Part 2The Gilded Womb

Eleanor didn’t get far.

Within minutes, Carter’s security team had us back in the penthouse, prisoners in our own home. Stella and I could feel the frantic, rabbit-fast thumping of our mother’s heart. We could feel her body trembling with a fear so profound it seeped into our own developing bones.

“Carter, you’re a monster! You’ll rot in hell for this!” Eleanor screamed, her voice raw as they pinned her to a vast, king-sized bed.

“A monster?” Carter’s voice was laced with a chilling amusement. “Eleanor, you should be honored. To be able to give something so precious to Chloe and Noah… it’s the most important thing you’ll ever do.”

“Shut up! Who the hell is Chloe to me?”

CRACK.

The sound was sharp, sickening. A wave of fiery pain shot through Eleanor’s cheek, and we felt it, too.

“Don’t you ever disrespect her,” Carter said, his voice dangerously low. “A woman like you isn’t fit to say her name.”

“I’ll spit on her name! She’s nothing but a home-wrecking—”

“It seems one slap wasn’t enough to clear your head.” His patience was wearing thin. “Let me remind you of something, Eleanor. Everything you have—your status as Mrs. Brooks, the black Amex, this apartment overlooking Central Park—I gave it to you. And I can take it all away.”

He leaned closer. “Do you really think your family, with their failing little business, can protect you? One phone call from me, and they’ll be wiped off the map by morning.”

Eleanor’s curses died in her throat, replaced by choked, desperate sobs.

This was the gilded cage I’d fought for nine hundred years to be born into?

Back in the dimension between lives, Stella and I were legends for all the wrong reasons. I was the top-tier soul guide who’d clawed my way up through sheer grit and paperwork. She was the hell-raising spirit who’d literally fought her way to the top. We’d battled to a stalemate over the single Platinum Rebirth package, only to be sucked into the same vortex at the last second by some cosmic glitch.

And now, here we were.

“Nice pick, Luna,” Stella’s thought was drenched in sarcasm. “This is the ‘good family’ you were so desperate for?”

“Oh, shut up, Stella,” I shot back. “Like you weren’t trying to shove your way in here, too.”

“Only because you were blocking the better options!”

“Sure, keep telling yourself that.”

Our bickering was interrupted by a syrupy sweet voice from the doorway.

“Carter, honey, don’t be angry with Eleanor. It’s all my fault…”

“It has nothing to do with you,” Carter’s tone softened instantly.

“If only my body were stronger, if I could have had another child for you, we wouldn’t have to put her through this…” It was Chloe. She sounded like she was on the verge of tears. “I’m so sorry, Ellie,” she said, her voice dripping with fake sympathy as she approached the bed. “Please don’t blame Carter. He’s just so worried about Noah. The doctors… the doctors said he might not make it through the winter…”

She was a performer, and this was her stage.

“As long as your children can save my Noah,” she whispered, her voice cracking beautifully, “I’ll… I’ll spend the rest of my life repaying you.”

“Did you hear that, Eleanor?” Carter’s voice was sharp again. “Chloe is being gracious. The least you can do is show some gratitude.”

He slid a document onto the bed. “Sign this. It’ll be better for everyone.”

“What is this?” Eleanor’s voice was hoarse.

“Voluntary organ donation consent forms,” Carter replied nonchalantly. “Signing them now just simplifies the process later.”

“And if I don’t?”

“If you don’t?” He laughed. “Fine. Then I can arrange for an ‘accidental’ premature birth. Or even… an ‘accidental’ death. Either way, Eleanor, the little things in your belly belong to me.”