When she opened her eyes, the sharp scent of hospital disinfectant filled her nose.

Nearby, a young nurse whispered to her colleague, "Both are women, but really, everyone has their own fate!"

"The second daughter-in-law of the Grive Family in the next ward only had a little fright, but the head of the family has been worried sick, guarding her room day and night, not even taking off his clothes to rest. He’s been so devoted, you can really ship a couple like that!"

"Unlike this one... I heard it was the servants who couldn't bear to watch and feared she’d die right there, so they called emergency services."

When Darren arrived, there was a hint of apology in his expression and he was carrying bags of nourishing supplements.

“Joanna, about what happened earlier... I was just so anxious that I acted irrationally. These tonics are my way of making it up to you. But you're allergic to peanuts, so be sure to check the ingredients carefully."

"Are you… and the baby okay?"

It was like a slap followed by a sweet date. What a clever trick. But Joanna wasn't buying it.

She forced herself to sit up and looked him straight in the eye. "Drake, how did you know I'm allergic to peanuts?"

Darren was stunned for a moment, his eyes evasive. "Mom told me, of course. When it comes to food, one has to be extra careful with pregnant women."

Full of holes! Garcia hated Joanna so much. How could she possibly remember her preferences and allergies?

Joanna quietly withdrew her gaze and looked out the window, her face filled with sorrow.

"When I heard the news of your eldest brother's death, I wanted to leave this world too, to follow him. When I swallowed a large number of sleeping pills, where was he? When I slit my wrists in the bathtub and blood flowed all over the bathroom, where was he? When I stood atop an eighteen-story building, the freezing wind cutting through me, where was he then?"

Darren's pupils trembled and he guiltily looked away. "I actually…"

Just a few seconds away from speaking, Darren’s words caught in his throat as a young nurse rushed in, flustered.

"Mr. Grive! Something’s happened to your wife! She found out you weren’t there and is threatening to slit her wrists!"

Darren still left. When Joanna’s close friend arrived, she was furious.

"Joanna, how did you end up like this? You’re not quite human, not quite a ghost!"

"How could the Grive Family treat you like this? You're the widow of their eldest son, after all! Once you give birth, just leave. In the meantime, I’ll keep an eye out for some outstanding young men. Worst case, we find you someone new and you remarry!"

That night, when Joanna went out to fetch water, she overheard Darren and Zaylee talking in the room next door.

"Honey, the informant I planted said Joanna plans to leave after giving birth. She's even planning blind dates to remarry! A fickle woman like her really can't be trusted. She has no sense of virtue as a widow!" Zaylee said indignantly.

But unlike her righteous anger, Darren's expression was complicated and especially dim. He shook his head.

"Impossible! Joanna loves me so much. There's no way she'd be willing to leave me. Blind dates? Who else does she think she can marry besides me? Even if I die, she should remain a widow for me forever."

"Just in case!" Zaylee's eyes rolled craftily. "How about this… We knock her out and get someone to take compromising photos of her. If she ever thinks about remarrying, we can use those photos to threaten her. That way, she’ll never escape the Grive Family for the rest of her life."

Just one wall away, Joanna returned to her room, closed the door and slowly slid to the floor.

This time, Darren didn’t even pretend to care about any bond they once shared as husband and wife.

That very night, a nurse sneaked into her room and slipped something into her water cup. Joanna pretended to take a sip, then turned around and vomited everything out in the washroom.

In the dead of night, someone quietly slipped into the room, climbed into bed, wrapped an arm around her waist and began planting heated kisses on her.

Joanna’s eyes flew open. Without hesitation, she reached beneath her pillow, pulled out the fruit knife she had long prepared and stabbed without a word.

"Who…"

A muffled groan rang out as the drunken man staggered to his feet, bleeding from his abdomen and barely able to stand.

Joanna turned on the light, only to realize it wasn’t someone sent by Zaylee to take indecent photos.

It was Darren.

He had bribed the young nurse to drug her, crept into her bed to touch her, force a kiss on her and even attempt to violate her.

At this moment, his drunkenness outweighed the pain. Darren was still out of it.

“Joanna, don’t go on blind dates with anyone else, I’m begging you… You’re still carrying my child, how could you possibly marry someone else?”

Under the light, the man's eyes were filled with nothing but longing.

