2: 2
“Yvette is the kindest, most forgiving person I've ever met.”
In a high-end VIP room at the downtown hospital, Savannah Fox leaned back against her bed, her voice calm.
She was the woman Edward carried in his heart, the one for whom he had broken off the engagement eight times.
Liver failure had kept her all but living in the hospital these past few years.
Every time her condition so much as wavered, Edward would drop everything, abandon my daughter, and rush to her bedside like a man gone mad.
Even at my pregnant daughter's engagement party.
Before all of this, I loathed this woman named Savannah.
It was only after my daughter died, when her liver, under the organ-donation agreement she had signed so long ago, happened by chance to be transplanted into Savannah, that I learned the truth from Savannah's own mouth.
Savannah was the daughter of the Gilberts' housekeeper.
Years ago, her mother had been killed by kidnappers while shielding Mrs. Gilbert from harm.
To make amends, the Gilberts promised to take her in as an adopted daughter and send her abroad for her education.
But Edward refused, making a scene, unwilling to acknowledge this sister.
The two had grown up together, and Savannah, with no mother to guide her, was strung along by Edward's deliberately ambiguous affection.
The Gilberts wanted to send her abroad for better treatment.
Edward wouldn't allow it, and had her admitted to a hospital he owned.
He kept her from all contact with the outside world and called it protection.
She had no idea whatsoever about Edward and my daughter.
Every time Savannah's condition worsened, it was one of Edward's informants who called to tell her.
Back then, when my daughter came to visit her at the hospital several times, Savannah asked out of curiosity who she was.
Edward brushed it off.
“She's madly in love with me. She keeps clinging to me.”
“Don't mind her. Just focus on getting well.”
Then he turned around and fobbed my daughter off too.
“Savannah is just my sister. Her mother saved my family. I can't turn my back on her.”
“Can't you be a little more gracious? She's not well. Do you really have to push her like this?”
My daughter was a kind soul.
She never gave Savannah any trouble again.
Just as I was about to say something more,
footsteps sounded suddenly in the corridor.
Savannah's face changed, and she knocked the water cup on her nightstand over onto herself.
Her eyes reddened, tears falling like beads off a broken string, and she wept up at me, all fragile helplessness.
“Mrs. James, I know you can't stand me, but there's really nothing between me and Edward……”
“Why do you keep pushing me like this? Does Yvette only come out to see Edward once I'm dead?”
At that moment, the door swung open.
Edward strode in, and his face darkened when he saw the scene.
He gave me a cool, indifferent glance.
“Mom, step out for a minute.”
I stood, watching coldly as he walked to the bedside.
He looked down at Savannah, his voice cold.
“Savannah, what I felt for you before was only a brother looking after his sister.”
“It's only now that I've realized the one I love is Yvette.”
“I'll have the family formally adopt you as a daughter and find you a good man to marry.”
Savannah wept, her face streaked with tears, and clung desperately to the hem of his shirt.
“Edward, you weren't like this before!”
“I've been with you all these years. Who's ever going to marry me now?”
“You said you'd look after me for the rest of my life. Don't leave me!”
Edward pried her hand off, annoyed.
But a flicker of smugness crossed his face.
Two women fighting over him. That must have felt good.
I watched it all, contempt curling inside me.
Even real siblings wouldn't say something like looking after each other for a lifetime.
Yet he used sweet, empty words like these to string along a young woman who had lost her mother as a child and was worn down by serious illness.
The wretched, shameless man. He really had some nerve.
Before long, Edward came out of the room.
He looked at me, and there was actually a knowing little smile on his face.
“Mom, Yvette sent you to test me today, didn't she?”
Not waiting for me to answer, he went right on.
“Just like her. Still as jealous as ever.”
“Talk her down. She's going to be Mrs. Gilbert soon. A little fuss to let off steam is fine, but she can't be this small-minded.”
He straightened his tie, the very picture of a man with everything under control.
“Mom, go back and tell Yvette. Since I've decided to marry her, I'll cut Savannah off completely.”
“Three years is more than long enough for this playing-hard-to-get game of hers.”
I fought down the churning in my stomach and nodded.
“All right. I'll tell her.”
