"Give it back to me!"

Melanie instinctively lunged forward to reclaim the item, but her arms were instantly pinned behind her back by the security personnel.

The moment Harvey pressed the answer button and activated the speakerphone, a man's raucous voice exploded through the quiet living room.

"I wrapped up that job you gave me to fabricate those scandalous rumors about Clara days ago! When exactly are you going to transfer the rest of my money?!"

Chapter 16

The accusatory questioning, laced heavily with complaints, caused Melanie’s legs to give out entirely.

She parted her lips, desperately wishing to tell the other party to disconnect the line, but her mouth was firmly clamped shut by the security guards. She could do nothing but widen her eyes in a frantic, desperate struggle.

"Hello? Hello? Melanie, let me tell you something: if you don't bring that agreed-upon five hundred thousand within three days, I won't just expose how you fabricated those rumors about Clara, I'll even leak the whole business of you cooking the accounts at the company!"

The man threw down the threat and hung up immediately.

The room fell into a deathly silence, save for Melanie’s ragged, trembling breathing.

Meeting Ethan’s razor-sharp stare, she shook her head frantically in absolute helplessness, desperately attempting to distance herself from those words.

Ethan lifted his hand slightly, and the guards released her.

"Ethan, I don't know him at all! I have absolutely no idea what he's talking about! You have to believe me..."

Melanie pinched the edge of his jacket, tears streaming down her face like rain.

Ethan looked down at her, his voice carrying a chilling desolation that pierced straight through to the bone: "Were you the one who ordered someone to sneak those photographs?"

Melanie’s face turned ghostly white, and her denial suddenly choked in her throat.

"Knock, knock, knock!"

A knock rattled against the half-open front door. A man clad in a courier uniform stood there, looking anxiously at the scene unfolding in the living room: "Ex... Excuse me, is Mr. Ethan home?"

Perhaps because the atmosphere felt far too bizarre, he stuttered slightly: "Th... This is the custom diamond ring gift you ordered for Miss Melanie..."

Hearing this, Ethan's brows tightly knit.

When exactly had he ever ordered a custom diamond ring for Melanie?

Sensing a freezing, menacing gaze settling squarely onto his form, the deliveryman immediately set the gift box down on the floor: "Last time, that young lady explicitly instructed me to deliver it to the corporate headquarters, but since Mr. Ethan is home, I'll just leave it right here."

With that final remark, he turned on his heel and fled without looking back.

Melanie no longer possessed the courage to meet Ethan's eyes, yet her mouth continued to utter hollow defenses: "Ethan, listen to my explanation, things are n... not what you think..."

Before the sentence could leave her throat, her jaw was violently seized in a crushing grip.

The very last shred of Ethan's patience was completely ground to nothing: "Throughout my entire life, I have loathed hypocrites above all else—especially stupid fools who refuse to confess even after their bottom line has been completely exposed."

The catastrophic weight of his pressure made Melanie’s knees turn completely to water: "No, I didn't..."

The moment his hand released its grip, she collapsed onto the hard floor with a sharp "thud."

Ethan adjusted his cuffs, looking down from his height as he glared at her with absolute detachment: "Melanie, since you possessed the malice to carry out these deeds, you should possess the spine to endure the consequences."

As if delivering a final, absolute sentence, he strode forcefully out of the room.

Melanie’s heart plunged into a dark abyss: "Ethan... Ethan!"

Suddenly, her field of vision was completely blocked by Harvey.

Harvey, who historically had always maintained a polite demeanor toward her, now looked down with eyes full of absolute aversion: "Miss Melanie, if you have anything left to say, you had best save it for the police station."

The sky was heavily overcast, and a fine drizzle blurred the glass of the vehicle windows.

Ethan climbed into the car, but delayed starting the engine for a long time.

Leaning back against the headrest, his chaotic mind continuously replayed the image of Clara swimming in tears.

A dull agony twisting within his chest caused his hands to slowly tighten against the steering wheel, his knuckles turning a stark white from the pressure.

