Chapter 2

Hazel

The first thing I felt was the weight in my chest, heavy and suffocating, before I even opened my eyes.

The air smelled like disinfectant. It was sterile and cold and the rhythmic beeping beside me confirmed what my sluggish mind could not yet accept.

I was in the hospital.

Slowly, I forced my eyes open.

The white walls and ceiling.

The rough texture of hospital sheets under my fingers.

For a fleeting moment, I forgot why I was here.

Then instinctively, my hand flew to my stomach. My heart squeezed so tightly it hurt. I felt empty.

Before the terror could settle, a voice sliced through the haze.

“You’re awake.”

I turned my head weakly and saw my husband.

His face was twisted, not with worry, but irritation.

Standing beside him was his personal assistant smirking faintly. And then, the one face I had prayed would soften my pain, my son. But even his gaze was hard, his lips curled in disdain for some reason I still couldn’t understand.

I parted my lips, my throat dry, desperate to ask about my baby.

But I didn’t get the chance.

“Do you really have to go this far?” Adrian snapped, his voice low but venomous. “Faking death? Drinking poison? All for what? Attention?”

My chest tightened. Poison?

Before I could speak, my son scoffed. My little boy looked at me with such disgust it felt like a blade to the heart.

“You’re wicked,” he spat.

“A liar. Why're you always pretending like you’re the victim?”

Tears blurred my vision, but they didn’t stop him. He folded his arms, his young face hardened with a cruelty that mirrored his father's.

I wanted to reach for him, to tell him I wasn’t lying, that I didn't do anything. That I didn't know what was going on.

But my voice caught, too broken to form words.

The assistant stepped closer, her voice dripping with feigned sympathy.

“Hazel, I know Adrian's been busy lately,” she said softly, as though she were the reasonable one. “But this? Trying to pull a stunt like this just to make him notice you? Don’t you think it’s childish? Even Daniel wouldn't throw such a tantrum.”

Tears spilled down my cheeks.

I had woken up, but a part of me really wished I hadn’t.

“Poison,” my husband repeated, his tone dripping with disdain. “Do you know how embarrassing it was to get a call saying my wife tried to kill herself? Do you realize what that does to my reputation?”

Reputation. Not my life. Not the baby. His reputation.

“I didn’t—” My voice cracked, thin and fragile.

“You always want people to pity you,” My son's voice sounded again, each word like acid against my skin. “You’re a wicked mother. A liar. Why would you want to leave me? Why would you make me look like I have a crazy mother?”

I reached a trembling hand toward him, desperate for him to remember who I was to him, desperate for him to see his mother and not the monster his father painted me to be. But he stepped back, out of my reach, as though my touch might stain him.

Adrian's supposed P.A, or not, his mistress folded her arms, tilting her head with mock concern.

“He’s just a child,” she said smoothly, “but can you blame him? He sees the truth. A good wife doesn’t try to trap her husband with theatrics. You should be grateful he still allows you in this house.”

I opened my mouth, but still.... nothing.

The door opened, and the doctor walked in, his expression unreadable.

For a moment, I felt a sliver of hope that maybe, finally, someone would bring comfort.

But I soon wished he never opened his mouth.

“We found traces of poison in your system,” he said bluntly, flipping through a chart. “It was enough to harm both you and the child.”

My stomach dropped. I tried to shake my head, tried to tell him it wasn’t true. I hadn’t taken anything. I hadn’t wanted to die. But my voice was lost beneath the crushing weight of their judgmental stares.

And then the thought hit me, I had lost my child.

“My baby… My baby”

The doctor barely looked at me. He just shook his head once, dismissively, before writing something down on his chart and I felt my world shattered all over again.

My child… was gone.

My baby, the one I had dreamed of holding, the one whose heartbeat had been my only comfort through endless nights of loneliness...... gone.

A sound escaped me, somewhere between a sob and a scream. I pressed both hands to my stomach, rocking as if somehow I could back the life that had slipped away. My body shook with grief so heavy it threatened to crush me.

But instead of comfort, his voice cut through my despair.

“This is exactly what I mean,” Adrian said, his tone flat, as though he were tired of a performance he had seen too many times. “Look at yourself. Crying, wailing and creating a scene in front of everyone. Your child isn't even up to six months, it was bound to happen with your carelessness.”

I lifted my tear-streaked face to him, disbelief burning in my chest. “My child or our child, Adrian? We lost our child,” I whispered, my voice breaking. “Because of you… Can't you see it?”

“Enough,” he snapped, his eyes narrowing. “You brought this on yourself. If you hadn’t been so desperate for attention, if you hadn’t… poisoned yourself…” He spat the word like venom. “...maybe we wouldn’t be here.”

My breath hitched. “I didn’t—”

“You're always going to have an excuse,” he cut me off, waving a dismissive hand. “But I’m done listening. I need peace. I don't have any use for you now that you've killed your baby. You’ll find somewhere else to stay for a while. Somewhere quiet where you can think about what you’ve done.”

The words hit harder than any blow. “You want to send me away?”

He didn’t even flinch. “It’s better for everyone.”

I looked at my son then, praying he would defend me, that he would see through his father’s cruelty. But he only crossed his arms, glaring at me with the same cold disdain.

“You’re embarrassing,” he muttered.

My chest tightened. I had lost my child, and now I was losing him too.

Tears blurred my vision, but I forced the words out anyway, trembling. “If I leave you alone, it will be peace for us all.”

He scoffed, shaking his head. “There you go again. Dramatic as always. Stop playing the damn victim.”

And with that, he turned away, already reaching for the door.

The door shut behind them, the sound echoing louder than it should have in the sterile white hospital room.

My chest ached and not just from the poison still lingering in my veins, but from the weight of every cruel word they had thrown at me.

My son’s voice, his anger, his hatred, replayed over and over in my head.

Wicked mother… lying bitch… I could hardly reconcile that the boy I once held close, the child I sacrificed everything for, had looked at me with so much disgust.

I lay frozen on the bed, my hands pressed protectively over my stomach even though I already knew that she wasn't there.

The dismissive nod of the doctor, the lack of urgency in his voice, told me enough. He saw me as a nut job. So my condition didn't matter to him.

Not even to the man I called my husband, not to my son, and certainly not to his assistant who had stood there bold enough to scold me in my own pain.

Tears finally spilled down the side of my face, sliding into my hair. I turned my head toward the window. The sky outside was gray, heavy with the promise of rain, and I wondered if it was mourning with me. If the heavens could see me, broken, unwanted, stripped of everything I once thought was love.

For a moment, I thought of simply giving in and letting go.

Closing my eyes and allowing the void to take me. It would be easier than this, than being told my pain was nothing but a performance, than being abandoned when I needed them most.

But a faint vibration on the bedside table pulled me back. My phone buzzed again, insistent, as though refusing to let me fade away. With trembling fingers, I reached for it. The screen lit up with my brother’s name. My heart lurched. They saw my messages.

Before I could decide whether to answer, the door burst open.

Elijah came in first, his eyes wide with alarm, followed by the others. Relief crashed into me so hard I nearly sobbed out loud. And for the first time that day, I breathed.

"You're coming with us.”