Chapter 3
The lights in the operating room were turned up brighter, and the instruments on the cart were laid out one by one. Metal clicked softly against metal—enough for me to fill in the rest of the picture in my head: forceps, retractors, sutures, and a saw meant to open a chest.
The doctor spoke from the other side, sounding like he was checking off a list.
“Cautery is working. Vitals are stable. Anesthesia is holding.”
The anesthesiologist gave a distracted hum. He didn’t sound like he cared who I was. He only cared whether the numbers looked good.
Lucas moved a little closer to me. He couldn’t hide his excitement. He sounded like a man staring at an asset about to pay out.
“Good thing that car crash three years ago didn’t kill him,” he said. “Otherwise we wouldn’t be making money off this heart today.”
The words hit my mind like a needle.
The crash.
I kept my breathing steady. It wasn’t time to move yet. I needed more.
Lucas asked Victoria with a teasing grin, “If we ever have a fight, you’re not going to put me on this table too, are you?”
Victoria laughed.
“You’re not the same as him. I married him because he was useful. I thought he had the skills and the brains to help my family’s business, bring in more clients. Instead, he found out a little too much and started playing righteous, gathering evidence and talking about turning us in.”
When she said turn us in, her voice went light, but there was disgust in it—as if reporting a crime wasn’t law, but betrayal.
“That car crash was what he deserved.”
So that was it.
Evan’s crash three years ago had never been an accident.
It had been her.
Victoria went on, “I didn’t expect him to be that hard to kill. The car was wrecked, and somehow he still survived. Lucky for me, he lost his memory and forgot everything about my family’s business. Otherwise, I would’ve had to arrange another accident.”
Given Victoria’s nature, killing someone twice wouldn’t have bothered her. But if a man barely survived a crash and then died in another “accident” shortly after, it would have drawn suspicion.
So the amnesia I had faked to protect my identity had, by pure luck, convinced her to let me live.
Her heels stopped near my head. I could feel her lean down and look at me, the way someone inspects a product before it ships.
Lucas asked, “Did you ever think he might be faking the amnesia?”
“I did,” she said. “That’s why I never divorced him. I kept him close and watched him. The way he looked at me was completely unfamiliar. He remembered nothing from before. Even his instincts had changed. You can’t fake that.”
I stored every word away.
When I got off this table, I’d settle every account one by one—starting with the person who drugged me, then moving on to the debt left behind by that crash.
The doctor cut in. “Ms. Victoria, we need to confirm the time window. From opening the chest to extraction, we have a maximum of twenty minutes. After that, preservation and transport—”
“I know,” Victoria said, glancing at her watch. “Work at your own pace. I’ll have someone handle the transfer.”
The doctor immediately shut up. His tone turned even more obedient.
“Understood.”
Victoria gave the monitor another glance, as if reassuring herself that I was still under her control, then turned to Lucas.
“Come on. Don’t get in the way.”
Lucas still sounded amused. “Fine. Ever think about where we should go for vacation after this?”
“Where do you want to go?”
He laughed. “Haven’t you always wanted out of this city? Once this is done, we fly out, file the paperwork, and get married. Beach, ski resort, whatever you want. It’s not like you’re short on passports.”
Victoria gave a soft hum, which was as good as agreement.
They walked out together. The air from the opening door brushed across my face and carried away some of the smell of disinfectant.
In the hallway, their voices dropped lower, but in that unnatural quiet, I could still make out pieces.
Lucas asked casually, “By the way, what about Noah?”
Victoria didn’t even pause.
“Dump him in an orphanage. You don’t plan on dragging a kid around after we leave the country, do you?”
Lucas chuckled. “Fair enough.”
Those few words cut through me like a cold blade, clean and precise. In a single sentence, Noah had gone from family to disposable inconvenience.
I felt my jaw start to tighten on its own. I forced it loose and buried every trace of reaction.
While the doctor wasn’t looking, I moved my fingers slightly, testing my condition.
The footsteps outside faded farther away. The operating room was left with only the medical staff.
The doctor returned to my side, his tone flat and procedural again.
“Prepare to open the chest. Nurse, drape him.”
The nurse began undoing my clothes with quick, efficient movements. Cold air brushed over bare skin. Then she gave a quiet, distracted sound of surprise and paused over my abdomen.
“What?” the doctor asked.
“He’s... in better shape than I expected,” she said, sounding honestly puzzled, as if she’d noticed something out of place. “He’s got very defined abs.”
The doctor paused too, then gave a low laugh.
“Victoria said he gets winded after a short run. Just some desk doctor.”
He looked at me, and his voice shifted into mocking contempt.
“Guess he spends more time in the gym than she thought. Fine by me. The better the donor, the more valuable the organs.”
They believed the version of me Victoria had sold them. So even when they noticed something odd, they reached for the safest explanation instead of getting suspicious.
In all these years, I had never been physically close with Victoria. Her knowledge of my body was still stuck in the image of Evan from years ago.
The nurse picked up the antiseptic and swabbed from just below my collarbone down to the center of my chest. Cold streak after cold streak. Then she draped the area, leaving only the surgical field exposed.
The doctor put on his gloves and picked up the blade. His breathing had grown heavier now.
He held it above my chest for a moment, as if confirming the exact point one last time.
Then he said quietly, “Begin.”
The instant the tip of the blade touched down, I opened my eyes.
The light above me was glaring white, but I saw his hand on the knife.
And I saw the slackness in his eyes.
I didn’t jerk upright. I didn’t shout. I didn’t waste a single movement.
I only looked at him—calm, direct, the way you look at a target before you kill it.
His hand froze.
His pupils tightened.
His lips started to part.
I didn’t give him the chance to finish making a sound.
