The day I nearly died in the delivery room, Carter was out cheating on me. Throughout my entire postpartum recovery, he flew that woman all over the globe, buying out every luxury boutique in sight. When he finally returned, he didn't forget to hand me a set of divorce papers. "Chloe hates being called a homewrecker, so we have to divorce." "Sign it. I purposely waited until your postpartum recovery was over to give this to you. Consider it my final act of kindness." "I don't want the kid anyway. Keep her as a souvenir. Chloe will give me my own children in the future." I didn't say a single word. I just picked up the pen and signed. I was terrified that if I hesitated for even a second, I would delay my reunion with the man I truly loved. Three months later, I received an emergency call from the hospital right in the middle of my wedding. They said a female patient had engaged in such vigorous intercourse that she suffered a ruptured corpus luteum. Furthermore, because this patient had been sleeping with multiple men simultaneously, she had developed severe pelvic complications. The situation was so critical they had to pull me in for emergency surgery. I pushed open the doors to the ER, and what a coincidence— The woman lying on the operating table was none other than my ex-husband's fiancée. 1 I looked down and carefully read the patient's name on the chart. Chloe Montgomery. Before my divorce from Carter Sterling, I had heard this name come out of his mouth countless times. He called her his "sweet Chloe," his voice dripping with so much affection it made you sick. I thought he had found some kind of flawless, perfect true love. Turns out, this was it. I remembered the day I gave birth. Complications arose, and I suffered a massive hemorrhage. The doctors were frantic, paging my family over and over. But Carter’s phone was unreachable. Meanwhile, the tabloids were flooded with paparazzi photos of him and Chloe Montgomery walking into a luxury hotel, wrapped in each other's arms. With the sheer power of the Sterling family's wealth, no media outlet would dare publish those photos unless Carter explicitly allowed it. The truth was clear: Carter didn't want to hide her anymore. He was giving her official status. When I miraculously survived and woke up, Carter finally showed up. A look of impatience flashed across his face. "Sarah, why do you always have to make yourself look so pathetic?" "You were a top student, and you're a doctor yourself. Did you really have to push yourself to have this baby?" "I don't even want it. Your idea of using a child to secure your position as Mrs. Sterling is honestly laughable." "I’ve been very busy lately. I don't have time to sit here and watch you throw a pity party..." Before he could finish, his phone rang. He answered it right in front of me without the slightest hesitation. "Chloe..." The voice on the other end cut him off playfully. "Carter, babe! Is my birthday surprise ready yet?" "You said you were just going to the hospital to check on the old ball-and-chain. It's been half an hour! Why aren't you back?" "I heard she was bleeding everywhere? Isn't it gross and messy?" "Hurry back, Carter. Don't get your shoes dirty over there." Carter chuckled softly. "You're always looking out for me, Chloe. I'm heading back right now." "Your birthday gift has been ready for days. I promise it'll be a surprise that keeps you in bed all night..." Carter talked as he walked out the door, never sparing me another glance. Naturally, it didn't even cross his mind to go look at our newborn daughter. Fortunately, I wasn't heartbroken. After confirming my baby was healthy and safe, all I felt was relief. Relief that I could finally talk to Grandpa Sterling about our original agreement. I took the initiative to call him. "Grandpa, the baby is safe and healthy. May I leave now?" Years ago, when the Sterling empire was on the verge of bankruptcy, Grandpa Sterling sought me out. A psychic had told him that my astrological chart was perfectly aligned to bring prosperity to the Sterling family. As long as I bore them a child, their wealth would be secured forever. I was already a medical intern at the time. To a woman of science, it sounded like utter nonsense. But the ultra-rich are often the most superstitious. When I refused the marriage, Grandpa Sterling used his influence to get my younger brother expelled from his university. Then, my parents called me, sobbing. They had just been in a hit-and-run accident and were an inch away from being killed. I was forced to compromise and agree to the marriage. In truth, I already had a boyfriend I’d been dating for ten years. He knew the whole truth, and he had been waiting for me the entire time. Grandpa Sterling sighed heavily over the phone. "I saw the news over the past few days. Since you can't force a horse to drink, I'll let you go." "But your body is weak right now. I've hired a professional postpartum care team. Wait until your first month of recovery is over before you leave." 2 Chloe's shrieks pulled me back to the present. I took a quick look at her condition. Severe vaginal tearing accompanied by a massive infection. Localized tissue was already showing signs of necrosis. The situation was much trickier than I had anticipated. She was convulsing in pain, yet she was still cursing up a storm. "Useless! You're all useless! You can't even handle a tiny little cut? Believe me, I'll have this hospital shut down by tomorrow!" "Those filthy men are all trash! They get their kicks and run, leaving me here to suffer! Once I get out of here, I'll skin them alive!" Expressionless, I snapped on my sterile surgical gloves. "Ms. Montgomery, based on the examination, you have severe lacerations and multiple pathogen infections. We need to perform surgical debridement immediately." Hearing the word "surgery," she ignored the agonizing pain and continued screaming: "Surgery?! Who gave you permission to cut me open! I'm warning you, if you leave a single scar on my body, I'll make you pay!" "I have to wear a haute couture wedding dress! I'm marrying into a billionaire family! Can you afford to ruin that?!" She glared at me fiercely. "Are you doing this on purpose? Trying to ruin me? Let me tell you, my fiancé is the wealthiest man in the city! One word from him and you're all fired!" I cut her off. "It's too early to worry about that. If we don't operate immediately and the infection spreads, forget about a wedding—your reproductive system will suffer permanent damage, and it might even cost you your life." I was merely stating objective medical facts. For a patient like this, sympathy was entirely useless. A nurse beside me handed over the pre-op consent form. Chloe snatched it and tore it to shreds. She roared hysterically, "I'm not signing anything! You quacks are trying to hurt me! I'm filing a complaint! I'll ruin your careers!" Suddenly, as if recognizing something, her eyes turned venomous as she locked onto me. "Who the hell are you? You think you're qualified to operate on me? Get your Chief of Surgery here right now! Or I'll have my fiancé tear this garbage hospital to the ground!" If her condition wasn't so critical, I would have washed my hands of her. But it's my duty as a doctor. I couldn't just turn around and walk away. I had no patience for her nonsense either. "Aside from me, there probably isn't another surgeon in this hospital capable of handling this procedure. Where is your family? We need a signature." At the mention of family, Chloe clearly panicked. "Family? I don't need family. I make my own decisions." "Hurry up and do the surgery! If you delay my plans, can you bear the consequences?!" I reminded her again, "Hospital policy requires a family member's signature. Alternatively, where is your fiancé?" I pressed the issue, my tone remaining flat, strictly business. Chloe's face twisted. "You all better keep your mouths shut. If a single word of this leaks out, I'll make sure you die without a grave!" I raised an eyebrow and didn't push further. We see things like this in the hospital all the time. I simply placed a new consent form in front of her. "Think clearly and decide quickly. Time waits for no one. Once your surgery is done, I still have to get back to my wedding..." My words were interrupted by a man's voice booming from behind me. "Wedding? Who are you marrying?" "We've only been divorced for three months and you're already getting married?!" 3 Carter Sterling blocked the entrance to the operating room, flanked by four men in black suits. His bespoke suit accentuated his tall frame, and his aura was suffocatingly oppressive. "Sarah, did you hear me talking to you?" "What? It's only been three months, have you forgotten your own ex-husband?" His gaze moved past me, and before I could even answer, his face changed drastically the moment he saw Chloe on the operating table. Chloe was hooked up to an oxygen tube, her face ashen. Carter's eyes instantly filled with heartbreak. The chill in his voice was directed entirely at me. "Sarah, what did you do to her?!" "She was perfectly fine when she left the house this morning! What have you done to her behind my back?!" Chloe weakly raised a hand toward him. "Carter! She's trying to kill me!" Her voice was hoarse and broken. "She was digging around inside my stomach with a scalpel! She said, 'After this cut, you'll never be able to have kids again!' I kept begging her, but she hurt me so much I thought I was going to die..." Before she could finish, she started coughing violently, her chest heaving. The medical monitors began blaring sharp alarms. Gasping for air, she used all her strength to scream, "It turns out she's your ex-wife!" "Carter, she's just jealous! Jealous that I can give you children, jealous that I'm going to be Mrs. Sterling!" I calmly tossed my blood-stained gauze into the biohazard bin, picked up the medical chart, and waved it slowly in front of Carter's face. "Mr. Sterling, a ruptured pelvic abscess triggered sepsis. If your fiancée had arrived forty minutes later, she'd be lying in the morgue right now." Before Carter could take the chart, Chloe snatched it away. "Carter, she's lying! She's framing me!" "Because she knows you divorced her for me, she's using her position to get revenge!" Chloe aggressively ripped the IV needle out of her hand. "Look, Carter! She intentionally missed the vein, and she pinched me all over! Look at all these bruises, even on my neck!" "She even threatened me! She said she was going to leak my medical records to the press, so everyone would know that Carter Sterling married a woman inferior to her!" I turned my head to look at Chloe. Her body was indeed covered in dark purple bruises and hickeys. But those were there the moment she was admitted. Obviously, they were the aftermath of a wild sexual encounter. Carter pulled her into his arms, stepping heavily on the medical chart that had fallen to the floor. "Sarah, years ago you used my grandfather's life-saving medicine to force me to marry you. That failed, and now you want to destroy Chloe?" He let out a scoff. "Mercy General Hospital? You think you're worthy of working here?" "It seems I was too merciful when we divorced, allowing you to think you could touch my woman." "Sarah, I guess you've never experienced the consequences of crossing Carter Sterling." As his words fell, two bodyguards stepped forward swiftly, pinning my arms behind my back. I was forced to bow in front of Carter and Chloe. I looked up at him, my voice dripping with mockery. "Carter, aren't you curious why she refused to consent to the surgery even if it meant her death?" The bodyguards tightened the leather restraints around my wrists, the straps biting into my flesh, sending sharp pains throughout my body. My body hadn't fully recovered from