Carson Moss wore a sharply tailored Tom Ford suit. He didn't look at the crowd. He walked straight through the whispering guests, heading directly for the center of the conflict.

Everly watched her husband approach. A desperate flicker of hope ignited in her chest. She instinctively reached her hand out toward him, needing him to shield her, needing him to fix this.

Carson didn't even look at her. He walked right past her outstretched arm, grabbed Giana's wrist, and pulled her toward him.

Everly's hand hung frozen in the empty air. The sound of the socialites laughing behind their hands pierced her eardrums like physical needles.

"You shouldn't be here," Carson muttered to Giana.

His tone was low, but there was no anger in it. Only mild scolding.

Giana immediately leaned her weight against Carson's chest. She pouted, her voice dripping with fake innocence.

"The baby was kicking," she whined. "He wanted to hear the music."

Carson frowned. He turned his head and gave a sharp hand signal to the hotel manager.

"Clear the room," Carson ordered. "No photos. Confiscate any phones that are out."

A wave of dizziness hit Everly. The room spun. She lunged forward and grabbed the sleeve of Carson's suit jacket, her fingers digging into the expensive wool.

"Carson, please," she begged, her voice breaking. "Look at my grandfather. He can't breathe."

Carson looked down at her hand on his arm. He ripped his sleeve away from her grip with brutal force.

"Stop acting like a hysterical shrew," he hissed, his voice low enough that only the three of them could hear. "You're embarrassing me."

Behind them, Arthur gasped for air. He gripped the armrests of his wheelchair, his entire body shaking.

"Who..." Arthur wheezed, his vocal cords straining. "Who is that woman?"

Carson's face stiffened. He opened his mouth, ready to deliver a smooth, practiced PR lie.

But Giana moved faster. She ripped her wrist out of Carson's grip, stepped around the table in her high heels, and marched right up to Arthur's wheelchair.

Everly screamed and lunged to grab Giana's dress, but Carson's personal bodyguard stepped in, slamming his solid chest into Everly and blocking her path.

Giana leaned down. She shoved her face, painted with bright red lipstick, inches from Arthur's pale skin. She deliberately brushed her hair aside, exposing a dark purple hickey on her neck.

"Carson never loved Everly," Giana said, pronouncing every syllable with venomous clarity. "He thinks she's pathetic."

She reached into her bag and pulled out a folded piece of paper. It was an ultrasound printout from New York-Presbyterian Hospital. She shoved it violently into Arthur's trembling hands.

"I'm carrying the real Moss heir," Giana laughed, a sharp, grating sound. "It's a boy."

Arthur looked down. His eyes locked onto the name printed at the top of the medical scan. His eyes widened until the whites showed. A horrifying, wet gurgling sound erupted from his throat.

His face turned a deep, unnatural shade of purple. His hands clawed at the front of his shirt, tearing off a button. His body went rigid, and then he slid sideways, collapsing out of the wheelchair and hitting the floor with a heavy thud.

"Grandpa!" Everly let out a blood-curdling scream.

She shoved the bodyguard with all her might, throwing herself onto the floor beside Arthur.

Her hands shook uncontrollably as she ripped his bowtie off and tore his collar open.

"Call 911!" she screamed at the crowd. "Somebody call an ambulance!"

The ballroom descended into total chaos. Guests shoved each other to get back. Several people pulled out their phones, the camera flashes reflecting off the crystal chandeliers.

Carson saw the cameras. His eyes widened in panic. He didn't look at the dying old man on the floor.

"Get their phones!" Carson roared at his security team. "Confiscate everything! We IPO next week!"

Everly locked her hands together and pressed them hard against Arthur's chest. She pumped down, her tears falling in thick drops, splashing onto Arthur's graying face.

She turned her head, looking up at Carson with wild, desperate eyes.

"Use the helicopter!" she begged, her voice tearing her throat. "Your private chopper is on the roof! Fly him to the hospital now!"

Carson stared down at her. His eyes were completely dead.

"No," Carson said coldly. "The helicopter will draw too much press. We wait for the ambulance."

Giana hid behind Carson's broad back. She placed a hand over her stomach, pretending to look scared, but Everly saw the corners of her red lips pull up into a satisfied smirk.

The wail of sirens finally cut through the Manhattan night, growing louder until they echoed inside the ballroom.

Paramedics rushed through the doors, pushing a stretcher. They grabbed Everly by the shoulders and physically dragged her away from Arthur's body.

Everly fought them, crying and reaching out. She watched helplessly as they strapped her grandfather to the board.

She turned her head one last time. Carson was wrapping his suit jacket around Giana's shoulders, carefully guiding the uninjured woman toward the private VIP elevator, leaving Everly entirely alone.

