The Truth?

Chapter 3

Isabella's POV

"Nurse Olivia?" I gasped in disbelief, and she laughed as she pulled me into a tight embrace.

"How many times must I tell you to drop the title? Just Olivia is fine. Besides, I am furious with you. Did you not promise to keep in touch after that night?" She asked, and I sighed.

"Yes. I am truly sorry. I lost your old contact." I told her as we stepped back from the hug.

"Oh, but I gave your husband my new number to pass on to you, when we ran into each other a few years ago." Olivia said, and I went still.

"You saw Marcus? When was this?" I asked, and she laughed again, unaware of the storm building inside me.

"Of course I did. Did he never mention it? I asked him for your number myself, but he told me you were having trouble with your phone and had been too consumed with work to replace it." Olivia explained, and I clenched my jaw.

Marcus had lied. Again. Why did he always seem so determined to cut me off from everyone who cared about me?

It was precisely what he had told my childhood friend, the one who had gone directly to his neighbour to ask after me, once I had given birth.

Had I not run into her by chance at the mall, where she barely recognized me, given how much weight I had gained, I would never have discovered the lie for myself.

My fists clenched at my sides as the urge to curse rose in my throat. No. I would not allow him the satisfaction of unravelling me here.

"Never mind that. What brings you here?" She asked, and I forced a smile.

"I should be asking you the same question. Did you not have to rush overseas that very night, once you finally received that scholarship you had prayed for so faithfully?" I redirected, and she giggled.

"Yes, and I have completed it now, actually." She told me, and I embraced her again.

"That is wonderful to hear."

"It truly is, and I will say it again, you and your baby girl were my good luck charm that night. I had waited years for that scholarship and nearly believed I would be rejected, since the portal was closing so soon after. Such a shame, what happened to that little one of yours." Olivia said, and my heart stopped cold.

"Something happened to Chloe?" I nearly shouted, and she flinched, the warmth draining from her eyes.

"I do not understand. Did you not know? It has been years. Are you attempting some sort of joke? What is happening right now?" Olivia demanded, and it felt as though the ground beneath me had begun to give way.

"That night, after I delivered your baby and stepped out to collect my mail, you collapsed from exhaustion and blood loss. I panicked while the doctors rushed to your side, and it was then that your baby stopped breathing, birth asphyxia. She simply was not receiving enough oxygen." Olivia explained, and my legs buckled as the air around me thickened into something unbreathable.

I pressed a hand to my chest as everything blurred before my eyes. I blinked, over and over, and before I understood what was happening, I had collapsed to the floor with a heavy thud.

No. This could not be happening. Was she telling me that my baby had died at birth?

"Oh my goodness! Isabella, are you all right?" Olivia rushed to my side, helping me up and guiding me to a nearby bench.

"You look utterly exhausted, pale, worn down. Have you not been taking care of yourself? I hardly recognized you earlier, if not for that rare white hair of yours, I might have walked right past you. Have you been unwell?" Olivia continued, question after question, but my voice had abandoned me entirely.

My legs trembled as I sat there, shivering in Olivia's arms, fighting to hold back the tears threatening to spill over.

My baby girl had died from lack of oxygen at birth?

Then how had I never known?

And if that was true, who, then, was the child I had raised for seven long years?

Chloe's earlier words surfaced in my mind, sudden and vicious.

"I even showed them Aunt Selena's photograph as proof. They all agreed we look remarkably alike."

"No…" I shot to my feet and screamed the word through the hospital hallway, startling everyone within earshot into wide-eyed silence.

Olivia's jaw dropped as she scrambled up to calm me, but I pushed her hand away and bolted from the hospital, tears streaming down my face without restraint.

My chest ached as though something inside it were tearing loose, because I understood, in that instant, that the thing I feared most might actually be the truth.

But would Marcus betray me so completely? After everything I had done for him?

And how had I been made to believe, for seven entire years, that Chloe was my daughter, if she never had been? I needed answers. I needed them now.

I turned to find Olivia running toward me, worry etched across her face.

"What is it, Isabella? Why are you screaming? Why are you crying like this? Has something terrible happened?"

Yes, I wanted to scream again, but her next words froze me where I stood.

"I assumed you already knew all of this. Marcus promised he would tell you once you were out of danger, since I had to leave the country so suddenly. Also, his friend, the one he brought into the clinic for an unexpected labour, did she deliver safely in the end?" Olivia asked, and my blood ran cold.

"What friend?"

Olivia frowned, clearly confused, but continued. "Her file listed the name Selena Cross. She was pregnant as well, and went into labour that same night, though it was not yet her due date. Your husband remained by her side the entire time. I remember being surprised to find him in her ward rather than yours, but he explained that you had insisted he stay with her, since she was family."

Words could not capture the disbelief that held me frozen in place, staring at Olivia.

Selena had been pregnant? How? When?

And then it struck me, it was during my own pregnancy that she had returned to the country, though Marcus had never once permitted me to see her. When I finally insisted and did see her, she had a visible swell to her stomach, but she had explained it away as overeating, as simple weight gain.

And I had believed her. Even as every sign pointed to the truth.

How could I have been so painfully naive?

Just then, my phone rang. With trembling hands, I answered.

"Isabella. My friend tells me she saw you looking absolutely worn down. When, exactly, do you intend to leave that worthless man, who does not deserve you, and come home?" My mother's voice thundered through the receiver, clearly furious, though I could hardly blame her.

All of this was my own doing, if only I had not been so blinded by love, so willing to overlook every warning sign.

The secretive business trips he always seemed to take alongside Selena, the ones his secretary could never quite explain or account for.

The way Selena had always hovered so protectively around Chloe, offering to "teach" me how to raise my own daughter. The outings Marcus took Chloe on, carefully timed to exclude me, while Selena went in my place instead.

I had permitted it all, convinced I had somehow failed him as a wife, desperate for him to feel free and happy beside me once more. But all of it, every ounce of that patience, had been nothing but foolishness.

How they must have laughed behind my back. Rage ignited in my veins at the thought, and in that moment, I finally arrived at a decision.

"I cannot believe you still intend to hand him that project after everything he has done to you.

Come home, darling. Your mother misses you." My mother pleaded, and I forced a smile no one could see.

"All right, Mum. But there is something I must settle first." I said, and silence stretched across the line for a long moment before the call ended.

Truth?....