Chapter 4

Mitch pried open my jaw roughly and demanded that the family doctor bring a stiff, cold feeding tube, which he personally grabbed and forcefully shoved into my nostrils.

"Make her throw up everything she just swallowed. And make sure the baby is not hurt."

My throat spasmed violently. I tried to scream, but I could only manage to sob brokenly.

The stomach that he once painstakingly nurtured and helped recover was now thoroughly ruined.

I didn't know how much time had passed before they yanked out the tube from my nose like I was a dead animal. My mouth was still glistening with bile juice and vomit.

Mitch then supported my weak body and said. "Good. Finally you've got everything out."

The fear in his voice and the loss of control of his expressions felt like a knife stabbing into my heart. But the more he cared about it, the more my heart ached.

Eventually, he had the man throw me into an empty bedroom on the second floor.

Mitch then walked in with a high-resolution photograph in his hand, forcing me to look up. It was a photo of Mom, lying on the hospital floor after being forcefully discharged from the ICU, jostled and knocked over by passing patients.

A surge of emotions rushed to my head. I slapped him hard.

"You're a fucking beast, Mitch Cooley!"

I slapped him so hard that his face whipped to the side. However, a cold smile curled at the corner of his lips when he saw me in my distraught state.

"Someone needs to bear the consequences after what you did wrong. If you want your mother to stay alive, then you'd better not have any more twisted thoughts, or I won't stop at just kicking her out of the hospital ward."

Then, he left.

But I couldn't trust him anymore.

I called the hospital crying, but they told me, "We're sorry, Ms. Gardner, but Mrs. Gardner has gone missing."

My mind went completely blank. I rushed over to the door and slammed my fists against it.

"Open the door! Let me out! I need to find my mother!"

I slammed hard for a long time until my hands were bruised and bloodied, but the door wouldn't open. I stumbled back over to my phone and called Mitch, but all I heard was just the robotic voice telling me that he couldn't be reached.

Just as I was about to fall into despair, my phone buzzed with a new text message from him.

"Wait for me at the hospital."

I grabbed a chair, lifted it against the glass window, and broke it. Then, I jumped out of the window and rushed all the way to the hospital like a madwoman, trying to search for Mitch.

However, when I saw the person coming toward me, I froze in my spot, unable to move anymore.

It was Dante. Lexie's stepfather. That bastard who ruined my life.

He forcefully dragged me to the roof of the building. And to my shock and horror, the old video of me being violated by a gang of people was playing everywhere around us, showing me begging and pleading for my life.

My face paled at once. How could this be? Mitch had personally assured me that every copy of the video had been deleted back then.

Just then, I received an anonymous text message on my phone. It said, "Your mother's dead."

It was just three words, but they were enough to completely tear my heart into pieces.

I screamed in despair and disbelief. I tried to run, to cry, to struggle, to escape, but my feet remained glued to the ground and refused to work.

Dante approached me, stepping closer and closer as he wiped away the disgusting drool on his face with the back of his hand.

"What are you trying to run away for? Just take a good look at how pretty you were back then," he said with a sneer. "Lexie and her hubby told me to wait for you here. Mitch said she's pregnant again, so they don't have any more use for that thing in your stomach. I'm just sorry that I never got to fuck your mom first."

His words struck me like a thunderbolt.

Mitch? He was the one behind all this?

So, as it turned out, I was disposable trash to him after all.

I slowly lifted my head. Dante didn't see the deathly calm in my eyes. He simply licked his lips again as he reached for my pants.

At that moment, I used the last of my strength and caught him completely off guard, dragging him with me as I headed straight for the edge of the balcony.

…

Mitch was in his car when he heard a loud, muffled thump. When he looked up, he didn't see anything, but there was a weird stifling feeling in his chest.

He told his driver, "Drive faster."

He'd just arrived at the villa and was about to get the maid to open the second-floor bedroom when he realized that the door was unlocked. So, he went in.

"Mom?"

He was surprised to see his mother, Sarah Stanton, inside. He asked, "What are you doing here? Where's Justine? I need to talk to her."

Sarah had already stepped aside from the moment Mitch barged into the room. Mitch saw the condition of the room and staggered, nearly tripping over himself.