Chapter 4

"Serena, no — it's not what you think."

Adrian pulled away from Eliana and crossed to Serena in an instant, catching her in his arms.

"I was only steadying her."

Serena burst into tears. "You're lying! No wonder she had someone steal the papers — you two were planning this all along. I've done everything for you, Adrian, and you make a fool out of me!"

Adrian went still. "She stole the papers?"

Eliana forced herself upright, her voice stripped bare.

"I haven't. I only just woke up. If I didn't want the divorce, I'd fight you on it properly — I wouldn't bother with tricks like that."

"Enough."

Serena pushed Adrian aside and bolted out of the room.

A heartbeat later — a scream.

"Ah —"

Adrian didn't look at Eliana again. He scooped Serena off the stairs where she'd fallen and rushed her to the hospital.

Eliana stood in the sudden quiet and felt her chest contract.

Run. That was all she had left. She was already broken — she couldn't afford another blow.

She pushed through the pain, grabbed what little she could, and lurched toward the door.

But the moment she reached the street, two of Adrian's security men clamped down on her shoulders.

"Let me go — what are you doing —"

They ignored her completely and escorted her to the hospital entrance.

Adrian was already there waiting, his face a mask of controlled fury. He seized her wrist and pulled her toward the blood draw room.

Eliana's lips started to tremble. "Adrian — what are you —"

"Serena's wound has reopened. She needs blood immediately. Five hundred millilitres. Now."

A chill ran through her from the inside out.

She and Serena shared the same rare blood type — O-negative. She'd learned years ago that when Adrian first hired Serena as his assistant, one of the factors had been exactly this: a compatible blood type and tissue profile, in case Eliana ever needed emergency support.

Now he was using that same biology against her. Against Eliana herself, freshly injured, to keep a woman who'd just run her down with a car.

"Adrian, I'm hurt. I can't give blood when I'm already hurt — that's not legal. You can't compel someone to donate. I'll call the police."

Adrian's grip loosened for just a moment. The air around him turned very cold.

Then he turned.

And in front of her, slowly and deliberately, he dropped to his knees.

"Eliana." His voice was rough. "Please. Save her."

"Name your price. Whatever you want, I'll give it."

His voice broke at the edges. His eyes were red.

This was the first time — since all the months of cruelty and pressure and cold silence — that he had asked her for anything. And it was for her.

Eliana heard her own voice shaking.

"Adrian — if I said I wanted the man you were seven years ago — the one who looked at me like that — would that be worth something to you?"

Something flickered across his face. Then it was gone.

Disgust. Brief and unmistakeable.

"Eliana, let's stop deceiving ourselves."

"What I felt for you back then was nothing but obsession over something I couldn't have. You married me because it was useful — I gave you something to hurt Maxwell Thorne with. The man I was seven years ago died the day you betrayed me."

The words were a knife going in clean and leaving everything a wreck.

Betrayed him. She had never betrayed him. She still didn't know what he meant.

Then he leaned close to her ear and dropped his voice to barely nothing.

"When you lost the baby — the first time — Maxwell Thorne messaged you that day asking to get back together. That's why you let it go. You made that choice deliberately."

Something detonated inside her skull.

Eliana pushed him away. She'd bitten the inside of her cheek without realising it. She could taste blood.

That's what he believed. That's what had broken him seven years ago and he'd never said a word. He thought she had —

She had blocked Maxwell the week they married. The one time he'd come to find her in person, she'd hit him hard across the face and told him never to contact her again. Adrian hadn't seen any of it.

She had no strength left to explain. It was too absurd. Too cruel. Too late.

A broken laugh came out of her instead.

"So that's what you thought of me all this time." She stepped back, unsteady. "All right. You win. I don't want your seven-years-ago either. And I'm not giving her my blood — she's your mistress, not my responsibility."

Adrian's eyes went cold with something harder than anger. He didn't hesitate another second. He grabbed her arm and forced her to the blood draw window.

"Let go of me — Adrian —"

"It's only a little blood." His voice was perfectly controlled. Perfectly devastating. "Don't worry. I'll compensate you ten times over."

"After all, you've stolen the papers again. Consider this what you owe her."