I simply placed the consent form in front of her. "Think it over and decide quickly. Time waits for no one—once your surgery is done, I still need to get back to my wedding..."

My words were cut off by a man's voice from behind.

"Wedding? Who are you marrying?"

"We've been divorced three months and you're already getting married?!"

Rhys stood at the operating room entrance, four bodyguards in black flanking him like a wall.

His tailored suit accentuated his tall frame, his presence radiating an almost suffocating pressure.

"Leonora, do you hear me talking to you?"

"What's this? Three months divorced and you've already forgotten your ex-husband?"

His gaze swept past me. Before I could respond, his expression shifted the moment he spotted Sophie on the operating table.

She lay there with an oxygen tube, her face deathly pale.

Pain flickered through Rhys's eyes instantly, and his voice turned glacial. "Leonora, what did you do to her?"

"She was perfectly fine when she left this morning! What have you two been doing behind my back?!"

Sophie raised a trembling hand toward him. "Rhys! She's trying to kill me!"

Her voice came out hoarse and broken. "She took a scalpel and twisted it inside me! She said, 'After this cut, you'll never have children again!' I begged her to stop, but she kept going until I nearly died from the pain..."

Before she could finish, violent coughs wracked her body. Her chest heaved, and the cardiac monitor shrieked its alarm.

Gasping for breath, she screamed with every ounce of strength she had left: "So you're Rhys's ex-wife!"

"Rhys, she's jealous! Jealous that I can give you children! Jealous that I'm going to be Mrs. Abbott!"

I dropped the blood-soaked gauze into the medical waste bin, then picked up the surgical record and waved it slowly in front of Rhys. "Mr. Abbott, a ruptured abscess in her lower body triggered sepsis. If your fiancée had arrived forty minutes later, she'd be in the morgue right now."

Before Rhys could take it, Sophie snatched the document away. "Rhys, she's lying! She's framing me on purpose!"

"She knows you divorced her for me, so she's using her position to get revenge!"

Sophie ripped the IV needle from the back of her hand. "Rhys, look—she deliberately missed the vein. She left bruises all over me, even on my neck!"

"She threatened me too! Said she'd leak my medical records to every media outlet so the whole world would know you married someone beneath her!"

I turned my head to look at Sophie.

Her body was indeed covered in purple marks.

But those had been there when she was admitted.

Obviously, they were love bites.

Rhys pulled her into his arms, then ground his heel into the surgical record on the floor. "Leonora, back then you tried to force me into marriage by holding my grandfather's life-saving medication hostage. When that failed, you decided to destroy Sophie instead?"

He let out a cold laugh. "Mercy Heart Hospital? You think you deserve to work here?"

"Clearly I was far too merciful during our divorce. I've spoiled you enough that you now dare to touch my woman."

"Leonora, I don't think you've ever experienced what happens when you cross Rhys Abbott."

The moment he finished speaking, two bodyguards stepped forward and wrenched my arms behind my back.

I was forced to my knees before Rhys and Sophie.

I lifted my gaze to meet his, my voice laced with mockery. "Rhys, aren't you the least bit curious why she'd rather die than have this surgery?"

The guards bound my wrists with restraints, the straps cutting into flesh, pain radiating through my entire body.

I'd hemorrhaged during a difficult delivery. I was still nursing. My body hadn't recovered. The forced position sent agony tearing through my abdomen.

Cold sweat seeped from every pore. I forced each word through gritted teeth. "She has seventeen different men saved in her phone—guys she's been flirting with. Last week alone, she checked into hotels with three of them. Call Dr. Grant Abbott Abbott right now. Ask him just how dangerous that kind of lifestyle really is."

"Lies!" Sophie shrieked. "You're framing me!"

The tears came instantly, streaming down her cheeks as she crumpled into Rhys's arms.

"Rhys," she sobbed, "she's gone too far. She's using her position at this hospital to forge documents and slander me."

"You know I've always been with you. How could I possibly be with other men? How could I have contracted anything?"

"Rhys, are you really going to let her bully me like this? You have to make her pay..."

With every word of her accusation, Rhys's expression darkened further. "Drag her to the underground freezer. No one releases her without my explicit order."

The bodyguards seized my arms and hauled me toward the fire escape.

