Ava Peterson POV:
His hand was on the doorknob, the final click of the lock about to seal my fate. With the last ounce of my strength, I pushed myself up onto my elbows.
“Harrison,” I rasped, my voice barely audible over the roaring in my ears. “In your heart… our baby… or a party. Which one is more important?”
I was a pathetic heap on the floor, my hands pressed against my abdomen, the blood soaking into the expensive rug beneath me.
He stopped. He actually turned around. His face wasn't concerned or guilty. It was cold, annoyed, as if I had just committed the ultimate social faux pas by bleeding on his floor.
He looked down at me, his gaze as remote as a distant star. His eyes flickered over the bloodstain, and his brow furrowed, not with worry, but with a clear, unmistakable disgust. *This is a mess I’ll have to have cleaned.*
I saw it all in that one look, but a tiny, pathetic part of me still clung to a sliver of hope.
Then he opened his mouth, and his voice, calm and steady, was laced with a poison that stopped my heart.
“Don’t be so dramatic, Ava.”
My breath hitched. The world seemed to tilt on its axis.
He continued, his tone as casual as if he were discussing the weather. “It’s not a baby yet. It’s just a clump of cells.”
Time stopped.
A clump of cells.
The words sucked the very soul from my body, leaving behind an empty, freezing shell. The life I had cherished, the future I had prayed for, the tiny secret I had held so close to my heart—to him, it was nothing. Less than nothing.
In that single, brutal moment, every illusion I had ever built about this man, about this marriage, shattered into dust.
Having delivered his verdict, he seemed to feel the matter was settled. He turned away from me, his back straight and unforgiving. He adjusted his perfectly knotted tie, a small, elegant gesture that stood in hellish contrast to the scene of carnage at his feet.
I wanted to scream. I wanted to claw at his face. But I couldn't move. I couldn't breathe.
I just watched his back, burning the image into my memory. This was the real Harrison Phelps. Not the hero on TV, but the monster who could step over his dying wife and unborn child to attend a party.
He didn’t look back. He didn’t hesitate.
He opened the door and walked out into the night, on his way to her.
The latch clicked shut. The world went silent.
I lay on the cold floor, the life draining out of me. My vision blurred at the edges. My phone was still clutched in my hand, its screen a lonely beacon in the dim light.
With a final, desperate effort, I opened my contacts and sent my live location to the only other person in the world who might care. My brother, Dustin. But he was in another city, hours away. It was a futile gesture.
My fingers, slick with sweat, fumbled as I dialed 911 again, whispering my address to the operator before the phone slipped from my grasp.
I couldn’t fight anymore. As the darkness closed in, my last thought wasn't of Harrison, or the baby, or the pain.
It was a quiet, cold realization.
So this is what it feels like when your heart dies.
