When I woke up again, I was in the hospital.
Dax’s grim face was hovering close by, looking down at me.
“Elara, you certainly know how to pick your moments to get sick,” he slowly began.
“Seeing Seraphina try to cut her wrists, you decided to use your illness to stage a bigger drama, hoping to guilt-trip me?”
He let out a cold laugh, leaning closer.
“Cut the act. Our marriage is just a contract. I don’t have time for your melodramatic performances, and I certainly won’t pity you.”
My heart felt utterly cold.
Sure enough, the look of panic I’d seen on him before I passed out was just a hallucination brought on by my sudden cardiac arrest.
The day I was discharged, I pushed open the door to a scene I wish I hadn’t witnessed.
Seraphina was wearing my silk robe, curled up in Dax’s arms on our matrimonial bed.
When he saw me return, he pulled Seraphina even tighter into his embrace and said to
me:
“Seraphina just got out of the hospital. The doctor said she has severe depressive tendencies and needs 24-hour care.”
“All of this is your fault. At my home, at least I can ensure she won’t do anything foolish
again.”
He seemed afraid that I might act on impulse and hurt her further.
But I had no strength left to argue: “Whatever.”
Anyway, the divorce agreement was signed. Soon, this wouldn’t be my home anymore.
Just as I was about to speak, Seraphina tugged at his sleeve, her voice weak: “Dax, it’s
time for my medicine.”
She lowered her gaze, but her eyes, at the very edge, darted a defiant look at me, “The
doctor said to take it with 104-degree Fahrenheit warm water; it’s good for recovery… Elara,
could you get me a cup?”
Dax turned to me and snarled, “Didn’t you hear her? Go pour it.”
I walked towards the bar counter in the living room, which was covered in Dax’s various business trophies.
“Is the water not ready yet?” Seraphina’s voice came from behind me.
I ignored her. Suddenly, she ran over and violently smashed one of the crystal trophies
onto the floor!
After a sharp, shattering sound, she lunged, grabbing my hand and violently pressing it against the razor-sharp crystal base!
“Ah-!”
I shrieked. Excruciating pain shot through my entire body like an electric current, and blood instantly gushed out.
When I pulled my hand away, my palm was mangled and bloody, the bone clearly visible.
Seraphina quickly picked up a small shard and lightly grazed her forearm with it.
Then she stumbled and fell to the floor, her eyes immediately welling up.
“What’s going on?” Dax rushed in at the sound.
Seraphina immediately started crying: “It’s all my fault. I shouldn’t have asked Elara to get me water… otherwise, she wouldn’t have gotten angry, deliberately smashed your trophy, and then used the pieces to cut me…”
Dax’s face instantly hardened. He strode over to me, seizing my injured wrist.
“Are you out of your mind?!”
I was shaking uncontrollably from the pain. I held up my mangled, bloody, and horrifying hand.
“Dax! She did this herself!”
I stared at Dax intensely.
“The living room is covered in surveillance cameras… One look at the footage would
prove it!”
“No need to check.” He cut me off coldly. “I believe Seraphina.”
I felt as if my heart had been hit by a large truck, shattered into a thousand pieces.
“Elara, you truly are beyond redemption.” Dax’s voice was laced with icy venom. His eyes
swept over me, then he grabbed my other, uninjured hand, holding it in a vise-like grip!
“No-! Dax! You’ll regret this!!”
My scream was swallowed by the sickening scrape of flesh against crystal.
r
The intense burning pain made my vision go black.