"You’ve got the wrong person!" Joanna calmly turned her face away, deliberately emphasizing each word as she called him by his current name.

"Drake! Look closely, who am I really?"

The night breeze sobered Darren a little. Just as he reached out, wanting to hold the woman in front of him, Zaylee suddenly appeared behind them.

A harsh slap landed squarely on Joanna’s face. Gritting her teeth, Zaylee pointed at her nose and shouted, "Joanna, your husband’s dead and now you’re seducing someone else’s? What were you two doing alone in the middle of the night?"

How ironic.

Joanna, who was once Darren’s lawfully wedded wife, was now being slapped by the mistress.

Joanna raised her hand high, ready to return that slap, but Darren grabbed her wrist and flung it aside harshly.

"Enough!" the man barked, now fully sober. "Joanna, I was just drunk tonight. Don’t take it to heart. Maybe I’ve been missing my brother too much lately and got possessed by his spirit, which led to such inappropriate behavior. As for Zaylee, she’s young and immature. It was just a slap, try to be more understanding."

Joanna suddenly laughed. Her lowered hand rose again. This time, it landed squarely on Darren’s cold, emotionless face.

"Oh? Since you feel so sorry for your wife, then you can take this slap on her behalf. Be more understanding? Sorry, that’s something I’ll never learn in this lifetime!"

On the day of her discharge, the night was deep and silent. Joanna, heavily pregnant, walked alone.

Suddenly, a group of men emerged in the dim underground parking lot. One of them covered her mouth and nose from behind and dragged her toward a van.

When she opened her eyes again, she found herself in an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of town. Tied to a chair like her was Zaylee, crying bitterly with tears streaming down her face.

A man with a scar on his face lashed a whip down, causing Zaylee to instantly drop to her knees and beg for mercy. "I’m part of the Grive Family! I can give you however much money you want! Please, just let me go! I’m pregnant too!"

To her surprise, the men burst out laughing. "Pregnant? Both of the women we kidnapped are expecting? Well, that makes things even more interesting!"

"Drake took over the Grive Group and still owes us back wages. So don’t blame us for kidnapping his wife and child. But looks like our intel was off. We caught two women. Now tell us, which one of you is really Drake’s woman?"

Zaylee immediately denied it on the spot, "It’s her! She’s the one you’re looking for! I have nothing to do with this! Please, I’m begging you, just let me go!"

The rusted warehouse doors were suddenly kicked open from the outside. It was Darren as Drake, dressed neatly in a suit.

The rough ropes dug deep into Joanna’s wrists, her palms already bleeding. She looked up just in time to see Darren swallow hard, then he pointed directly at her.

"The one with the bigger belly is my wife. You all better take a good look."

"As for the one next to her… she’s my late elder brother’s wife. She has nothing to do with this."

"Let the innocent one go. As for the rest, do whatever you want."

In that instant, all the blood in Joanna’s body turned cold.

She let out a cold laugh. Sure enough, between the two women, he still chose Zaylee.

She had long stopped having any illusions about him, but hearing those words with her own ears still made her heart twist in unbearable pain.

"Do whatever you want?"

He was willing to abandon even his own flesh and blood for Zaylee.

Zaylee was handed over to Darren. He immediately breathed a sigh of relief, holding the woman in his arms and checking her body for any scars.

But Joanna became the target of vengeance by desperate criminals.

The whip struck down, one lash after another, harsh and piercing, tearing the skin and flesh on her back. Yet Joanna endured it all silently without a sound.

What’s the use of crying? No one would feel sorry for her.

In the chaos, someone set a fire. The raging flames quickly spread and everyone fled in panic.

Joanna was tied to the chair, unable to move a muscle, her life hanging by a thread. Yet Darren’s heart and eyes were fixed only on Zaylee.

He only glanced at Joanna once, his eyes filled with inner struggle. But urged on by the woman, his expression hardened with resolve.

“Hold on a little longer! I’ll take Zaylee outside first, then come back to save you!”

“She’s carrying my child. I absolutely can’t let anything happen to her. Sorry!”

Holding Zaylee tightly in his arms, Drake turned and ran out.

The ceiling beam collapsed right in front of Joanna, blocking her path to escape.

“Darren…”

Before losing consciousness, scenes from three years ago when Darren was caught in a fire flooded Joanna’s mind.

