The Heart That Wasn’t Mine, the Life I Never Asked For Chapter 03

The Heart That Wasn’t Mine, the Life I Never Asked For Chapter 03

I looked away.

Head down, I walked to the master bedroom.

The wide black bed was tangled and warm with the scent of two people who weren’t me.

I went in anyway, moving on autopilot, and gently shook Jasmine awake.

She blinked open her eyes and looked at me with a soft, almost shy smile.

“Savannah, sorry to trouble you.”

“Mr. Shaw, he—”

I cut her off before she could finish and guided her to the bathroom.

The tub was already full of warm water. I took a washcloth and worked slowly, cleaning away every mark left on her skin.

Half an hour later, I helped her back to bed.

Ethan watched the whole thing with quiet amusement from the doorway.

When I finished and turned to leave, he spoke.

“Savannah. Anything you forgot to tell me today?”

His eyes drifted, barely, almost lazily, to my stomach.

I gave a hollow smile and shook my head, then walked downstairs to the housekeeper’s room.

I shut the door. My legs gave out. I slid down the wall until I was sitting on the floor, shaking.

I reached into my bag for the painkillers and swallowed them all at once.

I don’t remember falling asleep.

I hadn’t been out long when the door slammed open.

Ethan stood in the frame, fury written across every line of his face.

“Savannah, what did you do to Jasmine in that bathroom?!”

“Why is she bleeding?!”

I pushed to my feet and saw it. Both his hands were covered in blood.

I opened my mouth.

He grabbed my arm and dragged me to the car before I could get a word out.

“You’re coming to the hospital with us.”

“If anything happens to Jasmine, I will make sure you suffer for it.”

I was thrown into the backseat. My heart pounded so hard it hurt to breathe.

In the hospital lobby, I watched Ethan carry Jasmine in like she was something breakable, his face taut with urgency.

I sat alone in the cold waiting room and held myself together through gritted teeth.

A few minutes later, he came back out.

“Come with me. Jasmine has an ectopic rupture and she’s losing blood fast. You’re O-negative. Get your arm ready.”

He said it the way he said everything, like it was already decided, and turned away.

In three years, I’d never said no to a single thing he asked.

But this time, I thought about the extraction surgery one week from now.

And for the first time, I said it out loud.

“Ethan. No.”

“What did you just say?”

He turned back, disbelief written across his face. Then something shifted, a flicker of recognition, and he laughed, leaning against the wall.

“Savannah. Do you still not understand how this works?”

“With me, you have never had the right to say no.”

He reached into his jacket and pulled out a folding knife.

“Two choices.”

“Come donate your blood. Or use this to cut out the heart that doesn’t belong to you. Right here, right now.”