“Deborah Harding! You vicious bitch!”

Every drop of blood in my body was on fire. I lunged at Deborah like a woman possessed.

“I'll kill you! I'll kill you, you poisonous wretch!”

“Renee! You've lost your mind!”

Ferdinand moved fast, catching me around the waist and hauling me back.

“Are you blind, Ferdinand?”

I screamed at him, raw and unhinged.

“That drug is not medicine! It's poison! Deborah's been using it to destroy my mother! How long are you going to keep protecting her?!”

“Shut your mouth! You'd really stoop to making up lies like this just to smear Deborah?”

My words only enraged him further. He gave a cold flick of his hand,

and the bodyguards behind him stepped forward instantly, pinning my arms on both sides.

“Since you won't apologize and you can't control your mother, let me help you out.”

He didn't look at me again. He turned, walked to the corner of the room, and pulled a box from his pocket.

The miracle drug. He shook out two pills and crouched down beside my mother.

“Mom, time to take your medicine.”

“No!”

“Ferdinand, don't give that to her! It's poison!”

Ferdinand didn't hear a word. He pressed the pills to my mother's lips.

“Let me go! Please! Ferdinand, I'm begging you! Don't make her take it!”

“I'll apologize! I'll apologize to all of you! Please!”

“Too late.”

Ferdinand's face was blank. He forced the pills down my mother's throat.

Within moments, her thrashing stilled.

But it wasn't a normal calm. The panic in her eyes drained away into nothing, replaced by a hollow, vacant stare. She looked like someone whose soul had been pulled clean out of her body.

Ferdinand smiled.

He looked at her state, dusted off his hands with satisfaction, and turned to me, a trace of smugness in his voice：

“Anything else to say? That's the miracle drug, right there. You can see for yourself how well it works.”

I said nothing. Tears kept falling.

Whatever Ferdinand was saying, I couldn't make it out anymore. There was only one thought left in my head：

Get out. I had to take my mother and get out of here.

“Ferdinand.”

My voice came out slow, scraped so raw it was barely audible.

“Let's get a divorce.”

The word lit something behind his eyes, fury flaring white-hot.

“Even now, all you can think about is a divorce? Fine. I'll give you exactly what you want!”

Deborah, who had been hiding in Ferdinand's arms the whole time, rolled her eyes and spoke up：

“Ferdinand, since you two are getting divorced anyway, could you have Renee clear things up for everyone? She's the other woman, not me.”

“People keep pointing fingers at me, and I don't want our baby born with that kind of label.”

Ferdinand looked down at Deborah, and his gaze softened instantly. Then he raised his head and addressed me, cold and flat：

“You heard her. Tomorrow is Deborah's birthday gala. You'll stand in front of everyone and admit that you're the other woman.”

He knew the truth better than anyone. Deborah was the one who had dumped him and left the country.

When he was drowning himself in liquor every night, I was the one at his side.

He was the one who chased me like a man obsessed, swearing he'd give me everything.

I stared at that face, so familiar and so foreign at the same time, and I laughed. Tears slid down from the corners of my eyes.

“Fine.”

“As long as I can divorce you, as long as I can take my mother out of here, I'll say whatever you want.”

Ferdinand finally nodded, satisfied, and left with Deborah on his arm.

After I settled my mother, I didn't hesitate for a second. I walked into the obstetrics operating room alone.

I didn't need to wait until tomorrow. This man's child, I didn't want it anymore.

I couldn't let my child carry his blood. Couldn't let my baby call the woman who drove my mother insane and poisoned her "Daddy's" anything.

I lay on the operating table, and the moment the cold instruments entered my body, my nose stung with tears I hadn't expected.

“I'm sorry,” I whispered in my heart. “I'm so sorry, baby.”

It wasn't that I didn't want you. It was that I could never let Ferdinand Sanchez be your father. He didn't deserve it.

The next day, I showed up at Deborah Harding's birthday gala right on time.

The event was extravagant. She'd booked the most luxurious hotel in the city, and the guest list read like a who's who of high society.

Ferdinand stood in the crowd, holding court with easy charm. When he saw me walk in, he froze for a split second.

Maybe he noticed that my belly, still slightly rounded yesterday, was now flat.

Or maybe he was surprised I'd actually come to keep my promise.

Deborah pressed herself against Ferdinand's side, marking her territory for all to see.

None of it mattered anymore. After today, I'd have nothing to do with either of them ever again.

I walked straight to the front of the ballroom. The moment I picked up the microphone, the entire room went silent.

“Good evening, everyone. My name is Renee Vance. I'm Ferdinand Sanchez's wife. Or rather, I was.”

“I'd like to borrow a moment of Ms. Harding's birthday celebration to set the record straight about something.”

“The person who spread the rumors at my wedding and drove my mother to a mental breakdown wasn't a stranger. It was tonight's guest of honor——Deborah Harding.”

The smile on Ferdinand's face turned to stone.

Deborah shrieked：“You're lying! You're making this up!”

I didn't flinch. My gaze cut like a blade, fixed on Ferdinand as the color drained from his face.

“And my husband, Ferdinand Sanchez, knew the entire time. He helped her cover it up.”

“They pretended to get my mother medical treatment while feeding her poison for months, making her condition worse, pushing her into complete psychosis!”

Ferdinand stormed the stage, livid, and ripped the microphone from my hand.

Facing a sea of stunned guests exchanging uneasy glances, his expression was dark.

“My apologies, everyone. She's……been under a lot of stress lately. Mentally, she's become unstable, just like her mother.”

“Everything she just said is the rambling of a disturbed woman. Don't believe a word of it.”

Down below, Deborah reacted fast. Eyes brimming with tears, she pointed at me and addressed the crowd：

“Renee, how could you slander me like this? I never hurt your mother. I never spread any rumors.”

I stared them both down, my voice steady：

“I'm not crazy. Every single word I said is the truth.”

“Where's the proof?”

Ferdinand let out a cold laugh, his eyes full of contempt.

“Renee Vance, claims require evidence. You can't produce a shred of proof, yet here you are making a scene like some unhinged woman. Who's going to believe you?”

“She's right, where's the evidence? No proof means it's slander.”

“She really has lost it……”

The guests began piling on, their stares dripping with disdain.

Ferdinand scoffed and raised his hand, about to signal security to drag me off the stage.

That was when the ballroom doors swung open.

“Who needs proof? I've got it right here.”