I was placed under complete house arrest. My phone and ID were confiscated, and I was locked inside the villa with no way out.

Stan went to the office during the day. At night, he came home and found new ways to torment me.

At meals, he had the housekeeper prepare dishes he knew made me nauseous. At bedtime, he cranked the air conditioning down to freezing and left me to shiver through the night.

Eventually, he stopped pretending altogether and brought Annette home.

Right in front of me, he held her close, his arms wrapped around her while she nuzzled against him.

"Stan, Miss Kaufman is watching," Annette murmured, nestled in his arms.

Stan spared me a careless glance.

"She's just a disobedient little toy. Ignore her."

I sat on the couch and watched their performance. Not a single ripple disturbed my heart. If anything, I found it laughable.

In my past life, I'd been kept in the dark, drowning in agony. Now all I felt was disgust.

I stood to go back to my room.

Annette called out behind me.

"Miss Kaufman, could you pour me a glass of water?"

I didn't bother acknowledging her and kept walking.

Stan's voice cut through the air like a blade.

"Stop."

"Annette asked you to pour her water. Are you deaf?"

I paused and turned around.

"You married me just to make me your maid?"

Stan closed the distance in two strides, seized a fistful of my hair, and wrenched my head back.

"Wife?" He looked down at me with open contempt. "You think you deserve that title?"

"Jade, I married you for one reason: to make you suffer."

"Your father destroyed Annette's family. Ruined everything she had. That debt falls to you now."

I froze.

My father destroyed Annette's family?

That was absurd. My father ran his business with integrity. He would never have hurt anyone.

"That's a lie!" I thrashed against his grip.

Stan shoved me away.

"Deny it all you want."

"It doesn't matter. You'll spend the rest of your life atoning."

He turned to Annette, and his voice softened instantly, as if he were speaking to a completely different person.

"Annette, how would you like to punish her?"

Annette fixed her gaze on me.

"Stan, I've been so dizzy lately. The doctor says I'm anemic."

She tilted her head, a picture of innocence. "Maybe Miss Kaufman could spare some blood for me?"

Stan agreed without hesitation.

"Done."

He called in a private physician. Several people pinned me to the table while the doctor inserted the needle. They drew a full eight hundred milliliters of blood.

My vision went black. Cold seeped through every inch of my body. I crumpled to the floor, too weak to even lift a finger.

Stan looked down at me. There was nothing in his eyes. No pity. No hesitation. Nothing.

"This is just the beginning."

"Jade, everything you owe Annette, I will take back from you. Piece by piece."

For days after the blood draw, I burned with a fever that wouldn't break.

Stan refused to let anyone call a doctor. The only thing the housekeeper was allowed to give me was a bitter herbal concoction forced down my throat each day.

I was too weak to leave the bed.

Annette, on the other hand, made a point of visiting my room to gloat.

"Jade, you really are pathetic right now."

She dragged a manicured nail down my cheek.

"Stan doesn't love you. He never did. Every time he touches you, it makes his skin crawl."

"Your wedding night, he actually..."

She paused on purpose, pressing her fingers to her lips to stifle a coy little laugh.

"He actually hired some homeless man off the street to keep you company."

"Too bad you ran. You missed the full experience."

My eyes snapped open. I stared at her, unblinking.

Even though I already knew the truth, hearing it spoken aloud still made bile rise in my throat.

I forced my trembling body upright and slapped her across the face with every ounce of strength I had left.

"Get out."

Annette shrieked and tumbled to the floor.

Footsteps pounded outside the door. Stan burst into the room. The moment he saw Annette on the ground, the color drained from his face. He rushed to her side and gathered her up.

"Annette, are you okay?"

Annette clutched her cheek, tears streaming down her face.

"Stan, I just felt sorry for Miss Kaufman. I only came to check on her."

"She hit me..."

Stan turned and glared at me, fury blazing in his eyes.

"Jade, you have a death wish."

He strode over and backhanded me across the face.

I had no strength left. The blow knocked me onto the bed, and blood trickled from the corner of my mouth. All I could hear was a high-pitched ringing in my ears.

"Touch her again, and I'll end you."

I wiped the blood from my lips and lifted my face, laughing.

"Go ahead. Kill me now."

Stan seized my chin in a crushing grip.

"Kill you? That would be letting you off too easy."

"Annette's kidneys are failing. Your tissue was a perfect match."

"Next month, you're going into surgery."

My mind went blank. He was going to cut a kidney out of me while I was still breathing.

"I won't do it!"

"This is a crime!"

Stan's lip curled.

"In this house, I am the law."

The days that followed were a living prison.

Every day they forced needles into my arms, pumping me full of nutritional supplements to keep my organs in peak condition. I tried to escape, but the villa was surrounded by bodyguards. I couldn't even get past the front gate.

Despair swallowed me whole.

Then one day, a maid forgot to lock my door.

I slipped out and crept downstairs to the landline, dialing 911 with shaking hands.

"Hello, I need help. I'm being held against my will. They're planning to harvest my organs—"

The line went dead. Someone had ripped the cord from the wall.

Stan stood behind me, his face dark as a storm.

"Jade. You never learn."

He grabbed a fistful of my hair and dragged me all the way back to my room, hurling me onto the bed.

"Since you're so desperate to run, we'll do the surgery today."

He called in the bodyguards. They strapped me to a gurney.

The surgical light was blinding. I thrashed against the restraints until the straps carved raw, bleeding lines into my wrists.

"Stan Delgado, you'll rot in hell for this!"

"Let me go!"

Stan stood beside the operating table, his expression empty.

"Jade, this is what you owe Annette."

He turned to leave. The moment he did, a violent cramp tore through my abdomen.

"It hurts..."

"God, it hurts..."

The doctor rushed over to examine me. The color drained from his face.

"Mr. Delgado, she... she's pregnant!"

"There are signs of a threatened miscarriage. If we proceed with the kidney extraction now, both the mother and the baby could die."

Stan froze mid-step.

He turned slowly and stared at my flat stomach.

"What did you just say?"

The doctor's voice trembled. "She's almost two months along."

Two months. That lined up exactly with the night we signed our marriage certificate. The night he forced himself on me.

The pain was dragging me under, but I clung to the sheets with white-knuckled fists.

"Stan..."

"Please... save the baby..."

This was my flesh and blood. No matter how much I despised Stan, I couldn't let my child die.

Stan's expression shifted, unreadable, warring with itself.

The doors swung open and a nurse wheeled Annette in.

Her face was ashen, her voice a pitiful whimper.

"Stan, I feel so awful..."

"The doctors said my kidneys are already shutting down. If I don't get the surgery soon, I won't make it through the night..."

In my past life, he'd ignored me while I hemorrhaged during a difficult labor. Now, with two lives hanging in the balance, he walked toward Annette all the same.

Stan's voice was ice.

"It's just a bastard. Losing it changes nothing."

"Prep the kidney transplant. Save Annette first."

My whole body shook. He wouldn't even spare his own child.

"Stan Delgado! You'll pay for this!"

The scream ripped from my throat, tears and cold sweat streaming down my face.

Then the explosion hit.