Jasper nodded, a cold smile curling on his lips.

"Emma, you didn’t seriously think the surprise I mentioned was marrying you, did you?" he asked mockingly.

I froze, stunned by his words.

Why shouldn’t I think that?

Five years ago, when his company was on the brink of collapse and near bankruptcy, he’d been consumed by despair, taking out his frustration on me night after night. It became unbearable, both to witness and endure.

Desperate, I asked Yvonne to step in and secretly inject funds into his company, pulling it back from the edge of ruin.

After that, I went even further, begging my brother to provide covert support. Thanks to these efforts, his company began to thrive, growing over the next five years into the publicly listed enterprise it was today.

I gave so much to him.

Why wouldn’t I believe he intended to marry me?

"Emma..." Yvonne’s pained voice snapped me back to reality.

I turned to her and was met with a horrifying sight.

Her arm hung limply at her side, visibly broken. Blood dripped from several deep gashes across her face, streaking her features in crimson.

It hit me then—throughout the chaos, she had shielded me with her body.

Tears spilled uncontrollably from my eyes, shattering the last vestiges of my composure.

Spinning around, I screamed at Jasper in rage and despair.

"Jasper Lowe! Why are you doing this?"

"Sign it," he ordered coldly, tossing a contract in front of me.

I stared at the clauses written on the contract, feeling a wave of disbelief washed over me. For a moment, it seemed like Jasper had lost his mind.

"A breakup agreement? No disclosure of our past relationship? Leave Riverdale forever?"

I looked at Jasper in utter shock. "If you wanted to break up, you could’ve just said so. Why go this far?"

He rose to his feet, his expression chillingly calm. "Would you have agreed so easily if I didn’t?"

As he spoke, he suddenly pressed his foot down on Yvonne’s broken arm. Her heart-wrenching scream pierced the air.

I lunged forward, trying to pry his foot off her, but he kicked me away effortlessly.

"Sign it!" he roared, his voice like a whip.

Clutching my chest where the pain radiated, I forced myself upright and signed the agreement.

The moment the paper was snatched away, Jasper finally released Yvonne.

I scrambled to her side, pulling her into my arms.

Her arm was grotesquely twisted and deformed, her face drained of all color. The sight of her pale, blood-smeared features filled me with unbearable anguish.

Jasper Lowe wasn’t just heartless—he was a monster.

At that moment, Yvonne’s eyes fluttered open slightly. She glanced at me with concern before turning to Jasper.

"Jasper, do you even realize Emma’s true identity is—"

Before she could finish, Jasper erupted into manic laughter. With a brutal kick to her abdomen, he knocked Yvonne unconscious.

I screamed, but it was cut short as Jasper seized me by the throat, dragging me off the ground.

"Emma! Don’t think I don’t know about your schemes against me!" he snarled, his grip tightening.

He extended a hand, gesturing to his assistant. "Give it to me!"

The assistant promptly handed over another document. Jasper slapped it against my face, his voice cold and commanding.

"Transfer all your shares to me!"

As I caught sight of the document's contents, an icy chill swept over me, spreading through every inch of my body. The dense lines of text felt suffocating, each one a dagger to my chest.

A share transfer agreement.

So, he knew all along that I was the one who helped his company survive its darkest hour.

Back when I provided the funding to keep his failing company afloat, I’d considered telling him the truth. But his pride, coupled with the fact that my family would never approve of us if he didn’t establish a career of his own, held me back. That was why I chose to help him in secret.

Yet, even knowing I was the one who saved him, he still did this.

All that I had done for him—everything I sacrificed—was twisted into some kind of scheme in his eyes.

Jasper’s voice broke through my thoughts.

"Emma, be a good girl and sign it!"

His bloodshot eyes bore into mine, cold and predatory, like a starving wolf guarding its meal.

But all I felt was a bitter urge to laugh.

I was laughing at myself for being blind to his true nature and laughing at him for his shortsightedness.

He thought Yvonne was about to reveal something about the shares. What he didn’t know was that she had been about to expose my true identity.

If he knew I was the heiress of the influential Wynn family, he would never have dared to pull a stunt like this. Forget about the shares I held in his company, my family wouldn’t even blink at ten companies of his size.

But at this point, I had no intention of revealing who I was.

As the realization settled in, I spoke calmly, my voice steady.

"I’ll sign, but only if you take Yvonne to the hospital first."

I fully expected him to refuse outright.

To my surprise, he smiled and said, "Alright, I agree."

He clapped his hands, and two doctors in white coats promptly stepped forward, lifting Yvonne with practiced ease. Without a word, they carried her away, one at her head and the other at her feet.

Relief washed over me, and I exhaled deeply. With that, I signed my name on the agreement.

Before I could even set the pen down, Jasper snatched the document from my hands.

He held it as though it were a treasure, his entire body trembling with excitement. A near-maniacal, distorted laugh escaped his throat.

"Emma, do you know how long I’ve been investigating this? Six months! Six whole months! I almost delayed the company’s listing trying to figure it out. Only then did I uncover the truth that the shares were in your hands all along."

His voice grew colder, more twisted. "Did you seriously think that your mere $200,000 investment would allow you to control my company, now worth hundreds of millions? Your scheming runs far too deep!"

Watching his crazed expression sent a chill down my spine. Fear gripped me, but beneath it was a wave of gratitude.

