All because his first love, Luna Harper, needed test subjects for her drug research, Jake Bertrand sent me to a mental hospital when I was pregnant just so I could serve as an experiment subject for her.

I was electroshocked until I drooled and convulsed, but he simply covered his first love’s eyes in disgust, saying, “What filth. Don’t look.”

Thanks to the results of this experiment, Luna received a nomination for an award, and he lit up the entire city with fireworks to celebrate her success.

Meanwhile, during the freezing winter night under the dazzling fireworks, I gave birth to a deformed male fetus. The child cried just once before passing away. Numbly, I placed the stillborn into a freezing chamber.

Seven days later, at the awards ceremony for Luna, it would appear in Jake’s hands as a gift.

I begged the nurse with red-rimmed eyes to help me.

The nurse, herself a mother, hesitated as she saw me clutching the lifeless fetus and crying my heart out, but she eventually agreed. She was about to leave while holding the freezer box when she bumped into Jake Bertrand.

The stench from the freezer box made Jake cover his nose. He frowned and lowered his hand only after the nurse’s figure faded into the distance.

However, nothing seemed to dampen Jake's good mood at that moment. He was like a general returning triumphantly from battle. His voice was cheerful, and it almost seemed like he was talking to himself.

“Luna’s experiment was a great success. Her dream has finally been realized.”

From the moment he entered, his eyes were fixated on the dazzling night sky outside the window, not sparing me a single glance. When he noticed my prolonged silence, he gave me a calm, appraising look and furrowed his brows.

“Joy Friedman, Luna begged you for this small favor when she returned home. Since you’ve been idle after getting pregnant, why not come here, make some friends, and help her out? There's no need to look so glum, is there?”

Let me think.

The old man who barged into my room to harass me…

The middle-aged woman who grabbed me by the neck, accusing me of stealing her money…

The woman who kicked me to the ground, claiming the child in my womb belonged to her...

These were the "friends" Jake spoke of.

Luna Harper fed me handfuls of drugs, and the child I gave birth to turned out to be deformed. The doctor who delivered the baby said that if I had come for prenatal checkups earlier, this might not have happened, but how could I expect such freedom when I didn’t even have control over my own life?

Seeing me, with my eyes reddened and head bowed, Jake leaned in, about to question me.

“Joy…”

Nevertheless, he had barely uttered my name when his attention shifted to his lit-up phone. Moonlight streamed through the window, illuminating his face with an expression of pure happiness.

In the twenty-odd minutes he spent in the room, he didn’t even notice my now-flat stomach.

Exhausted after giving birth, I was about to fall asleep when Luna’s junior delivered my medication for the day. Thinking of the deformed baby I had given birth to, I angrily threw the medicine to the ground.

Startled, the man by the window strode to my bedside in a few steps and unhesitatingly shoved the pills into my mouth. His cold voice poured into my ears. “This is part of Luna’s experiment. If you don’t take it, how is she supposed to write her report?”

With tears streaming down, I turned my head away, only for him to grab my jaw tightly and force the pills down my throat.

Jake seemed like he wanted to say something more, but after glancing at his vibrating phone, he turned and left the ward, not even bothering to take his jacket. I could more or less guess the reason for his departure.

I opened my social media app and was greeted by a picture of Luna, her nose stuffed with tissues, looking both silly and adorable.

“Watched fireworks all night and ended up catching a cold. By the way, taking one extra cold medicine pill won’t kill me, right?”

The comments were filled with Jake’s eager concern. “Caught a cold? Why didn’t you say so earlier? You’re such a little scatterbrain. You need a checkup at the hospital to be sure. Wait for me.”

That night, Jake didn’t return.

After midnight, I silently wished myself a happy birthday.

I still remember that before I was admitted to the psychiatric hospital, Jake had once accompanied me for a prenatal checkup. At that time, when the doctor had calculated the due date, he had looked so excited.

“Your due date might fall right on your birthday. Let’s celebrate properly that day!”

However, as time passed, things changed. He lit up the whole city with fireworks for Luna, just to celebrate some baseless nomination.

At dawn the next day, the nurse brought me a little palm-sized cake.

“I remember you mentioned that today’s your birthday, but… about your baby…” She hesitated but still lit a candle for me. It was her care that got me through those inhumane days.

I closed my eyes and made a wish. Just as I was about to blow out the candle, a figure appeared in the doorway. Jake glanced at the scene before him, his brows furrowing slightly like he suddenly remembered something. “Oh, today’s your birthday.”

He awkwardly patted his coat pocket, as though searching for something he could use as a gift.

To no avail, he pulled out a crumpled piece of lacy pink lingerie. Embarrassed, he stuffed it back into his pocket and stammered, “Maybe… maybe someone played a prank on me. I’ll make it up to you with a proper gift later.”

I blew out the candle abruptly and replied without thinking, “There’s no need.”

The words had barely left my mouth when Jake’s expression darkened instantly. With a displeased look, he shoved his hands into his pockets.

