Revenge From Ashes, Ruin for the Billionaire

(Ava)

Just one year ago, my life was picture perfect. 

I had a beautiful daughter with a patient and loving man, Zach Lorne. I still remember his smile, his playful teasing, the day he held Lila for the first time.

The thing is, Zach already has a son with his ex, Sienna. And they are still a big part of his life. But I couldn’t care less, I was in love. 

To my relief, once Zach married me, and I was pregnant, Sienna seemed committed to making our blended family work.

All that turns out to be a big fat lie.

Then the day that broke my world apart and smashed my heart to a million pieces came:

Zach screams at me, brandishing paternity results. His broken heart revealed in his eyes.

He had the blood tests. Lila is not his daughter. It was definitive. I’d lied. I’d tricked him for his billion-dollar empire. 

I argued that I signed a prenup so that theory was ridiculous. 

That I’d never made love to another man. He was my first and my last. 

But he wouldn’t have it.

He was so angry that day, I thought he was going to strike me as I cowered beneath his towering rampage. 

But he just walked away. 

He wouldn’t even go and see Lila, crying in her crib. I think that hurt me the most.

Zach went straight back to Sienna’s arms. And as soon as our divorce was final, he married her. 

My health suffered after I signed the divorce papers. The media, the scandal, the hatred of me took its toll. 

It was a time from Hell. Lila was the only thing that kept me from going right off the edge. 

I had medications, nothing worked, I just got worse. 

More depressed. More scared. More paranoid.

And now apparently, I landed myself in hospital judging from the harsh glare of lights and the steady beep of machines.

“Ava, please, stay calm. I’m Doctor Browning. You can call me Greg. Do you remember how you got here?” 

How can anyone stay calm when you hear that? That’s what doctors say when something is very, very wrong. 

Wait…Lila! Where’s my daughter? I was holding her and…

I swallow, my throat raw and dry. There’s no moisture at all. I manage to part my lips and croak out, “Lila…” 

The doctor exhales, setting my chart down. He raises the back of my bed slowly. “Ava… you’ve been unconscious for five months.” 

I stare at him, disbelieving, my heart pounds so violently.

Five months? I’ve missed Lila’s second birthday. 

The doctor’s gaze is careful now. Too careful. “You were very ill when you were admitted. The cocktail of drugs in your system was very dangerous and definitely not professionally prescribed. Did you self-medicate? Take anyone else’s pills?”

“No! I don’t know…” I barely process his words. “Tell me where Lila is!” 

The doctor sighs again. “Ava… while you were…incapacitated, considering your recent manic episodes, custody was granted to her biological father, Zach Lorne.”

“What? How? He doesn’t even believe Lila is his daughter.”

“Further testing proved Zach was Lila’s father.”

“Of course he’s the father…” I hissed. “Do they have my daughter now?”

“There’s no easy way to tell you this. Lila underwent a bone marrow donation procedure for her half brother Kai Lorne… last week…” His voice fades away.

“Sienna’s son?” My stomach lurches.

I loved that boy like my own. He’d been ill, back and forth to doctors. They thought his immune system was the cause. That his body was attacking itself.

“She was a perfect match,” he continues, his voice a muffled buzz, like I’m underwater. “Due to the stem cells from Lila, Kai has made a remarkable recovery from his Aplastic Anemia disease. Lila saved his life.”

They used my daughter to cure Sienna’s son.

The doctor kept going, “Since Lila is young, a bioethical committee had to be consulted…” 

“I don’t care about all this! Where is she!” I can’t take this anymore.

“Ava…Lila is in intensive care.”

I clamp my eyes shut as fresh terror stabs my chest. 

Lila, only two years old, forced to undergo invasive procedures while I was out cold for months?

My voice is barely a whisper… “What’s… what's wrong with her? Something went wrong during the donation?”

“The donations went textbook. But there is a side effect of the second procedure…”

“The second?”

“Yes, she needed two because of her small size, to collect enough stem cells.”

“Oh god.” My hand goes to my mouth, I want to vomit.

I can’t. Lila needs me.

“She developed an infection from a blood transfusion. That infection turned to sepsis.”

I snap my eyes to meet his. “That means… she could die?”

He nods. “We’re doing everything we can.”

“And Zach, he’s with her?”

“No. Not right now. Kai is having a birthday party tonight. Zach and Sienna want to have a big celebration of the birthday they thought he’d never get.”

My blood is colder than ice now. 

He is celebrating his son’s birthday while his daughter lay dying, alone.