Chapter 1

My husband Julian’s medical resident had anorexia, while I was a popular food vlogger with a massive appetite.

When she went two days without eating, Julian brought her straight to our penthouse.

With tear-filled eyes, she said, "She’s a food influencer. Maybe if I watch her eat, my appetite will come back. I see those streamers eating super spicy food all the time. Can you eat that for me, please?"

To get her to eat, Julian quickly ordered a massive spread of extremely spicy takeout and set it right in front of me.

For her sake, I ate scorching hot food every single day, spending hours forcing it down.

On the ninety-ninth day, I clutched my burning stomach and panicked. "I can't eat anymore. I'm... I have a baby in—"

I desperately wanted to tell him I was pregnant.

He sneered. "Stop being so dramatic. You can gorge yourself for strangers on TikTok, but you can’t do it to help Chloe?"

Forced by him, I spent another agonizing eight hours swallowing fiery chilies.

Until my throat gave up, and I violently vomited while doubling over in pain.

Eventually, I collapsed onto the cold hardwood floor, a massive puddle of bright red blood spreading between my thighs.

I begged Julian to save me, but he merely covered his little resident’s eyes and said with disgust, "Disgusting. Don't look, Chloe."

After the two of them walked out, I made a desperate call to my stepbrother abroad. "Julian... can you come bring me home?"

Inside the sterile operating room, I stared blankly at the bright ceiling tiles.

The moment the scalpel sliced through my flesh, blinding agony tore through me.

I wanted to scream, but a plastic tube was shoved deep down my throat. The paralytic made it impossible to even twitch a finger.

"Heart rate is 140, BP is climbing," a nurse’s voice sounded muffled in the distance.

"Push more sedatives."

The voice was painfully familiar. It was Julian, my husband. Wearing sterile scrubs and latex gloves, he was cutting open my lower abdomen with his own hands.

Standing by the anesthesia machine, Chloe blinked innocently at me.

It was obvious she had deliberately under-dosed my anesthesia.

"Chloe, hand me the electrocautery," Julian said, his tone sickeningly gentle.

Passing the surgical instrument, Chloe’s fingertips brushed against the back of his hand. "Dr. Vance, is she in pain?"

"Patients under general anesthesia don't feel anything," he scoffed softly. "Focus. Once we finish this procedure, I’m taking you back out for sushi. You only managed two pieces earlier..."

Liar. I was dying from the pain.

Yet I couldn't tell whether my heart or my body hurt worse.

I could smell the sickening stench of burning tissue from the electrocautery, and hear the wet gurgle of blood being sucked through the plastic tubing.

The worst pain came from my uterus—there was supposed to be a nine-week-old fetus nestled there, but now there was only a destroyed placenta eroded by toxic levels of capsaicin.

"The patient is crying!" a circulating nurse suddenly called out.

Chloe leaned over me, her eyes above the surgical mask crinkling into happy crescents. "Oh, must be intraoperative awareness. Don't be scared, though. It won't hurt much longer."

When the sharp curette scraped violently inside my womb, darkness threatened to swallow me whole. The wet, rhythmic sound of my nine-week-old baby and blood clots being vacuumed away was horrifyingly distinct, like dirty paper towels getting sucked down a flushing toilet.

"Clear it out thoroughly," Julian told the nurse coldly. "She binge-eats ghost pepper extract every day. Her uterus is soaked in capsaicin."

Then, Chloe subtly pressed the lockout button on my pain pump.

As an explosive wave of pure torment detonated inside me, I heard Julian’s parting words: "It’s all your fault. Chloe finally had an appetite, and you just had to make a scene. Eating some peppers required surgery, and you even lost my first child over it."

Unable to endure the hellish agony, I finally blacked out.

The rhythmic beeping of the vitals monitor dragged me back to consciousness.

It was already noon the next day.

I opened my eyes, every fiber of my being screaming in pain.

A nasogastric tube was shoved down my throat, turning every breath into a swallow of crushed glass. My phone buzzed persistently on the bedside table. It was a text from my stepbrother, Julian Vance—no, Julian had the same name, but my stepbrother was Alexander Hayes:

"Hang in there, sweet girl. I'm landing tomorrow night to bring you home."

Right then, the hospital room door swung open.

"You're awake?"

Chloe’s voice was sweet as venom. She stepped inside holding an insulated thermos, with Julian trailing behind her in a spotless white lab coat.

"Chloe woke up early to make you some soup," Julian said, unscrewing the lid. A rich, heavy aroma filled the small room.

It was seafood chowder. I had just undergone emergency gastrointestinal surgery; rich seafood was strictly prohibited for my inflamed gut.

Julian was a board-certified surgeon. There was no way on earth he didn't know that. He simply didn't care whether I lived or died.

Chloe scooped up a spoonful and held it right to my chapped lips. "Try it? I even added extra shrimp oil."

The sudden movement tugged hard on my feeding tube, and my vision swam with dark spots. Julian frowned, pinning my wrist to the mattress. "Stop squirming. Chloe spent three hours simmering this for you. Don't throw her kindness back in her face."

Lacking the strength to fight back, I could only jerk my face away. Without missing a beat, Chloe shoved the scalding broth straight against my lips. Blisters immediately welled up, bright red and searing.

Before I could even react, Chloe’s eyes welled with tears first. "I'm so sorry! I'm so clumsy, I burned you! Let me wipe it off!"

With that, she grabbed a rough paper towel and rubbed it directly over the raw blisters.

"Stop! Don't touch me!"