The Scorned Bride: His Cruel Vows

Chapter 17- A Script

Adrian's Pov

“Help! Somebody help me!”

My voice shattered the quietness of the hospital lobby as I sprinted through the doors, my lungs burning and sweat dripping heavily down my brow and stinging my eyes. The metallic scent of blood was thick in the air, coating my suit jacket, my shirt, and my hands.

In my arms, Thalia was terrifyingly light. Her head slumped back against my shoulder, her dark hair spilling over my arm, completely limp. Her face was as white as a sheet, her skin icy to the touch. Blood was still seeping through the makeshift cloth I had desperately tied against her left wrist, dripping onto the clean hospital floor with every step I took.

“Emergency! We need a stretcher over here now!” A nurse yelled.

Within seconds, two doctors and three nurses rushed out with a metal stretcher. They immediately took Thalia from my arms and laid her down on the white sheet. The moment my hands were freed, I felt them trembling violently. I stood there in the middle of the hallway, panting heavily, staring down at my palms covered in her blood.

“Sir! Sir, look at me!” a male doctor barked, slapping a hand onto my shoulder to pull my attention away from my hands. “What happened? How deep is the laceration?”

“She... she cut her wrist,” I forced out, my voice raspy, “With a shard of glass. There was... there was so much blood.”

“How long ago?” the doctor asked quickly while the nurses began hooking up IV lines and wheeling the stretcher rapidly down the corridor toward the trauma bay.

“Fifteen minutes. Maybe twenty,” I stammered, taking a step forward to follow them.

The doctor held up a hand, stopping me in my tracks. “Sir, who are you to the patient? What is your relationship with her?”

I froze. The simple question hung in the air. Who was I to Thalia? After everything that had happened over the past few days, after the bitter arguments, the marriage… who was she to me? For over a decade, she had grown up in my home. She was the girl who used to follow me around, the girl my family took in, the girl I had protected as a sister before everything went to hell. Now, she is my wife.

“Sir!” the doctor pushed, his tone growing more urgent as the stretcher disappeared through a set of double doors. “I need a legal next-of-kin to sign the emergency consent forms immediately!”

The urgent tone jerked me awake from my daze. I swallowed the lump in my throat, my jaw clenching tightly.

“I'm her adopted brother,” I said quickly. The words slipped out of my mouth before I could even process them. “I'm her brother. Give me the forms.”

The doctor gave a swift nod and handed a clipboard to a nurse nearby. “Get him to sign the surgical and blood transfusion consent forms immediately. We’re moving her into the trauma room now!”

They hurried away, leaving me standing alone in the wide hallway. A nurse shoved a pen and a stack of paper into my hands. I signed my name at the bottom of the pages in unrecognizable scribbles, barely reading the things printed on them. Once the paperwork was handed over and the initial emergency admission fees were cleared at the front desk, I walked down the quiet hallway toward the trauma bay doors and began pacing back and forth.

‘Why did she do it?’ The thought kept beating against the inside of my skull. ‘How could she actually do it?’

“Adrian!”

Frantic footsteps echoed down the hall. I turned my head to see Matthew jogging toward me. His suit jacket was unbuttoned, his tie loose around his neck, and his hair completely disheveled. He looked out of breath, his face pale as he stopped a few feet away from me.

“How is she?” Matthew asked, his voice rough as he swept his hair back in frustration. “Is she... is she alive?”

“She’s still in the emergency room,” I replied, my voice dangerously quiet. I leaned my back against the wall, “They're working on her now.”

Matthew let out a harsh exhale, running both hands over his face. “Damn it... I didn't... I didn't actually think she would cut herself, Adrian! You know how she is! She cries over a tiny pinprick! How the hell did she actually drag a piece of glass across her arm?!”

I pressed my lips together in a hard, tight line. Frustration, guilt, and a strange anger boiled inside my chest.

“Thalia never said anything she wouldn't do,” I murmured softly, my voice laced with bitterness. “If she said she was going to do something... no matter what it was, she would do it.”

My hands curled into tight fists at my sides, my fingernails digging into my palms. My mind flashed back to ten minutes ago in that sunlit room. I had turned my back on her. I had walked out, calling her pathetic, completely convinced that she was just pulling a cheap stunt to get out of trouble. But as I walked down the stairs, something had pulled at my chest. It was the look in her eyes just before I turned away, that dead, hollow emptiness. There were no tears, no anger, no pleading. Just nothing.

That emptiness had terrified me. It had made me turn around and run back up those stairs like a madman before I knew what I was doing. At one point, I almost stopped and went back downstairs, feeling like I was just fretting over nothing. After all, Thalia had already done so many things that soured our relationship. This could just be another stunt she was pulling.

But if I hadn't gone back when I did... if I hadn't let that strange gut feeling take over... if I had delayed for even two more minutes... Thalia would be dead right now.

I closed my eyes, a cold shiver running down my spine. But why? I asked myself frantically. Why am I so concerned?!

If she had died, wouldn't it have solved everything? If she died, it would save me from all this endless trouble. It would mean she had finally paid the price for pushing Aria away, for driving Aria onto that doomed plane, for killing the woman I was supposed to spend my life with. If Thalia was gone, Aria would be avenged, wouldn't it?

So why? Why did I drop to my knees in her blood? Why did I scream her name until my throat hurt? Why did I scoop her weak, bloody body into my arms and run through the mansion like my own life was ending?

“Why did you bring her here, Adrian?”

The question hit me like a bucket of ice cold water. I snapped my eyes open and looked at Matthew. He was staring at me, his eyes narrowed, asking the exact same horrifying question that was tearing through my own mind.

“If she died in your house... after everything that happened with Aria... wouldn't that have been her punishment?” Matthew asked softly, his tone laced with confusion and a hint of accusation. “Why did you rush to save her like that?”

The real answer, the terrifying, confusing panic that had seized my heart when I saw her bleeding on the floor, was something I couldn't admit to him. I couldn't even admit it to myself.

So, the most logical and calm excuse came out of my lips perfunctorily. “If she died inside my house, the police would be involved,” I said coldly, staring straight ahead. “The media would find out. We would be under investigation for murder or forced suicide, and the company's stocks would plunge overnight. I can't afford for that kind of scandal to happen right now.” It felt like I was reading the answer straight out of a script.