Chapter 1 The Donor
Everyone in Asterfall City knew Sophia Lloyd was the woman Vincent Fowler had risked everything to bring back from Cordilla, and that when it came to love, she was dangerously possessive.
She hated it when he had dinner alone with another woman. She had his chest inked with her name, called him at random just to check in, and held on to him with everything she had.
Then she caught him cheating with her own eyes, and the shock caused her to miscarry. After that, she burned the villa to the ground and fled the country.
A month later, Vincent had her dragged back. He used her mother's illness as leverage to force her back into his control, locking her under house arrest for six months.
During those six months, he held her down night after night, murmuring in her ear with equal parts desire and regret.
"I've been miserable every single day since you disappeared. If you'll give us another chance, I'll save your mother myself."
So when they got back together, Sophia became the perfect wife in his eyes. She stopped checking up on him. She stopped getting jealous. She shut down every feeling she had left for him.
Even when Quinn Conrad ended up naked in the master bedroom, Sophia quietly moved out and said to Vincent.
"She's the donor you found for my mother. She should be comfortable. I can sleep on the cot at the hospital."
Everyone said Sophia had finally matured, but Vincent slowly realized she hadn't become understanding. She was avoiding him.
When he traveled for work, she no longer clung to him. When he called her first, she no longer kept him on a video call just to make sure he was really alone.
On their wedding anniversary, she told him to spend the evening with Quinn. When he got drunk, she sent Quinn her hangover remedy and had her make it for him.
It was as if she had handed her home to another woman and moved her own life into the hospital.
At that moment, she stood outside the transplant unit, sick with worry.
The doctor frowned. "Where is the donor? Your mother has already gone through the preparation for the transplant. If we delay this any longer, her life will be in danger!"
Quinn shrank into Vincent's arms, tears filling her eyes.
"Vincent, I heard bone marrow donation hurts. I'm really scared. Can't you find someone else?"
She was backing out.
Sophia felt her chest tighten and looked up at the trembling woman in front of her.
Vincent stepped in front of Quinn, shielding her with his body. "Quinn is delicate. Maybe... We should call it off for today."
"How can we call it off? My mother has already gone through an ablation. She can't wait!"
Sophia reached for Quinn in desperation, and Quinn stumbled backward, hitting the corner of the wall. A bump immediately formed on her forehead.
"Sophia," Vincent said flatly, as if none of this mattered. "Quinn is just scared. It won't take long to find another match. Your mother's been sick this long already. A few more days won't make a difference."
A fresh wave of nausea rolled through Sophia. She drew in a slow breath and asked Vincent, "Are you really going to protect her and let her back out now?"
Quinn shivered and said softly, "Vincent, maybe I should just do it. If Sophia gets upset and leaves again, you'll be heartbroken."
Vincent glanced at Sophia's belly, and a confident smile spread across his face. "She's pregnant. She's not going anywhere. Baby, Quinn isn't donating today. I'm taking her to get that bruise checked out, okay?"
When he finished speaking, he looked at Sophia expectantly, as though waiting for her to plead with him not to give up on her mother and beg him to find another donor as quickly as possible.
Sophia didn't even look at him. She only lowered her voice and started discussing something with the doctor.
He refused to give up and asked again, "Baby, you're not even going to ask me to stay? You're not going to say anything?"
Sophia still didn't turn around.
His expression darkened by the second. He pressed his tongue hard against the inside of his cheek, then stormed off with Quinn in his arms.
After Vincent left, Sophia rested a hand over her belly, made up her mind, and said to the doctor, "I've decided. I'll be the donor."
The doctor looked troubled. "But you're pregnant..."
"Then terminate it," Sophia said with a quiet sigh. "This child never should have existed."
During the months Vincent kept her confined, she had gotten pregnant by accident, and that had taken away her chance to save her mother herself.
That was why Vincent found Quinn, who was a bone marrow match.
But Quinn was young and bright and exactly the kind of woman Vincent never knew how to resist, and that had made him forget, almost instantly, the promise he had made to stop cheating. He turned right back into the same reckless playboy he had always been.
He said Quinn was in poor health and needed to recover at the house, and Sophia did not protest.
Quinn wanted the sunny master bedroom, so Sophia moved into the hospital. She watched them grow intimate right in front of her, and she still said nothing.
She had endured everything up to this point. If she could not trade this child for her mother's life, then there was no reason to keep it!
That same night, she lay down on the freezing operating table.
Right before the anesthetic went into her system, she saw Quinn's i********: post.
Quinn was half-dressed in Vincent's arms. Her fingers, still damp from wiping away tears, were held up to the camera, and on one of them sat a huge diamond ring.
Quinn: Thank you for the gift, Mr. Fowler. I just need someone to cry on, and you are there, but I'm still scared... Still, you promised to take me on a trip to help me feel better.
The post was short, but it pierced through Sophia's numbness.
She recognized the ring. The design was identical to the wedding band Vincent had personally designed for their marriage.
She had thrown hers into an airport trash can before leaving the country, but now she realized Vincent had made the same ring all over again and given it to Quinn.
Before this, Vincent had always been generous with the women he slept with, but he had never once given any of them a wedding ring.
Maybe this girl really was different in his eyes.
But Sophia no longer cared.
The day after the abortion, Sophia refused the doctor's advice to rest and went straight into the marrow donation process.
One injection after another went into her body. She began to run a fever, her lower back ached, and her lower abdomen, still raw from the procedure, throbbed with a dull, persistent pain.
Meanwhile, Quinn documented every detail of the trip.
Quinn: Thirty thousand feet in the air, alone with him, and somehow his profile is more breathtaking than the view.
Quinn: The best thing about sleeping in is having him feed me breakfast himself. I had a long night, so he said I needed something nourishing.
Sophia stared at the posts, numb. A week later, after enduring every stage of the donor preparation process, she finally made it to the blood draw.
Then the doctor burst into the room, pale as death. "Mrs. Fowler, I'm so sorry! Your mother didn't make it!"
Sophia froze. It felt as though someone had ripped her soul straight out of her body, and the whole world tilted around her.
Her phone rang, and she answered on instinct.
Vincent's voice came through warm and gentle. "Baby, we found a new match. Your mother's going to be okay. You and the baby are doing well, right? I'm in the UK for business. What do you want me to bring you?"
Sophia stared at the screen with empty eyes. Her tongue felt heavy, and every breath came hard.
"Baby? Why aren't you answering? What do you want?"
Sophia finally came back to herself and forced the words out through clenched teeth.
"I want..."
