Part 3I Died Once, Now I’m Here to Make Them Pay

“Grayson, where are you? Please, just pick up the phone!” I cried, forcing tears to well in my eyes.

Brenda looked at me, her gaze filled with guilt and avoidance. She tried to defend her son. “Grayson is probably… probably busy with something important. If you can’t get through, just wait a while.”

Even now, she was covering for his affair. My heart ached for Cassie, fighting for her life just a few feet away.

Suddenly, a commotion erupted at the end of the hall.

“Cassie! What’s happened to my precious granddaughter?!”

My father-in-law, Robert, was helping the family matriarch, Grandma Pierce, hurry toward us. She was over seventy, but her face was a mask of fierce anxiety.

“Where is Grayson? Is he in there saving Cassie right now?”

Grandma Pierce adored Cassie, who was the spitting image of her as a young woman. Don’t let her age fool you. In my past life, when they beat me, she had the strength of a demon, breaking two thick wooden canes over my back.

I still remembered the bone-deep agony.

This time, I would not let them pin this on me.

I put on a pained expression, my eyes red-rimmed. “Grandma, Grayson told me he had to work overtime. But I just asked the nurse, and he’s not here. He’s not in the operating room. I… I don’t know where he is.”

“What do you mean, you don’t know? What kind of wife are you? If you don’t know, why don’t you call him and ask?”

She jabbed her cane toward my face, the tip hovering inches from my eye.

“Grandma, I did call.” I looked helplessly at Brenda. “Mom, you saw me, didn’t you? I just called him ten times in a row. He didn’t answer a single one!”

Brenda nervously twisted the hem of her blouse and nodded. “Yes… yes, she’s been calling…”

The old woman’s eyes narrowed into slits. “Then it’s your fault! You must have done something to piss him off, that’s why he’s not answering your calls. Try your mother-in-law’s phone. Let’s see if he dares to hang up on her!”

Now Brenda was truly terrified. Her hand trembled as she gave me her phone.

“Dial it!” the old woman commanded.

I took a deep breath, pressed the familiar number, and put the call on speaker.

After two rings, he answered.

“Mom, what’s up? Didn’t we agree you wouldn’t call unless it was an emergency?” Grayson’s voice was lazy, the sound of wind and waves clearly audible in the background.

I took another breath and shouted, my voice trembling with fake tears, “Honey, it’s me, Cass—”

“Ivy?!”

His roar cut me off like a gunshot.

“Are you fucking insane?! It wasn’t enough to spam me from your phone, now you’re stealing my mother’s? I told you I’m busy!”

“No, honey, please listen! Cassie is dying! She’s been stabbed, and you’re the only one in the hospital who can save her! You have to come back!” My voice cracked with desperation.

There was a brief silence on the other end.

Then, a sweet, cloying female voice floated through the speaker.

“Grayson, honey, I think you should go back. Ivy is obviously just jealous. To get you to leave, she’s actually lying about poor Cassie. It’s okay, I can pick up seashells by myself. You don’t need to stay with me.”

It was Sophie.

I trembled with fury, my nails digging into my palms.

“I am not lying! Sophie, shut your mouth! Cassie is in surgery! Grayson, I’m begging you, please come back. Cassie needs you!”

“Ivy, that’s enough!” Grayson’s voice exploded again. “There’s a limit to jealousy! To trick me into coming home, you’d stoop to a lie like this? Cursing my own sister? Aren’t you afraid of karma?”

“Stop bothering me! I’m busy! If you screw up my promotion to department head, I’ll make you wish you were never born!”

“Beep… beep… beep…”

He hung up.

I stood there, clutching the phone, fat tears rolling down my cheeks. My eyes swept over the three elder Pierces.

Their faces were a mirror of shock, humiliation, and utter disbelief.

Just then, the OR doors were thrown open again.

The nurse’s voice was more frantic than ever, practically a scream.

“Have you reached Dr. Pierce yet?! The patient’s heart rate is dropping, and we can’t stabilize her blood pressure! She can’t wait any longer!”

Grandma Pierce looked like she was about to have a stroke.

She snatched the phone from Brenda’s hand and shoved it back at her. “You call him! You do it now!”

Brenda’s fumbling fingers dialed the number. After several rings, Grayson finally picked up.

His voice, colder than ice and more toxic than poison, echoed from the speakerphone once more.

“What the hell do you want now, Ivy? If you’re that bored, go kill yourself! Hang yourself, drink poison, there are plenty of ways to do it. Just stop fucking bothering me!”

The blood drained from Brenda’s face.

Just before he could hang up, she mustered all her strength and shrieked.

“Grayson! Don’t hang up! It’s your mother!”

“You have to come home! Your sister… a monster stabbed her through the heart! She’s on the operating table! The doctors say you’re the only one who can save her! Please, son, come home!”

Dead silence on the other end.

It stretched for a full five seconds before Grayson’s voice returned.