Terence's POV

“Remember, I will not allow anything to happen to Jeremy!”

That was the last thing I heard before everything went dark.

Then, I had a long, long dream.

In it, I went back to the day I first met Queenie. It was during our university’s welcome party, and she fell for me at first sight. To win me over, the proud and temperamental heiress wrote me 999 love letters, chasing me patiently through our entire college life.

Eventually, I gave in. She threw herself into my arms like an excited little girl and cried with joy.

Two years later, her career skyrocketed. On the day her company went public, she dropped to one knee with a massive diamond ring already prepared. She looked up at me and said, “Terence, marry me. You’re my whole world. I swear I’ll never let you down in this lifetime.”

When my mother found out, she didn’t approve. She even warned me, “Women in that world are never to be trusted.”

But I didn’t listen. We fought bitterly, and I even made a bet with her that Queenie was different.

And for a while, it seemed I was right.

After we got married, she treated me well. She never came home late, never let me suffer even the slightest injury.

Until the night she was drugged and ended up sleeping with a so-called “pure” college boy.

And that boy was Jeremy.

The next morning, I saw the same burning passion she once had for me, now directed at someone else.

Still, I couldn’t let go. I refused to believe the woman who once loved me so deeply was truly gone. I couldn’t accept that I’d lost to her world and its cruel rules.

So I didn’t bring up divorce. I held on, trying desperately to save our crumbling marriage.

But the moment she hung my mother still on a ventilator from an excavator, that was when I finally realized I had lost completely and brutally.

With that, the dream ended.

I jolted awake with the image of the heart monitor’s flatline still burned into my brain.

Ripping out the IV needle in my arm, I staggered out of the hospital bed and ran straight for the morgue.

But after searching every cold storage locker, I couldn’t find my mother’s body.

Panic surged through me.

Then I heard two nurses coming out of the room next door, retching over a trash can.

“That was disgusting,” one gagged. “He looked so polite and well-groomed. Who knew he was into that?”

“Right?” the other said. “I don’t even know what kind of fetish that is. Said he wanted to understand the human body, and used a sixty-something-year-old woman for the experiment. The body was already stiff and he still cut into it. Ugh!”

My blood ran cold upon hearing that horrible conversation. Then I rushed over and grabbed one of the nurses with trembling hands.

“What… what did you just say?” I asked, my voice shaking. “What sixty-year-old woman? What do you mean?!”

Startled, the nurse stammered, “There… there was an old woman who passed away yesterday. We couldn’t reach any relatives, so she was placed in the morgue. But then, the hospital director’s boyfriend had just had a kidney transplant and said he wanted to learn more about the surgery, so he…he dissected the body.”

I didn’t hear the rest. My ears buzzed, and my veins froze. My stomach turned inside out.

I shoved past them and bolted into the next room like a madman.

There, lying on the operating table was my mother.

Her body was unrecognizable, mangled, and dissected. Not a single organ was intact.

My knees gave out at the scene.

I collapsed beside her, shaking violently, unable to even form a coherent sentence.

Then Jeremy walked in, smug and proud, as if this were something to celebrate.

At that instant, I saw red.

I lunged at him, grabbed him by the throat, and squeezed with everything I had.

“You touched my mother’s body?!” I screamed. “I’ll make you pay for that with your damn life!!”

His eyes rolled back as he struggled, clawing at my hands for air.

I reached for the surgical knife nearby and aimed straight for his heart.

But just before I could strike, someone kicked me hard from the side.

My head hit the floor with a crack, and the wounds on my body tore open again, blood seeping out like I’d been ripped apart.

Terence's POV

I looked up and met Queenie’s furious gaze.

“Terence, are you insane? You tried to stab Jeremy with a knife! If he so much as gets a scratch, I’ll throw you and that crippled mother of yours out of our family!”

I laughed. Laughed so hard that I cried.

Pointing at her, I spoke with nothing but despair in my voice, “You’re right. I am insane, driven insane by you! Queenie, after what you did to my mother, do you really think I’d still stay in your family? But how dare you let him do that to her body? That was my mother!”

Her brows furrowed, and she gave me a look of disgust. “What nonsense are you talking about? I didn’t kill your mother! She’s lying safe and sound in her room!”

She was still acting and pretending.

“Hospitals use cadavers to teach anatomy, Terence! That’s just a random body, not your mom,” she even added.

Then, without another glance, she gently helped Jeremy to his feet and walked away.

But I couldn’t take my eyes off the body, the one with the exact same birthmark on her chest as me.

Just then, I coughed up blood.

How could I not feel pain?