Even though he was unconscious, she still rushed into the fire alone, carrying him out by herself, even sacrificing one of her kidneys to save him.

The boomerang of the past had now struck him right between the eyes.

When Joanna opened her eyes again, she thought she was in hell.

But the tubes inserted in her body and the running ventilator made her realize she was still alive.

After all that, how was she still not dead?

The doctor sighed, "Thanks to your luck and fate, you held on until the rescue team arrived. You inhaled too much toxic gas and were unconscious for three days and nights. Fortunately, the baby in your womb was saved!"

So, Darren really did disregard her life and death, right?

Joanna struggled to sit up, but the doctor ordered someone to hold her down, "Don't move! You just had skin graft surgery. Are you trying to risk your life?"

Her whole body stiffened, like falling into an ice cellar.

“What? Skin graft surgery? Who authorized this?”

Facing Joanna’s furious question, the private doctor’s tone turned icy cold.

“We only took instructions from Mr. Grive. He was worried that the wounds on your legs would scar, so he ordered us to take healthy skin from your arm and graft it there. We had to follow his orders.”

When Darren arrived, Joanna threw everything she could grab at him, screaming hoarsely, “Zaylee is a living, breathing person you cherish, but my life means nothing to you? You had no right! How could you perform a skin graft on me without my consent?"

The man frowned, looking at her coldly. "Joanna, stop making a scene. Please calm down."

Joanna laughed until tears came out, pretending to be calm as she asked, "Take a guess. If your elder brother were still alive, what do you think he would have done?"

A flicker of struggle flashed in Darren's eyes. He didn’t know what to say and his voice turned somewhat flustered. "Joanna, once Zaylee gives birth to the baby, everything will be fine! If my brother… had survived, he would’ve made it up to you. He wouldn’t have let you down."

Joanna said nothing. She simply looked at him calmly, her gaze as still and lifeless as a pool of dead water. “Is that so? Then the child and I will wait and see.”

Darren quickly turned away, but it felt like something was stuck in his chest, making it hard to breathe.

Just a wall away, Darren’s assistant arrived as instructed.

Zaylee sat up.

“Darren, your birthday banquet with your twin brother is in a few days. Why don’t we take the opportunity to humiliate Joanna a little, just a small lesson. If something were to happen while the car is passing over the West Brigde…”

Before she could finish, the man interrupted her. He frowned, a trace of guilt flashing in his eyes. “Zaylee, how could you come up with such underhanded tactics? Is this really the gentle and delicate you I once knew?”

"You used to be so kind. Back then, you didn’t hesitate to donate one of your kidneys just to save me from that fire. I saved you this time, consider it repaying the favor. But now, why are you speaking of nothing but schemes and violence?"

Zaylee’s gaze flickered, then she suddenly pouted and wiped away a tear in a show of emotion. “I… I only did it all for you, for our child. I was afraid you’d get back together with her. I was afraid you’d leave me. I was even more afraid you’d be heartbroken if Joanna remarried.”

Leon, Darren’s assistant and longtime friend, exchanged a glance with Zaylee. At this moment, he also stepped in to mediate.

"Boss, don’t tell me you’ve really fallen for Joanna? This is just a minor punishment, that’s all. Back then, didn’t you only plan to marry her because you admired her capabilities? All these years, she’s only ever had the title of Mrs. Grove in name. You never truly loved her, did you?"

"I’ve seen with my own eyes how deep your bond with Zaylee is. She’s pregnant, how could you bear to let her feel hurt?"

Zaylee burst into tears again. "Forget it… maybe it was all just my wishful thinking. I don’t want to make things difficult for Darren."

At that moment, an image of Joanna’s once bright and innocent smile flashed through Darren’s mind, only to be quickly replaced by her current cold and emotionless expression.

He nodded, giving a stern warning in a low voice. “Just a punishment. Make sure there’s no danger to her life. No matter what, that woman is carrying the Grive Family’s blood. Nothing can be allowed to happen to her.”

Joanna stood at the doorway, her gaze dim. She dialed a number to the Spencer Family. “I have one last request. Create a lifelike corpse, modeled exactly after my proportions and appearance and real enough to pass for the real thing.”

If Darren could fake his death… then why couldn’t she?