"Stop being dramatic, Carmela," his voice was devoid of any warmth. "You brought this on yourself."
He tossed the folio onto the floor beside my bleeding body. It landed with a heavy thud.
"Sign it."
I forced my heavy eyelids open. Through the blur of pain, I read the bold print.
It was a legal waiver. A document absolving Greenville General—and Vaughn himself—of all liability regarding the diverted medevac helicopter. He was covering his tracks.
Beneath it was a second document. A total transfer of the lucrative medical patents I had spent three years developing. The very patents his entire research center relied on.
"You want me to give her my life's work?" My voice was a broken, scraping rasp.
Vaughn adjusted his cuffs, his expression completely detached. "Consider it an apology for attacking her. If you refuse, I have two orderlies waiting downstairs."
"Okay," I whispered, my voice chillingly calm. "I'll sign."
Vaughn sneered, handing me his expensive fountain pen.
As I shifted my weight, pretending to wince in agony, I slid the patent transfer out of the folio, hiding it beneath my sleeve.
In its place, I slipped in a folded document I had drafted in my hospital bed just days ago.
An ironclad divorce and total asset-forfeiture agreement.
"Vaughn! Coco threw up on the rug!" Jade’s whiny voice echoed from the hallway.
Vaughn sighed, his attention instantly snapping toward her. "I'm coming, Jade."
He snatched the folio from the floor. Distracted and arrogant, he didn't read a single word. He just flipped to the last page and scrawled his signature across the bottom line.
He tossed the pen aside and walked out, leaving me to bleed.
I dragged myself up, leaning heavily against the cabinets. I needed to get to my hidden satellite phone. I needed to call my estranged billionaire grandfather.
But I never made it out of the building.
Before I could even reach the elevator, a heavy cloth was clamped over my mouth. The sickly sweet smell of chloroform filled my lungs, and the world went black.
When I woke up, the stench of rust and damp concrete assaulted my senses.
I was tied to a metal chair in an abandoned warehouse.
A few feet away, Jade was tied to a chair as well. But she wasn't crying. When the hired thugs looked away, she turned to me and smirked.
Hours later, the heavy metal doors groaned open.
Vaughn rushed in, clutching a silver briefcase. The ransom money.
"Vaughn! Save me!" Jade immediately began to sob, her voice trembling with perfectly acted terror.
The lead thug snatched the briefcase, flipping it open. He laughed. "There's only enough cash here for one of them, Doc. Make your choice."
Vaughn froze.
He looked at me. My face was bruised, my clothes stiff with dried blood, my eyes pleading for a single ounce of humanity.
Then, he looked at Jade.
Without a second of hesitation, he turned his back on me.
"Let Jade go," he ordered.
He took her hand, leading her out of the warehouse, leaving me in the dark with men who were paid to make me disappear.
I survived the ordeal only because the thugs realized I was too close to death to be of any use, dumping me in an alleyway.
But Vaughn wasn't finished.
To protect Jade from any police scrutiny, he framed me. He claimed I orchestrated the entire kidnapping out of "jealousy" to hurt his sister.
Before I could even contact a lawyer, I was thrown into a brutal women's holding facility.
I didn't last two days.
Jade had reached her hands in here, too. She bribed the inmates.
During yard time, a shadow fell over me. A sharp, rusted shiv was driven deep into my side.
I collapsed onto the cold dirt, clutching the gushing wound, my blood pooling into the mud.
The sirens wailed. The harsh, blinding lights of the hospital ceiling rushed past my eyes as the paramedics wheeled my gurney down the hallway.
I was fading fast. Every breath was a battle.
"We need a trauma surgeon! She's bleeding out!" a nurse shouted.
Footsteps approached. A crisp white coat.
It was Vaughn. He was the attending physician on duty.
He looked down at the gurney. He saw my pale, dying face. He saw the blood soaking through the cheap prison uniform.
"Vaughn..." Jade’s voice echoed from a nearby VIP suite. "My arm hurts."
Vaughn’s eyes swept over my bleeding body with absolute indifference.
"Leave the inmate for the residents," Vaughn commanded the nurses coldly. "Miss Jade has a scratch that needs immediate attention."
He turned and walked away without a second glance.
My vision faded to black. The coldness seeped into my heart, freezing the last beat.
The long, piercing sound of the heart monitor flatlining echoed through the hallway.
I was gone.
But just as the darkness swallowed me whole, the heavy double doors of the emergency ward blew open with a deafening crash.
"Step away from her!" a voice roared, carrying the weight of absolute authority.
