I Returned From My Own Funeral

Chapter 7 He Drained Me for Her

"Don't blame Dr. Lancaster... I ruined your relationship anyway, and I don't have much time left. Just let me die..."

Vivian lay weakly in Ethan's arms, tears slipping silently from the corners of her eyes. Panic instantly overtook him. Pressing one hand tightly over her wound, he held her against his chest and said hoarsely, "Vivian, I won't let you die."

Then he scooped her into his arms and rushed out of the office. Before leaving, he turned back once to look at Lydia. The coldness in his eyes sent a chill through her entire body.

Lydia bit down hard on her lip, wanting to explain that Vivian had attacked her first, but she already knew the truth. No matter what she said now, Ethan would never believe her. In the end, she simply lowered her gaze and looked away.

After Ethan disappeared with Vivian in his arms, Lydia slowly pushed herself up from the floor. Scrapes covered her elbows and knees, and her clothes were stained with dust and blood. Looking at the shattered porcelain scattered around her feet, she let out a bitter laugh.

What a pathetic sight.

She bent down to pick up the broken pieces, intending to leave and find another hospital for her psychiatric evaluation. But before she could walk out, Ethan stormed back into the office with several doctors and nurses following behind him.

"Vivian lost too much blood, and the blood bank is running out of Rh-negative blood," he said coldly. "You need to take responsibility for this."

Before Lydia could react, Ethan grabbed her wrist and dragged her toward the operating room.

"You're donating blood. Starting now, you're her blood bank."

"I'm not going!" Lydia struggled violently against him. "She brought this on herself! I never touched her!"

Ethan only tightened his grip. When their eyes met, his voice turned terrifyingly cold. "You don't get a choice."

A sharp sting pierced Lydia's neck before she even realized what was happening. Ethan had injected her with an anesthetic.

Dizziness swallowed her almost instantly. Strength drained from her limbs as her body went limp in Ethan's arms.

Inside the operating room, blood flowed steadily through the tubes connected to Lydia's arm, filling one blood bag after another. The constant beeping of the machines echoed through the sterile room while the anesthetic gradually wore off. As consciousness returned, Lydia could feel the warmth leaving her body alongside the blood being drawn from her veins.

One of the nurses finally could not bear it anymore. Lowering her voice, she said, "Dr. Walker, we can't continue. Dr. Lancaster's body won't survive much more blood loss."

Ethan's reply remained emotionless. "This is what she owes Vivian. Keep drawing."

"But Ms. Hale's condition is already stabilizing. She doesn't need this much blood."

"No," Ethan said flatly. "Continue. Just in case."

Pain twisted through Lydia's chest. Using the last of her strength, she forced her eyes open, only to meet Ethan's cold, indifferent gaze.

"Even if she dies," he said, "she still has to leave enough blood behind for Vivian."

Despair swallowed Lydia whole. Slowly, she closed her eyes again.

Time blurred after that. Her body gradually turned cold, and even breathing became difficult.

"She's in shock!"

The nurse stared at the monitor in horror as the heartbeat weakened into a nearly flat line. She immediately turned to look for Ethan, only to discover that the moment he heard Vivian had regained consciousness, he had already left the operating room and rushed to Vivian's hospital room instead.

Panicked and helpless, the nurse hurried outside to call for help, leaving Lydia alone in the operating room.

Only the endless beeping of the machines remained, accompanied by the suffocating smell of disinfectant.

As Lydia drifted in and out of consciousness, fragments of her life flashed through her mind like fading photographs.

She saw herself as a child flying kites with her parents on the grounds of Lancaster Estate. She saw sleepless nights after her father executed traitors, her mother holding her tightly while quietly crying in the dark. Then came the funeral after her mother's death, where Lydia knelt alone because her father never appeared.

Later, she left Meridia and met Ethan. They fell in love.

Those memories slowly burned away one by one until only a single face remained before her eyes.

A man with deep blue eyes and sharply handsome features held her tightly in his arms, panic written all over his face as he carried her out of the operating room.

"I won't let anything happen to you!"