Chapter 12
“That’s impossible!” Leila retorted. She and Ian had been together for two years. How could she not know that he only had one kidney?
The doctor looked grim as he held out the medical report. “You should take a look at this, Ms. Sutherland.”
Leila snatched it from him. She almost couldn’t remain standing after reading the report. Ian really was short of one kidney. When had that happened? Why didn’t she know anything about it?
Fear spread through her. She called her assistant and told her to look into where Ian had gone and what he’d done recently.
After hanging up, she sat on a bench in the corridor and clutched the reports so tightly that she almost ripped through them. The people around her didn’t dare make a sound, afraid that they would inadvertently piss her off.
Her assistant was efficient. She returned with the results of her investigation in just half an hour. However, to Leila, every passing second
Her hand trembled when she answered her phone. “Did you find anything?”
was agonizing.
“Ms. Sutherland, I found out that Mr. Zahn went to the black market half a month ago to sell his kidney for 500 thousand dollars. According to the people there, he seemed to be doing it to get money for someone’s medical treatment.”
The remnants of Leila’s rationality shattered. Ian had willingly sold his kidney to get money for her to treat her so–called cancer!
She bit her lip so hard that she almost drew blood as endless regret washed over her. She’d only been pretending to have cancer, yet Ian had done: so much to “treat
‘her. He’d given her the money he’d saved up over four years and even sold his kidney.
”
She’d never been as overwhelmed by regret and self–hatred as she was at that moment. She hated herself for agreeing to help Connor trick.
Where could lan be now that he was no longer at the hospital?
Leila thought about the invitation to her engagement party that she’d given him a week ago. She hurried out of the hospital and sped to the hotel where the party was being held.
She had to find lan and apologize to him. Whether or not he forgave her, she had to take him to the best doctor available so he could get reconstructive surgery. Then, she would find him a matching kidney for a transplant.
Ian’s love for her weighed mountains; she would never be able to repay him for it.
The journey from the hospital to the hotel usually took half an hour, but Leila managed to get there in half the time. After she’d announced that her engagement to Connor was off, both their families and friends had left in anger. Her parents had warned her to think things through and threatened to disown her.
She couldn’t care about any of that anymore. All she wanted to do was find Ian, whose love she’d betrayed.
As soon as she entered the hotel, an attendant hurriedly handed her a box. “Ms. Sutherland, this parcel was sent here for you,‘
Her hands trembled when she saw the invitation on top of the box. She accepted it, still lying to herself as she denied the guess that had formed at the bottom of her heart.
When she opened the box and saw the cheap items within, her hopes were dashed. Everything she’d given Ian over the past two years was there, even the watch he usually treated like a treasure. It had been carelessly thrown in with everything else.
Leila felt like a fist had clamped around her heart as she stared at the items that she couldn’t even name. She couldn’t breathe.
As the Sutherland family’s heiress, she’d grown up in the lap of luxury. The prices of items had never mattered to her–they were just numbers on a price tag.
After getting together with lan, she’d asked her family’s maids where she could purchase the cheapest items possible so she wouldn’t let the cat out of the bag. Upon learning which online shopping platform was the cheapest, she’d bought all the gifts for Jan from there. Either that or she would buy something cheap from roadside stalls whenever she was out with him.
He would happily twirl her around whenever she gave him the gifts, and he’d always treat the items like they were treasures.
Now, however, they’d been carelessly thrown into a box. That made it clear he no longer cared about the things or their relationship.
That realization pierced Leila’s heart. She couldn’t imagine life without Ian.
She picked up the invitation, which had fallen to the floor, and noticed the sentence written on the back of it. “I wish you two all the happiness in the world. May we never see each other again.”
She shut her eyes, letting the invitation fall from her hand. Ian had found out the truth.
A
One by one, the subtle details that had slipped past her surfaced in her mind. Why hadn’t lan contacted her lately? Why had he thrown their matching items away? Because he’d long since seen through the web of lies she’d woven.