That was my mother, the woman who carried me for nine months, the woman who raised and protected me.

And now she was gone, ripped from this world right in front of me.

And I never even got to close her eyes.

Numb, I dragged myself up and quietly arranged her funeral alone.

Afterward, with my heart in ruins, I dialed a number.

“Hello? Didn’t you say you’ve been waiting to take down Queenie? I’ll help you. But you need to agree to one condition.”

After the call, I took my mother home.

The same home where she once smiled and fussed over me like I was her whole world.

Now, she was reduced to a box of ashes. And I couldn’t hold it in anymore. I broke down sobbing.

On the seventh day after her death, I brought her ashes to a church to pray for her soul’s peace.

While the priest was chanting a blessing, Jeremy suddenly appeared, looking fresh and lively, nothing like someone who’d just had surgery.

He walked up, grinning ear to ear as he glanced at my mother’s photo.

“Well, she’s finally dead, huh?” he said smugly. “You have no idea how hard it was to swap her out for that dummy body!”

Remembering something, he lively added, “Oh, and Terence, wasn’t it satisfying? Watching Queenie toss your mom to her death just for me? Funny thing, when I cut her open, even her kidneys were smashed to pieces. Brutal way to go.”

He then clapped his hands like he was celebrating a job well done.

My blood turned cold, and my stomach twisted with a pain so violent it felt like my organs were ripping apart.

In that instant, I snapped.

I grabbed him by the hair and slammed his head to the floor, again and again.

“Kneel!” I roared. “Kneel and apologize to my mother!!”

Blood streamed down his face. But even then, he smirked, eyes filled with defiance.

“You think this’ll bring her back? You think this is revenge? Dream on, loser.”

Before I could react, he shoved his hand straight into the church’s candle altar.

Smoke curled from his blackened fingers as he collapsed to his knees before me, tears streaking down his cheeks.

“Terence, I’m sorry!” he wailed. “I shouldn’t have taken your kidney. I shouldn’t have let Queenie fall for me. Please, just let me go. It hurts so much!”

When Queenie arrived, this was the scene she walked in on.

Without hesitation, she slapped me so hard I crashed to the floor.

“Terence! How dare you keep hurting him? Have I given you any right to behave like this?!”

I lay there in a mess of blood and melted candles, laughing bitterly.

Such a pathetic performance, and yet Queenie didn’t even ask what happened. To her, I was already guilty.

Disgusted, she sneered down at me and said, “No wonder, you really are her son. Just as worthless as your crippled mother!”

The moment she brought up my mother, I felt something inside me snap.

My eyes burned red as I glared up at her.

Terence's POV

“Queenie, don’t you dare speak about my mother! You’re a murderer! You don’t deserve to say her name!”

My voice trembled with rage, every word burning in my throat. For a moment, she hesitated, as if sensing I wasn’t faking this pain. She opened her mouth like she wanted to say something, but Jeremy clung to her like a helpless child.

Trembling, he said, “Queenie... I can’t breathe. Terence said he burned my photo and mixed its ashes into the urn. It must be working... it hurts…”

The moment those words left his mouth, all the doubt on Queenie’s face disappeared.

Her expression turned cold as ice.

She picked up the urn from the floor, opened the lid, and her gaze darkened.

I shook my head violently, heart thundering in my chest. I begged, pleaded like a madman, “No! Please, don’t! Queenie, that’s my mother in there—!”

Before I could finish, she let go, and the urn slipped from her fingers and dropped into the fire pit.

In an instant, everything was gone.

“No!”

I screamed until my voice gave out. I plunged my hands into the flames without thinking, causing blisters to erupt instantly. But I didn’t care. I just wanted to grab anything that was left of her.

But there was nothing.

Not even a trace of her ashes.

I collapsed on the ground, broken and howling in despair.

But Queenie simply looked at me like I was insane, then turned and walked off with Jeremy in her arms.

As she left, she threw out one cold sentence, “Jeremy’s birthday is next week. If you show up and apologize, I’ll pretend none of this happened. I’ll even keep your mother in the hospital, just like before.”

But I said nothing and just held the scorched, discolored urn to my chest like it was the last piece of my soul.

Third Person's POV

A week had passed, but Terence never showed up to apologize.

Furious, Queenie stormed into the hospital room where his mother had stayed, ready to drag him out herself.

But when she pushed the door open, the room was completely empty.

Something sank deep in her chest.

Just as she reached for her phone, her assistant came rushing in, face pale with panic.

“Ms. Hawkins… they said Mr. Shaw’s mother passed away… a week ago! And no one’s seen him since!”