Everly sat on the hard plastic bench outside the emergency room at New York-Presbyterian Hospital. Her hands were covered in dried, sticky blood.

The fluorescent lights in the hallway buzzed with a harsh, blinding white glare. She stared straight ahead, her eyes locked onto the red "SURGERY IN PROGRESS" sign above the heavy double doors.

Every second felt like a physical weight pressing down on her chest. She pulled her phone from her pocket. Her fingers were stiff and cold. She dialed Carson's number.

The call went straight to a cold, automated voicemail.

Everly slammed the phone down onto the plastic bench. She pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes and let out a low, suffocating sob that burned her throat.

Suddenly, the red light above the doors clicked off. The heavy airtight doors slid open with a mechanical hiss.

Dr. Elias Thornton walked out. He pulled down his surgical mask, revealing a face lined with exhaustion. There were fresh blood splatters on his blue scrubs. He walked slowly toward Everly.

Everly shot up from the bench. The sudden movement drained the blood from her head. Her vision went black at the edges, and she stumbled forward.

Dr. Thornton caught her by the arm, steadying her.

"Mrs. Moss," he said, his voice heavy with finality. "I am so sorry. The delay in getting him here caused massive myocardial infarction. His heart suffered too much damage. Arthur Weber is gone."

The words hit the back of Everly's skull like a sledgehammer. A high-pitched ringing instantly deafened her.

She opened her mouth to speak, but her throat felt like it was filled with wet cement. No sound came out.

She shoved Dr. Thornton aside and stumbled blindly into the emergency room.

In the center of the room, a body lay on a metal table, covered by a thin white sheet.

Everly walked toward it, her legs feeling like lead. She reached out with a trembling hand and pulled the sheet back.

Arthur's face was sunken, his skin a terrifying, ashen gray.

The dam inside Everly's chest shattered.

She collapsed against the edge of the metal bed, letting out a raw, animalistic scream of pure agony. The sound tore from her lungs, echoing off the sterile tile walls. The edges of her vision darkened, the room spun violently, and she hit the floor, slipping into total darkness.

When Everly opened her eyes again, she was staring at a plain white ceiling. She was lying in a private hospital room. A sharp pinch in the back of her hand told her an IV drip was taped to her skin.

Before she could process the pain in her head, the cell phone on the bedside table began to ring. It was a sharp, grating sound.

Everly turned her head slowly. She reached out and answered the call.

"Everly," Marion Moss's voice came through the speaker. Her mother-in-law sounded haughty, cold, and entirely unbothered.

Marion didn't offer a single word of condolence.

"Listen to me carefully," Marion ordered. "You will post a statement on your social media accounts immediately. You will say the incident at the banquet was a misunderstanding. You will state that Arthur died of natural causes due to old age."

Everly's lungs stopped working. The sheer audacity of the demand sent a shock of ice-cold rage straight into her veins.

"I will not cover up a murder," Everly said, her voice a harsh whisper.

Marion let out a dry, cruel laugh.

"You will do exactly as I say," Marion threatened. "Or I will freeze every single cent of the medical trust fund paying for your crippled daughter's treatments."

At the sound of Aria's name being used as a bargaining chip, something inside Everly snapped. The soft, accommodating woman she had been for four years died in that hospital bed. Her eyes hardened, turning cold and vicious.

Everly didn't say another word. She pulled the phone away from her ear and hit end.

She reached over with her right hand, grabbed the plastic IV tube taped to her left hand, and ripped it out of her vein in one violent motion.

A stream of hot blood immediately ran down her knuckles, dripping onto the white bedsheets.

She grabbed a rough paper towel, pressed it hard against the bleeding hole in her hand, and threw the blanket off. She shoved her bare feet into her ruined heels.

A nurse walked into the room, her eyes widening at the blood. "Ma'am, you can't-"

Everly shoved the nurse out of the way. Her eyes were so dead, so filled with raw intent, that the nurse stumbled back and didn't dare follow.

Everly walked into the hospital elevator. She stared at her reflection in the metal doors. Her hair was a tangled mess. She clenched her fists.

She walked out the front doors of the hospital. The freezing, early morning wind of New York hit her face, but it did nothing to cool the boiling rage in her chest.

She flagged down a yellow taxi. She ripped the back door open and slid onto the cracked leather seat.

The driver looked at her in the rearview mirror, his eyes wide with shock at her bloody, disheveled state. "Where to, lady?"

Everly stared out the window at the dark city streets.

"Tribeca," Everly said, her voice like crushed glass. She gave him the exact address of the penthouse Carson had bought for his mistress.

