Chapter 8
603words
I refuse all food and water. I'll use my life and my children's lives as my final gambit against him.
I want him to watch helplessly as his precious "bloodline" withers away inside me.
Frederick was beside himself with rage.
He had nurses strap me down, cold needles piercing my arms to force nutrients into my body.
He stroked my swollen belly, his voice sickly sweet: "Stop this nonsense, Sophie. After the babies are born, I'll take you to your father's grave. How's that?"
His words made bile rise in my throat.
I began pretending to cooperate—eating and drinking on schedule, even offering weak smiles.
He was pleased with my "submission," believing he'd finally broken my spirit completely.
He never suspected I'd stolen a large dose of oxytocin while the nurse wasn't looking.
Rather than passively accepting the fate he planned, I would choose when my children entered this world.
I calculated everything perfectly. The Fisher Group emergency shareholders' meeting was at 3 PM. With traffic, it would take him an hour to reach me. I wanted that desperate call to reach him at his moment of greatest confidence—when he thought victory was within reach. I wanted him to crash and burn in front of everyone.
Meanwhile, Howard Hayes had launched his short-selling attack.
Fisher Group's stock was plummeting like an avalanche, billions in market value evaporating daily.
Frederick was drowning, locked in emergency meetings until dawn each day.
He was actually relieved I was confined to the hospital, unable to cause more trouble.
He never suspected that the eye of this financial hurricane was me—the "useless" woman chained to a hospital bed.
While he was desperately trying to calm panicked shareholders in the Fisher Tower penthouse, his phone rang.
It was the hospital.
"Mr. Fisher! Your wife—she's injected herself with oxytocin! She's hemorrhaging severely! Both she and the babies are… they might not make it!"
I could picture Frederick's face contorting when he heard those words.
He crushed the phone in his fist.
With my life and my children's lives as bait, I dragged him from his corporate throne back to my delivery room.
I had won this round.
In his twisted heart, the entire Fisher empire couldn't outweigh his obsession with bloodline.
Frederick burst into the hospital like a raging bull, kicked the operating room door open, and seized the surgeon by his collar. "Save them," he snarled through bloodshot eyes, "or this entire hospital burns!"
An icy voice cut through the chaos from behind him.
"She's just a woman. You can find another if she dies. The Fisher heir cannot have such an unstable mother."
Frederick's father, Victor Fisher, approached slowly, leaning on his cane, flanked by bodyguards.
He glanced coldly at the operating room's red light. "These children, once born, will be registered under Lily Reynolds' name. She's untainted and fertile."
Through waves of anesthesia, I caught these words.
With my fading strength, I grabbed the doctor's sleeve: "If I die… tell Frederick… I curse him to die without heirs."
Victor Fisher sneered. "Who heeds the words of a corpse?"
I looked at his wrinkled, vicious face and managed a weak smile.
"The evidence I gave Howard Hayes… wasn't the only copy. If I die, backups go to every financial regulator and media outlet worldwide…"
"When that happens, the Fisher name dies before I do."
Victor Fisher's face transformed with shock.
I smiled as darkness took me, the last thing I saw being the terror in both their eyes.
