My Heart Keeps Him Alive Chapter 10

My Heart Keeps Him Alive Chapter 10

Nathaniel canceled all engagement plans with the Sheffield family.

The day the announcement went out, Croftfield stock took a brief hit.

Some board members complained, saying that tearing up years of partnership for a woman was irrational

Nathaniel was on a video call when one of them voiced that opinion.

When the man finished, Nathaniel looked up and asked one question. “Without her, would you be in this

meeting with me right now, or at my funeral?”

The conference room went silent.

That board member submitted his resignation the next day.

Blackwood Institute was completely overhauled.

The top floor was no longer an airtight monitoring prison.

Nathaniel had half the walls torn down and replaced with floor-to-ceiling windows.

I saw my first full sunrise from the top floor of Blackwood Institute that morning.

Gold light poured through the glass and fell across my bed.

Before this, the curtains were never opened more than a crack. The doctors said light changes might affect

my heart rate.

Now no one made those decisions for me anymore.

The new sync device was small enough to fit in my palm, could be detached anytime, and wasn’t buried

under my collarbone. No one could force it on me.

Every morning, Julian came in with a document and asked the same question. “Do you agree to sync today?”

The first time I heard that, I stared at him for a long time.

It took me a while to get used to it.

It turned out having the choice in your own hands felt like this.

The institute also set up an independent medical trust, with me as the beneficiary.

I had my own lawyer, my own doctor, my own bank account. I could even leave whenever I wanted

Nathaniel didn’t stop me. He just put a small apartment next to the institute in my name.

“If you want to move out, that one is close to the hospital.”

I asked him, “Aren’t you afraid I’ll actually go?”

He was quiet for a few seconds. Then he said, “Yes. But being afraid doesn’t mean I get to lock you up

After that day, I started going downstairs sometimes.

Chloe walked with me in the courtyard and secretly bought me an iced latte that was far too sweet.

Julian saw it and frowned, saying sugar intake would affect my waveforms.

Before I could even react, Nathaniel walked past.

He looked at the drink. “Light ice?” Chloe nearly dropped the straw.

I nodded.

Nathaniel said, “Hmm. Get it hot next time.”

Julian looked at him in disbelief. “Mr. Croftfield, her heart rate-”

Nathaniel cut him off. “She’s a person. Not a machine.”

Julian fell silent.

Later, Nathaniel went back to work. But his meetings were always scheduled around my rest time.

If the institute’s system flagged any heart rate anomaly from me, he would interrupt his meeting

immediately.

Once, during a multinational merger negotiation at the most critical moment, I had a nightmare and my heart

rate spiked.

He pulled off his headset without a second thought.

The opposing legal team was still shouting, “Mr. Croftfield, we’re one step away!”

Nathaniel said only one sentence back. “And I’m one heartbeat away.”

Then he walked in and sat by my bed until I woke up.

When I opened my eyes, I saw the monitoring light on his artificial heart blinking in the dim room.

I asked him suddenly, “Nathaniel, do you hate having your life controlled by someone else’s heartbeat?”

He looked at me for a long time. Then he said, “Yes.”

“That’s why I didn’t want that for you.”

I didn’t say anything else.

I just reached over and turned on the sync device on the nightstand.

On the screen, two waveforms slowly drifted toward each other.

One was my heartbeat; the other was his artificial heart.

They settled into the same rhythm, little by little.

But this time, it wasn’t because someone forced me.

I pressed the connect button myself.

Nathaniel looked down at the screen. Finally, a faint smile touched his eyes.

I used to think I was just his life support, a base frequency source hidden in the top floor of Blackwood

Institute.

Then I learned that what he really wanted was never my heartbeat. It was the moment I chose to stay.

Outside, the morning was fully bright.

I leaned back against the pillow and listened to two hearts beating in sync through the machine, steady,

matched, one with the other.

It was okay. At least this time, I wasn’t needed. I was chosen. And I chose for myself.