"Six months, Sabrina. At most." Dr. Evans slid the manila folder across his steel desk.

I stared at the stark white paper. "There has to be a mistake. Run the tests again."

"I ran them three times. Your heart muscle is deteriorating rapidly."

"But I’m twenty-nine. I don’t have a family history of heart disease."

"Sometimes genetics mutate. Sometimes the body just gives out under extreme stress."

"Extreme stress? You mean taking care of my husband?"

"You spent seven years in this hospital, Sabrina. You barely slept. You didn't eat right. Now that Colton is awake and fully recovered, your body is finally crashing."

"So I saved his life just to lose mine?"

Dr. Evans sighed, folding his hands on the desk. "Get your affairs in order. Spend time with Colton. Take that vacation you two always talked about."

"Six months," I repeated.

"I'll prescribe pain management medication. But you need to tell him today."

"I will. He'll know what to do. Colton always knows what to do."

I pushed the front door open. The heavy scent of white roses filled the entryway. Dozens of bouquets covered the mahogany coffee table. In the center sat a velvet box.

"Colton?" I called out.

"In here," he answered.

He stepped into the living room, adjusting the cuffs of a tailored black suit.

"You're home early," he said.

"What is all this? Are we celebrating?"

"In a way."

"Is it for my birthday? That's next month."

"It's not for you." He picked up a thick envelope from the side table and held it out. "Sign these."

"Sign what?"

"The divorce agreement."

"Divorce? Colton, what are you talking about?"

"Opal is back."

"Opal?" I laughed, a harsh, bitter sound. "The woman who blocked your number the day after your car wrapped around a tree? That Opal?"

"Keep your voice down," Colton warned, glancing toward the hallway as if she were hiding there.

"Why? Are you embarrassed? You should be. I stayed, Colton. I bathed you. I fed you through a tube. I slept in a plastic chair next to your bed for seven years."

"And I paid you back by marrying you when I woke up. But I never loved you, Sabrina. I was just grateful."

"Grateful? You call this gratitude?"

"Opal was scared. She was young."

"We were all young! I was twenty-two!"

"She's ready now." He tapped the envelope against the glass table. "I've left you the house in the suburbs and a generous alimony. It's more than fair."

"You're proposing to her. Today."

"Yes."

"While we are still married."

"That's why I need your signature." He checked his gold watch. "I have a reservation at eight. Please don't make this difficult."

"Did you even try to love me?" I asked, my voice cracking. "Even for a single day since you woke up?"

"Love isn't something you try to do. It just is. And it is with Opal."

"Seven years of my life, Colton. I dropped out of college. I worked three jobs to pay for your experimental treatments."

"I didn't ask you to sacrifice your twenties for me. You chose to play the martyr."

"I was your wife!"

"On paper. Because my parents insisted I owed you. They're gone now. I don't owe anyone anything."

"You owe me your life."

"I wrote you a check for two million dollars. That covers your time."

"My time? You think you can buy back the youth I gave you?"

"Take the money, Sabrina. Move on. Find someone who actually wants you."

I stared at him. The man I saved. He stood tall, broad-shouldered, radiating health. Meanwhile, my own heart was rotting inside my chest, giving out after years of carrying his weight. I came home to tell him I was dying. He beat me to the punch.

"Where do I sign?" I asked.

"Bottom of page twelve."

"I'll look them over," I said, snatching the envelope from his hand.

"Sabrina, just sign them now."

"No. I need time."

"Don't drag this out. Opal wants a spring wedding."

"I just found out you're leaving me for the woman who left you to die. You can wait a few hours."

I turned and walked out the door.

The night air stung my face. I drove aimlessly until the neon red 'Emergency' sign of St. Jude's Hospital loomed ahead. The only place I knew. The place I spent my entire adult life. I parked and slumped onto a concrete bench near the entrance.

Tears spilled over. My chest physically hurt. A sharp, squeezing pain shot down my left arm.

"Why?" I screamed into the empty parking lot.

A passing nurse gave me a sympathetic look, but kept walking. People broke down outside hospitals every day. I was just another tragedy.

My phone buzzed. A notification from social media.

