Chapter1

The moment the oxygen mask sealed over my face, I finally remembered what it tasted like to be alive. Three agonizing months. That was how long I had waited for the FDA-approved targeted medication and the portable oxygen concentrator.

The VIP ward door slammed open with a deafening crash. Two burly men in black suits strode in, roughly shoving my nurse against the wall. Liam walked in behind them. He didn’t so much as glance in my direction. His finger aimed squarely at the oxygen concentrator mounted above my bed.

"Unplug it. Pack up the medication cooler, too. We’re taking it all."

There was not a single second of hesitation.

"What are you doing?! That’s Ms. Aria’s life support—" The nurse’s frantic protest died in her throat the moment she recognized him. In this city, no one dared to cross Liam.

Rip. The bodyguard yanked the thick power cord straight from the wall socket.

A metallic clack followed as the second bodyguard hoisted the custom cooler containing my targeted therapy with one hand.

I forced my torso off the mattress, ripping the suddenly useless oxygen mask from my face. "Put it... down..."

Hypoxia was already clawing at the edges of my vision, turning the room into a gray blur, but I lunged forward with everything I had left. My right hand clamped fiercely onto the metal rim of the cooler.

Liam finally looked at me. His eyes were pools of undisguised, profound disgust.

"Let go, Aria." He stepped closer to the bed, looking down from his imperious height. "Chloe is having a severe asthma attack. They’re trying to stabilize her in the ER right now. She has a far greater need for this equipment and medication than you do."

I ground my molars together, fighting for air. "Asthma?" The word scraped out of my dry throat. "These are... targeted meds... for end-stage lung failure! If I don't have them... I won't make it... through the night..."

"Enough!" he snapped, cutting me off. "How much longer are you going to keep up this pathetic act? How many times have you faked an illness over the years just to keep me chained to you? Didn’t you learn your lesson from those forged medical reports you bought last time? Whose pockets did you line this time to get a 'terminal' diagnosis?"

He leaned in close, driving every syllable into my chest like a rusted nail. "Chloe dragged me out of a raging fire. That’s why her lungs are compromised. Giving this to her is an actual life-saving measure. As for you... whatever phantom 'rich-wives' disease you claim to have, surviving another day without pampering won't kill you."

Tremors wracked my hand until my fingers lost their strength, slipping uselessly off the metal case. A suffocating wave of despair crashed over me. I lunged forward, half-falling out of the bed, and seized the fabric of his suit trousers in a death grip.

"Liam..." My chest hitched in violent, spastic gasps. "I'm not... faking... please... just leave the meds..."

He stared down at my gripping hand for a fleeting second.

Then, with ruthless precision, he leaned down and yanked my arm outward.

A blinding, agonizing pain shot through my thumb. I let out an uncontrollable, guttural scream, but Liam's expression didn't so much as flicker. With meticulous, brutal force, he prized my fingers off his trousers, peeling them back one by one.

Free from my interference, the bodyguards hefted the cooler and wheeled the oxygen concentrator out of the ward.

Liam drew a silk pocket square from his tailored jacket. He meticulously wiped the fingers that had just touched my skin. When he was finished, he tossed the expensive fabric away, letting it flutter casually into the biohazard waste bin.

He turned on his heel, not bothering to spare me a final glance. "Stop playing these cheap tricks to manipulate me. Even if you were actually dying in this bed, I wouldn't waste another second looking at you."

The door slammed shut with a heavy thud.

I lay sprawled across the mattress, my mouth open in desperate, gaping breaths, but my failing lungs couldn't pull in a single wisp of oxygen. As I stared at the door he had just walked through, physical pain blurred my vision, but the memory of that night three years ago exploded in my mind with crystal clarity.

It was the night I sat on the edge of our plush bed, gathering every ounce of courage I possessed. My hands shook as I lifted the hem of my nightgown, wanting to show him the massive burn scars webbing across my back.

I had wanted to finally tell him the truth: that I wasn’t the scheming, money-hungry gold digger he thought I was. I was the one who had shielded him from that blazing, collapsing crossbeam with my own body in that inferno.

But he only gave my back—covered in a twisted lattice of raw, hideous scar tissue—a single passing glance.

The faint, relaxed smile vanished from his face, replaced by an icy frost.

"Pull it down," he said, his voice dropping to a freezing pitch. "Don't ever show me that again. It's incredibly unsightly."

He left for the guest bedroom that night, carrying his revulsion with him. We slept in separate rooms from then on. Throughout the next three years—over a thousand agonizing nights where my skin grafts would swell, inflame, and throb mercilessly—I never once took my shirt off in front of him again. I buried every scar, along with the bloody truth of that fire, deep beneath my clothes, terrified of ever exposing them.

Because I was terrified of seeing that raw disgust in his eyes again.

Across the city, Chloe reclined comfortably against her upholstered headboard, draped in an elegant silk robe. Down on the rug at the foot of her bed, the custom cooler covered in FDA labels sat half-kicked under the bedframe, thoroughly ignored. Her phone screen glowed brightly on the nightstand—a notification chimed, displaying a half-million-dollar wire transfer from Liam flagged as "emergency funds." The attached message read: "Meds delivered. Get some rest."

Severe hypoxia sent rolling waves of darkness crashing over my vision. I bit down on my lower lip so hard I tasted copper, my left hand clutching desperately at my own chest as if I could force air into my failing lungs.

I couldn't just die here. Not soundlessly, forgotten in a sterile hospital room.

I violently threw my weight sideways, tumbling off the mattress. My body hit the freezing linoleum floor with a heavy, sickening thud.

I had to get back to the estate. There was still someone waiting for me there.