Chapter 4

"Call the police." Evelyn's voice was ice cold.

Serena completely fell apart. She dropped to her knees, sobbing dramatically. "No! Evelyn, I was wrong! I just came to see the baby, I didn't mean any harm..."

"No harm?" Evelyn walked up to her, looking down with disdain.

She bent down, picked up the syringe off the floor, and handed it to the nearby doctor. "Test what's in this."

The doctor took one look and his face changed. "This is a high concentration of potassium chloride! If this had been injected directly into an infant, it would have caused cardiac arrest—and it would've been nearly impossible to detect."

The room gasped collectively.

A sixteen-year-old girl, capable of something this vicious?

Evelyn looked at Serena like she was looking at a corpse.

"Serena, you're just as useless as your mother."

The police arrived quickly and dragged Serena away as she desperately tried to talk her way out of it.

The room fell silent again.

Evelyn walked over to the incubator and looked at me inside it.

She reached out and traced my outline through the glass.

Her eyes were no longer cold—they held a depth and complexity I couldn't quite read.

"Baby, don't be scared," she whispered. "Mommy will protect you. Anyone who's ever hurt us—Mommy's not letting a single one of them go."

I looked at her, my mind churning with disbelief.

This mother of mine... she wasn't as simple as she seemed on the surface.

News that Serena had been detained by police on suspicion of attempted murder became the final straw that broke Elias.

Vance Group's stock had been hitting limit-down for three straight days, and the board members—a pack of old wolves—were closing in, demanding answers.

Elias rushed to the hospital that night like a beaten dog.

He burst into Evelyn's room, eyes bloodshot, face covered in stubble, with none of his usual arrogance left.

"Evelyn! Drop the charges! Drop them right now!" He grabbed her wrist, voice hoarse and desperate.

"Serena's only sixteen! She can't have a criminal record! How is she supposed to live with that?!"

I lay in the bassinet beside them, listening to this all-too-familiar script, and sneered inside.

In my past life, when Serena deliberately pushed me down the stairs and broke my leg, Elias said the exact same thing.

"Maya, Serena didn't mean it, she's still young, you're the older one, you should be more forgiving, don't ruin her future."

He always, always protected that girl who didn't even share his blood.

Evelyn didn't pull away. She just looked at him coldly.

"Elias, your daughter tried to kill mine, and you want me to drop the charges?" Her voice was eerily calm.

"She's just a kid! What does she even understand?!" Elias cut her off impatiently. "It was probably just a moment of stupidity! Besides, the baby's fine, isn't she?!"

"Fine?" Evelyn yanked her hand away and slapped him across the face, hard.

Smack!

Elias stood there stunned, hand on his cheek, staring at this woman who'd always been so submissive.

"If the nurse hadn't found her in time, my daughter would be a corpse right now!" Evelyn pointed at the door. "Get out! If you say one more word defending that murderer, I'll hand the evidence of Vance Group's tax fraud straight to the economic crimes unit!"

Elias's whole body shook, panic flashing across his eyes.

"You... how do you know about..."

"If you don't want people to find out, don't do it in the first place," Evelyn said coldly. "Elias, you think after three years with you, I'm really just some clueless trophy wife?"

Elias completely deflated, like a balloon losing air.

He knew this woman had him by the throat.

"Fine... I won't get involved, I won't say anything..." He turned away, defeated, but stopped at the door and added through gritted teeth, "But Margaret's not going to let this go. Watch yourself."

Elias left.

Evelyn turned to look at me, and the ice in her expression melted into a gentle smile.

"Baby, see that? That's what a man really looks like. You can't rely on anyone but yourself."