My Husband’s Golden Retriever, My Second Life Chapter 05

My Husband’s Golden Retriever, My Second Life Chapter 05

Ethan came back on the day Wynn went into labor with her first litter.

I sat on a folding chair outside the breeding shed when my phone rang.

“Nora, I just got off the highway. Where’s Wynn?”

“She’s at the pet salon getting groomed,” I said calmly, “They’ll send her back tonight.”

“I’ll come pick you up, and we’ll grab dinner together.”

“Sure.”

I hung up and walked into the shed.

Wynn lay inside the cage, covered in blood. Six tiny puppies huddled motionless beside her. All stillborn.

Mason squatted nearby, a syringe in his hand.

“The pups were malpositioned and stuck. I had to pull them out forcefully. She’s severely damaged her uterus. She needs two months to recover before the next breeding.”

“Two months is an eternity,” I said. “Make it one.”

Mason looked up at me sharply, “Are you serious?”

“Do I look like I’m joking?”

He fell silent for a few seconds before pushing the medication in the syringe into Wynn’s body.

“Fine. You’re paying the bills, you call the shots.”

Wynn convulsed violently in the cage.

Her eyes hung half-open, her pupils hollow and unfocused.

I knelt down and tapped her cold nose with my finger.

Still icy cold.

“You can endure this,” I whispered, “You dared to master soul transference. This pain is nothing to you.”

Wynn’s eyes slowly rolled toward me.

Her lips trembled, shaping a barely audible sound.

“Why…?”

“Because you never asked me why when you killed me and my child in our past life.”

I stood and walked away without a single backward glance.

Ethan was waiting for me in the car.

He’d brought me a bouquet of flowers and a box of imported prenatal vitamins.

“Where’s Wynn?”

“The salon said she caught a mild cold and needs a couple more days of observation.”

Ethan frowned deeply, “Which salon? I’ll take her to a proper vet check.”

I pressed my hand over his, “No need. I’ve already sorted everything out.”

He stared at me, a flash of sharp suspicion flickering across his eyes.

Ethan was undeniably brilliant. It was his greatest strength, and his fatal flaw.

He sensed something was wrong, yet he dared not probe deeper.

To ask was to admit he’d always known Wynn was no ordinary dog.

And he didn’t dare face that truth.

I smiled softly and leaned against his shoulder.

“Ethan, do you think Chloe will die?”

His body stiffened instantly.

“Where did that come from?”

“Just curious. She’s so sick. I’m wondering if I should go see her.”

“Go tomorrow,” he said, “I’ll come with you.”

“No need. I’ll go alone.”

I needed to see for myself the state of Chloe’s physical body.

With her soul trapped elsewhere, her body should be nothing but an empty shell.

I was right.

When I arrived at the hospital the next day, Chloe lay frail in her hospital bed. Her skin was sallow, her eye sockets sunken, her lips cracked and dry.

She’d wasted away to skin and bone, her hands covered in countless needle pricks.

Yet one detail stood out.

Her fingernails were pink, smooth, and glossy.

No one on their deathbed could maintain such healthy nails.

A body without its soul doesn’t repair itself. It doesn’t grow. But Chloe’s nails were growing. That meant her soul, wherever it was trapped, was still drawing life force.

From me.

I stood over the bed, staring down at her face.

For four years of college, we’d eaten together, pulled all-nighters finishing papers, ranted about terrible men, laughed and cried side by side.

She’d been my bridesmaid at my wedding, grinning brighter than anyone in attendance.

I realized now that smile was never for me. It was the joy of finding the perfect source to drain dry.

“Chloe,” I murmured softly, “Don’t worry. I won’t let you die.”

Her fingers twitched faintly.

Her distant soul had felt someone calling her.

But it could never return.

It was trapped inside a bleeding, broken dog, fresh off delivering six stillborn pups, locked in a filthy cage.

I turned and walked out of the ward.

The hallway fell dead silent, only my footsteps echoing through the empty corridor.

“Ms. Hayes,” Zoe waited for me in the stairwell, “Mason just called. He can schedule the second litter early, but her condition’s severely weakened. She might not survive it.”

“Tell him she doesn’t have a choice.”

Zoe bit her lip and nodded, holding back every word she wanted to say.