Shame?
My laugh was hollow. "You kicked me out, remember?" My voice wavered, but I held his gaze. "You even said the Crawford Family only has one daughter—Ava. So why should I care?"
Cassius' sneer cut through me like a blade. "You brought this on yourself. Ava's sick and you still celebrated your birthday? You did it to upset her, didn't you?"
The words didn't hurt anymore. Not after what I had just seen.
Then came the final blow.
"The hospital just confirmed—you can donate a kidney to Ava. Consider yourself lucky."
My heart plummeted.
Troy's video flashed in my mind—the whispered voices, the calculated cruelty. I had prayed, I had cried, I had told myself over and over that they just lost their memories. That there had to be an explanation.
But the truth had come first. And it was merciless.
Cassius yanked my arm roughly and dragged me toward the door.
A sharp, twisting pain bloomed in my stomach, making my vision blur for a moment. I swayed on my feet, my fingers instinctively pressing against my abdomen.
"Cassius!" My voice trembled, but I forced the words out. "I'm pregnant! I can't donate a kidney—it's dangerous for me and the baby!"
The room plunged into an eerie silence, the air turning ice-cold.
Then, with ruthless indifference, Cassius shoved me backward. My body hit the ground hard and the sharp edge of the table caught my forehead on the way down. Pain exploded through my skull and warm blood trickled into my eyes, turning my world red.
Cassius didn't even look at me.
"Pregnant?" His voice was laced with contempt. "Who knows which man it belongs to? Weren't you just fooling around with Troy?"
I clutched my throbbing head, my pulse roaring in my ears.
"It's just a bastard child," he continued coldly. "If it's gone, it's gone. Donating a kidney won't kill you."
I stared at him, my breath catching.
"Think of it this way—your kid's taking on Ava's suffering. That's its purpose."
My blood ran cold.
The man who once panicked when I so much as cut my finger with a fruit knife was now speaking about my life—and my child's—as if they were nothing more than disposable objects.
The weight of his words crushed me. Ava's arrival had stripped me of everything—my home, my family, my love.
A bitter laugh tore from my lips. Cassius looked away, his gaze distant, detached.
"Cassius," I whispered, tasting iron on my tongue. "Are you sure you won't regret this?"
For a fraction of a second, something in his expression cracked. But just as quickly, he crushed it beneath a sneer.
"Regret?" His lips curled cruelly. "Sienna, don't flatter yourself."
With a flick of his wrist, the bodyguards lunged forward. A dozen hands grabbed me, shoving me onto the cold operating table. I thrashed, my limbs burning with resistance, but their grip was unyielding.
Then I saw them. My parents.
Their familiar figures emerged from the hallway, their faces twisted with frustration—not concern. Not worry. Just disappointment. For me, for their own daughter.
A stinging slap cracked against my cheek, jerking my head to the side.
"How could you be so heartless?!" My mother's voice trembled with rage. "It's just a kidney donation and you won't even agree to that?"
My father's gaze bore into me with icy detachment. "How did we end up with such a selfish daughter?"
Something inside me fractured. I stopped struggling.
Slowly, I turned my head to face them, blood seeping into my lashes. My voice was calm, eerily detached.
"Didn't you already sever ties with me?" I asked quietly.
Their expressions stiffened.
I tilted my head, watching them, unblinking. "What? Now that you need to save your precious adopted daughter, you suddenly remember me?"
A flicker of hesitation passed over my mother's face. She froze, caught in my words.
But my father quickly yanked her sleeve, grounding her back in reality.
Anger flared in her eyes and in the next instant, she grabbed the anesthetic syringe from the doctor's tray.
"You ungrateful child!" she spat, jabbing the needle into my arm without hesitation.
Pain lanced through me, but I barely felt it. The numbness spread fast, creeping from my arm to my fingertips, then my legs.
My tongue felt heavy. I wanted to speak—to ask them one final question.
Who was their real child?
But before the words could leave my lips, the door burst open.
A nurse rushed in.
"Miss Ava is terrified and won't stop crying. Perhaps—"
Before the nurse could finish her sentence, my parents had already rushed off to Ava's ward without hesitation.
