Chapter 2

Audrey POV:

At two in the morning, I ran through the pouring rain all the way into the emergency room of Saint Jude Memorial Hospital. I was soaking wet, and my shoes were covered in mud.

The plastic bench outside the trauma bay was freezing cold. My mother was slumped on it, her hands pressing against her knees, trembling violently and uncontrollably.

"The doctor said his main artery is completely blocked, Audrey..." my mother sobbed, burying her face into my wet coat.

"They just wheeled him into the catheterization lab for emergency resuscitation."

I stayed by her side without leaving for a single step on that hard, freezing bench for six whole hours.

At eight in the morning, the heavy double doors of the waiting room were pushed open.

Aaron walked in leisurely, wearing an expensive cashmere sweater and holding a takeaway cup of boutique coffee.

He didn't ask about my father's condition. He didn't ask why my clothes were still wet, nor did he ask why my mother was crying.

He walked right up to me, and his very first sentence was: "Why is the location tracking turned off?"

I looked up at him blankly with bloodshot eyes.

"Aaron, my dad is inside having emergency heart surgery."

"That is no excuse for you to break the rules and pull a vanishing act!" Aaron scolded coldly, pulling a charging cable from his bag and plugging my phone into the wall outlet.

"Do you think having a family crisis excuses those bad habits of yours?"

He forcefully rebooted my phone, opened the app store, skillfully entered his administrator password, and reinstalled that family tracking surveillance app.

He tapped on the screen a few times, setting up an automated alarm--as long as my phone battery dropped below fifty percent, his phone would immediately receive an alert.

When the page popped up, I clearly saw that in the shared notification list, besides him, there was actually Bella.

I snatched my phone back, my voice trembling: "Why does she have permission too?"

Aaron's tone was flat: "When I'm in a meeting and can't reach you, she can remind you to charge your phone."

"You let an outsider track my real-time location?" I trembled all over, feeling a sickening wave of nausea churning in my stomach.

"Bella is not an outsider, she is my closest friend," Aaron retorted self-righteously.

Right at that moment, Bella walked out gracefully, holding a cheap, wilted bouquet from some gas station.

"Audrey, how is your dad doing now?" Bella asked softly, tilting her head slightly with a fake and exaggerated look of sympathy.

"I specifically bought flowers, but the nurses said plants aren't allowed in the ICU, so I'll just leave them on the floor for now."

Looking at her, my chest felt so tight I could barely breathe.

Bella placed the flowers on the floor and then looked timidly at Aaron.

"Aaron, when I got home last night, I found that someone had tampered with my apartment door lock again," Bella's voice trembled as if she had suffered a massive scare. "I'm really afraid."

Aaron's brows immediately furrowed, and without hesitation, he pulled a set of keys from his pocket.

"Move into the new condo on Elm Street for now."

I jerked my head up, staring at him in disbelief: "That is our future home!"

Aaron looked at me, his voice very faint: "The house is sitting empty anyway, Bella is just staying temporarily."

I clenched my fingers tightly: "More than half of the down payment for that condo was paid by my parents, that's their life savings!"

His face instantly turned cold: "Audrey, we aren't even married yet, and you're already drawing such clear lines? When did you become so selfish?"

Bella hurriedly waved her hands, and large teardrops immediately fell from her eyes.

"Forget it, I won't stay there," Bella cried, shrinking back. "Audrey doesn't like me, I can't let you two fight because of me. I'll just go back to my own place, even if I run into danger it doesn't matter..."

Aaron immediately strode forward and forcefully shoved the keys into Bella's palm.

"Take them," Aaron glared at me and said sternly. "If something happens to a woman living alone out there, are you going to take responsibility?"

When those keys fell into Bella's palm, a loud ringing filled my ears.

She kept her head down, tears still hanging on her face, but I distinctly saw a mocking smile tug at the corner of her lips when she turned her back to Aaron.

Just as I was about to speak, the emergency room doors were suddenly pushed open.

A doctor in blue scrubs rushed out and pulled off his mask.

"Who is the family of Walter Mcleod?" the doctor called out anxiously.

My mother and I immediately rushed over.

"The main artery is completely blocked, causing a severe ventricular rupture," the doctor spoke rapidly. "We have temporarily stabilized his vitals, but he must be urgently transported to the university cardiac center for an advanced bypass surgery within four hours. The specialized private out-of-network transport team requires a thirty thousand dollar upfront deposit before they will deploy the mobile ICU."

"Thirty thousand dollars?" my mother gasped, swaying on her feet. "All our savings went into Audrey's down payment..."

I abruptly turned around and grabbed Aaron's arm tightly with both hands.

"Aaron, we still have fifty thousand dollars in our joint wedding fund account!" I pleaded desperately, my tears finally breaking through. "Your phone has the primary account authentication token. Please, immediately transfer thirty thousand dollars to the hospital billing desk. Without this transport, my dad will die!"

Aaron, however, just looked down at his phone screen.

A red warning popped up on his tracking dashboard.

"Audrey Mcleod's device battery is currently at 48%."

Aaron looked up, his face as cold as frost, completely devoid of any warmth.

"Audrey, your phone battery is only at forty-eight percent." Aaron's tone was flat, without a single ripple of emotion.

"I just warned you two minutes ago to always keep your battery fully charged. Not only are you making a chaotic, disgraceful scene in a public hospital, but you can't even follow the most basic rules."

"My dad's heart is stopping, Aaron!" I screamed hysterically, shaking his arm desperately. "This is not a game! Transfer the money!"

"Go to the outlet and charge your phone to one hundred percent, prove to me you can manage yourself," Aaron forcefully shook off my hands.

"I will absolutely not use our joint assets for someone who can't even learn the most basic rules."

He turned around indifferently and strode away from the surgical area.

"Aaron!" I cried out desperately behind him, but he didn't even look back.

He walked straight into the elevator, and the cold metal doors slid shut mercilessly in front of me.

I stood in the billing lobby, my vision going dark in waves.

I tremblingly pulled out my phone and plugged it into the outlet by the nurse's station, waiting for the banking app to load.

A social media notification popped up; it was a new photo Bella Aguirre had just published three minutes ago.

In the photo was the sunlit living room of my brand-new condo on Elm Street.

Bella was sinking leisurely into my custom-ordered velvet sofa, holding a glass of white wine in her hand, with the panoramic city skyline that originally belonged to me right behind her.

Aaron was tagged in the post, and his comment was prominently pinned right below her caption:

"A safe haven for someone who truly deserves to be treated with tenderness. From now on, you never have to feel afraid again."