I was one step away from catching him in bed at Westfield Mall.

The blue pills in the drawer had already gone down by several tablets. He’d only been with me once this month—those pills must have gone to Isabella.

I decided to let him have her.

The next morning, when I went to Divorce Court, I got stuck in traffic. While waiting, I received a call from an unknown number.

“Hello, are you Sophia Miller? I have your daughter. If you’re smart, come here. Otherwise, I can’t promise I won’t sell her overseas.”

The voice was cold and male.

He put my daughter on the line.

“Mommy, help me.”

“Don’t hurt her, please! I’ll come right away,” I panicked. I immediately tried calling Daniel, but his phone was off. He hadn’t come home the night before. I didn’t know if he had stayed at Isabella’s or at Margaret’s.

“Damn it. Both his and Margaret’s phones are off.”

I had no choice but to go rescue Lily myself.

When I arrived, a gang of homeless-looking men surrounded me.

“Well, well. I knew you couldn’t abandon your daughter.”

I hadn’t realized they would recognize me. Was this revenge?

“Mommy, help me! Don’t let them hurt you!”

“Let her go!!” I shouted angrily.

Seeing my eight-year-old tied up, my eyes filled with tears.

“Sure, we can let her go—if you play with us for a while,” the gang leader, a greasy older man with yellow teeth, sneered.

“Play what? I’ll call the police! Kidnapping a child in broad daylight is a federal crime!”

The gang leader laughed. “I’ve already gone this far. You think I’m afraid of you calling the cops? Get on your knees.”

I was forced to kneel, praying that Daniel might see my texts and call the police. Otherwise, Lily and I could really be trafficked overseas like in some movie. The thought made my blood run cold.

But they didn’t stop. They beat me like a dog. A crowd of them punched and kicked me. My nose bled heavily, but I shielded Lily’s small body. I took the blows myself, until one of them hit me hard on the head with a blunt object.

When I woke up, I was horrified to find one of my legs gone.

I wasn’t dead. I’d been amputated.

I wanted to scream, but my throat was blocked. From the crying and screaming during the attack, my voice had broken.

Where was I? Was this overseas? Had I already been trafficked?

Where was my daughter—where was Lily?

Panicking, I looked around. Then I saw the sign on the door: St. Mary’s Hospital.

I looked out the window. It was pitch black night, but I could recognize Broadway Avenue.

I hadn’t been trafficked overseas. Relief washed over me—but fear for Lily returned immediately.

Before I could reach for my phone, I heard whispers from the next room.

“Daddy, how was my acting? I tricked Mommy, didn’t I? I was awesome, right?”

“Perfect.”

“But Daddy, Mommy’s leg was amputated. How could you bear that? She’s basically disabled now. Just because she put a GPS tracker in your scooter and discovered your movements, you had her beaten like that? How will she live from now on?”

To my shock, it was Daniel’s voice.

“Lily, you don’t understand. I had no choice. If she exposed my GPS history, both Isabella and I would be ruined. We have reputations, families. She insisted on divorce, forcing me to go to Family Court tomorrow morning. If she exposed me, I’d be humiliated. What choice did I have? I could only ask you to help me.”

“And besides, poor Isabella. She’s been abused for so long and has wanted a divorce. Isn’t it normal for me to comfort her, fix her pipes here and there? Sophia has no empathy.”

“And don’t you like Isabella better anyway?”

My daughter clapped her hands and laughed. “Of course! I love Isabella! She always dresses like a fairy when she picks me up from school. But my mom—she always looks like a peasant woman. It’s so embarrassing in front of my friends.”

My heart turned cold.

The daughter I carried for ten months and nearly died giving birth to… The daughter I risked my life to save… had betrayed me for an outsider, tricking me, leading me to lose my leg.

And my husband of more than a decade—he was the mastermind.

Too cruel.

This betrayal was harder to accept than being trafficked overseas.

The next day, the police came to take my statement after I regained consciousness. I told them everything I knew.

But Daniel and Lily instantly put on their performance.

“Officer, can you believe such terrorists exist here in Newark? I strongly condemn this. You must catch them and give my wife justice!” Daniel said passionately.

“Yes, officer, my mom is innocent! If she hadn’t risked herself to save me, she wouldn’t have lost her leg. How could they do that to a mom?” Lily sobbed. “Please, officer, help my mommy get revenge!”

The officer patted her cheek gently.

“Don’t worry, little one. We’ll bring those bad people to justice.”

