Chapter2

Chloe was the most pampered, sickly daughter of the Ashford family. The PR team called her an "angel with broken wings." In my past life, I had even donated money to her foundation—until she took my heart.

"Lin, I know you're worried about hurting the baby." Her voice trembled. "But this is just a checkup, no one wants to hurt you..."

Liam tenderly pulled his stepsister's shawl tighter around her shoulders. A dying heiress and a devoted heir. In my previous life, I died in this exact tableau.

I turned directly to Miller. "Detective, I refuse to discuss my medical privacy with any unauthorized, unrelated personnel."

Chloe's sobbing abruptly stopped. Fire flared in Liam's eyes. "She is not unrelated! She is the recipient!"

I let out a short laugh. "You admitted it."

Liam's face turned deathly pale. He realized he had just slipped up.

Miller took a step forward, closing the distance. "Did you just say she's the recipient? Who disclosed the match results? Where did the donor sign the informed consent form? Produce it."

Liam opened his mouth, but couldn't spit out a single word.

Chloe lowered her head in the wheelchair. "I don't know anything about the process... I just heard them say they were confident they could keep me alive."

Dr. Harding walked in accompanied by two lawyers. He was the Head of Surgery. In my past life, he had altered my prenatal checkup data, and right on the operating table, he had told the anesthesiologist, "Ignore the fetus, just crack her chest open."

Harding frowned the moment he walked in. "What is going on here? Why did you bring the NYPD into the VIP ward? This is just routine medical communication."

I stared at him. "Dr. Harding, when did I ever authorize you to perform a high-resolution HLA typing test?"

He spoke with bureaucratic ease. "You signed the insurance paperwork when you were admitted. The prenatal package includes genetic and cellular screenings by default."

"Where is the authorization form? Show it to me now."

He paused for a second. "The electronic files are in the hospital's encrypted system."

"Then pull them up right now."

The hospital's legal counsel stepped forward. "Detective, core privacy is protected by HIPAA. You cannot review those files without a search warrant."

Miller unclipped his handcuffs directly. "The person making the 911 call is the party involved. She is now pressing charges against you for attempted first-degree murder and illegal organ trafficking." He pressed his walkie-talkie. "Lock down the main server and the hard-copy records room. Before the search warrant comes through, if anyone so much as touches a single line of code, arrest them for destruction of evidence."

Harding's confident expression finally cracked.

An orderly prepared to wheel Chloe out. As the wheelchair passed by my bed, she suddenly grabbed the hem of my hospital gown. "Lin, I'm sorry... I just want to live one more day."

I looked down at the back of her hand. In my previous life, she had grabbed me exactly like this from across the transport bed, crying and saying, "I will repay you." And then I died.

I pried her fingers off my clothes, one by one.

"Your life cannot be bought with the lives of me and my baby."

In less than thirty minutes, my phone blew up. Twitter, Instagram, gossip blogs—my name was trending everywhere.

"Gold digger fails to force marriage with pregnancy, refuses to cooperate with family medical screening."

"She won't even give a little blood for a match, how can she bear to watch Chloe die?"

"An orphan raised by the Ashford, an ungrateful wretch who bites the hand that feeds."

Someone had posted an uncensored screenshot of my prenatal checkup report. The caption read: "She's as healthy as a horse. Her paranoia is just a ploy to extort a bigger trust fund."

In my previous life, the conglomerate's PR team turned black into white. When I died, they wrote it off as a "tragic surgical complication."

A text message from Maya popped up on my screen: "Lin, it's crazy out here! Reporters are blockading your apartment building. They've dug up all your photos. Should you just lay low and give in for now? It's just PR tactics, don't clash head-on."

"It's just a checkup anyway... it's not like they're actually going to take your heart..."

I replied, "What if you were the one tricked into coming in for the checkup?"

Maya didn't reply again.

I zipped up the post links, IP addresses, and the leaked screenshot of the prenatal report, uploading them to my encrypted cloud drive. I typed out the leads on the "High-Net-Worth Client Organ Transplant Blacklist" that I had memorized from my previous life into a secure document and saved it all together. I sent one last text to Maya: "Transfer the files from the cloud drive to the backup USB stick in your bedroom and hide it well."

After finishing that, I swiped open the hospital's electronic scheduling roster. Harding had taken time off tonight.

He wouldn't be at the hospital.

So where would he go?

I looked up. Liam was standing in the doorway. He was no longer pretending to be the deeply devoted fiancé.

"Lin, do you really have to trample on everyone's dignity like this?"

"You were the one who tricked me onto the train to hell first."

He gritted his teeth. "If Chloe really dies, you will repent before God."

I looked at him coldly. "I've already repented once."

He let out a cold sneer, turned, and left.

The ward fell silent. But I knew the real madness had only just begun.