When the Contract Marriage Ended, He Stayed

###Chapter 115: A Casual Rescue

Hazel Hawthorne and Sharon Winters looked with matching expressions of pity at the woman clinging to life on the hospital bed. For some reason, Hazel found the woman’s face familiar, as if she had seen her somewhere before. But for the life of her, she couldn’t place it.

"Hazel, what are you thinking? You’re just staring at her without saying a word," Sharon Winters asked, looking at Hazel curiously. They had found the unconscious woman on the side of the road. If it hadn’t been for Hazel’s sharp eyes, they wouldn’t have even spotted the poor woman.

Sharon Winters had never seen a body so covered in wounds—there wasn’t a single uninjured patch of skin. On the way to the hospital, Sharon had briefly examined the woman’s injuries and found that her body was covered in either cigarette burns or slashes from a blade...

Some of the wounds, having not been treated in time, were already inflamed and festering, a truly horrifying sight.

"If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I’d never believe someone so vicious could exist. To do something this cruel to another person... I wonder who this woman could have possibly offended."

"Hazel?" Sharon Winters had been talking nonstop, but Hazel hadn’t responded. She waved a hand in front of her friend’s face. "Hey, I’m talking to you. What are you thinking about? You’re completely spaced out."

"I just feel like I’ve seen this woman somewhere before. She looks so familiar."

"Maybe you just passed her on the street sometime," Sharon Winters said slowly. "For now, we should figure out how to contact her family."

Hazel racked her brain but came up with nothing, so she decided to drop it. Since they hadn’t been able to contact the woman’s family, they couldn’t very well leave the hospital. They’d just have to wait for her to wake up so they could help her get in touch with her relatives before they left.

Sharon Winters was highly sentimental—the kind of person who cried watching TV shows. She couldn’t bear to see suffering, and faced with something so utterly inhumane, her tears were unending. She was sniffling quietly, her waterworks starting up again whenever the woman’s injuries were mentioned.

"I mean, what kind of person could be so vicious?"

"How would I know? This world is full of people whose hearts you can’t read from their faces. Someone who acts like a saint in public might be a devil in private," Hazel Hawthorne said nonchalantly. "It’s hard to draw a clear line between good and evil."

But Sharon Winters didn’t agree with Hazel Hawthorne’s point. "Evil is evil, and good is good. How can it be hard to tell the difference?"

Hazel Hawthorne gave a resigned smile. Everyone has their own internal scale for weighing good and evil, and she had always felt that the two were difficult to distinguish.

"COUGH... COUGH COUGH..." The woman on the bed suddenly twitched a finger. Sharon Winters excitedly leaned in close. She saw the woman’s eyelids flutter, and a moment later, her eyes opened, staring blankly at Sharon.

Sharon smiled. "You’re finally awake."

Hazel Hawthorne was standing next to Sharon Winters. The woman had no strong reaction to seeing Sharon, but the moment her eyes landed on Hazel, her face twisted in terror. Hazel was completely baffled and could only stare back in confusion.

The woman looked at Hazel as if she were seeing a ghost. She became highly agitated, gripping the bedsheets tightly, her whole body starting to convulse as if she were having a fit. Hazel immediately called for a doctor.

The doctor gave her a sedative, and the room finally fell silent.

Sharon Winters, breaking out in a sweat, stared at the now-sedated woman on the bed. "She seems terrified of you," she said, bewildered. "She actually recognizes you!"

"I can see that. And even though she looks really familiar to me, too, I just can’t for the life of me remember where I’ve seen her."

"Okay, I’ll keep quiet so you can think. Take your time. If you’ve met her before, you’ll definitely remember. You have to, or else people will start thinking you’re her abuser every time she freaks out like that upon seeing you."

Hazel Hawthorne rolled her eyes. ’As if I could be that twisted.’

A long while later, Hazel Hawthorne suddenly shot to her feet. The abrupt movement startled Sharon Winters, who had just dozed off. She blinked her wide, innocent eyes, staring blankly at Hazel’s grim expression. "Did you remember something?"

"I know where I’ve seen her now," Hazel said coldly. "But I need to confirm my theory. I have to call someone over here first. This person will definitely recognize her."

Hazel Hawthorne made a call, briefly explained the situation, and hung up.

"Hazel."

Hazel looked at Sharon Winters. "Don’t worry. As soon as this person gets here, I can get to the bottom of this."

"Okay."

The minutes ticked by. When the door to the room was pushed open, Aiden Xavier walked in. He saw Sharon Winters dozing in a nearby chair and the still-unconscious person on the bed. Without a change in expression, he averted his eyes and walked straight toward Hazel Hawthorne.

"You called me all the way over here just to identify someone?"

Hazel Hawthorne nodded. "I kept thinking she looked familiar," she said, gesturing toward the woman on the bed. "I had a feeling I’d seen her somewhere, and after racking my brain, I finally remembered. I have seen her before—at the villa you have Raina Lowell living in."

After a pause, Hazel continued, "She must be the maid you hired specifically for Raina Lowell, the one meant to take care of her. I called you over to confirm if I’m right. You would certainly recognize Raina’s maid."

"She is, in fact, the maid I hired for Raina Lowell."

Hazel hadn’t detailed the woman’s condition over the phone, so Aiden Xavier still didn’t understand her motive. "So you really did call me all the way over here just for an ID?"

Hazel Hawthorne walked over to the bed, pulled back the blanket, and exposed the woman’s slender arm. When Aiden Xavier saw the mass of injuries covering her arm, his expression darkened. "Who did this?" he asked in a low, grim voice.

"I don’t know. Perhaps only she can tell us the truth when she wakes up. Sharon Winters and I found her unconscious on the side of the road..." Hazel Hawthorne covered the woman with the blanket again, then walked to the window. Aiden Xavier followed, unsure of what to say.

"She woke up for a bit earlier, but she became extremely agitated the moment she saw me. I have no idea why. I saw her once before when I went to visit Raina Lowell—she was the one who answered the door. Even then, I sensed that she seemed terrified of Raina."

"Are you suggesting Raina Lowell caused all these injuries?" Aiden Xavier frowned. Raina might not be the kindest person, but he didn’t think she was capable of something so twisted. Abusing someone like this was a criminal offense.

"She’s the person hired to take care of Raina Lowell. Following any logical line of thought, doesn’t that make Raina the prime suspect?" Hazel Hawthorne seemed to detect a hint of defensiveness for Raina in Aiden Xavier’s tone, and she was instantly annoyed.

"I’m not saying your theory is wrong. It’s just that we have no evidence, and Raina isn’t that kind of twisted person."

Hearing this, Hazel Hawthorne couldn’t help but scoff. "You can know a person’s face, but not their heart. Who’s to say Raina isn’t secretly a psycho? Who else is there in that villa for this woman to even interact with? Besides, even if Raina *is* a psycho, she’d never let you see it. Isn’t putting on an act for you her greatest talent?"

*****