Zion coldly laughed. “Last night during the livestream, she was surrounded by a bunch of haters, yelling at her nonstop, calling her a mistress, saying she’s carrying a child she shouldn’t have. She held it in alone, held it in until she broke down, and almost drowned herself in the bathtub.”
“Those haters, you sent them, right? Just because I didn’t answer your call? Isn’t that going too far?!”
I stiffened, feeling nothing but absurd disbelief. Zion actually thought I did something like that?
Zion’s voice turned even colder than before.
“Why do you want to push her to her death? Maeve only wants to stay quietly by my side. She isn’t a threat to you at all. You’re already Mrs. Payne, what else are you unhappy about?!”
“Do you know the child in her belly almost didn’t survive?!”
When those words dropped, I let out a laugh with no sound.
So the reason Zion showed up wasn’t that I was lying in a hospital bed; he came to question me for Maeve.
The blanket covered my now clearly flat belly. He didn’t notice, and I didn’t point it out.
I only spoke in a low voice, “Then do you know… because of Maeve, I was kidnapped on my way back. I almost lost my life there, and I almost lost my child.”
His brows pulled together even more, clearly not expecting it.
“What does that have to do with Maeve?”
He reacted fast, and his tone went cold again. “Don’t drag everything onto her.”
I reached over, picked up my phone from beside the pillow, and played the recording.
It was what I had secretly saved while shaking in fear.
The man’s harsh voice filled the room, full of clear hate, saying I was a “worthless Mrs. Payne,” saying I stood in his sister’s way, so I had to be gotten rid of.
Zion’s expression changed.
At that moment, Maeve was helped into the room.
She looked pale, her eyes swollen. “It’s not true… I don’t have a real older brother.”
She looked at Zion, and tears dropped at once.
“Brother Zion, trust me, how could I do something like that? I don’t even dare step on an ant, how could I hurt anyone?”
“Is it because I’m carrying a boy that Natalie hates me this much? That she would try to throw this kind of dirt on me?”
Zion’s look turned even colder.
He turned back toward me, his eyes showing nothing but disappointment and irritation.
“To think you’d try to blame Maeve like this, you’ve crossed the line!”