Reborn Heiress: Divorcing My Ruthless Husband

The sharp, chemical stench of medical bleach violently forced its way into her nasal cavity.

Alaya gasped, her lungs expanding so rapidly her ribs ached. She jolted up from the suffocating darkness, her heart hammering against her ribs like a trapped bird.

She snapped her eyes open. The blinding glare of the surgical lights above the bed seared her retinas, blurring her vision for a few agonizing seconds. A tearing pain ripped through the back of her skull.

Then, the memories hit her. They did not come back as thoughts, but as a physical avalanche. She felt the freezing rain soaking through her clothes. She heard the deafening roar of the Hewitt Corporation building collapsing into rubble. She felt the exact moment the life drained out of her body on that wet asphalt. Her breath stopped entirely.

Her right hand shot downward, acting on pure, terrified instinct. Her fingers grabbed at the thin fabric of the hospital gown, pressing hard against her stomach.

It was flat.

The physical emptiness beneath her palm-the absolute absence of the six-month-old life that had been growing inside her-yanked her violently back to the present.

A specific image flashed behind her eyes. Hardy. Her husband. Standing in the rain, his broad shoulders shielding Kelsi Warner as he guided the young woman into a warm car, leaving Alaya to bleed out on the street.

Alaya bit down on her lower lip. She bit down so hard her teeth cut through the delicate skin. The metallic, rusty taste of her own blood flooded her tongue. It was the only thing keeping her from screaming until her throat tore.

She looked down at her left hand. A thick IV needle was taped to the back of it, pumping clear fluid into her vein.

She reached over and ripped the needle out in one brutal, unhesitating motion.

Dark venous blood immediately welled up, spilling over her knuckles and dripping onto the pristine white hospital sheets. She stared at the bright red stains blooming on the fabric. She felt absolutely no physical pain from the torn vein.

She threw the blankets off and swung her legs over the edge of the mattress. She stumbled forward. Her bare feet hit the freezing marble floor. The cold shot straight up her legs and settled deep in her chest.

She pushed through the bathroom door and gripped the edges of the porcelain sink. Her knuckles turned completely white. She stared into the mirror.

The woman looking back at her was pale, her dark hair tangled, but her face was young. The deep lines of exhaustion and despair from her final days were gone. She was back. She had returned to a point three years before her tragic death.

The bathroom door was pushed open wider. A nurse carrying a metal tray stepped into the room. The woman saw the blood trailing across the floor and dropped the tray. It hit the tiles with a deafening clatter.

"Mrs. Suarez!" The nurse rushed forward, reaching out to grab Alaya's arm.

Alaya slapped the woman's hands away. The slap echoed sharply against the tiled walls.

She turned her head. Her eyes were as sharp and cold as shattered glass. "What is the exact date today?" her voice came out as a harsh, guttural rasp.

The nurse shrank back, visibly shaking under the sheer weight of Alaya's stare. "It... it's Thursday, October 14th. You've been unconscious for three days since the car accident."

Alaya closed her eyes. A single, freezing tear slid down her cheek and dropped off her chin. It was real. This absurd, twisted second chance was real.

The nurse scrambled backward and slammed her hand against the red emergency button on the wall. A piercing alarm immediately shattered the dead silence of the VIP ward.

Less than a minute later, heavy footsteps rushed down the hallway. Agnes, the senior nanny who had worked for the Hewitt family for two decades, burst into the room, followed closely by a doctor in a white coat.

Agnes had red, swollen eyes. She lunged toward Alaya with her arms wide open. "Oh, my poor girl! The baby... the poor baby!"

Agnes tried to pull Alaya into a tight hug.

Alaya's entire body went rigid. Her muscles locked like iron. She did not raise her arms to return the embrace. Instead, she stared at the side of Agnes's face with the cold detachment of someone observing a stranger.

She placed her hands flat against Agnes's shoulders and shoved the older woman away. The push was hard enough to make Agnes stumble backward.

Alaya walked past them, her bare feet leaving faint red smudges on the floor. She sat down on the edge of the hospital bed and looked straight at the doctor.

"Where is Hardy Suarez?" she demanded. Her voice held zero emotion.