I opened it. A live video feed from a mutual friend, Sarah. The caption read: *True love always finds a way.*

Colton knelt in the center of a private dining room. Opal stood before him, wearing a stunning red dress, hands covering her mouth.

"I waited a lifetime for you," Colton said through the speaker.

"You were married," Opal whispered, playing the shy, hesitant girl.

"That was an obligation. You are my soulmate. Marry me, Opal."

"Yes. Yes, Colton."

He slipped the massive diamond onto her finger. The crowd cheered. Sarah flipped the camera around, grinning. "Can you believe it? They are finally together!"

I locked the screen. The silence of the hospital parking lot swallowed me whole.

He didn't just break my heart. He humiliated me. Everyone in that room knew he was still legally married to me. None of them cared.

I unzipped my purse, pulled out a pen, and flipped to the last page of the divorce agreement. My hands shook so violently the ink smeared, but I forced the letters out. *Sabrina Miller.*

Let him have his happily ever after. I wouldn't be around to ruin it anyway.

The moment the cap snapped back onto the pen, my phone rang. An incoming call from Dr. Evans.

I cleared my throat and answered. "Hello?"

"Sabrina, don't leave the city," Dr. Evans said. His tone was sharp, urgent.

"I'm sitting in the parking lot. Did I forget a prescription?"

"No. I was just reviewing your blood panels again." He paused, papers rustling in the background. "There's an anomaly in your toxicology report."

I gripped the phone tighter. "What does that mean?"

"I sent your samples to a specialized lab across town this morning. They just faxed back the detailed breakdown."

"Dr. Evans, you're scaring me."

"You have trace amounts of digitalis in your system. High levels built up over a long period."

"Digitalis? Foxglove? How is that possible?"

"It's a plant extract. Highly toxic to the heart muscle if ingested repeatedly."

"Are you saying my heart isn't failing naturally?"

"I'm saying someone has been poisoning you."

I shoved the phone into my pocket and drove straight to the Plaza Hotel. The engagement party from the live stream was still in full swing. I needed to look Colton in the eye. I needed to know if my husband had been slipping foxglove into my tea for years.

I pulled my phone back out in the lobby, typing a frantic message to Dr. Evans. *Send the toxicology report to my email. I need a copy right now.*

A hand clamped over my wrist. Long, red fingernails dug into my skin.

Opal plucked the phone from my grip.

"Give that back," I demanded, lunging forward.

She sidestepped, her thumb swiping across the screen. "Dr. Evans? Are we feeling unwell, Sabrina?"

"That is none of your business."

"Everything regarding Colton is my business now." Opal read the screen, her lips curling into a smirk. "Toxicology reports? Looking for a second opinion to guilt him into staying? Don't bother."

"I said give it to me."

Opal tapped the delete button. She dropped my phone onto a silver tray held by a passing waiter. "He doesn't need his ex-wife playing the sick card to ruin our night."

"I'm not playing a card. I need my medical records."

"You need to leave." She leaned in, her perfume thick and overpowering. "I intercepted your little tragedy act before you could embarrass him. You always were too desperate. Seven years playing nurse, and you still couldn't make him love you."

"I kept him alive."

"And I gave him a reason to live. There's a difference." She patted my cheek. "Do us all a favor and disappear quietly."

A microphone screeched in the ballroom.

"If I could have everyone's attention," Colton announced.

I pushed past Opal and stood in the doorway. Colton stood on a raised platform, a crystal glass in one hand. His cheeks were flushed with expensive champagne and victory.

"For seven years, I was trapped in the dark," he told the crowd. "I was told I might never walk again. Never live a normal life."

Guests clapped respectfully.

"But I fought. I fought because I knew the light was waiting for me." He extended a hand toward the wings. "Exactly one month from today, we will host the wedding of the century. Opal and I are finally making it official."

Opal glided past me, joining him on stage. She raised her left hand, letting the chandelier catch the massive diamond.

"He never gave up on me," she told the cheering room. "People whispered. They said he moved on. But he knew I was the only one he truly wanted. True love waits."

I scanned the faces of the guests. The mayor. The hospital board members. The people who watched me push Colton’s wheelchair through the park every Sunday. None of them met my gaze. They just clapped for the woman who abandoned him.