If he hadn’t revealed his true colors now, and if I had actually married him, the consequences would’ve been unimaginable.

The thought made me even more eager to put as much distance between us as possible.

"I’ve signed the papers. I’ll take Yvonne and leave now."

Without waiting for his response, I turned and carefully made my way toward the exit, tense and wary of any sudden moves from him.

But the thing I feared most happened anyway.

I had barely taken two steps when I heard Jasper’s sinister laughter behind me.

"Emma, did you really think I’d let you leave so easily?"

Every hair on my body stood on end, a chilling sense of danger piercing through me.

I stopped in my tracks and slowly turned to face him. Jasper held up the agreement I had just signed, waving it mockingly in my direction.

My eyes locked onto the document, and my blood ran cold.

Somehow, at some point, the breakup agreement I signed had turned into an organ donation agreement.

"Emma, with your so-called cunning, how could you think I’d waste time having you sign some useless breakup agreement? And didn’t you notice? Yvonne hasn’t made a sound since she was taken away."

Jasper’s words, dripping with venom, echoed in my ears.

My mind went blank, the horrifying truth crashing down on me.

The "breakup agreement" was a lie. What I had signed was an organ donation agreement!

Jasper never intended to let me or Yvonne leave alive today!

"Yvonne!"

Panic surged through me as I turned and bolted toward the direction where Yvonne had been taken. My heart pounded wildly, driven by sheer desperation.

"Run, Emma, run faster!" Jasper's voice called out from behind, dripping with cruel mockery. "Maybe you'll catch her last breath if you're quick enough!"

Blood.

It was everywhere.

Yvonne lay on the ground like a discarded, torn plastic bag. Her pale, rigid face was devoid of life, and her once beautiful eyes were now just two hollow, bloodied sockets. Her body was shattered beyond recognition.

I held her in my arms, collapsing into the empty room. Blood poured endlessly from her wounds, pooling around us. Her body, hollowed out and weightless, felt unnervingly light in my embrace.

"Yvonne, wake up... please, wake up. I was wrong. I should’ve listened to you and broken up with Jasper long ago. This is my fault. I dragged you into this...

"I know I was wrong. Please, wake up, okay? Didn’t we say we’d go on that trip next month? If you’re not there, who’s going to stop me from getting duped by another man? You know how clueless I am!"

I kept talking to her, over and over, hoping against hope she’d suddenly glare at me with her familiar exasperation and scold me for being a hopeless romantic.

But she didn’t respond.

She would never again ruffle my hair and call me an idiot while cleaning up the messes I made. She’d never join me in mischief again, only to take the blame afterward and demand I play the servant to make it up to her.

From our school days, she had been there—bright, vibrant, and full of life.

Now, all that remained was her cold, lifeless body in my arms, tangled in sticky, suffocating blood that clung to me like a web. My chest felt tight and the air around me was unbearably heavy.

Jasper followed behind me, his voice low and chilling, like it rose straight from the depths of hell.

"Emma, don’t blame me. If you want to blame someone, blame yourself. Who told you to drag Yvonne into this?"

He stopped in front of me, crouching down to meet my gaze.

His dark eyes, filled with cruelty and mockery, bore into me as he looked down.

I glared at him in fury, my voice trembling as I shouted, "Do you even realize this is murder!?"

Jasper, utterly unfazed, replied coldly, "When we separated both of you earlier, Yvonne signed the organ donation agreement for your sake."

His words hit me like a dagger to the heart, the pain so sharp I almost blacked out.

Yvonne... she did it for me.

Monster.

Jasper was nothing short of a monster.

"Jasper! You’ve gone insane—selling lives for money!"

But he merely smiled at me, a chillingly smug expression.

"Do you really think it’s about the money? I can offer these shares as a dowry to the Wynn family. Do you even know what the Wynn family represents?"

The mention of my family made my head snap up to look at him.

He leaned in closer, excitement blazing in his eyes as he continued. "Do you know how I built this company over the years? The Wynn family heir, Winston Wynn, holds me in very high regard. He’s given me so many contracts and so many opportunities.

"One time, I asked him why he was helping me so much. Do you know what he said? He said if I managed to get my company listed, he’d agree to let me marry his sister. He told me to work hard for it.

"Do you have any idea how shocked I was when he said that? That’s the Wynn family we’re talking about!"

I stared at him in disbelief.

I remembered what my brother had said before: if Jasper’s company could go public, he’d speak to our parents on my behalf and help me bring Jasper home to meet the family.

At the time, my brother even gave me a cryptic assurance, promising that Jasper would never dare to betray me.

I thought it was odd back then.

Now, it all made sense.

My brother had been subtly helping Jasper in secret.

But what a shame...

What a shame that this fool, Jasper, had never realized that I was the Wynn family heiress.

He thought my brother had simply taken a liking to him, wanting him to marry into the family!

Looking at Yvonne’s cold, lifeless body, a wave of immense sorrow and fury swelled within me, threatening to drown me.

At this point, it was clear that Jasper would never let me go.

Even if I revealed my true identity, he would probably resort to silencing me permanently.

But...

But I wanted him to know exactly how stupid he was and how gravely he had miscalculated.

If he was so eager to become a son-in-law of my parents, then I would give him the truth he so desperately craved.

With a cold, mocking laugh, I said, "Jasper, did it never occur to you that my last name is Wynn? That I am the Wynn family heiress you’ve been dreaming of?"