"Don't hold your favors over her head anymore. She's sensitive. It'll destroy her self-esteem."
I stared at the bank card in disbelief.
My grandmother was fighting for her life behind those doors, and he'd come out here to buy off my kindness? To protect his mistress's self-esteem?
I knocked his hand away. The bank card flew across the hallway and clattered into a far corner.
Phil's face went ashen.
"Serena, don't push your luck!"
I stared at him, my voice trembling with a fury I could barely contain.
"Self-esteem?"
"She's a parasite who couldn't survive without my charity, and she has the nerve to talk about self-esteem?"
"Where was her self-esteem when she came crawling to me, begging me to pay for her education?"
"Where was her self-esteem when she was rolling around in bed with you in the Maldives?!"
Clarissa flinched as though I'd struck a nerve. Tears spilled down her cheeks again.
"Serena, how can you humiliate me like this?"
"I know I owe you. I'll pay you back, every last cent, I swear!"
Phil pulled her behind him, shielding her. The look he turned on me was pure disgust.
"Serena, you're out of your mind!"
"You think throwing money around gives you the right to own someone's life?"
"You've always been like this—overbearing, never once considering anyone else's feelings. I'm sick of it!"
"If you weren't so suffocating all the time, do you think I would've fallen for Clarissa?"
"Do you think I would've slept with her the night you were hospitalized for vomiting blood?!"
The words hit me like a wall of white noise. My mind went blank. I couldn't even form a sentence.
"What...?"
Last week, to secure the final round of funding before his company's IPO, I'd sat through three full bottles of liquor with the investors. I drank until I was vomiting blood and had to be rushed to the hospital.
I'd been writhing in agony on that hospital bed, calling Phil over and over. His phone was off every single time.
Afterward, he'd held me with guilt written all over his face. Told me he'd been pulling back-to-back all-nighters at the office and had passed out from exhaustion.
I believed him. I even felt sorry for him, working himself to the bone for his startup.
But the truth was—
The truth was that while I lay there in agony, he was in bed with Clarissa.
My tears finally broke free.
"Phil Gilbert, are you even human?"
I lunged at him like something inside me had snapped, wanting to tear apart the stranger wearing the face of the man I'd loved.
Clarissa rushed forward and grabbed my arm.
"Serena, stop! Don't hit him!"
In the struggle, I flung her off.
Clarissa seized the moment and toppled backward, crumpling to the floor. She clutched her ankle, whimpering in pain.
"It hurts..."
Phil shoved me aside without a second thought and rushed to her, scooping her into his arms.
When he looked back at me, his eyes were ice.
"Serena, you're beyond saving. Stay here and think about what you've done."
He turned and carried Clarissa away.
I slid to the floor, staring at the empty hallway where they'd disappeared. I couldn't even muster a bitter laugh.
Then the doors to the emergency room burst open. A doctor emerged, drenched in sweat.
"Who's the family of the patient Dorothy Abbott?"
I scrambled to my feet, half-crawling, half-running, and grabbed the front of his white coat.
"Me! I am!"
"Doctor, how is my grandmother?"
He pulled down his mask and let out a heavy breath.
"She's alive."
"But the situation is far from stable. She could deteriorate at any time."
"We'll move her to a room for observation."
They wheeled my grandmother into a private ward.
She lay there with an oxygen mask over her face. The kind, gentle features I'd known my whole life were utterly still, drained of all life.