After a long pause, Ethan finally ignited the engine, driving forcefully toward the hospital.

The hospital.

Having completed his rounds, Julian walked over to the intensive care unit. According to the on-duty nurse, Ethan had stood watch directly outside the observation window for the entire night, though no one knew where he had gone at the moment.

Inside the room, Clara remained completely locked in her comatose state.

He reached out a hand to gently brush a stray lock of hair from her brow, his movements filled with a careful, unmaskable tenderness.

For some inexplicable reason, a fleeting thought crossed his mind that perhaps it would be the absolute best outcome if Clara simply continued to sleep like this forever.

She wouldn't have to face the catastrophic blow of paralysis, she wouldn't be forced to watch her own body steadily march toward death, and she certainly wouldn't have to face Ethan—the man who had shattered her soul.

Julian froze for a fraction of a second, a wave of intense self-reproach instantly washing over him.

What on earth was he thinking? Shouldn't his only focus be on helping her recover her health as quickly as possible?

Suddenly, Ethan's clinical, freezing baritone echoed from directly behind him.

"Dr. Julian still hasn't managed to break his habit of looking after another man's wife."

Julian calmly withdrew his hand, turning his head back.

He looked squarely into the depths of Ethan's menacing, murderous glare!

Chapter 17

Following a brief moment of absolute silence, a nurse stepped forward and pulled to a halt outside the room.

She threw a quick glance toward Ethan before gesturing to Julian: "Dr. Julian, the patient in bed 28 is experiencing a sudden deterioration."

Julian offered a flat response: "Understood, I will head over immediately."

With that, he bypassed Ethan entirely, stepping down the corridor without a single word.

The moment Ethan's gaze settled onto Clara's emaciated frame, the frost in his eyes steadily dissolved into a soft warmth.

Lacking any luxury to care about his friction with Julian, he sat down directly beside the mattress, gently taking her hand—which had finally recovered a faint trace of warmth—into his own.

Throughout his entire journey back, the phrases of apology he had carefully structured in his mind swirled behind his teeth, yet he found himself entirely unable to voice a single syllable.

She might be unable to hear him, or perhaps she simply possessed no intention of ever granting him forgiveness.

The moment he recalled that child—the one who had been declared dead inside her womb and frantically stripped away through surgery—his heart suffered a violent, agonizing spasm.

When all was said and done, the absolute blame lay entirely on his own shoulders.

Lifting Clara's fragile hand to press against his cheek, Ethan's voice cracked with a heavy sob: "I'm so sorry..."

Night fell.

The inpatient pavilion was plunged back into a suffocating quiet, and the on-duty nurses moved silently between rooms, verifying the status of their patients.

Resting against the sheets, Clara's fingers offered a slight twitch.

A consciousness that had felt like drifting aimlessly through a heavy fog slowly began to sharpen.

Forcing my eyelids open, the warm yellow illumination of the room wasn't bright, yet it still forced my eyes to instinctively narrow against the light.

My field of vision was blurred, and it felt as though I had just escaped a massive, endless nightmare, though I could no longer recall a single detail of what I had envisioned.

Attempting the slightest movement, a pain resembling the literal slashing of blades ripped through my entire system.

"Ugh..."

The unendurable pain forced a muffled groan from my throat.

Resting against the back of his chair, Ethan snapped awake the moment the sound registered, his gaze swinging frantically toward the bed.

Catching sight of my tightly knit brows and my hand moving with extreme difficulty—as if desperately attempting to rip off the suffocating oxygen mask—his heart leaped into his throat.

He scrambled to his feet, slamming the call button to summon the nurses before locking his hand around mine.

"Clara? Clara?"

The familiar calling of my name forced my head to turn, and through my hazy vision, I took in the man’s features, his eyes filled with a mixture of intense worry and radiant joy.

I froze entirely.

Ethan?

As if a switch had been violently thrown inside my mind, the four long years of clinical detachment, the relentless emotional torture, and the horrific images of my child and my mother meeting their deaths all surged into my awareness simultaneously.