Chapter 2

Dad clutched his chest, his knees buckling as he collapsed to the floor.

"Call 911! Get an ambulance!"

I dropped to my knees beside him, my fingers shaking so hard I couldn't even unlock my phone.

The guests were in an uproar.

Carter finally stepped down from the stage. He crouched down beside us, reaching a hand out toward my father.

I shoved him back with all my strength. "Don't touch him!"

His hand hung awkwardly in midair, his expression tight and defensive. "I already had someone call the paramedics."

Yet, across the room, the camera operators kept filming. On the massive screens, the stream was still broadcasting my father lying helpless on the floor.

I snapped. "Shut off the stream!"

"Amanda is handling the damage control—"

"I told you to shut it off RIGHT NOW!" I screamed, tears burning my eyes. "Carter, that is my father! How much more clout do you need?!"

His face drained of color.

Amanda rushed over, keeping her voice low and tight.

"If we pull the plug now, the platform and the press will take it as Carter admitting the cheating rumors are true."

"PR recommends keeping the stream live and letting Chloe clear the air on camera."

I looked at the two of them standing side by side.

And somewhere deep inside my chest, something went completely cold and still.

When the paramedics rushed into the ballroom, the cameras were still rolling.

They loaded my father onto a stretcher, and I gathered up the heavy folds of my white gown, rushing after them.

As we reached the grand exit, Carter caught up to me. "I'm coming with you."

"No," I said, voice dead.

"He's my father-in-law too!"

"The moment you put that video on the big screen, he stopped being your anything."

Outside the emergency room, I sat on a plastic waiting room chair in my wedding dress for three grueling hours.

My phone vibrated nonstop with hundreds of missed calls. Breaking news notifications popped up like wildfire:

【Top Relationship Influencer Betrayed on His Wedding Day!】

【Carter Evans's Bride Caught in Secret Pre-Wedding Hotel Rendezvous with Mystery Man!】

【The Real-Life Romance Scam: Can Anyone Be Trusted?】

Out of the top ten trending topics on Twitter and TikTok, seven were about me.

People had already doxxed my high school, my college, my writing portfolio, and my home address. Trolls were spamming the official social media page of the university where my father had taught for forty years, claiming a man who raised such a shameful daughter must have been a fraud of a teacher his whole life.

Someone had even turned the clip of my dad collapsing into a meme, captioning it: 【Father-in-law faints on the spot after hearing his daughter got caught!】

Staring at that looping GIF on my screen, nausea tore through my stomach.

My father was fighting for his life behind those double doors, and the internet was treating his death as cheap entertainment.

At 11:00 PM, the surgeon finally walked out.

"He suffered an acute myocardial infarction. We performed an emergency angioplasty and placed a stent."

"He's out of immediate danger for now, but the next twenty-four hours in the ICU are critical."

I braced myself against the cold hospital wall, my legs shaking so badly I could barely stand.

The doctor glanced down at his clipboard. "Who is the direct family member? We need a signature on the consent and admission forms."

"I am."

Another voice cut in behind me at the exact same moment.