The air in the room instantly froze. Agnes looked away, her hands nervously twisting the bottom of her apron. She refused to make eye contact.

The doctor cleared his throat, shifting his weight uncomfortably. "Mr. Suarez is currently handling an emergency cross-border merger and acquisition for the corporation. He..."

Alaya looked down at the blood drying on her fingertips. A low, chilling laugh scraped its way out of her throat.

She knew exactly where that "merger and acquisition" was happening. He was currently lying in a cheap bed in a Brooklyn art studio, comforting his precious Kelsi.

In her past life, she had spent this exact hour sobbing hysterically, begging the doctors to call her husband, begging for his love. Right now, her stomach churned violently. A wave of pure nausea washed over her.

She snapped her head up and glared at the doctor. "Inject me with a long-acting painkiller. Right now."

She needed her brain to be absolutely clear for the war that was about to start.

The doctor frowned. "Mrs. Suarez, medical protocol dictates that we monitor your natural pain levels after a trauma of this-"

"I am the majority shareholder of the Hewitt Corporation," Alaya cut him off, her voice slicing through the room like a scalpel. "If you do not push that medication into my IV in the next thirty seconds, I will personally ensure you never practice medicine in this state again."

The doctor swallowed hard. He nodded quickly to the nurse, who scrambled to prepare a syringe.

The cold liquid pushed into her vein. Alaya leaned back against the pillows. She reached out and grabbed the latest smartphone resting on the bedside table.

She tapped the screen. It was completely clean. There were zero missed calls. Zero text messages from her husband. It perfectly validated the cold-blooded reality she remembered.

She opened her contacts list. Her thumb hovered over the name saved as "Husband."

She stared at the delete button for one full second.

Instead of deleting it, she tapped the edit icon. She typed in "Social Climber." Then, she toggled the switch to put the contact on 'Do Not Disturb'.

Heavy, measured footsteps echoed in the hallway outside. The faint, distinct scent of cedarwood cologne drifted under the doorframe.

The heavy soundproof door was pushed open. Hardy stepped into the room. He wore a custom-tailored dark suit. His face was a mask of absolute stone.

He stopped at the foot of the bed. His dark eyes locked directly onto Alaya's.

Hardy took two long strides toward the side of the bed. His tall frame blocked the harsh sunlight streaming through the window, casting a heavy shadow over Alaya's pale face.

He did not ask how she was feeling. He did not ask if she was in pain. His dark eyes swept over the flat surface of the blanket covering her stomach. His jawline tightened so hard a muscle twitched beneath his skin.

Underneath the blanket, Alaya's hands curled into tight fists. Her fingernails dug so deeply into her palms she felt the skin break. Every muscle in her body screamed at her to grab the surgical scissors from the tray and drive them directly into his chest.

She forced herself to breathe. She remembered the mistakes of her past life. Screaming and fighting now would only alert him to her change. She needed to play the game.

She forced the burning hatred in her eyes to melt into a look of absolute, crushing despair.

She lowered her eyelashes. She forced her shoulders to shake. The movement was small at first, then more violent. Tears welled up in her eyes and spilled over her cheeks, hot and fast.

She brought her hands up to cover her face. A broken, pathetic sob ripped from her throat. She played the role of the devastated mother perfectly.

Hardy's body went completely rigid. For a fraction of a second, a flash of raw agony broke through the thick ice in his eyes.

He slowly lifted his right hand. His fingers extended, moving toward her shaking shoulder.

He stopped. His hand hovered exactly one inch above the hospital gown.

He pulled his hand back. He curled his fingers into a tight fist and pressed it firmly against the side of his suit pants.

"It was an accident," he said. His voice was flat, mechanical, and completely devoid of warmth.

Behind the cage of her fingers, Alaya smiled. It was a cold, dead smile. An accident? She knew exactly what the mechanic had found on the brake lines of her car. A clean, precise cut.

She threw her hands down and snapped her head up. She glared at him through her tears.

"My baby is dead!" she screamed, her voice hoarse and cracking. "Where were you? Why are you only here now?"

Hardy looked away. He refused to meet her piercing gaze. He turned his head to look out the window at the Manhattan skyline.

