Chapter 3

"Stop the surgery!" Liam roared at the nurses, his chest heaving. "Step away from her! If anyone touches that IV, I will personally break your hands!"

I sobbed, feeling the crushing weight of despair instantly shatter.

"Liam!" I strained against the thick leather restraints, desperately trying to reach him. "They trapped me! They want to kill our baby!"

Liam didn't hesitate. He stormed up to the surgical chair and began frantically unbuckling the heavy leather straps binding my arms.

His warm hands cupped my tear-soaked face. "I've got you, Vivian. I'm taking you home. Nobody is touching our child."

I buried my face into his chest, clinging to his scrubs like a drowning woman.

I was finally safe. The man who loved me more than anything else in the world was here.

"Going somewhere, Liam?"

Eleanor strolled into the operating theater.

"Mom, are you out of your mind?!" Liam yelled, shielding me behind his body. "This is my wife! That is my child!"

Eleanor simply walked up to him. Without a single word of defense or argument, she raised her hand and pressed the thin DNA report against Liam's chest.

"Don't look at it!" I screamed, grabbing Liam’s sleeve in a blind panic. "Liam, it's a lie!"

But it was too late.

Liam instinctively looked down. His eyes traced the single line of text at the bottom of the page.

"Liam...?"

His hands, which had been holding me so tightly, started to violently shake.

In the dead silence of the operating room, Liam slowly let go of me. He took a rigid step backward. Then another. He physically retreated, turning his head away, completely avoiding my desperate, pleading gaze.

"Liam, what are you doing?" My heart stopped beating. "Take me home..."

Liam walked over to the stainless steel medical tray. His hands were shaking so badly he knocked over a scalpel. He mechanically tore open a sterile package and snapped a pair of latex surgical gloves onto his hands.

"Prep the maximum dose of anesthesia," Liam ordered the nurses. "This fetus cannot stay. Abort it."

The words struck me like a physical blow to the skull. My entire reality disintegrated.

"Are you insane?!" I shrieked, my voice tearing my throat raw. I lunged at him, but the nurses instantly slammed me back down onto the chair.

"Liam! That is your flesh and blood! What is on that paper?! What are you so afraid of?!"

He refused to turn to me.

"Strap her down!" the head nurse barked.

Rough hands forced my arms back onto the armrests. The heavy leather belts were violently yanked tight over my wrists again.

I thrashed like a wild animal, kicking and screaming until I tasted blood in my mouth.

"Liam! Don't let them kill our baby! Please!"

He finally glanced over his shoulder. The look in his eyes wasn't malice—it was the look of a man staring at a ghost.

A nurse grabbed my forearm. The thick needle pierced my vein.

The chemical ice immediately flooded my bloodstream. My vision rapidly began to blur, spinning into darkness.

In the final seconds of consciousness, the sharp, freezing surgical extractors invaded my body.

The intense physiological agony ripped through my abdomen, merging flawlessly with the absolute psychological trauma of being butchered by the man I loved.

For the third time, my child was ripped from my womb.

Days later, I lay perfectly still in the guest bedroom.

Since the clinic, Eleanor and Liam had maintained a suffocating, polite illusion of a happy family.

But I was hollowed out. Only pure, freezing hatred kept me breathing.

I had to know why a single piece of paper had turned my husband into a terrified executioner.

A faint, rhythmic squeak echoed from the hallway.

I slipped out of bed, crept to the door, and cracked it open.

Eleanor was pushing Arthur’s wheelchair down the dim corridor, gripping that familiar vial of thick brown potion.

They bypassed the master bedroom, heading straight for the heavy oak door at the end of the hall. The basement. The one place I was strictly forbidden to go.

My pulse hammered. I waited for them to descend, then followed like a ghost.

The air grew freezing as I crept down the concrete steps. At the bottom, the massive iron door was left slightly ajar, spilling sickly yellow light. Trembling, I pressed my eye to the gap.

The sight hit my brain like a physical blow.

I slammed both hands over my mouth, biting my palm to choke back a violent scream.

I finally understood why they had forced me to abort my three perfectly healthy babies.