“All this fuss over a gift? Really? I paid for your mom’s medical treatment when she was gravely ill. And now you’re throwing a tantrum over a lousy birthday? Don’t you think you’re being unreasonable?”

I bit my lip, silently listening until he was done. He was right. He was my family’s savior. I owed him, and it seemed like I could never repay that debt.

Even the nurse sitting at the bedside couldn’t take it anymore. She stood up to leave and accidentally bumped into Jake’s shoulder. Staggering, his expression grew even more unpleasant, and his chest rose and fell exaggeratedly.

He shot me a reproachful look, then decided to leave, only to run into Luna entering the room in her lab coat, under which was a short lacy dress faintly visible beneath.

Jake’s anger inexplicably dissipated. He hurried forward and said in a gentle tone, “I told you to rest at home. Why are you here again?”

Luna sneezed, waving her hand dismissively. “Thanks to you taking off your coat and warming me up yesterday, I’m feeling much better now.”

She suddenly realized there were others in the room, quickly retracted her flirtatious gaze, and gave me a polite smile. “I came today because there’s an important experiment to conduct, and I need Joy’s cooperation.”

My heart sank. I looked at Jake with pleading eyes, shaking my head repeatedly, begging him not to agree. However, he turned to Luna with a generous smile and said nonchalantly, “It’s fine. She’s not doing anything else anyway.”

At that moment, the knife hanging over my heart finally fell.

Luna curved her lips into a smile and added as she glanced at me. “This might hurt a little, but as long as you endure it, it’ll be fine. Joy, you’ve cooperated so many times before. I’m sure you’ll do great this time too.”

A sense of foreboding crawled over my chest.

Jake poured a significant amount of startup funding into setting up Luna’s laboratory. He allowed her to test her self-developed drugs on living people, even indulging her in extreme electroshock therapy.

Every time, it was Jake who cleaned up her messes, and he seemed to enjoy it. Even still, I never imagined that one day, Jake would let Luna torment me like this.

I didn’t resist strongly because I owed him too much. After all, once the experiments were over, surely the debt would be repaid in full, right?

Luna shattered the silence with a few claps. Moments later, a group of doctors holding various tools entered the room. As the equipment was set up, Luna suddenly leaned coyly against Jake’s shoulder, pouting. “Jake, I’m feeling a bit scared now.”

His heart seemed to ache for her. He gently covered her eyes with his hand as he spoke in a tender voice, “Let’s step outside for now. We can get them to send the data over later.”

In the room, I lay on the cold hospital bed, staring at the ceiling without blinking as they restrained my hands and feet. The light blurred, and my consciousness began to fade. As the voltage increased, my body grew numb, but my mind occasionally cleared.

In a daze, I heard the people around me scrambling and the clattering of equipment.

“Tsk, what are you doing? Can’t you even control the voltage properly?”

The next thing I knew, my body convulsed violently. Faintly, I heard someone shout, “Hurry, hurry! Get her to emergency care. Maybe there’s still time!”

I didn’t struggle; it felt like being knocked out by a club.

When I opened my eyes again, I was in a new and unfamiliar hospital room. Before I could speak, a sweet voice chimed in my ear, “You’ve worked so hard, Joy. Here’s a little compensation for you.”

Luna gave me a sugary smile before pulling out a bill from her bag and placing it beside my pillow. She turned around, immediately putting on a pitiful expression as Jake entered the room.

Gone was the sinister grin. Instead, she frowned and lowered her head. “It’s all my fault. I was too careless, which caused Joy to pass out. I’ve already apologized to her.”

Jake gave me a quick glance, then affectionately patted Luna on the head. “It wasn’t intentional, so there’s no need to apologize.”

Then, he paused for a moment, as if a thought had crossed his mind, and walked over to my bedside. “The doctor said there’s no baby anymore. Why didn’t you tell me when you were giving birth?”

I stayed silent. At the time, he had been busy watching fireworks with Luna. I had sent him countless messages, none of which he replied to.

The nurse beside me was about to explain, but I raised my hand to stop her. I told Jake, “The baby is very weak and needs to stay in an incubator for a few days.”

To avoid further questions, I added, “It’s a boy.”

Jake lowered his head thoughtfully, a faint smile tugging at his lips. He nodded in satisfaction.

“Good. As long as he’s out now. You’ve been holding on for so long. Tonight, I’ll take you to a restaurant to celebrate properly.”

Without waiting for my response, Jake dragged me to a clothing store and bought me a dress. When he zipped me up, his eyes caught sight of the bruises all over my exposed skin, and his hands froze, but in the end, he said nothing.

At the restaurant table, Jake’s eyes stayed glued to his phone the entire time. He even left for the restroom for over twenty minutes. When he returned, he finally remembered to ask the waiter for a menu, but he was distracted and pointed aimlessly.

Bewildered, the waiter froze as Jake pointed to the restaurant’s address printed on the menu.

Sighing, I took the menu myself, ordered the food, and handed it back.

A while later, just when all the dishes were served, Jake hurriedly stood up, grabbing his coat.

“Luna got picked on at a party. I need to go check on her right away.”