Chapter 4
Audrey's POV
That night at the gala became the turning point of my life.
A kind waitress had called 911, and Lily was saved. But she'd gone too long without oxygen. Her lungs had taken permanent damage.
The doctor told me she needed to be moved to the ICU immediately. Heart failure could happen at any moment.
I stayed outside that ICU day and night, hollow and drifting through the fluorescent hallways like a ghost.
Daniel — my husband, Lily's father — didn't show up once. Not for an entire week.
He'd taken Lydia to Aspen. Joel went with them. "Team bonding," he called it.
December brought the worst blizzard New York had seen in a hundred years.
That night, alarms went off throughout the hospital.
Lily's condition took a sudden, catastrophic turn — anaphylactic shock with complications. A doctor burst through the ICU doors, voice urgent. "Mrs. Mercer, the hospital's running critically low on Rh-negative blood. We need a family member to get to the central blood bank in Brooklyn right now, or else—"
He didn't finish. He didn't have to.
Outside, the blizzard had shut the city down. Every ambulance was already out. The only vehicle I had access to was Daniel's Range Rover, sitting in the hospital garage.
I called him. Once. Twice. Ten times.
Finally, he picked up.
Loud music in the background. Laughter. Voices.
"What NOW, Audrey?" Pure irritation. "I'm on vacation. Can you go five minutes without blowing up my phone?"
"Daniel, Lily is DYING." I was on my knees in the hospital hallway, choking on the words. "The hospital's out of blood. I need your car to get to Brooklyn. Where are the spare keys? They're not in the bag — WHERE ARE THEY?!"
A beat of silence.
Then Lydia's voice, light and sweet. "Oh, babe, I saw that keychain yesterday and I just loved it — I threw it in my bag. I didn't think it was a big deal."
"Honestly, Audrey needs to relax. It's a spare key, not the end of the world."
"You heard her." Daniel's voice went dead cold. "Not my problem. Figure it out."
"Figure it OUT?!" I couldn't breathe. "Daniel, that car could SAVE HER LIFE. Call someone — hire a helicopter, call one of your friends — she is DYING!"
"Audrey, I'm not falling for this again." A short, cold laugh. "Every single time Lydia and I try to get away, suddenly Lily's 'dying.' Give me a break."
"Daniel—"
"We're done here."
Click.
I called back. Straight to voicemail. He'd blocked me.
My hands wouldn't stop shaking. I could barely get Joel's number right. It rang forever before he picked up, background noise spilling through — music, shouting, glasses.
"Audrey, Jesus, can you STOP? Daniel's introducing me to some guys from Silicon Valley right now. She's got doctors — she's not gonna die. God, just RELAX for once."
She's not gonna die.
I stood there holding the phone, staring at the closed ICU doors.
My last family member. And he'd hung up on me.
Ten minutes later, the ICU doors swung open.
The doctor pulled off his mask. He looked at me and slowly shook his head.
"I'm so sorry, Mrs. Mercer. We did everything we could. She didn't make it."
The world went silent.
No crying. No screaming.
Just a hollow cold spreading from my feet upward through my entire body, until I felt completely emptied out.
I walked into the room and picked Lily up. She was already cold.
She was seven years old.
She'd never been to Disney World. She'd never gotten to grow up. She'd never seen Central Park after a snow.
The people who killed her — her own father, her own uncle, her beloved Aunt Lydia.
If they hated me this much — if they'd taken the only reason I had left to keep going —
Then what was the point?
I carried Lily up to the hospital roof.
The blizzard screamed around me. The city was buried under heavy snow, not a single star showing through.
I pulled out my phone and hit record.
"Daniel. Lydia. Joel."
My voice was steady. Eerily steady. Not one tremor.
"You won. You destroyed my home. You took everything I had. And now — you killed my daughter."
I looked down at Lily and pressed my lips to her cold forehead.
"I will never forgive you. Not ever."
"I'll be watching from wherever I end up — watching every single one of you lose everything. Watching it fall apart piece by piece. Until there's nothing left."
I hit send.
Then I threw the phone off the roof and listened to it disappear into the dark.
The wind wrapped around us. I held Lily against my chest and closed my eyes.
"Don't be scared, baby. Mommy's taking you home."
I stepped off the edge —
And fell into nothing.
...
CRACK.
A sound I felt more than heard. My body hit the snow-covered pavement sixteen floors below.
Blood spread wide and dark across the white.
But there was no pain.
I opened my eyes.
I was floating — suspended in midair, weightless, looking down at the snow.
