“Patsy, if you still want your grandma alive, then kneel before Stevvi a hundred times to apologize.”
Cornell stared at her with detachment. There was no longer a trace of love in his eyes for his wife—only pure contempt.
When Patsy rushed into the hospital, she was already in a mess. Hearing her husband’s sentence made her face turn even more deathly pale.
It was clearly Stevvi who hit Connee with her car. Yet now, as the old woman lay on the hospital bed covered in blood, Cornell had stopped her treatment and was forcing Patsy to apologize to the culprit.
He was like this after Stevvi, in her reckless speeding, had not only struck Connee but also chipped a few rhinestones off her manicure—something that made her cry a few pitiful tears.
Watching her husband hold that woman protectively in his arms, Patsy almost cried in rage.
Her lips trembled uncontrollably as a thousand questions burned in her chest, yet she forced herself to swallow them all down.
Instead, she pleaded in a trembling voice, “Cornell… I’ll kneel, I’ll beg for fogeys—anything you want. Just… Please, save Grandma first.”
Holding the shaken Stevvi close, Cornell glanced impatiently at his watch.
“You’re in no position to bargain. I’ll give you one more minute. If you don’t start, you can meet your beloved grandma in the morgue.”
The word morgue exploded in Patsy’s head like a bomb. In an instant, her knees buckled.
With a loud thud, the bustling hallway fell silent.
On her reddened knees, Patsy crawled toward Cornell, clutching at his trouser leg as she choked back sobs and begged him.
“Cornell, I beg you. I’ll kneel a thousand times if I must. Grandma’s old… She can’t hold on much longer. Please, save her first…”
Fat tears splashed against the leather of his shoes. For a fleeting moment, something in his chest seemed to burn.
But a second later, his expression hardened and turned cold once again. “Still not apologizing now? Looks like you really don’t want Grandma to live.”
With those words, he snapped his fingers. At once, someone moved forward, preparing to cover Connee with a white sheet and wheel her toward the morgue.
“No!” Patsy screamed hoarsely. “I’ll do it! I’ll apologize—”
A cruel smile curved Cornell’s lips. “Good. When you’re done saying sorry, her surgery starts.”
The next second, she lowered her head for the first apology. Despite teetering on the edge of collapse, she forced herself to voice the words he demanded—each one different from the last.
“I’m sorry. I should’ve watched Grandma.”
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have argued back.”
“I’m sorry. This is all my fault.”
The crisp knocks of her knees against the floor echoed through the busy hall while passersby skirted her like she was something filthy.
Patsy didn’t care at all. In her heart, she carried a thousand apologies because maybe, in the end, it really was her fault.
She never should have believed Cornell married her because he still loved her.
She never should have foolishly hoped they could go back to the way things were, and for that fantasy, brought Connee into this mess.
Two minutes later, she had uttered all one hundred apologies. At this point, her voice was already hoarse.
With her knees covered in blood, she supported herself with trembling arms as she tried to rise—only to collapse back to the floor in exhaustion.
Dizzy and weak, she lifted her head to look at him and rasped, “Can you… save Grandma now?”
But Cornell gave a cold laugh and flicked a glance at the doctor. The next second, he gripped Patsy’s chin hard.
“Not yet. Stevvi lost ten rhinestones from her nails. You wait another ten minutes.”
Patsy’s eyes widened in disbelief at the delay. At that moment, panic filled her heart.
“No! Cornell, you promised! You said the surgery would start! If you delay ten more minutes, Grandma will die!”
Her desperate cry snapped the last thread of his restraint. He lunged at her again, his hand clamping around her throat.
“Oh, so you do know ten minutes can kill,” he spat. “Then why didn’t you show up earlier? Compared to you, I’m merciful. At least I’m not the one standing by and watching her die.”
His grip tightened, her face turning a ghastly shade of purple. She didn’t even have the strength to fight back.
When her breath was nearly gone, Cornell finally released her.
Pulling out a handkerchief, he wiped his hands with meticulous care, as though ridding himself of filth.
The gesture pierced her heart like a blade. Her voice trembled as she forced out, “Why…”
Before she could finish the question, he cut her off. “That’s what I want to ask you.”
Just one sentence, and Patsy’s heart turned to ice. She understood exactly what he meant.
He still didn’t believe her. He still hated her.
He hated her for allegedly running to a French tycoon the very day Cornell was sent to prison. He hated her for never visiting him once in those two years.
He blamed her for watching his mother jump from a building without saying a single word to stop her.
But she had explained it all again and again. She only wanted to ask him, “Why wouldn’t you believe me?”
As he walked away without glancing back, Patsy forced herself to her feet, clinging to her last breath of strength.
She had to move her grandmother to another hospital. If they wouldn’t save her here, someone else somewhere had to.
But just as she touched Connee’s face, someone yanked her back roughly.
“The patient has no vital signs. Ma’am, please step away. We need to attempt resuscitation.”
In that instant, chaos erupted outside the operating room. With her grandmother dying, a sharp pain exploded in Patsy’s mind. Her knees buckled, and she collapsed.
Her throat was so dry she could barely speak. She could only beg them again and again, her cries echoing through the hall.
“Please… Please save my grandma. I’m begging you…”
Soon, the doors to the operating room slammed shut. Patsy slumped weakly on the floor, a bitter taste rising in her throat. It was blood. She swallowed it down.
In a daze, she tried to find a chair to sit on. But the moment she stood, her vision blackened, and she collapsed headfirst.
When she opened her eyes again, all she saw was white.
For a fleeting second, she thought she’d reached heaven. A faint smile touched her lips… until a nurse’s voice shattered that fantasy.
“You’re finally awake. I’m so sorry, your grandmother didn’t make it. Please go to the mortuary to claim the body for cremation.”
She didn’t remember how she watched Connee disappear into the furnace.
Even when she carried the urn home, she felt like an empty shell, unable to shed a single tear.
She only knew something was wrong—Connee’s body used to be so warm. For the first time, it was cold. It was so cold it crushed the air from Patsy’s lungs.
She sat there for what felt like an eternity. When the sound of the door opening jolted her back to reality, she reached into her bag, pulled out the divorce papers she’d printed on her way home, and stared at them for a long time before rising.
For two years, no matter how many times Cornell hurt her, she never thought of leaving. She clung to the fantasy that they could still go back to how they used to be.
But now, she knew. That was all a delusion. They could never go back.
The Cornell who had loved her so desperately at twenty was gone. The man before her, at thirty, wanted nothing more than to destroy her.
Slowly, she descended the stairs with the stack of papers in hand. She held them out to him with a calm face.
“Cornell, President Spyres said you forgot to sign a few contracts last week. He sent them over this afternoon and asked me to remind you.”
Cornell skimmed the titles and saw they were indeed deals he’d negotiated earlier. Without a word, he signed them all.
And when his signature landed on that hidden divorce agreement, Patsy finally breathed a sigh of relief.
Once, they had endless things to say to each other. Now, they faced each other in silence.
Just like that, Patsy gathered the documents and turned upstairs.
One arm cradled Connee’s urn. The other opened her phone, pulling up train tickets.
“Grandma,” she whispered, “let’s go home.”
She no longer dreamed of reconciling with Cornell. All she wanted was to stay with her grandmother… forever.
