Too Late, Mr. Cooper: Your Bride Ran with Your Baby novel Chapter 73

Hearing her mother's words, Liliana remembered what Old Mrs. Kingsley had told her just a few days ago at the Kingsley estate.

Her engagement to Linton hadn't been a simple arrangement. He had knelt by her grandfather’s sickbed for three days, begging for her hand in marriage.

Liliana slowly lowered her gaze.

She had always believed Linton didn't care for her, that he was sick of her constant clinging and couldn't wait for her to disappear. But now, it seemed the reality was slightly different from what she'd imagined.

For a brief moment, she hesitated.

But in that single moment, the weight of all the negative emotions that had been building for weeks crashed down on her. Her body couldn't take it anymore. She clamped a hand over her mouth, a powerful wave of nausea rising in her throat.

"Urgh!"

A violent dry heave wracked her body, so forceful it brought tears to her eyes.

"Liliana!" Mrs. Hart cried out, rushing to her side and rubbing her back. "What's wrong? Did you eat something bad?"

"We're already at the hospital. Come on, I'll take you to get checked out."

Without waiting for an answer, Mrs. Hart grabbed Liliana's hand and pulled her forward, her face a mask of anxiety, giving her no chance to refuse.

Panic seized Liliana. She gripped her mother's arm, about to protest, when a sudden commotion erupted outside the emergency room.

Doctors and nurses rushed in with a gurney, on which lay a pregnant woman, her face contorted in agony.

Her belly was swollen, her face deathly pale, and a pool of blood was spreading beneath her. Her eyes were closed, her brows furrowed in an unconscious grimace.

Liliana stopped in her tracks.

It was like being flayed alive by a thousand sharp knives, each one slowly carving away her flesh. The agony was so intense she thought she was going mad, thought she was dying.

And in the end, she did die.

Antenatal depression, combined with her fragile health, led to a fatal hemorrhage during childbirth. The doctors couldn't save her.

Throughout that hazy month of nightmares, the words she heard most often were from a nurse.

"The baby's father can't make it. He's at the hospital next door with his sister, who's having a depressive episode."

The bitterness was suffocating.

Now, the nightmare and reality bled into one another. Liliana stood frozen, watching as the bleeding woman was wheeled into the operating room, a nurse frantically trying to reach her family on the phone.