strange look on her face. "It's true," she said, almost to herself. "You're Rh-negative. O-negative." She looked at me with a newfound respect. "You really could have saved him."

She picked up the phone on the wall. "I need to call the Mccall estate. They need to know this."

I heard her speaking to someone on the other end. "Yes, this is St. Jude's Hospital... about the girl, Eliza... her blood test came back. She is O-negative, a universal donor. A perfect match for Mr. Mccall..."

There was a pause. I could hear a faint, sharp voice crackling through the receiver. The nurse's face fell.

"Yes, Mrs. Morrison," she said, her tone now formal and defeated. "I understand... No, I suppose it doesn't matter now... A top-tier foster home? Yes, of course. We'll have her ready."

She hung up the phone and wouldn't look at me. Dionne had dismissed it. It was a disruption. They had already arranged for me to be removed.

I resigned myself to my fate. It was better this way. If I was gone, my mother could be happy. She wouldn't have to see my face and remember. My absence was the only gift I could give her.

A social worker with a weary smile arrived a short time later. She handed me a small bag with my old, dirty clothes. She led me out of the hospital and into a plain sedan. As we pulled away from the curb, I looked out the back window for one last glimpse of the place where I had almost been a hero.

That's when I saw it. Hadley Mccall's sleek, black Bentley, speeding toward the hospital, moving far too fast.

Inside that car, Hadley was gripping his phone, his knuckles white. He was listening to a voice from a DNA lab, a voice that was calm, professional, and about to shatter his world.

"Mr. Mccall," the voice on the other end of the line was saying, "the tests are conclusive. We ran the sample from your son against the sample from the girl, and also against the archival sample from Burt Mckenzie. Mr. Mckenzie was sterile, sir. He had mumps as a child. There's zero possibility he could have fathered a child."

There was a beat of silence.

"Sir," the voice continued, "the girl, Eliza. Her DNA is a 99.999 percent match. She is your son's biological daughter."