Chapter 27–A Feverish Search
Isabel’s POV
I felt the panic rising in my chest as I rushed to the maid’s quarters. My heart pounded with each step. “Get the private doctor,” I ordered, my voice shaking. “Tell him it’s urgent. Emerson has a fever, and it’s “bad.”
The maid sensed the urgency and ran to make the call. I returned to the bedroom, where Emerson lay in bed. His face was flushed. Beads of sweat were rolling down his forehead. His breathing was ragged. “Emerson? Please, stay with me….” I said as I sat by his side.
He mumbled incoherently, caught in a feverish daze. I tried to calm myself, but it was difficult seeing him like this. He looked so vulnerable. So unlike the man I had known all these years. His wound, his fever, it was all my fault. He saved me from the fire, and now he was dealing with the consequences.
There was a gentle knock on the bedroom door. It was the maid. The doctor is on his way. But the only one available at this time lives on the other side of Rivermont,” she explained. It would take time for him to arrive too much time. I couldn’t just sit there and do nothing. The doctor’s instructions over the phone were simple: keep him cool, give him fluids, and monitor his temperature. Simple, but it felt overwhelming.
I grabbed a cool cloth and gently dabbed his forehead, trying to bring his fever down. His skin was burning to the touch. He kept tossing and turning, muttering nonsense. “Lilith… Isabel… don’t leave me…” The words were barely audible, but they pierced through me, each one carrying the weight of his pain.
“Shh… you need to rest,” I whispered, trying to calm him. But he just kept mumbling. His voice was laced with desperation. “Please… don’t go… I love you….” The words hung in the air, leaving me more.
unsettled. Was it the fever talking? Or was there something deeper buried in his mind?
I couldn’t let myself think about it. Not now. “If you don’t stay quiet, I’ll leave,” I threatened softly. I never expected it to work. But to my surprise, he calmed down. As if my words had the power to reach through the haze of his fever. That confused me even more. Did he really care about me that much?
As I sat by his side, wiping his forehead and trying to keep him cool, my thoughts kept drifting back to the email I had seen on his computer. The words “more evidence about Allen White’s crimes” echoed in my mind. They filled me with a cold dread. How long had he been gathering this information? And why?
I couldn’t ignore the gnawing suspicion that there was more to Emerson’s actions than I knew. Why would he have married me if he truly hated my father? Why would he save me and tell me he loved me if he had a happy family with Lilith? None of it made sense.
Finally, the doctor arrived. I stepped aside as he took over. He took Emerson’s temperature and gave him an injection. “This should stop his fever. He’ll be fine. I just need to run some more tests and give him anti–inflammatory medication for the wound,” he explained.
“Thank you, doctor.” The relief I felt was mixed with anxiety. I needed to get to the bottom of this. I needed answers. Perhaps now was my chance. Everyone in the house was preoccupied with Emerson’s healing.
As the doctor tended to Emerson, I slipped out of the room and made my way to the study. My heart raced as I approached the desk. My eyes locked onto the computer. This was my chance. I had to know the truth, no matter how painful it might be.
I hesitated for a moment, feeling a pang of guilt. Emerson was lying in bed, fighting a fever. And here I was, sneaking around his study like a thief. I knew it was wrong to breach his privacy. But he was
just as wrong in trying to bring my father down. A man who had already suffered so much, whose life was hanging on a thread.
The memory of that email, the cold calculated tone of it, pushed me forward. I had to protect my father. I had to know what Emerson was planning.
I entered his old password, hoping it would still be the same as when we were married. “Yes,” I whispered as the screen unlocked. He hadn’t changed it. Which was surprising, since it included the date of our wedding. I started searching through his files. “Allen. White,” I muttered as I typed out the words.
There were documents, spreadsheets, emails–everything meticulously organized. The further I dug, the more I found. Files on my father’s company, records of transactions, and evidence that painted my father in a damning light.
My heart sank as I read through them. Emerson had been collecting this information for a long time. But why? To destroy my father? To ruin us completely?
The evidence didn’t add up. I knew my father. He wasn’t a criminal. But these files, these cold, hard facts… they told a different story. I felt a lump in my throat, a mixture of anger and fear. Was Emerson framing him? Or was there something I didn’t know?
I delved deeper into the files. My mind was racing with possibilities. Each new discovery was like a punch to the gut, leaving me
breathless. How could Emerson have kept this from me? How could. he do this to us?
I was so engrossed in the files that I didn’t notice the time passing. My hands trembled as I clicked through the documents, trying to piece together the puzzle. But the more I found, the more confused I became.
“W–What is this?” I whispered breathlessly as I opened a file of old
3/4
+15 BONUS
photos. I trembled in shock. Suddenly, a cold, angry voice shattered my thoughts. “Isabel, don’t tell me you’re just simply using the network.“