"What did you say?"
Yan Xiaye's eyes suddenly widened in shock as she looked at Huang Qian, who was sweating profusely.
The child... isn't Li Beicheng's?
How is that possible?
"I'm sorry, Xiaye!" Huang Qian could not lift her head in guilt, "When you came here for IVF, the assistant doctor took the wrong sperm tube. By the time I realized it, it was already too late."
"...Why didn't you tell me earlier?"
"I'm sorry, I'm really sorry!" Huang Qian cried, continuously sobbing, "You know about my family's situation, and the hospital itself is under the Li Family's name. If they knew I made such a big mistake, I would definitely lose my job."
Yan Xiaye was at a loss for words, her mouth agape, unable to say a single word.
This secret came too suddenly, dazzling her with stars before her eyes, utterly clueless about what to do next.
Just as the two of them fell into a silent pause, a nurse came back and awkwardly avoided Yan Xiaye's gaze, "The family member is in another operating room... and cannot be contacted."
"Does he have no humanity!" Huang Qian couldn't help but exclaim, "If it wasn't for him knocking down Xiaye for another woman, things wouldn't have gotten to this point. How could he..."
Before she could finish, Yan Xiaye softly interrupted her.
"Save the baby."
"Xiaye!"
"Even if he is not Li Beicheng's child, he is still my, Yan Xiaye's child." As she said this, Yan Xiaye's lips painfully curled into a bitter smile, followed by an intense rush of pain through her heart, "Huang Qian, if you had told me the truth before today, I would have found it hard to accept. But now, I am grateful that the child has no relation to Li Beicheng."
Her fate as a tool was miserable enough; if she hadn't been desperate, why would she willingly let her own child become a prop in those two people's happy life?
Huang Qian let out a deep sigh and firmly grasped Yan Xiaye's hand, "Okay, I will make sure both you and the baby survive!"
"I believe you. Once the child is safely born, I will proceed with the divorce from Li Beicheng as soon as possible, and raise the child well."
Three hours blinked by.
Huang Qian laughed and cried as she lifted the soft, lovely little life, rushing to the drowsy Yan Xiaye, "Xiaye, look how beautiful your son is!"
Yan Xiaye struggled to open her eyes, and the high tension in her heart finally eased.
At that moment, the door to the operating room was suddenly slammed open, "When will the surgery inside be over? We've received a report of intentional injury, and we need to take the person back to the station for detention."
Huang Qian's arms, holding the child, trembled, and she looked towards the door in a blank shock, "He actually called the police to arrest you?"
The weak smile on Yan Xiaye's lips immediately stiffened.
He really is ruthless!
So anxious to send her to prison and take her son away to be a family with Yan Shuirou.
And she was not dead yet; who knew what Li Beicheng might do when he found out the child was not his!
Having no other choice, she made the most dangerous decision of her life, "Huang Qian, can you find a way to send the child to his biological father?"
The fact that the preparations for frozen sperm had been made indicated that the man must also want the child.
Huang Qian panicked inside.
Looking down at the equally weak mother and child in front of her, she clenched her teeth and nodded, "I promise you."
Yan Xiaye let out a long sigh of relief, watching reluctantly as Huang Qian placed her son by the bed and covered him with a white cloth.
"Don't worry about the police outside, go find that man, tell him his child is born."
The nurse hesitated for a moment, then looked at Yan Xiaye with pity one more time before turning to leave as instructed.
Soon after, Li Beicheng's tall figure appeared in the operating room.
"I am sorry, the mother was under great emotional stress during childbirth, and the fall caused her to hit her stomach. The child was born without breath," Huang Qian's attitude was very natural as she coldly observed Li Beicheng's reaction, "Would you like to see for yourself?"
The man was taken aback and instinctively looked towards Yan Xiaye, who was lying on the operating table, emotionless.
In his memory, Yan Xiaye always seemed to be strong and dull, utterly different from the pitiable Yan Shuirou.
Years ago, when she donated bone marrow to the grandfather, she lay quietly on the surgery table, her eyes, clear-cut and astonishingly bright, always looked at him with adoration and sweetness.
But at this moment, there was not a trace of a smile in those watery eyes, her gaze indifferently moving away from him, as though he would no longer exist in her eyes or her heart.
Li Beicheng's eyes grew colder, unclear about where his irritability and displeasure came from.
Composing himself, he nodded lightly to Huang Qian, "Alright."
No matter what, that was his child.
Not far away, Yan Xiaye pricked up her ears, her heart leaping into her throat.
Huang Qian hummed affirmatively, holding the baby wrapped in white cloth in her arms, and slowly offering it.
Li Beicheng held his breath, his deep gaze moving with her action.
Just as the man's fingertips were about to touch the swaddling clothes of the child, a nurse rushed in, gasping, "Mr. Li, Miss Shuirou is in a critical situation, the doctor said..."
Li Beicheng's extended arm froze mid-air, and he turned away decisively the next second.
The door banged shut behind him.
Yan Xiaye raised a hand to cover her eyes, letting out a hollow laugh in the dead silence, her heart feeling indescribably empty.
So this was the end of loving Li Beicheng.
Once you give your heart to him, even your life is not your own.
She was truly afraid and truly no longer in love.
Outside the operating room, the waiting police surged in, officially handcuffing her with cold manacles.
A week later, she waited in detention for her trial verdict.
Intentional injury.
Putting the victim's life in danger, sentenced to five years in prison with immediate effect.
...
Five years later.
The forbidding iron gates of the Western Suburb prison slid apart.
A gaunt figure stepped slowly out of the gates, her outdated maternity dress hanging loosely on her frame, blatantly out of place with the outside world.
She did not hurry to leave like most of the other prisoners; instead, she turned and gazed longingly into the high walls of the building.
From twenty to twenty-five, just for loving the wrong person, she had to bury the best years of her life there.
"Yan Xiaye."
"..."
A voice both familiar and strange approached from the distance.
Her heart suddenly clenched tight, ripples stirring through the serene surface of her eyes.