Chapter 3

By the time I left the hospital, it was already afternoon.

Several passersby stood near the entrance, giving me strange looks.

"That's him, the so-called homewrecker."

I pulled out my phone.

A local gossip account was livestreaming, with a headline so outrageous it was almost laughable.

[Lieutenant Claire Bennett Suspected of Cheating on Her Husband? Sick Ex-Husband Betrayed]

In the video, Daniel's eyes were red, and his voice was hoarse but clear. "Claire and I got divorced because I was sick and didn't want to drag her down with me. But she promised she'd wait for me to recover.

"Evan was the man she rescued during the hostage incident at the downtown bank. I even comforted him afterward. I never imagined he'd do something like this to me."

The comments had already descended into chaos.

[Climbing over someone else's back while they're sick. Absolutely disgusting.]

[Doesn't matter if it's a man or a woman. A homewrecker is a homewrecker.]

[I heard Claire even helped him find a doctor for his father. So much for doing someone a favor.]

[This is heartbreaking. The poor child is so young.]

I closed my phone.

An old delivery truck suddenly screeched to a stop in front of me.

The door flew open, and two men grabbed me from behind. They pressed a foul-smelling cloth over my mouth and nose.

My consciousness quickly faded.

When I woke again, I heard a child screaming and crying. I was in an abandoned warehouse in Seattle's southern industrial district.

My hands were tied behind my back, and duct tape covered my mouth.

Lily was huddled in a corner not far away. Her face was streaked with tears, and her wrists were tied with rope.

When she saw I was awake, she started crying even harder. "Evan, please help me..."

In the middle of the warehouse, a burly man wearing a mask was making a phone call. "Lieutenant Bennett, you can only take one of them. Your husband or your daughter."

The call was on speakerphone.

Claire's voice came through, trembling with tension. "Don't touch them. We can negotiate."

"Cut the crap." The man pulled out a knife and stepped between Lily and me. "Choose. Your husband or your daughter. One minute."

Daniel's shrill cries came through the phone. "Claire, save Lily! She's our daughter!"

Lily curled into a ball, crying so hard she could barely breathe.

After two seconds of silence, Claire spoke. Each word sounded as though she had to force it through clenched teeth.

"Let my daughter go."

I closed my eyes.

I wasn't surprised, but it still felt as though something inside my chest had been violently torn apart.

The man turned the tip of his knife toward me. "You heard her?"

"This man is yours to do whatever you want with." The burly man nodded toward his accomplices.

One of them roughly cut the restraints around Lily's wrists and shoved her toward a side door of the warehouse.

Officers lying in wait outside immediately rushed forward and led the crying girl away from danger.

The moment Lily was taken away, the man holding me pressed his knife against the side of my neck and shouted toward the warehouse entrance.

The other two men grabbed me and dragged me toward the opposite end of the building.

The duct tape was ripped off my mouth, and I sucked in several desperate breaths. The blade pressed against my fingers.

"Pretty brave of you," the man sneered. "Too bad it won't do you any good—"

The warehouse doors crashed open.

As SWAT officers from the Seattle Police Department stormed inside, chaos erupted.

The man holding me cursed and dragged me backward, pressing the knife harder against my neck. "Don't move!"

The tip pierced my skin, and warm blood trickled down the side of my neck.

"Come any closer, and I'll kill him!"

I struggled to breathe. My vision began to darken.

Outside the warehouse, at the temporary command post, two of Claire's colleagues were holding her behind the police perimeter.

Through the open warehouse doors, she saw the knife pressed against my neck. All the color drained from her face.

"Bennett, stay back," someone warned her quietly. "The tactical team is handling it."

The armed man seemed to hear the commotion outside. His gaze briefly shifted toward the entrance.

That was my opening.

Summoning every last bit of strength I had, I slammed myself backward. His grip loosened for a moment.

SWAT seized the opportunity and opened fire.

But the blade still sliced across the side of my neck, and blood poured out.

As the gunfire stopped, the tactical team quickly subdued the armed man.

The moment officers signaled that the passage was secure, Claire broke free of her colleagues, rushed into the warehouse, and dropped to her knees beside me.

Her hands were trembling violently. She wanted to press down on the wound in my neck, but seemed afraid of hurting me.

"Ev, don't fall asleep... Look at me." Her voice was nearly breaking.

When the paramedics rushed over and took over, I finally couldn't hold on any longer.

I lost consciousness completely.