They Gave My Wedding To My Sister Chapter 05
Over a hundred missed calls. Ethan’s name appeared more than any other.
The phone buzzed again in my hand—his name flashing on the screen once more.
I stared at it for a few seconds, declined the call, and blocked every single one of them.
The project director met me at the airport.
One look at my face and she frowned.
“You look terrible. Do you need a hospital?”
I shook my head.
“Just a minor procedure. A few days’ rest and I’ll be fine.”
She didn’t press. She simply took my suitcase and held the car door open for me.
Unfamiliar streets slid past the window, one by one.
Here, no one knew Pearl Whitfield.
No one knew about that grotesque wedding.
The team gave me a week off.
By day three, I was back at my desk.
Not because I wasn’t in pain.
But because every time I closed my eyes, I saw that Instagram post.
My parents at Pearl’s bedside, picking names for her unborn child.
I saw the nurse holding out the consent papers in that silent, empty room.
The only way I knew how to survive was to keep moving.
I worked from dawn until midnight, revising the plans again and again until I collapsed into dreamless sleep.
……
Ethan received the call from the hotel on the third day.
The manager explained that the bridal suite carpet had extensive bloodstains. The hotel needed authorization from the wedding party before charging the cleanup costs.
“Bloodstains?”
Ethan’s grip tightened around his phone.
“Whose blood?”
“A Ms. Whitfield was taken from the suite by ambulance.”
“The attendant who found her said she was already unconscious.”
Ethan went white.
He rushed to the hospital and learned that Clara had been six weeks pregnant—and that the baby was gone.
The nurse found his name listed as Clara’s emergency contact. Her expression cooled as she looked at him.
“We called the number listed for you eight times.”
“The first time someone answered, a woman said you were with another pregnant woman and told us not to call again.”
Ethan stood motionless. He couldn’t speak for a long time.
That day at the hospital, his phone had been inside Pearl’s bag the entire time.
When he confronted her at home, Pearl arranged her face into confusion.
“I never answered your phone.”
“Mom and Dad and Marcus were all there—how would I know who touched it?”
Tears spilled down her cheeks almost on cue.
“I feel terrible about what happened to Clara.”
“But you can’t blame me for everything just because she left.”
Diane immediately wrapped a protective arm around her.
“Pearl is pregnant. She can’t handle this stress.”
“Clara didn’t even know she was pregnant herself. How could anyone have predicted this?”
Richard sighed.
“What’s done is done. What good does it do to keep asking who answered the phone?”
No one suddenly understood what they had done that night.
They went quiet for a moment, then found their excuses and settled back into comfort.
Clara hadn’t known she was pregnant. Pearl hadn’t meant any harm. No one could have foreseen the fall.
As long as everything could be filed under accident, they could all go on living guilt-free.
Only Marcus said nothing that evening.
For the first time, he opened his message thread with Clara.
The last message was from six months earlier.
Clara had texted him from the hospital after the miscarriage, asking him to come because she had no one else to list as her emergency contact.
He had never replied.
That day, he had been in Tulum celebrating Pearl’s birthday with the rest of the family.
Marcus typed: I’m sorry.
He stared at it for a long time. Then deleted it, letter by letter.
He hadn’t truly realized he was wrong.
He’d only begun to dread looking at his conversation history with her.