I waited by the private bar until the crowd dispersed. Colton leaned against the marble counter, downing his third whiskey.

"Did you put it in my food?" I asked, stopping two feet away.

He blinked, his eyes unfocused. "Put what?"

"Foxglove. Digitalis. Did you poison me, Colton?"

He rolled his eyes. "Are you insane? I gave you two million dollars. I didn't give you poison."

"Then who did? Someone has been destroying my heart for months."

"Nobody poisoned you, Sabrina. You're just desperate for attention." He slammed the empty glass down. "Sign the papers and leave before I have security throw you out."

"If you loved her so much, why did you marry me?" I asked. My fingers curled into fists. "Why not just pay me off when you woke up? Why make me your wife?"

Colton let out a harsh, mocking laugh. He stumbled forward, his liquor-soaked breath fanning my face.

"You really don't know?"

"Know what?"

"Look in a mirror." He pointed a finger at my face. "You were twenty-two. You had that same auburn hair. Those same green eyes. You were a carbon copy of Opal."

My jaw tightened. "What?"

"Opal left me. I was angry. But when I opened my eyes, there you were. A younger, naive version of the woman I actually wanted." He shrugged, a careless gesture that shattered my remaining dignity. "You were a convenient stand-in. A ghost to keep my bed warm until the real thing came back."

I didn't cry. I didn't scream.

Instead, a hollow laugh tore out of my throat.

Seven years. I emptied bedpans. I fought with insurance companies. I sacrificed my youth for a man who only saw another woman's face when he looked at me.

"You're a monster," I whispered.

"I'm a man who finally got his real girl back," he countered. "You were just the understudy, Sabrina. The show is over."

I turned and ran.

I burst through the glass doors into the night. A torrential downpour had started, washing over the city streets. Lightning cracked across the sky, illuminating the empty valet stand.

I made it halfway across the cobblestone driveway before the pain hit.

It wasn't a dull ache this time. It felt like a hot knife twisting directly into my chest, slicing through muscle and bone.

I gasped, clutching my shirt. My knees buckled.

The wet stone scraped my palms as I collapsed. Rain plastered my hair to my face. I struggled to drag air into my lungs, but my chest refused to expand.

A group of guests exited the hotel, laughing under large umbrellas.

"Help," I rasped, reaching a trembling hand out.

A woman in a sequined gown paused, glancing down at me. She nudged her companion. "Look at her. Completely wasted."

"Pathetic," the man agreed. "This is why Colton is leaving her. She's a mess."

They stepped around me and kept walking.

My vision blurred at the edges. The poison. The stress. The heartbreak. Dr. Evans said six months, but my body was quitting right now. I pressed my cheek against the freezing cobblestone, listening to the erratic, failing rhythm of my own heart.

Headlights cut through the darkness, blinding me.

A sleek, black Maybach rolled to a stop inches from where I lay on the ground.

The engine purred, a low, powerful hum against the drumming rain. Water washed over the polished hood.

The rear passenger window lowered smoothly.

I forced my heavy eyelids open.

A man sat in the shadows of the backseat. I couldn't see his features clearly, only the sharp line of his jaw and the cold, unyielding intensity of his gaze. He wore a dark suit, immaculate and intimidating.

He stared down at me, completely still.

"Please," I whispered, the word barely audible over the storm.

He didn't open the door. He didn't call for help.

He just watched me fade away.

My head hit the pavement, and the world went completely black. Who was he?

I opened my eyes to harsh fluorescent lights. The rhythmic beep of a heart monitor echoed off the sterile white walls.

"You're awake," a nurse noted, checking the IV taped to my hand.

"How did I get here?" I rasped, my throat feeling like sandpaper.

"A gentleman brought you in. He carried you through the emergency doors, paid your bill in cash, and vanished before we could get a name."

Before I could ask what he looked like, the door swung open.

Colton marched in, flanked by two men in sharp gray suits. Opal trailed behind him, clutching a pink designer handbag.

"Good, you're conscious," Colton stated, stopping at the foot of my bed. "We have business to conclude."

"I almost died on the pavement last night," I pointed out.

"But you didn't," Opal chimed in, adjusting her diamond necklace.

