Chapter 4

Slaps rained down on Hendrick's face repeatedly until Adrian finally caught Haylee's hand and stopped her.

When Adrian caught sight of Lexie, he was equally stunned. "What are you doing here?"

Lexie simply replied, "I heard Cameron wasn't doing well, so I came over to check on him. You don't need to worry too much. I've already found a matching heart donor for Cameron, so he'll be fully recovered soon."

Haylee, who had just been weeping hysterically, cut off her crying in an instant. "Is that true? Where did you find a matching heart? Is Cameron really saved?!"

Lexie confirmed it once more. "I have access to a few additional resources. I'll be performing the surgery myself, so Cameron will definitely be discharged safe and sound."

Upon hearing that she would perform the surgery, Hendrick shuddered violently.

Then, a resigned laugh escaped his lips.

After Haylee left, Lexie felt the burning temperature radiating from Hendrick's skin and took him straight to a ward.

She then thoughtfully arranged for a blanket and a glass of cold water.

As Hendrick lay on the hospital bed, Lexie took his temperature with a thermometer. Seeing the display read 104 degrees Fahrenheit, she frowned. "Why didn't you call me when you had a fever?"

Hendrick curled up beneath the covers and replied sarcastically, "Dr. Shelton, you're so brilliant, such a miracle worker. I guess it just never crossed your mind that standing in a freezing stairwell under 41 degrees for three whole hours would make a person sick."

She simply didn't care.

Because she didn't care about him, she would naturally never bother to care about his health.

The only thing she had ever cared about, from start to finish, was the heart beating inside his chest.

Lexie's hands paused. Then, as if hit by a sudden wave of guilt, she uttered, "I'm sorry."

Her voice was so muffled that Hendrick took it for a hallucination.

Sitting down by the edge of the bed, Lexie took Hendrick's scalding-hot hand into hers and murmured, "I'm sorry. I promise you, once this is over, I'll definitely settle down and live a good life with you. I'll fulfill whatever conditions you have, and I will love you properly."

Hendrick didn't even look at her. He just quietly withdrew his hand from her grasp.

After spending the entire night hooked up to IV drips, Hendrick finally felt a little better.

Instead of returning to her own hospital to work, Lexie stayed here the entire time and brought over a few pills.

The medicine was extremely bitter, causing Hendrick's brows to furrow as he swallowed it.

Lexie promptly handed him a glass of orange juice.

"How long will it take for me to fully recover?" Hendrick asked.

Lexie replied, "Generally speaking, a common cold clears up in about seven days. Since your fever was quite severe, it might take around ten days."

"Will that delay me donating my heart to Cameron?"

He asked the question so nonchalantly, as if he were bringing up a completely trivial detail.

Lexie stared at him with a complex mix of emotions in her eyes. Suddenly, she felt as though she couldn't read him at all anymore.

She didn't offer an answer right away.

Hendrick pressed on, "Even if the cold isn't fully cured, it shouldn't make a difference, right? After all, once my heart is carved out, I won't be able to stay alive anyway. Does it really matter whether I have a cold or not?"

The statement was brutally cruel, yet Hendrick delivered it with complete composure, like a cold, detached blade.

For reasons she couldn't quite grasp, Lexie felt an unsettling pang of distress inside. She insisted firmly, "I will make sure you walk onto that operating table completely healthy."

Walk onto it completely healthy, only to be carried off it dead?

Hendrick couldn't fathom what point there was to her stubborn insistence.

Just then, Adrian entered the ward, holding a share transfer agreement.

He slammed the hard-bound document heavily against Hendrick's face, his voice icy. "Just as you wished. Every last share Cameron owned is officially yours now."

The paperwork combined his original half and Cameron's half. Together, it added up to 20%.

It was more than enough to secure a solid seat on the board of directors.

Hendrick felt satisfied and signed his name cleanly on the line.

Once everyone else had cleared out of the room, he called his personal lawyer, Jake Webb. "I want to arrange my estate and leave a will with you."

Jake arrived alongside Hendrick's close friend, Devin Cantrell.

The moment Devin saw Hendrick lying on the bed looking pale and gaunt, a surge of fiery rage instantly flared inside him. "Those absolute bastards! How could they do this to you? I'm going out there right now to settle the score with them!"

Hendrick held him back.

Throughout all the years he had spent trying to win Lexie over, he had rarely crossed paths with genuinely good people, but Devin was a rare exception.

Devin had always stood by Hendrick's side with unwavering loyalty. No matter what Hendrick went through, Devin was always the very first to step up and lend a hand.

He was also the only person besides Lexie who knew about the existence of the system.

Now that things had reached this point, Hendrick laid out his entire plan to switch targets and explained everything to Devin.

"So what you're saying is… you can finally break free from that toxic nightmare of a woman?"

Hendrick gave a silent nod.

Devin practically jumped for joy. "That's amazing! The system actually did something useful for once. You should have dumped Lexie a long time ago and left her to suffer!"

Hendrick was amused by his reaction. He turned toward Jake. "I want to transfer all my Campbell Group shares as well as my fashion company directly to Devin. As for my remaining cash reserves, donate every penny to children in the underprivileged mountain regions."

Jake wasn't particularly surprised by the request, but he still asked as part of the procedure, "And what about your family?"

"Don't leave them a single cent."

Devin's eyes reddened at those words. "I'm only holding onto all this stuff for you temporarily. Once you come back under your new identity, I'm returning everything to you. You'd better make sure you come back."

Hendrick nodded gently.

Right at that moment, Lexie stepped inside from the hallway. "Come back from where?"

Her gaze was instantly laced with suspicion.

Hendrick had no idea how much she had overheard, so he quickly explained, "I was just telling Devin that once I recover, I want to travel abroad for a while. He was telling me to bring him back some souvenirs."

Lexie showed little reaction. She looked skeptical for a moment before quickly composing herself. "Remember to go get your checkup done in a bit."

Hendrick breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

Lexie personally escorted him to the examination room.

Hendrick knew full well that this checkup was merely to verify whether his heart met the physical requirements for donation.

As he walked out of the examination room, he ran right into Cameron.

Cameron was sitting in a wheelchair, his frail frame swallowed by a thin hospital gown. His face was pale, and he coughed now and then.

Just sitting there, he looked like the very picture of someone deserving pity.

"Hendrick, Lexie told me they finally found a matching heart donor for me." Cameron spoke up out of nowhere. "You must be really happy for me too, right?"

Hendrick looked into those dark eyes of his. They appeared so bright and innocent on the surface. Yet underneath lay such deep, festering malice.

Did he truly know nothing?

"I am."

Hendrick let out a soft smile, which contained a hint of genuine warmth. "I'm extremely happy for you."

Failing to see the angry outburst he had anticipated, Cameron felt a touch of dissatisfaction. He casually raised his hand. "That's wonderful to hear. You always held such a grudge against me before, so I honestly thought you wouldn't want me to get the surgery done."

On his hand, a band on his ring finger stood out clearly. It formed a matching pair with the ring on Lexie's hand.

Hendrick made no attempt to hide that he'd noticed. Instead, his gaze locked straight onto it.

Seeing this, Cameron hurriedly slipped the ring off. "I'm so sorry! This was just a homecoming gift Lexie got for me when I returned to Celandor. It doesn't mean anything else.

"I originally wore it on my middle finger, but since my hands swelled up from being sick, I had no choice but to shift it to my ring finger. You won't blame me for that, will you?"