Chapter 1

Three years after I withered away, my husband finally remembered me.

His childhood sweetheart, Brielle, was suffering from a relapse of her chronic blood condition. She needed another infusion of my rare plasma to survive.

Caleb drove to the rundown cottage where he had discarded me, ready to force me to sign the consent forms. But the yard was silent and the windows were covered in thick dust.

He found the old woman living next door to ask about my whereabouts.

“You mean Avery?” the woman sighed. “She’s been gone for years. I heard someone forced her into a medical procedure while she was already sick. She didn’t last a week after she got home.”

Caleb’s face twisted with suspicion, convinced I had paid the woman to lie to him.

He sneered at her, his voice full of impatience. “If you see her, tell her she has three days to show up. If she doesn’t, I won’t pay a single cent for that brat’s medical bills anymore.”

The old woman watched him walk away, shaking her head. “That poor child,” she whispered to the wind. “She starved to death a long time ago.”