The yellow taxi pulled up to the curb outside the luxury high-rise in Tribeca. Everly reached into her clutch, pulled out the last few twenty-dollar bills she had, and threw them onto the passenger seat. She pushed the door open and stepped out into the biting wind.

She walked straight through the revolving glass doors of the lobby. The night doorman started to stand up, his mouth opening to stop the bleeding, disheveled woman, but Everly didn't even look at him. She walked with such terrifying purpose that he froze.

She stepped into the private VIP elevator. She reached out and punched in the security code Carson had drunkenly muttered months ago.

The keypad beeped green. The doors slid shut silently.

Everly watched the digital numbers climb higher and higher. She reached down to the silk ribbon tied around her waist. She untied it, wrapped it tightly around her bleeding left hand, and pulled the knot hard with her teeth. Her eyes were completely empty.

The elevator chimed. The doors opened directly into the massive, open-concept penthouse living room.

Everly stepped off the marble floor of the elevator. The room was littered with expensive designer shopping bags and high-end baby toys.

Giana was lounging on a massive white leather sofa. She wore a sheer silk robe, holding a crystal flute of non-alcoholic champagne, laughing into her cell phone.

At the sound of footsteps, Giana turned her head. When she saw Everly standing there, covered in dried blood and dirt, she gasped, the crystal glass slipping from her fingers and shattering on the floor.

Everly didn't say a word. She moved across the room like a ghost out for blood, her steps fast and silent.

Giana dropped her phone. She scrambled to stand up, trying to mask her panic with a sneer. "Look at you. You look like a homeless beggar-"

Everly lunged. She shot her hand out, grabbed the front of Giana's silk robe, and slammed the woman backward onto the sofa cushions.

Giana shrieked. She threw her hands up, her long acrylic nails clawing wildly at Everly's face.

Everly didn't flinch. She used her other hand to grab both of Giana's wrists, pinning them down with a strength born of pure adrenaline.

"You killed him," Everly snarled, her teeth bared. "You are going to pay for his life."

Before Everly could do anything else, the heavy oak door of the master bedroom flew open. Carson rushed out, wearing only his dress shirt, his hair a mess.

He saw Everly pinning Giana down.

"What the hell are you doing?!" Carson roared. He crossed the room in three massive strides.

He grabbed Everly by the back of her shoulders and yanked her backward with brutal force.

Everly was caught off guard. The violent pull lifted her off her feet. She stumbled backward, her heels catching on the rug.

Her back slammed directly into the sharp edge of the solid marble coffee table.

A sickening crack echoed in her ears. Blinding, white-hot pain shot up her spine. Everly gasped, the air completely knocked out of her lungs, and she crumpled onto the wool rug.

Carson didn't even look at her. He immediately pulled Giana into his arms, his hands frantically checking her stomach. "Are you hurt? Did she hit the baby?"

Giana burst into fake, hysterical tears. She buried her face in Carson's chest. "She tried to kill our son, Carson! She's crazy!"

Carson turned his head. He looked down at Everly writhing on the floor. His eyes held nothing but absolute disgust.

"You are a vicious, insane bitch," Carson spat.

Everly gritted her teeth. She pushed her hands against the floor, forcing herself to stand despite the agonizing pain radiating from her spine. She pointed a shaking finger at Giana.

"She murdered my grandfather!" Everly screamed, her voice cracking. "She shoved that ultrasound in his face on purpose!"

Carson rolled his eyes. He let go of Giana and walked over to the sleek oak desk in the corner. He pulled open a drawer and took out a leather-bound checkbook.

He grabbed a pen and scribbled a series of numbers across the paper. He ripped the check out, walked back over to Everly, and threw it directly at her face.

The paper fluttered through the air and landed at Everly's feet.

"That is five million dollars," Carson said, his voice dripping with condescension. "It's your hush money. You will sign the NDA tomorrow, and you will get out of New York."

Everly looked down. The blue Chase Bank logo stared back at her.

A low, dark laugh bubbled up from her throat. The sound echoed off the high ceilings, sounding completely unhinged.

She bent down slowly, wincing as her back screamed in protest, and picked up the check.

Carson crossed his arms, a smug look crossing his face. He thought she had finally broken. He thought money had won.

Everly looked him dead in the eye. She gripped the edges of the paper and ripped it in half. Then she put the pieces together and ripped them again. And again.

She raised her hands and threw the shredded pieces of paper violently into Carson's face. The tiny white squares rained down over his expensive shirt and the floor.

"I don't want your filthy money," Everly said, pronouncing every word with lethal precision. "I am going to make you both bleed."

She turned her back on him and walked straight toward the elevator.