He Only Wanted Me in Bed, So Why's He Sobbing When I'm Gone?

Chapter 3

Gripping my bloodied arm, I thought Ethan had uncovered the truth about the surgery.

"She was the one who begged me to do it."

His hand lashed out, cutting me off as he dragged me up by the collar.

The car ride to the hospital was a blur.

Mia sat perched on the hospital bed, and her tear-streaked face twisted into an accusation the moment she saw me.

"How could you betray me like this? After all my trust, you stabbed me in the back! First you steal my husband, and now you want him to dump me so he will never lay a finger on me again. Is that your game?"

My throat clenched. 'None of this made sense.'

"The procedure was textbook perfect. I would never harm you."

"You lying snake!" she screamed, her voice raw with hysteria. "I am hemorrhaging! The doctor said you butchered me down there! This was no accident. You are just jealous, and you want to ruin my marriage!"

Her sobs turned jagged.

My head jerked up, and my eyes darted between her and Ethan.

"I followed every protocol. The surgery was flawless. I took an oath. Harming patients goes against everything I stand for."

Their stony faces said it all.

Mia clutched Ethan's sleeve, her nails digging in. "Ethan, if you side with her after this, I will vanish from your life for good. Choose. Her or me?"

Her chin trembled.

The silence stretched, and I watched him while that fragile hope fluttered in my chest like a dying moth. 'Surely being his wife still meant something.'

Then came the crushing blow.

He pulled Mia against his chest, and his eyes turned glacial as they locked onto mine.

"You ignored my warning. Now face the price."

Burly hands seized me from behind. I writhed like a hooked fish, and my pleas came out in broken rasps.

"Ethan, stop this! I am innocent."

He flicked a glance at me, colder than a surgeon's scalpel. A beat of silence passed, and then he said, "Do it."

The sound of a pop and a crunch echoed through the room as my wrist bones gave way. Then my fingers followed, one by one, bent backward until they snapped like dry twigs.

A scream ripped through me, and my body convulsed against the white-hot agony, but the real torture was watching my future disintegrate.

My hands were shattered. My life's work was gone. I would never operate again, never scrub in, and never save another life.

"Ethan, you are merciless, absolutely heartless."

Tears streamed down my face in a hot and unrelenting torrent, and the pain was so intense that my vision blurred and darkened at the edges, threatening to swallow me whole.

Then I heard the click of his phone. His voice cut through the haze: "Serena Wells is under investigation for medical misconduct. Have her detained for questioning."

My eyes flew open in horrified disbelief. He was using his influence to have me imprisoned.

"Ethan, you cannot do this!" I shrieked, twisting violently against their grip like a fish on a hook. "I will not go!"

But strong hands wrenched me away regardless.

What followed became my personal hell. The guards had been instructed. Every day brought fresh torment: steel-toed boots grinding my shattered fingers into the concrete, and callous hands twisting my broken wrist beyond its limits.

After three endless days of torment, my body became a patchwork of bruises and lacerations, with barely an inch spared. When they finally released me as a trembling, broken wreck, I was immediately dragged before Mia.

Her eyes raked over my battered body, lingering on every wound as her lips curved.

"Seeing you like this proves Ethan loves me best," she cooed.

Her words lanced through my chest like a scalpel finding its mark. The pain was surgical in its precision.