I struggled, but their grip only tightened. Pain shot through my body until even the stairs seemed to pitch and sway before my eyes.

"Rhys Abbott! Ignore what I've told you and you'll regret it."

Behind me, Sophie's wailing grew louder.

"Rhys, make her disappear. I can't stand looking at her anymore. If she finds out we're getting married soon, she'll try to ruin our wedding."

Rhys's voice softened as he soothed her. "Shh, trust me, baby. I won't let anything go wrong on our wedding day."

"You're going to be the most beautiful bride in the world."

"..."

The freezer door groaned shut.

Minus fifteen degrees. The cold hit like a thousand ice needles, piercing straight through to my bones.

I curled up against one of the storage units, pounding on the door. "Rhys Abbott, let me out!"

"This is false imprisonment! It's illegal! Let me out!"

My thin surgical scrubs were useless against the biting cold. My thoughts began to blur, freezing over like frost on glass.

I don't know how long I'd been there when Rhys's voice cut through the haze. "Learned your lesson yet? Going to try this again?"

"Leonora, don't think that giving me a child entitles you to touch what's mine."

"I'm making sure you understand exactly what happens to anyone who does."

Rhys stood just outside the freezer, carrying Sophie in his arms like a princess.

She was wrapped in his suit jacket, her face still pale—but beneath that fragile exterior, her eyes glinted with calculation.

Sophie nestled deeper into his embrace. "Rhys, it's so cold here. Do you think she'll freeze?"

I'd seen her medical report. I knew how serious her condition was.

Instead of worrying about me, she should be counting how many days she had left.

"But she's so wicked," Sophie continued. "After everything she's put me through, a little freezing is the least she deserves."

She gazed up at Rhys, her voice trembling with practiced fear. "I'm terrified she'll come after me once she gets out. Back in the operating room, the way she looked at me... like she wanted to tear me apart."

Rhys held her close, sparing me a single glacial glance. "As long as I'm here, she can't touch you."

Sophie's eyes welled with fresh tears. "But what if she holds a grudge? What if she spreads rumors about my... my personal life?"

"Everything she said was made up. She's jealous of me. She's trying to destroy my reputation..."

"If it damages you or the Delgado Group, I'll never forgive myself."

"Rhys, please don't believe her lies. You're the only one in my heart. She's just trying to drive us apart so she can worm her way back to you."

My teeth chattered violently, my whole body screaming in agony. Thoughts were becoming impossible to form. "Sophie... do you dare unlock your phone for Rhys to see? Do you dare let him check your hotel records from last week?"

"Shut up!" Sophie's voice shot up an octave.

"Rhys, look! She's still spouting nonsense! I didn't do anything! She's framing me!"

She deliberately leaned into Rhys's embrace, but the movement pulled at the bruises on her wrist. A pained whimper escaped her lips. "Ah... it hurts... Rhys, I can't stand hearing her voice anymore!"

The cold in Rhys's eyes deepened into something glacial. "Turn the temperature to the lowest setting. Let's see if she still dares to spew lies."

The guard by the door obeyed instantly.

The cold air intensified with brutal force. White frost crystallized across the metal walls.

A metallic sweetness surged up my throat. My fingernails scraped against the freezer's interior, producing a sound that made my own skin crawl.

My vision began to darken at the edges.

Rhys's voice reached me like a final verdict. "Leonora, when you learn to behave, I'll let you out."

"Otherwise, you'll stay in there forever."

My consciousness started to scatter. The cold had frozen me into complete stillness.

I forced out my last shred of awareness. "Rhys... let me out..."

But he simply turned away, Sophie still cradled in his arms.

Just before they could leave, the corridor door slammed open with a deafening crash.

Head Nurse Elaine Porter burst in clutching a stack of lab reports, her voice sharp with urgency. "Sophie Pruitt's HIV test came back positive! Every instrument from the operating room must be destroyed immediately!"

She slapped the reports down on the nearest surface, her voice cutting through the air like a blade. "You've all been exposed to her blood! Get to post-exposure treatment NOW—wait any longer and it'll be too late!"

Rhys's hand froze mid-air. The color drained from his face in an instant. "What did you say?! That's impossible!"