the traumatic hemorrhage during childbirth, and I was still nursing. Being forced to bend over exacerbated the dull ache in my abdomen. Cold sweat poured down my face. I enunciated every word clearly. "She has the contact info of seventeen different 'sugar daddies' in her phone, and she booked hotel rooms with three different men just last week. Call your private doctor right now and ask him just how severe the consequences of an extremely promiscuous lifestyle can be!" 4 "You're lying! You're planting evidence!" Chloe burst into tears, burying her face into Carter's chest, looking utterly victimized. She sobbed, "Carter, she's gone too far. She's using her status as a doctor here to forge documents and slander me." "You know me, Carter. I've always been with you. How could I possibly be with other men, let alone catch some virus?!" "Carter, are you just going to let her bully me like this? You have to get revenge for me..." As she cried, Carter's face grew darker and darker. "Drag her to the sub-zero biological storage room! Without my orders, no one lets her out!" The bodyguards hauled me toward the service stairwell. I struggled, but their grip only tightened. The pain was so intense that the stairs seemed to blur and sway in front of my eyes. "Carter Sterling! You'll regret not believing me!" Behind me, Chloe's crying grew louder. "Carter, make her disappear. I don't want to see her ever again. If she knows we're getting married soon, she'll definitely try to ruin our wedding." Carter comforted her softly, "Be good, baby, trust me. I won't let a single thing ruin our wedding." "You're going to be the most beautiful bride in the world." "..." The heavy metal doors of the sub-zero storage room slowly clicked shut. The -15°C (5°F) air hit me like thousands of icy needles piercing my bones. I curled up next to a medical freezer, pounding on the door. "Carter, let me out!" "This is false imprisonment! It's illegal! Let me out!" My thin surgical scrubs offered absolutely no protection against the bone-chilling cold. My consciousness slowly began to blur from the freezing temperatures. I don't know how much time passed, but suddenly, Carter's voice echoed through the intercom. "Do you know what you did wrong? Will you ever dare do it again?" "Sarah, don't think that just because you gave birth to a child for me, you can touch my people." "Today, I'm going to teach you exactly what happens when you touch someone who belongs to me." Carter was standing right outside the heavy glass panel of the storage room, holding Chloe in his arms. She was wrapped securely in his tailored suit jacket. Her face was still pale, but a calculating, malicious glint shone in her eyes. Chloe shrank deeper into Carter's embrace. "Carter, it's so cold in there. Won't she freeze to death?" I had seen her bloodwork. Her condition was incredibly severe. Instead of worrying about me, she should be worrying about herself and how long she had left to live. "But she's so evil, making me suffer so much. She deserves to freeze a little," Chloe said, looking up at Carter with feigned terror. "I'm just so scared she'll take revenge on me when she gets out. The way she looked at me in the OR... it was terrifying, like she wanted to eat me alive." Carter held her tighter, glancing at me through the glass, his voice cold and hard. "With me here, she can't touch you." Chloe's eyes reddened again. "But I'm afraid she holds a grudge and will spread rumors everywhere that I'm promiscuous." "The things she said earlier were completely made up. She's just jealous and trying to frame me..." "If this affects your reputation and the Sterling Group, that would be terrible." "Carter, you absolutely cannot believe her lies. My heart only belongs to you. She's just trying to drive a wedge between us so she can crawl back to you." My teeth chattered violently, my whole body ached, and my brain was sluggish from the cold. "Chloe... do you dare unlock your phone and show Carter... do you dare let him check your hotel records from last week..." "Shut up!" Chloe's voice hit a shrill pitch. "Look, Carter! She's still spouting nonsense! I didn't! She's framing me!" She purposely pressed harder into his chest, "accidentally" aggravating the bruises on her wrists, and let out a pained cry. "Ah... it hurts... Carter, I don't want to hear her voice anymore!" The darkness in Carter's eyes deepened. He gave an order to the bodyguards: "Turn the temperature down to the absolute lowest. Let's see if she dares to speak another word of nonsense." The bodyguard at the panel immediately complied. The blast of cold air intensified instantly. White frost began forming on the metal walls. I tasted copper in my throat. My fingernails scraped against the inside of the freezer, making a screeching sound. As my vision began to fade to black. I heard Carter's final warning. "Sarah, whenever you learn to be obedient, I'll let you out." "Otherwise, you can stay in there forever." My consciousness was slipping away. My body was so frozen I couldn't move an inch. With the absolute last sliver of my strength, I whispered, "Carter... let me out..." But he just turned around, carrying Chloe away. Right as they were about to leave the corridor, the double doors burst open. The Head Nurse sprinted in, clutching a stack of lab results, her voice panicked and shrill: "Chloe Montgomery's HIV test came back positive! Every instrument in that OR must be incinerated immediately!" She slammed the lab results onto a nearby counter and yelled at the bodyguards: "All of you who came into contact with her blood just now! Get to the clinic for PEP (Post-Exposure Prophylaxis) treatment immediately! If you wait, it'll be too late!" Carter's hand froze in mid-air. The blood instantly drained from his face, leaving him ghostly white. "What did you say?! How is that possible?!"
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