Then he turned to me.

“If you think of any enemies or suspicious people, contact us again.”

I nodded my thanks.

“Honey, are you okay?” Daniel grasped my hand tenderly. I quickly pulled away, disgusted.

To arrange my assault, to have my leg amputated, and then to act devoted—how had I ever married such a man?

“Lily, are you all right?”

She stammered, “I’m fine, Mommy. I’m sorry. I ran first… so I didn’t get hurt.”

I smiled at her coldly. “Good. As long as you’re not hurt.”

Then I glared at Daniel.

“Tomorrow, to Family Court. Don’t forget. I will divorce you. If you dare not show up, you know the consequences.”

Daniel froze, disbelief in his eyes.

“You’re in this condition, and you still want a divorce?”

I laughed bitterly.

“What, am I dead? Or too disabled to walk with a cane?”

He deflated. “Can’t we just not divorce? Honey… you know me. I didn’t really betray you. It was just a mistake in the GPS logs…”

I shook my head. “Whether it was a mistake or not—can you cut ties with her completely?”

Daniel fell silent.

“So tomorrow. First thing. I want the divorce finalized. I won’t wait another day.”

“…Fine.” His face darkened, as if I owed him millions.

The traitor was him, yet he acted like the victim.

I didn’t sleep that night. My daughter’s deceitful eyes kept stabbing my heart. But tomorrow, I would finally be free. Once divorced, I’d ask Lily the truth. Maybe I could forgive her for being manipulated by Daniel.

Around 2 a.m., just as I drifted into sleep, a noisy commotion jolted me awake. When I opened my eyes, I thought I was dreaming.

That gang of thugs actually sat around my hospital bed, grinning at me.

I instinctively thought I was having a nightmare and pinched myself hard several times.

The gang leader sneered, then burst into laughter.

“Stop pinching yourself. This isn’t a dream, sweetheart—we meet again.

Smart people know when to yield. You made a mistake, now you pay. Boys, let’s show her what we can do.”

I was terrified, gasping for breath.

“Please—don’t hit me! Don’t hit me! I’ll call Daniel Carter—he’s the one who sent you, isn’t he? I’ll call him right now!”

But of course, Daniel’s phone was switched off. He wasn’t answering texts either. Lily’s smartwatch was also off. Even when I tried calling Margaret, it was nothing but a busy tone.

Fear swept over me in waves.

“Please, let me go. I’m just a pitiful woman. Whatever Daniel paid you, I’ll double it. Ten thousand, twenty thousand dollars—will that do?”

The gang leader looked at me with smug amusement.

“Didn’t think you were rich. Tempting offer, but I live by a code—I don’t break deals once I’ve accepted them. So, sweetheart, how do you want to die?”

“No, please, don’t hurt me. Let me go…”

“Hahahaha!”

At his command, the men dragged me off the hospital bed like I was a dead dog. They ignored my already injured leg and stomped on my other one, making me break into a cold sweat from the unbearable pain.

“Ahh! Stop twisting it! My leg’s going to snap!”

“Heh, one leg’s already gone. What’s another?”

My eyes widened in horror.

“You mean—”

“Bingo. Brace yourself, sweetheart. You shouldn’t have made enemies.”

I blacked out from the pain.

When I woke again, I was shocked to discover that everything below my waist was gone.

I wasn’t a whole person anymore. I was half of one.

So tragic. So painful. Too painful.

I cried myself unconscious again. When I woke later that night, the room was empty—but in the bathroom, I heard Daniel’s voice on a video call.

“Daddy, did you really have Mom’s other leg broken too? Just because she forced you to divorce her? But now she can’t even get prosthetics, right? She’ll be stuck in bed forever, like a paralyzed invalid. That’s so pitiful.”

My husband sighed in the bathroom.

“Lily, you saw her aggressiveness. If I don’t go through with the divorce, she’ll expose me and Isabella Reed. But we’re just innocent college friends, nothing more.”

“And Isabella cares about you so much. She never forces you to eat green peppers, does she? Unlike your mom—her controlling nature is unbearable. She needed to be taught a lesson, to rein in that arrogance.”

“I had no other choice. Even if your mom is bedridden for life, I can provide for her, give her a comfortable life. But poor Isabella—she’s abused daily and can’t get divorced. As her old classmate, isn’t it right for me to comfort her? I can be her support, her shield, so that abusive man never dares hurt her again!”