My Husband Killed My Eight Children For My Best Friend Chapter 05
The moment Adrian got home, his private doctor was calling.
“Mr. Blackwood — that showing you put on for Sophie was supposed to be a private event, wasn’t it? How are the photos all over the internet?”
“What if your wife sees? She just miscarried. She can’t handle a shock like that.”
Only then did Adrian realize someone had taken pictures of him and Sophie and leaked them online.
Had Emily seen them?
An email appeared in his inbox — one that had been scheduled to arrive.
The sender was me.
He opened it with a flicker of hope.
The moment he heard the recording, the color drained from his face.
That night, outside the study door, I had heard everything.
That was why I had begged him, later, not to make me drink that glass of milk.
And what had he done?
He had pressed it to my lips with his own hand.
On the other end of the line, the doctor was still talking. “Mr. Blackwood? Are you there? When you have time, please bring your wife in for a follow-up.”
Adrian’s voice cracked.
“She can’t come in.”
The doctor faltered.
“What?”
Adrian’s voice was shaking.
“Emily knows everything.”
“She’s gone.”
By that time, I was already on the other side of the ocean.
Stepping off the plane, I spotted Mia Carter waiting for me — my friend, whom I hadn’t seen in far too long.
After I told her everything, Mia was so furious she nearly booked a return flight on the spot to go tear Adrian and Sophie apart with her bare hands.
I caught her arm.
“Let it go, Mia. I already left the divorce agreement. I don’t want anything to do with either of them ever again.”
Mia pulled me into a hug. Her eyes were red.
“Good. You’re better off away from that bastard. Otherwise one day he’d have finished the job and you wouldn’t have even known.”
“Let him and that bitch Sophie rot together. You’ve got looks. You’ve got talent. Back in college, directors were already fighting over your scripts.”
“If it weren’t for that son of a bitch Adrian, you’d have been a hell of a screenwriter by now.”
Something in me went bitter.
Mia and I had both been screenwriting majors at film school.
Our professor used to say we were the two most promising students in our year.
Mia never wanted to marry. After graduation, she moved to Australia to build her career.
I got pregnant with my first baby practically the moment I said “I do” to Adrian.
Adrian said he worried about my safety and didn’t want me going out to work. He wanted me to rest at home and take care of the pregnancy.
From that point on, my life became a nightmare of pregnancies and miscarriages, one after another.
At least now, I had finally clawed my way out of it.
Mia told me she had a project she couldn’t handle alone. She wanted us to collaborate, split the earnings fifty-fifty.
I nodded.
Screenwriting had always been my dream.
Mia grinned. “But first, we’re going to have some fun. Scripts can be written anywhere. My last project paid well. Just come along with me.”
Traveling around the world — that had been our promise to each other in college.
Now, at last, we could make good on it.
Mia and I roamed all over Europe. Ate. Drank. Wandered exhibitions. Took the trains. Stayed in little seaside towns.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, Adrian was searching for me like a man possessed.
He had never once let personal matters keep him from work.
But in those weeks, he barely set foot in the office.
Ethan was preparing to take over Blackwood Group, putting on his best face for old Mr. Blackwood.
But several key projects had always been Adrian’s territory. Only he knew the details.
And Adrian wouldn’t come in. Wouldn’t take calls.
Ethan was left flailing.
He made the wrong call on decision after decision, took a brutal dressing-down from the old man, and saw his handover of the group indefinitely postponed.
Sophie, heavily pregnant, went looking for Adrian, hoping to persuade him to come back and help.
She hadn’t come this far to watch the position she’d nearly secured slip through her fingers.
“Adrian, have you still not found Emily?”
“Honestly, that woman. There’s a limit to how far you can carry a sulk. Everything at the company is a mess because of her alone, and now she’s running you into the ground too—”
“Shut up!” Adrian snapped.
Sophie jumped.
Adrian’s stare was ice-cold.
“The company’s a mess because Ethan is incompetent. What does any of it have to do with Emily?”
He had never once raised his voice at Sophie.
Her eyes filled instantly.
“Adrian, I was only worried about you. Why are you attacking me? You’re scaring me.”
Adrian gave a cold laugh. Then his hand shot out and closed around her throat.
“Are you still pretending? In front of me?”
“Sophie, you’re afraid? A woman who fed off Emily’s babies is telling me she’s afraid?”
Sophie went white.
“Wh — what are you talking about? Adrian, I don’t know what you mean.”
He had known she’d play dumb.
He pulled up the surveillance footage from outside the estate that day.
Sophie had been too smug in that moment. She had forgotten about the cameras at the gate.
Onscreen, she said every word of it. In her own voice.
For years, she had performed for him — soft, wounded, innocent.
To his face, she cared about me.
Behind his back, this was how she had humiliated me. Tortured me.
By the time the footage ended, Adrian’s eyes were terrifyingly cold.
“If you hadn’t said what you said at her birthday party, I wouldn’t have known even now how hollow you are.”
“For your lies, I killed one child after another — mine and Emily’s. I destroyed her ability to be a mother.”
“I deserve to die for that. I own it.”
“But you — you had the nerve to bribe the people around me. To take those babies. To use them, and then throw it in her face on purpose.”
“She wasn’t a threat to you anymore. Why couldn’t you leave her alone?”
Cornered, Sophie finally lost her composure.
She sobbed. “Adrian, I had my reasons. The shaman I saw said it was the only way I’d have a son. Without a son, my place wasn’t safe. I had no choice.”
“Enough!”
Adrian cut her off.
“All you’ve ever cared about is your position. Being the first lady of Blackwood Group.”
“What about Emily?”
“Why did you tell her I was the one who gave those babies to you?”
“You wanted to drive her away from me, didn’t you? So I’d keep circling back to you.”
Sophie shook her head, weeping.
Adrian watched her. His voice was quiet, and it was chilling.
“You want a son so badly. You want that position so badly.”
“Then let me show you what it feels like to lose what matters most.”
He clapped his hands.
Several men in white coats walked in. Their faces were blank.
Terror filled Sophie’s eyes.
“Adrian, what are you doing? I’m Ethan’s wife. I’m the future first lady of the group. And I’m carrying your child. You can’t touch me.”
Adrian smiled.
“First lady of the group?”
“You drove Emily out, and thought that seat would just be yours?”
He turned to the men.
“Take it out of her. No anesthesia.”
“Then let her watch the consequences with her own eyes.”
Sophie was dragged away.
Not long after, the villa filled with her screams.