I pushed open the door to Dr. Peterson's office and my heart sank.

Ashley Nunez was already there, sitting in one of the chairs opposite his desk. The moment she saw me, a flicker of triumph flashed in her eyes before she quickly arranged her face into an expression of tearful victimhood.

Dr. Peterson's face was a thundercloud. He slapped two thick research papers down on his desk. The sound echoed in the silent room.

"Explain this," he snarled, his voice tight with fury.

I looked down. One paper had my name on it. The other had Ashley's. They were nearly identical. My groundbreaking research on vascular regeneration techniques, the project I had poured my soul into for the last year. Stolen.

"One of you is a liar and a thief," Dr. Peterson said, his gaze sweeping between us.

"It wasn't me, Dr. Peterson," Ashley said immediately, her voice trembling with manufactured sincerity. "I would never… I have a witness."

On cue, the door opened again.

Adrian walked in.

He didn't even look at me. He addressed Dr. Peterson directly, his tone cool and authoritative.

"Sir, I can vouch for Ashley. I've been mentoring her on this project for the past six months. I've seen her data, her drafts." He paused, then finally let his cold eyes fall on me. "Dr. Goodwin, however… We all know the pressure she's been under. Perhaps she took a shortcut."

I stared at him, disbelief rendering me speechless. He had helped me with that research. He had read my drafts, praised my innovative approach. He knew it was mine.

And he was giving it to her.

Dr. Peterson dismissed them, leaving me alone to face his wrath. The lecture was brutal. My paper was disqualified. A formal reprimand for academic misconduct would be placed in my permanent file. My career, already crippled, was now officially dead.

I floated back to the apartment in a daze. Later, the lock clicked. Dean came in, all fake smiles and soothing words.

"Come on," he said, pulling me up from the bed. "You've been moping around all day. Let's go out. We're going to complete our 'Couples Bucket List'."

He dragged me out, forcing me through a grotesque parody of a perfect date. A walk in the park, ice cream, a movie. I was a puppet, my strings being pulled by his cheerful, lying hands.

As night fell, he took me to a high-end, exclusive club. The kind of place with velvet ropes and private rooms.

"I'm just going to the restroom," he said, pushing me down onto a plush sofa in a secluded booth. "Don't move."

He was gone for less than a minute when the door to our private room swung open. Three large, drunk men stumbled in, a leering grin on their faces. One of them locked the door behind them.

"Well, well, what have we here?" the leader slurred, his eyes roaming over my body. "All alone, little lady?"

I shot to my feet. "Get out."

They just laughed, advancing on me. I fought back, kicking and scratching, but it was useless. They were too strong, their hands grabbing at my clothes, my arms.

Suddenly, the door was kicked off its hinges.

Dean stood in the doorway, his face a mask of pure fury. The easy-going charm was gone, replaced by something primal and terrifying.

He moved like a predator.

In a blur of motion, he lunged, grabbing the first man by the throat and slamming his head against the wall. A sickening crack echoed through the room. The second man came at him, and Dean spun, his elbow connecting with the man's jaw with brutal force.

In the chaos, the third man, scrambling on the floor, pulled a knife. He lunged, not at Dean, but at me.

"AVA!" Dean roared, a sound of pure, animalistic terror.

He threw himself in front of me.

I saw the flash of steel. I heard a wet, percussive thud.

The knife disappeared into Dean's back.

Blood blossomed through the fabric of his shirt. He let out a choked grunt but didn't fall, driving his fist into the man's temple. The man collapsed in a heap.

Security guards burst in, and Dean stumbled, his body going slack, falling against me.

"Dean," I whispered, my hands coming up to his back, feeling the warm, sticky wetness of his blood. My mind went blank. All the betrayal, all the anger, it all evaporated.

I was a doctor. He was bleeding out in my arms.

My hands, slick with his blood, fumbled for my phone. I dialed 911.

I spent the entire night at the hospital, pacing outside the operating room, then sitting by his bedside. The next morning, a nurse gently urged me to go get some coffee. I was exhausted, running on pure adrenaline. I finally relented, leaving my purse on the chair in his room.

I was halfway down the hall when I realized my mistake. I turned back.

As I approached his room, I heard his voice. He was on the phone.

"Yeah, it hurts like a bitch," he was saying, his voice laced with a familiar, arrogant humor. "But it was worth it. You should have seen her face. She was so worried."

My blood ran cold. I pressed myself against the wall, out of sight.

"She'll be all soft and grateful now," he continued, chuckling. "Perfect time to finally get in her pants for real, you know? It's been driving me crazy, her thinking I'm Adrian this whole time. I want her to know it's me."

There was a pause.

"Of course I still like Ashley," he said, his tone dismissive. "But a guy can have a little fun on the side, can't he? Especially when the side piece is as hot as Ava. Tonight's the night. I can feel it."

I didn't hear any more. I couldn't.

I clamped a hand over my mouth to stifle the sob that clawed its way up my throat.

He had staged it all. The attack. The heroic rescue. The life-threatening injury. All of it a sick, twisted performance to make me feel guilty, to make me feel indebted, to manipulate me into sleeping with him.

I stumbled away from the door, my body shaking uncontrollably, and fled the hospital as if the devil himself were at my heels.

The phone call came that night. It was Adrian. His voice was sharp, cold, and laced with an urgency that made the hair on my arms stand up.

"Get to the hospital. Burn unit. Now."

He hung up before I could ask any questions.

I ran, my heart pounding a frantic tattoo against my ribs. When I burst through the doors of the burn unit, Adrian was there waiting. He grabbed my arm, his grip like steel.

"It's Ashley," he said, his face a grim, stony mask. "There was an accident with some chemicals. She needs skin grafts. Extensive ones."

He started dragging me down the hall.

"Her skin type is rare," he continued, his voice devoid of any emotion. "We ran the database. You're a match."

He pulled me into a pre-op room and shoved me towards a surgical table. Nurses were already there, prepping instruments.

"What are you doing?" I stammered, my mind struggling to catch up.

"You're going to be the donor," he said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

He and another male nurse forced me onto the table, holding me down as a third came at me with a syringe. I felt the sharp sting of the needle in my arm. Anesthesia.

"Wait," I begged, my words starting to slur as the drug took hold. "You can't-"

The attending surgeon stepped forward. "Adrian, we have enough. We've taken a significant amount from her thigh and abdomen. Any more from her back, and we risk damaging the nerve bundles along the spinal column."

"I don't care," Adrian said, his eyes fixed on something over my head. "Take more. I want enough for revisions. I want her to be perfect."

The surgeon hesitated. "It could affect Dr. Goodwin's mobility. Permanently."

"I said, take it."

The last thing I felt before the darkness consumed me was the cold, slicing path of the scalpel across the skin of my back.

When I woke up, I was in a standard recovery room. My back was a universe of pain.

Adrian was sitting in a chair by the bed. He didn't ask how I was.

He looked at me, his eyes as sharp and cold as the surgical steel that had just carved up my body, and said, "You did this to her."

I stared at him, my pain-fogged brain struggling to comprehend.

"We found corrosive liquid in her facial moisturizer," he said, his voice a low, accusatory growl. "She said you were the only other person who had access to her locker. She said you've been jealous of her for years."

"No," I whispered, my voice trembling. "I would never."

He didn't believe me. "Her face is ruined. Because of you."

In that moment, I understood. Ashley had done this to herself. She had intentionally disfigured herself to frame me, to create a situation so horrific that Adrian would have no choice but to destroy me completely.

Two military police officers came into the room. They read me my rights as they handcuffed my wrists to the bed frame.

I was under arrest for assault.