The Scorned Heiress's Hidden Empire (by Jade Quinn) novel Chapter 318

It was light, soft, and bitterly ironic.

Winter remembered the time she and Chris had been trapped in the elevator. When it dropped without warning and he pulled her into his arms, he had lowered his head and kissed her forehead like this to calm her down.

That kiss really had steadied her back then.

But this one felt like a dull blade carving into her. And with one merciless cut, it left her raw and bleeding.

“Can you not make me sick?”

Chris looked into the disgust and hatred in her eyes. His gaze darkened, and his jaw tightened. Then he suddenly lifted one hand and covered her eyes.

“You look better with your eyes closed.”

“Why don’t you just say I’d look even better if I never opened them again?” Winter snapped. His calm, possessive attitude pushed her past the edge of restraint.

The muscles in Chris’s jaw flexed. “What kind of nonsense are you talking about?”

In the front seat, Gavin glanced at his phone when it lit up. He checked the caller ID and answered. After listening to the person on the other end, his expression didn’t change. He gave a quiet acknowledgment and hung up.

“Mr. Xander, the results are back. There’s a problem.”

By the time William got Chris’s call, he was already on the way to Blackwood Manor. He had been planning to go up there himself and bring Winter back.

The moment he answered, Chris’s cool, even voice came through the line, as if nothing unusual had happened.

“I took her back to Westbay.”

William didn’t say a word. He hung up and told Zion to turn the car around and head back to Westbay.

When he arrived, he found Winter lying in bed just as Chris had said, tucked neatly under the covers.

The room was warm. A glass of warm water sat on the nightstand.

She was lying on her side, so he couldn’t see her face when he first walked in. But when he stepped closer, he heard a faint sniffle in the quiet room.

It was the sound someone made after crying. Soft and suppressed.

She was trying hard not to let him hear it. But even without seeing her face, he knew she had been crying hard.

William stopped short.

He lowered his head, and a shadow seemed to settle over his face.

At the hospital, Chris got out of the car and strode through the lobby. He took the elevator straight to the top floor, where the private intensive care unit was located.

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Inside the private suite, the caregiver was anxiously wiping the blood from the corner of Skyla’s mouth. She kept muttering under her breath in a panicked voice.

“How could this happen? How could this happen? I was so careful with everything Ms. Jasper ate…”

How could Skyla have been poisoned out of nowhere?

Footsteps sounded in the hallway, drawing closer.

“Ms. Jasper has been poisoned.”

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