Chapter 3

Sloane's POV

Just as these self-righteous neighbors thought they had me cornered with "justice," Marlena's victim facade shattered.

She suddenly darted out from behind Hollis and raised her hand high.

Two full-force slaps cracked across my face!

"You shameless whore! Who do you think you are!" Marlena cradled her massive belly, spit flying so close it almost hit my nose. "Not only did you curse my baby, but you dared pull my hair! I'll teach you a lesson for God before the cops even get here!"

"Sloane! Do you have zero shame?!" Bryony squeezed through the stairwell. The commotion terrified her year-and-a-half-old daughter, who burst into piercing wails.

Teary-eyed, Bryony yelled at me: "You've woken up every kid on this floor, you crazy bitch! Marlena is pregnant, you classless trash! You are the shame of Linden Court!"

The condemnation surged like a tidal wave, their angry glares ready to swallow me alive.

Ignoring the stinging slap across my face, I screamed back, my voice hoarse but cutting: "Use your damn brain before you accuse me! I told you—I live alone. There's no man in my apartment! If someone's screwing me at midnight, where the hell is he? Did he vanish into thin air?!"

The surging curses in the hallway abruptly choked.

I locked eyes with Marlena's exaggeratedly pushed-out belly, slamming the fatal flaw I should have pointed out in my last life onto everyone present: "And use your brains, people! She keeps screaming she’s forty weeks pregnant! What normal pregnant woman, carrying a full-term baby that hasn't dropped, has the energy to run up and down the halls picking fights? Is the kid just fermenting in there?!"

The neighbors' angry glares cracked, revealing a layer of confusion and doubt.

Bryony frowned, muttering defensively, "Forty weeks and no labor... Medically, it's normal to go over by a week or two. That doesn't prove anything..."

"Then she should be calling the ER!" I doubled down, refusing to let go. "Since you're so 'at risk,' and I'm 'making you miscarry' every day, why aren't you in the hospital waiting for labor right now? Why are you playing tough with such a dangerous pregnancy?"

Right then, Manager Hollis, who had slipped into my apartment during the chaos to check, backed out into the hallway with a grim face.

"Enough, everyone shut up!" Hollis dusted off his hands, giving me a complicated look before turning to Marlena. "I am a witness. Sloane's apartment is completely empty. No men's belongings under the bed or in the closet."

He paused and sighed. "Marlena, the noises you hear at night—that's the 'water hammer effect' in our building's old radiator system. Condensation in the high-pressure pipes hits the old valves, and it sounds exactly like someone banging on a wall or a bed. You're just overly sensitive. You need to get a cab to the hospital right now."

Marlena, so arrogant just a moment ago, deflated like a popped balloon, taking a step back. Her manic eyes darted around frantically. "I... I'll wait till tomorrow. My husband is still out of state on business... I don't want to go to the hospital and suffer all by myself."

"Bullshit!"

I shook off the arms that were holding me, took a step toward her, and delivered a cold sneer straight into her ear: "What sane husband leaves his highly unstable, high-risk pregnant wife home alone, knowing they could both die at any moment?"

Watching her face turn deathly pale, I hammered the final nail into her coffin.

"Unless... you fooled everyone. You're faking your pregnancy!"

"Bullshit!!!"

The words "faking your pregnancy" stomped directly on Marlena's final nerve. She lunged at me, grabbing my wrists like an evil spirit. "Trying to frame me, huh?! I'll show everyone how black your heart is! If I prove I really have a baby in there, you pack your shit and leave this complex immediately! Never show your face to me again!"

"Deal. And if unfortunately I'm right, you check yourself straight into a psych ward!" I shot back, unflinching.

Under the scrutinizing, drama-hungry gazes of the neighbors, Marlena dragged me toward the stairwell and kicked open the door to apartment 502.

I froze in the doorway. This wasn't a lunatic's lair—this was a goosebump-inducing, perfectly arranged nursery. An expensive walnut crib was polished to a shine, handmade cloud wind chimes hung from the ceiling, and the floor was covered in soft puzzle playmats.

"Open your damn eyes!" Marlena slammed a document stamped by Ravenhill City Hospital onto my chest. "My husband, Preston, prepared all of this for our child himself! Can't you see the latest ultrasound scan? It clearly says forty weeks!"

How is this possible... Did my memory malfunction? Is her baby really still there?!

But in that split second, the triumphant, manic grin on Marlena's face suddenly locked into a spasm.

She clutched her massive belly. Like an invertebrate drained of its spine, her knees slammed heavily onto the carpet, beads of cold sweat flooding her forehead.

"Ah—! It hurts... It hurts so much!"

Her trembling nails desperately clawed into the cracks of the playmat. A clear liquid seeped from her upper thighs, dripping onto the floor.

"Help! My water broke... The baby is coming!"