"There was a sudden crisis with the board of directors," he lied smoothly. "I had to stay and manage the fallout."

Alaya's eyes darted downward. There, resting against the cuff of his expensive suit jacket, was a faint, almost imperceptible smudge of cerulean blue oil paint. A pigment used exclusively in art studios.

She grabbed the heavy goose-down pillow from behind her back. She gripped the fabric with both hands and hurled it as hard as she could directly at his chest.

"Get out!" she shrieked.

Hardy did not flinch. He did not raise his hands to block it. The pillow hit him and fell to the floor. When he turned back to look at her, his face was terrifyingly dark.

He looked at her shaking, hysterical form. He categorized her behavior as standard post-traumatic stress. Arguing with a hysterical woman was a waste of energy.

He reached down and casually brushed the front of his suit jacket, smoothing out the invisible wrinkles.

"You need to calm down," he said coldly. "I will have Silas send some nutritional supplements over later."

He turned his back on her. He walked to the door, pulled it open, and stepped out into the hallway without looking back.

The heavy door clicked shut.

The instant the latch engaged, the tears on Alaya's face stopped. The pathetic shaking of her shoulders vanished.

She reached over and grabbed a rough paper towel from the bedside stand. She scrubbed the moisture from her cheeks, her eyes returning to a state of dead, calculating calm.

She threw the covers off. A sharp, pulling ache radiated from her lower abdomen, but she ignored it. She walked barefoot across the cold floor to the floor-to-ceiling window.

She looked down at the hospital driveway far below.

A black Maybach pulled up to the curb. She watched Hardy's broad shoulders disappear into the back seat. The car merged immediately into the heavy New York traffic.

She knew exactly where that car was heading. It was not going to the financial district. It was heading straight for the Williamsburg bridge.

Alaya walked back to the bed and slammed her palm against the call button.

"Send Dr. Coleman in here," she commanded the speaker. "Tell him to bring my complete medical file. Now."

Five minutes later, Dr. Coleman stood at the foot of her bed. He was sweating. He shifted his weight from foot to foot.

"Mrs. Suarez, I... the original physical file was already collected by Mr. Suarez on his way out," he stammered.

Alaya's eyes narrowed. Hardy was hiding something. He was hiding the specific details of the crash, or the details of the fetal death.

She leaned forward. "If you do not print a complete copy from the internal system and hand it to me in the next three minutes, the Hewitt family legal team will have your medical license revoked before dinner."

The doctor wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. He nodded rapidly and practically ran out of the room.

He returned shortly with a thick stack of printed papers. He handed them to her with shaking hands.

Alaya flipped past the standard trauma assessments. She scanned the complex medical jargon, her eyes searching for anomalies.

She stopped at the toxicology report. Down at the very bottom of the page, in a small, easily missed font, was a single note from the lab tech.

Trace amounts of Beta-blockers detected in blood sample.

Alaya stared at the words. Her breathing stopped. Her heart was already weak from a previous condition. Beta-blockers would slow her heart rate to a dangerous, potentially fatal level.

Someone had drugged her before she got into that car.

Alaya folded the medical report with precise, rigid movements. She walked over to the wall panel, punched in the code for the hidden safe, and shoved the papers inside. The heavy steel door clicked shut just as the sound of low voices drifted through the hallway.

She froze. She walked silently to the heavy wooden door and pressed her face close to the narrow slats of the built-in blinds.

Hardy had returned. She watched through the slats as he grabbed Dr. Coleman by the arm and shoved him into a small consultation room across the hall. The door didn't click shut completely. Alaya silently opened her own door and slipped across the corridor, pressing her ear to the narrow gap.

Dr. Coleman looked terrified. He kept his voice low, but the narrow opening carried the sound directly to Alaya's ears.

"The uterine tearing from the impact was severe, Mr. Suarez," the doctor said, his voice trembling slightly. "The damage is irreversible. It is highly unlikely Mrs. Suarez will ever be able to conceive again."

Hardy's massive frame flinched. It was a violent, involuntary jerk. The fingers of his right hand curled inward, spasming against his thigh.

He closed his eyes for a fraction of a second. When he opened them, the cold, dead stare was back. He forced his jaw to unclench.

