Emma's POV
The words hit me like a sledgehammer.
Sophie. My sister. Tried to kill herself.
The shock made everything else disappear for a second. The pills, the lies, the hurt, all of it just evaporated. All I could think was: Sophie tried to die. My sister wanted to die.
I didn't even think. I just moved. Pushed through the pain in my body, ignored the way my legs felt weak and shaky. I grabbed the first clothes I saw jeans, a T-shirt- didn't even care if they matched, and threw them on while practically running down the stairs.
By the time I got outside, Dylan had already started the car. The engine was humming, exhaust coming out the back. He was about to leave without me.
I ran to the passenger side and yanked the door open.
"Get your filthy hands off my car."
His voice stopped me dead. I looked at him through the open door. His face was twisted with disgust, like I was something dirty he'd stepped in.
"Who the hell said you could sit there?"
My hand fell away from the door handle as it had burned me. I stood there on the driveway, feeling about two inches tall. Like dirt. Like trash. Like nothing.
"Dylan, please," I heard myself say, and I hated how small my voice sounded. "I'm worried about Sophie too. She's my sister. Let me come with you."
He actually laughed at that. This short, bitter sound that had no real humor in it.
"Worried?" He looked at me with something close to amusement, but cruel. "Shouldn't you be throwing a party if she's dead? Isn't that what you wanted all along?”
He gave me one last look, full of pure contempt, and then he just floored it. The car peeled out of the driveway so fast it left tire marks on the pavement.
I stood there watching the car disappear down the street, my face drained of all color. I felt numb. Completely numb.
After standing there like an idiot for what felt like forever but was probably only a few seconds, I finally snapped out of it. I pulled out my phone with shaking hands and called for a ride, then spent the whole drive following the route Dylan's car had taken.
---
Riverside General Hospital. That's where they'd taken her.
I walked through those sterile white hallways, following the room numbers until I found the right one. The door was partially open, and I could see inside.
My feet stopped moving. I just stood there in the doorway, frozen.
Dylan was walking toward the hospital bed, and I watched with this sick, twisting feeling in my stomach as Sophie looked up and saw him. Her whole face just... crumpled. She was already pale, so pale she looked almost ghostly against the white sheets, but when she saw him, tears started streaming down her cheeks.
Then she practically threw herself into his arms.
At least she wasn't in danger. Thank God for that. I felt some of the crushing weight lift off my chest. She was okay. She was alive.
"Dylan..." Sophie's voice was so soft, so sweet. Like honey.
She said his name the way I wished I could say it, with affection, with the certainty that he'd catch her. And he did. She told him everything that had been hurting her, all her pain and sadness, and he just held her through it all. His arms wrapped around her like she was something precious. Something worth protecting.
Standing there watching them, they looked perfect together. Like one of those couples you see in movies, beautiful, tragic, meant to be. And me? I was just some random person standing in the doorway. An intruder. Someone who didn't belong in this picture.
I swallowed hard, trying to push down all the hurt that was bubbling up in my chest, and forced myself to walk into the room.
"Sophie..." I started to say.
"Emma, you ungrateful wretch! How dare you show your face here to see Sophie!"
The voice came from behind me, sharp and furious. I barely had time to process it before I was about to turn around.
I knew that voice. Mrs. Patricia Morgan, Sophie's mother. Well, her adoptive mother. Same as mine, technically, since they'd adopted me too.
But I never got the chance to turn around fully.
SLAP.
The sound cracked through the room like a whip. Pain exploded across my left cheek, so sharp and sudden that my vision actually blurred. Little spots of light danced in front of my eyes. My head snapped to the side from the force of it, and I stumbled, nearly losing my balance.
"You shameless little harlot!" Mrs. Morgan's face was twisted with rage, her carefully applied makeup doing nothing to hide the pure hatred in her eyes. "We took you in out of the goodness of our hearts. We fed you. We clothed you. We gave you a roof over your head. And this is how you repay us? By stealing Sophie's fiancé?"
My cheek was burning. Throbbing. I could feel it starting to swell already.
She started going off about that night three months ago, the night everything changed. The night I woke up next to Dylan. But she was making it sound like I'd planned the whole thing. Like I'd orchestrated some elaborate scheme to trap him.
I wanted to explain. God, I wanted to explain so badly. It wasn't like that. I didn't plan it. I didn't even know how it happened.
But before I could get a single word out, her hand flew again.
SLAP.
The other side of my face this time. The impact was even harder than the first one, and I felt something warm and wet in my mouth. The metallic taste of blood. My lip had split open, and I could feel the blood starting to trickle down my chin.
The room spun. My legs felt like jelly. I swayed on my feet, the floor tilting under me, and I was about to go down. I could feel myself falling.
Then a voice, loud, booming, and furious, cut through everything.
"Emma, from this day forward, you are no longer a Bennett! You hear me? We don't have a daughter who's shameless enough to do whatever it takes to get what she wants!"
Dad, Mr. Richard Bennett. My adoptive father.
I looked up at him through blurry eyes, my vision still wonky from the slaps. His face was red, veins bulging in his neck. He looked like he wanted to hit me too.
And then he did.
Not a slap this time. A kick. His foot connected with my side, and I felt something in my ribcage protest with a sharp spike of pain. The force sent me stumbling backward. I crashed into the wall, then slid down to the floor in a heap.
Everything hurt. My face, my side, my heart.
I sat there on the cold hospital floor, tasting blood, feeling like my whole world had just shattered into a million pieces that I'd never be able to put back together.
