At that very moment, Adrian was busy feeding Vanessa soup by her hospital bed.
The wedding planner called again to go over the details.
As for Evelyn, he had no time to spare for her at all.
Then three days passed, and the wedding arrived right on schedule.
Dressed in an expensive custom suit, Adrian stood at the entrance of the ballroom greeting guests. His eyes kept sweeping through the crowd on instinct, but there was no sign of Evelyn, and a strange irritation began to creep into his chest.
Then, through the moving crowd, he suddenly caught sight of a slender figure in a pale blue dress not far away.
Slim and slight, the figure looked so much like Evelyn.
Adrian relaxed at once, letting out a long breath inside.
He knew it. She would come after all.
As the romantic wedding march began to play, the ceremony moved forward exactly as planned.
Onstage, Vanessa wore a stunning wedding gown scattered with crystals, smiling radiantly.
"And now, let's welcome Ms. Evelyn Hart, to the stage for a few words!" The host's booming voice rang through the entire hall.
Applause thundered from the audience, but when the spotlight hit the end of the red carpet, no one was there.
"Ms. Evelyn Hart, please come up to the stage!" the host called again with an awkward laugh, raising his voice the second time.
Still nothing. A deathly silence fell, and the guests began whispering among themselves as the entire room turned painfully awkward.
The smile on Vanessa's face froze. Gathering up her skirt, she turned to Adrian with a wounded look.
Her beautiful eyes filled with tears, confused and aggrieved, and her voice trembled as she spoke. "Adrian, if Evelyn really didn't want to give me her blessing, she could've just said so earlier! Why would she disappear on purpose at a time like this? She just wanted to humiliate me in front of everyone. She wanted to ruin the perfect wedding I'd been looking forward to!"
Every tear Vanessa shed landed on Adrian's nerves like a spark.
But before he could react, a dull thud suddenly sounded beside him.
A second ago Vanessa had still been accusing Evelyn. The next, her eyes rolled shut and she crumpled onto the crystal steps like a rag doll.
......
This time, Vanessa stayed unconscious for a long while. The doctor said she could not be upset again, needed complete rest, and would require close monitoring.
Adrian frowned when he heard the diagnosis.
Before Vanessa woke up, he meant to find Evelyn himself and ask just how much resentment she had been carrying to pull something so low as disappearing from the wedding and pushing Vanessa to the brink!
Just as Adrian turned to leave, a buzzing vibration broke the silence in the hospital room.
The sound was coming from the designer handbag Vanessa had left by the bed.
Adrian walked over, pulled out the phone, and saw a new text light up the screen.
The sender was saved as "Dr. Martin Graves," but the content itself was hidden by the phone's privacy settings.
Adrian had no intention of paying attention to it. He was just about to put the phone back when Martin called directly.
Adrian hesitated, puzzled.
Vanessa's attending doctor was never Martin. Could it be some specialist Vanessa had contacted privately for treatment?
Thinking it might have something to do with her condition, Adrian swiped to answer and raised the phone to his ear.
"Hello?"
A sharp gasp came from the other end, and then the call was cut off without even a second of hesitation.
Adrian froze mid-motion, his gaze darkening by the second.
What kind of doctor reacted like that just from hearing a family member's voice?
He turned and looked at Vanessa lying unconscious on the hospital bed. As if driven by something he couldn't explain, he walked over and unlocked the phone with her fingerprint.
Adrian opened the messages and fixed his eyes on the unread text that had just come in.
"Ms. Cole, the fainting act at the wedding went perfectly. Mr. Quinn seems to have completely bought it. When will you send the remaining payment?"
It hit Adrian like a blast.
He stood there as if struck by lightning, rooted to the spot, his mind going completely blank.
The fainting… was an act?
His fingers stiff, he scrolled upward through their message history like a machine.
The most recent exchanges came into view at once.
Martin texted, "Ms. Cole, those medications have serious side effects. The risks are high, especially since you've only just recovered…"
Vanessa replied, "What's there to be scared of? You don't win big without taking a risk. If Adrian doesn't think I'm dying, how's he ever supposed to bring himself to kick that stumbling block out of the way for good?"
Vanessa continued, "Oh, and don't forget to send me that 'critical condition' diagnosis template I asked you for earlier. I might need it again next time."
Everything above that had already been wiped clean. Nothing was left.
For a split second, Adrian felt as though every drop of blood in his body had frozen, only to rush backward the next instant.
Fake?
It was all fake?
Then what had all of this been for?!
What about Evelyn? Had she stayed away today because she knew something? Why hadn't she told him?
Something inside Adrian hollowed out all at once, and a fear unlike anything he had ever known swallowed him whole.
With trembling hands, he pulled out his own phone. He even keyed in the number wrong several times before finally placing the call.
"Sorry, the number you dialed is currently unavailable…"
The cold mechanical voice sounded again.
Adrian stared at the call log on his screen. This was already the twenty-third call.
He took several deep breaths, forcing himself to calm down through the suffocating panic.
Then he called Lillian.
The call was answered after only two rings.
"Lillian!" Adrian blurted out like a drowning man grabbing for a lifeline. "It's Adrian. I can't get through to Evelyn. Did she go to you because she was upset? Please, let me talk to her, I…"
"Adrian, you bastard, how dare you call me? Will you only be satisfied once you've driven her to death?"
On the other end, Lillian, always so gentle and kind, roared with such fury that Adrian went completely still.
Lillian sobbed and cursed him mercilessly, calling him heartless, blind, bewitched by a scheming woman, ungrateful to the core, and damned for what he had done.
Adrian could no longer process the exact words.
All he heard were Lillian's final words, drenched in despair and fury, each one cutting into him like a blade.
"That precious childhood sweetheart of yours isn't dead yet, but Evelyn really is dying! Her brain tumor ruptured days ago and she suffered massive bleeding. Ethan already flew her to Silverpine this morning. So rest easy, because even if she dies on the operating table, she will never turn back and look at a bastard like you ever again!"