"Will this increase the rejection risk for her transplanted heart?" Hardy asked. His voice was like crushed ice.

The doctor shook his head quickly. "No, sir. The cardiac tissue is stable. Her lifespan won't be affected by the infertility."

Hardy gave a single, sharp nod. He looked completely indifferent, as if the fact that his wife could never have children was a minor inconvenience on a spreadsheet.

Behind the door, Alaya pressed both hands hard against the center of her chest. The phantom pain in her transplanted heart flared, mixing with a suffocating, crushing despair. He only cared about the organ beating inside her chest. She was just a container to him.

Out in the hallway, Hardy's private cell phone vibrated.

He pulled it from his pocket and glanced at the screen. His facial muscles tightened instantly.

He looked up and snapped his fingers at his executive assistant, Silas, who was standing a few feet away. Hardy made a sharp, cutting motion with his hand-the signal to move immediately.

He didn't even turn his head to look at Alaya's door. He spun on his heel and walked rapidly toward the VIP elevator, his long strides eating up the distance.

Alaya leaned her forehead against the cold wood of the door. She watched his broad back disappear around the corner. Her lips curled into a bitter, self-mocking smile. She thought she was numb to him, but hearing her infertility diagnosed and watching him walk away without a second thought still made her stomach churn.

A night-shift nurse, Jennings, pushed a medication cart past the room. She glanced at the door and gasped, startled by the sight of Alaya's pale face pressed against the glass slats.

Alaya pulled the door open and grabbed the nurse by the forearm. She yanked Jennings into the room and shut the door.

Alaya opened the bedside drawer, pulled out a stack of hundred-dollar bills she kept for emergencies, and shoved them into the nurse's hands.

"The man who just left. The black Maybach," Alaya ordered, her voice completely flat. "Find out exactly where that car is going. Right now."

Jennings stared at the cash, swallowing hard. "My boyfriend works in the underground dispatch room. He can track the plates on the city grid."

"Do it."

The next ten minutes felt like physical torture. Alaya sat on the edge of the leather sofa. She picked up a sealed alcohol wipe and mechanically tore the foil wrapper into tiny, jagged shreds.

The door opened. Jennings slipped back in, breathing heavily.

"The car crossed the bridge," Jennings whispered. "The GPS tracker stopped in Williamsburg, Brooklyn."

Alaya closed her eyes. She knew the exact coordinates. She knew the exact brick building. It was the cheap apartment rented by Kelsi Warner, the "struggling art student" her husband sponsored.

Alaya shoved the rest of the cash from the drawer into Jennings's pocket. "Get out. You saw nothing."

The nurse nodded and fled.

Alaya walked into the bathroom. She turned the silver faucet handle and let the freezing water run over her hands. She splashed the ice-cold water directly onto her face, shocking her system.

She looked up. Water dripped from her chin onto the hospital gown. The woman in the mirror had zero affection left in her eyes. There was only the cold calculation of an executioner.

She walked back to the bed and picked up her phone. She took a deep breath, forcing her lungs to expand smoothly, and dialed her father's private line.

Halbert Hewitt answered on the second ring. "Alaya? Sweetheart, are you alright?"

Hearing the deep, worried gravel of her father's voice made Alaya's throat close up. A massive lump formed in her airway.

She swallowed hard, forcing the tears back down. "I'm fine, Dad. The doctors say I just need to rest."

She did not mention the beta-blockers. She did not mention the cut brake lines. She did not mention Hardy rushing off to his mistress. Her father's blood pressure was already dangerously high. A shock like this could kill him.

"I'll come see you tomorrow," Halbert said.

"No, stay at the manor. I'll be home soon."

She ended the call. She opened a secure, encrypted browser on her phone. Her fingers flew across the keyboard, typing in the name of the most ruthless, discreet private investigation firm in New York.

Shadows.

She opened a new email draft. She typed out the license plate of the Maybach. She typed out Kelsi Warner's exact apartment address.

She hit send.

At that exact moment, a massive crack of thunder shook the hospital windows. A flash of lightning illuminated her face in the dark room, casting sharp, terrifying shadows across her cheekbones. The countdown on her marriage had officially started.