“Sir, if we don’t get her to the hospital right now, she might not survive. Are you really planning to use the fetus in your wife’s womb as a cure for Mrs. Maeve?”
The butler, who had seen more than his share of crises in his twenty years of service, was in a panic. Even for him, the gruesome scene unfolding before his eyes was too much.
Claudine Pitts lay unconscious in a pool of blood. Her face was deathly pale and the lower half of her body was a ghastly mess. Her consciousness flickered in and out.
But Elliot Graves didn’t waver for a second.
“That’s what the shaman said—only this unborn child can save Maeve! Her life depends on it!”
He barked his orders without a shred of remorse.
“Don’t just stand there! Get the baby out of her now—while she’s still unconscious!”
The butler froze in disbelief.
“Sir! That’s a human life! You can’t play with it! And don’t forget, she spent an entire day submerged in freezing water for you. The doctors said she might never be able to conceive again. If you do this, she might never carry another child for the rest of her life!”
Panicking, he pulled out his phone to call 911, but Elliot lunged forward, snatched it from his hands and smashed it to pieces.
“If you’re not gonna do it. Move! Get me a knife—I’ll do it myself!”
Elliot’s hand moved with terrifying precision. Cold. Calculated.
And then he stumbled away, clutching something like it was the most precious thing in the world.
Only after he disappeared did the butler rush to Claudine’s side, finally calling for help and getting her to the hospital.
No one knew—Claudine had never lost consciousness entirely.
Her eyelashes fluttered weakly, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t open her eyes.
The pain was too much. It was a kind of pain that felt worse than having her heart ripped from her chest.
The sharp scent of disinfectant invaded her nostrils as she lay on the hospital bed. The room was dark, the windows pitch black against the night.
She instinctively reached for her belly.
Her baby… her only child… was gone.
Just hours ago, Claudine had been pushed down the stairs by her sister-in-law, Maeve Waller, during an explosive argument. The cause? Claudine had refused Mrs. Graves’s outrageous proposal—to let Elliot take on a second wife and give Maeve a child.
A week earlier, the Graves Family had been ambushed by an old enemy. Both brothers were kidnapped, and in the end, Melvin—Elliot’s older brother and Maeve’s husband—died shielding him from a bullet. Maeve, a newlywed, had become a widow in the blink of an eye.
Consumed by grief, Maeve spiraled. She tried to end her life multiple times, only to be stopped each time.
Desperate, Mrs. Graves had come up with what she called a “solution”: Elliot would father a child with Maeve. It would give Maeve a reason to live and preserve the Graves Family line. She framed it like an act of duty.
Elliot refused at first, but things escalated quickly—and violently. In the heat of it all, Maeve shoved Claudine, sending her tumbling down the stairs. Claudine, who was pregnant at the time, never stood a chance.
Now, in the cold silence of the hospital room, a soft moan broke through the dark.
“Mmh… Elliot, no… not here. Claudine’s right next to us.”
Maeve’s voice, sweet and breathy, was followed by the slick, unmistakable sound of two bodies tangled in the filthiest kind of betrayal.
“She’s still out cold. It’s fine,” Elliot muttered, unbothered.
“If we didn’t stage all this, someone as selfish as her would’ve never willingly given up that baby for you. Maeve, your illness… it’s finally going to be cured.”
Their bodies moved faster, the rhythm cruel and unapologetic. The curtain between their hospital bed and Claudine’s barely muffled the moans or the thumping of the headboard.
“Maeve,” Elliot whispered between gasps, “we’re going to have a child. A real Graves heir—just you and me.”
His voice was dripping with affection, adoration even, as he held Maeve tightly and buried himself deeper into her. They rode wave after wave of pleasure, until they both came undone with matching cries.
Not once did they stop to consider the broken woman just feet away—bleeding, empty and awake.
In the corner of the room, unnoticed and forgotten, Claudine shed a single tear. It slid down her cheek, silently soaking into the pillow.
Elliot didn’t stop that night. Over and over, he reached for Maeve, like Claudine was already gone. Like she’d never mattered.
By morning, Claudine had had enough.
She ripped out her IV, stumbled out of bed and left the hospital without looking back.
Later that day, she slammed a stack of papers down on Mrs. Graves’s polished mahogany desk.
“You got what you wanted. I’m walking away from Elliot,” she said, her voice icy but controlled. “But I have one condition—I’m taking every cent of the Pitts Family fortune with me. And I want ten million dollars.”