One of the suited men pulled a thick stack of documents from his leather briefcase. "Mrs. Miller, I am Mr. Davis. We have revised the divorce settlement."

"Revised?" I pushed myself upright against the stiff pillows. "You already offered the suburban house and alimony."

"That offer is off the table," Davis replied, thrusting a silver pen toward me. "My client requires a full waiver of all marital assets. You leave with what you brought into the marriage. Nothing more."

I stared at Colton. "You're cutting me off completely? After seven years of wiping your face and feeding you through a tube?"

"Circumstances changed," Colton said, his jaw tight.

Opal stepped forward, sliding a folded paper from her purse. She smoothed it out on my tray table with perfectly manicured fingers.

"I'm pregnant," she announced.

The words hit me like a physical blow. I looked from the paper to Colton's proud, beaming face.

"Pregnant," I repeated.

A strange, hollow giggle escaped my lips. I couldn't stop it. I laughed until my monitor beeped faster, the sound shrill and frantic.

Colton frowned, clearly unnerved by my reaction. "It's not a joke, Sabrina. We are starting a family."

"You were in a coma until six months ago," I managed to say, wiping a tear of pure disbelief from my eye. "And she just got back to town."

"We didn't waste time," Opal purred, resting a protective hand on her perfectly flat stomach. "The doctor confirmed it this morning. Six weeks along."

"So you need the suburban house," I guessed, the manic humor draining from my system instantly.

"A baby needs a yard," Colton agreed. "And a safe neighborhood. You understand."

"I understand you're throwing me on the street so your mistress can play house in the home I picked out."

"Sign the papers, Sabrina," Colton demanded. "Or my lawyers will tie you up in court until your legal fees bankrupt you."

I grabbed the pen from Davis. I didn't read the clauses. I just signed my name on every yellow tab, pressing so hard the tip nearly tore the paper. I shoved the clipboard back at the lawyer.

"Get out," I whispered.

Colton and the suits turned and left without another word. Opal lingered, waiting until the heavy door clicked shut.

The moment we were alone, her hand dropped from her stomach.

"Six weeks?" I asked, watching her face closely. "You've only been back for four."

Opal's lips curled into a nasty smirk. "Math never was Colton's strong suit. A fake ultrasound costs fifty bucks on the internet."

"You're lying to him."

"I'm securing my future." She reached into her pink bag and pulled out a different piece of paper. It bore the St. Jude's Hospital logo.

"What is that?" I asked.

She held it up. My name sat at the top. It was the physical copy of my toxicology report.

"Dr. Evans is so careless," Opal mocked. "Leaving private files on his desk while he steps out to fetch coffee."

"Give that to me." I ripped the IV from my hand, ignoring the sharp sting, but my weak legs failed as I tried to stand.

Opal tore the report in half. Then into quarters. She let the shredded pieces flutter into the plastic biohazard bin near the door.

"No evidence, no poison," she whispered, her eyes flashing with pure malice. "Enjoy your failing heart, Sabrina."

She spun around and walked out, leaving me alone with the hum of the machines.

Two days later, I hauled my single suitcase up three flights of stairs. The hallway smelled of old cabbage and cheap bleach. Apartment 4B. The rusty lock stuck, requiring a hard shove with my shoulder to yield.

Inside, peeling yellow wallpaper framed a single window overlooking a dark brick alley. A stained mattress lay on the floor.

I dropped my bag on the bare springs. My phone vibrated in my pocket.

A text message from my bank flashed across the cracked screen.

*Incoming Wire Transfer: $500,000.00. Sender: Anonymous.*

I blinked, rubbing my eyes to clear the exhaustion. Half a million dollars?

I unzipped the front pocket of my suitcase to find my charger. My fingers brushed against something stiff and unfamiliar.

I pulled it out. It was a thick, textured piece of cardstock. Jet black, with embossed silver lettering. No phone number. No company logo.

Just a single name.

*Benjamin.*

I flipped the card over. On the back, written in sharp, elegant ink, was a short message.

*You have six months to live. Let's make them regret it.*

I stared at the silver letters, my heart pounding a fragile, dangerous rhythm against my ribs. Who was Benjamin? And how did he know my secret?