Alfred wrenched me away from her.
"Shelagh, your mother's life is in danger and only now you panic?!"
"When Scarlett's life was in danger, how could you just stand by and let her die?!"
I looked at Alfred, my eyes cold.
"I didn't let anyone die."
"She's pregnant. If she was in trouble, she should have gone to the obstetrics ward, not gone after the surgeon in the middle of operating on my mother. Even if he'd gone, he couldn't have saved her. That's a sick, twisted thing to demand!"
With that, I shoved Alfred aside and rushed to my mother.
But the moment my hand touched her cold wrist,
Alfred's hand clamped around my throat.
He glared at me, eyes bloodshot, grinding the words out through his teeth.
"You're the sick, twisted one! Scarlett was frantic. How was she supposed to tell one ward from another! And you, you wouldn't even spare a single nurse. I think you're just jealous that Scarlett gets to be a mother! You can't have children yourself, so whose fault is that!"
"Ever since that thing happened five years ago, something in you went warped! You turned into a freak! It's disgusting!"
Alfred's words struck me like a clap of thunder.
Five years ago, Alfred had been escorting a shipment back to the city when he was seized along the way by criminals.
I went alone to save him, and someone drove a knife into my womb.
After that, I could barely hope to conceive.
Back then I offered to break it off, but Alfred knelt outside the hospital room, knelt for a full day and night.
He said that for the rest of his life he would never bring up having children in front of me, or he'd live in poverty and die a wretched death.
And it had only been five years…
Alfred seemed to realize he'd said the wrong thing.
A trace of guilt surfaced in his eyes, and he was about to speak again,
when Scarlett, clutching her belly, let out a tearful little whimper.
"Forget it, Alfred, just hurry and take Shelagh's mother back. They're born to wealth, they're worth so much more than the two of us, my baby and me. Even if Shelagh deliberately killed the child in my belly, I wouldn't dare say a word. Besides, Shelagh said she didn't do it on purpose. If she says so, I believe her…"
Deliberately killed?!
Whether she was even pregnant, or what she was carrying, I didn't care in the slightest!
Because just yesterday,
I had found out I was pregnant.
The doctor had wept with joy, saying my sincerity must have moved the heavens for such a miracle to happen.
I was about to open my mouth and tell Alfred the news,
but his face had already changed.
He pointed at my mother's bed and gave the order in a vicious tone.
"Take the old woman off the ventilator!"
"Shelagh, today I'm going to make you taste what it's like to lose someone you love too!"
The moment Alfred finished, the man standing beside my mother ripped the ventilator away.
In almost the space of a blink,
my mother's face went blue,
her fingers clawing hard into her palms, and soon thin threads of blood trickled down from them.
"Alfred, have you lost your mind?!"
I lunged toward my mother's bed like a madwoman,
but Alfred seized my wrist in an iron grip and shoved me to the floor.
He slid an arm around Scarlett's waist and bent down to look at me.
"Shelagh, apologize to Scarlett, or your mother won't be going back to her room today."
Great gasping breaths kept coming from the bed,
my mother's face already turning gray,
and I grabbed Alfred's wrist, my voice shaking.
"Alfred, take my mother back to her room now. When my father left, you promised him you'd take good care of her, take good care of me. It's only been ten days! If he found out…"
"Don't talk to me about your father!"
Alfred cut me off sharply.
"Your father is dead! Stop trying to scare me with him!"
