The night was deep.
NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital.
Isabella lay on the operating table, her face pale, and her body drenched in sweat. Despite the intense pain, she endured it without uttering a word of complaint.
"Push, we can see the baby's head," the midwife's voice echoed in her ears.
Isabella's hand clung tightly to the bed rail. After a day and a night of pain, she could hardly summon any strength.
"The baby seems to be stuck; it might be a difficult birth. Should we notify Bet-, Mr. Ryan, for their safety?" The midwife and the head nurse exchanged a glance.
"No, don't mind me, save the baby," Isabella's sweat-soaked hand suddenly clutched the doctor. Her voice was filled with agony but unwavering.
The doctor was moved and firmly held her hand, saying, "Let's try again. Listen to my instructions, take a deep breath, and push..."
With the sound of a newborn's loud cry, everyone in the delivery room breathed a sigh of relief.
The head nurse took the baby to clean, and the midwife left the delivery room, dialing a number on her phone.
"Beta Ryan..."
On the other end, Ryan answered the call and knocked on the intricately carved wooden door in front of him.
"Come in," a mature and deep voice echoed from inside.
Ryan pushed the door open and found a tall man standing by the large French windows, his suit buttons undone, revealing a crisp shirt underneath. A cigarette burned quietly between his middle and ring fingers of his left hand.
"Is there something you need?" he raised an eyebrow, exuding an intimidating aura.
"Alpha, the hospital just called. That human, Isabella, has given birth to a baby boy, six pounds two ounces. Both mother and child are fine," Ryan immediately replied.
"Alright, I know." Alpha Andrew listened without a hint of emotion in his profound expression.
Ryan felt like he should say "congratulations," but before he could speak, Andrew asked, "What time does the video conference with the UK branch start?"
Ryan was momentarily taken aback, struggling to keep up with the conversation. He raised his wrist and checked his watch, then cautiously answered, "In half an hour, Alpha."
"Have Nathan prepare for it and head to the conference room." Andrew finished his sentence, extinguished his cigarette, and turned to walk out the door.
The video conference continued until the early hours of the next day.
A secretary entered the conference room, holding two cups of strong coffee.
"Aren't you going to the hospital?" Beta Ryan, who had been holding back all night, finally couldn't help but ask.
Sitting across from him, Andrew elegantly took a sip of coffee. After a brief hesitation, he instructed, "Prepare the car."
Hospital room.
The first rays of morning sunlight streamed through the window, casting a warm feeling on Isabella's body.
Isabella opened her tired eyes and looked at her sleeping child beside her, tears streaming uncontrollably down her face.
At the age of nineteen, while other girls her age were still in their parents' arms, she had become a mother.
Even though the child's father was unknown, and she had almost collapsed when she first found out she was pregnant, over the past ten months, he had grown inside her, becoming an irreplaceable part of her life.
Perhaps, that's what motherhood is. So when the doctor mentioned that she might have a difficult birth, she almost instinctively offered her own life in exchange for the hope of the child's survival.
A knocking sound echoed at this moment, and Isabella quickly wiped away the tears on her cheek with the back of her hand. In a hoarse voice, she said, "Please come in."
She thought it was a nurse coming to change the IV, but as the door opened, a handsome young man she didn't recognize walked in.
"Have you come to the wrong room?"
His demeanor was cold, and the way he looked at her made her feel like he was looking down on her. "Andrew Turner, your child's father," he introduced himself briefly and directly. Although his voice was clear and cold, to Isabella, it felt like a thunderclap, making her dizzy.
Her already pale face turned even whiter, and she struggled to sit up in bed, grabbing a pillow and throwing it at him, losing control.
"Rapist, how dare you show up here? Aren't you afraid I'll report you!" Isabella angrily growled.
Compared to her hysteria, Andrew casually raised his arm to block the pillow she threw at him, and then, with long strides, walked to the hospital bed.
Next to the hospital bed was a baby sleeping in swaddling clothes. A wrinkled, rosy face, like a little monkey.
Isabella didn't know what he wanted to do, but instinctively, she reached out to protect the child in her arms.
"Why haven't you called the police yet?" Andrew's gaze moved away from the child and returned to her. His eyes were deep and calm.
Isabella clenched her lips tightly, trembling, unable to find her words out of anger.
She couldn't call the police because she had no evidence to prove he had raped her.
That night, she had entered his room on her own, mistaking him for her fiancé, and she hadn't resisted at all.
"What do you want?" Isabella asked hoarsely, her earlier defiance gone.
"If you calm down, we can talk," he said.
She stared at him, wondering what there was to talk about with a rapist.
"You have two choices: marry me, or give me custody of the child." His tone was as if it were a matter of course, and he seemed accustomed to giving orders.
She wanted nothing more than to tear off his handsome face. "You can't..."
"No need to rush to answer. Think about it, and you can call me," he interrupted her, his expression aloof, as he placed a business card with his name on the bedside table.
The door opened and closed, and he left without a sound.
The baby in the swaddling clothes slept soundly, as if he had no connection to the world even if it collapsed.
Isabella closed her eyes in exhaustion, feeling wronged, and her eyes, still bitter, seemed to well up with tears again.
Memories from a year ago flooded her mind like a tidal wave.
On her eighteenth birthday, she and her fiancé James Brown had agreed to give their first time to each other.
Her half-sister Emily, however, had climbed into James's bed in her place after getting her drunk.
Meanwhile, in another dark room, she had been raped by a stranger.
Isabella had always thought the man who had been intimate with her all night was James. It wasn't until the next morning, when she woke up naked in her bed, alone in the room, that she realized something had happened.
She had no idea what had transpired, and she called James's name like a fool. Then, her stepmother Charlotte burst into the room, hugging her and crying loudly. "Isabella, my poor child, how could something like this happen? Auntie has already reported it to the police. The animal who raped you will not escape justice..."
With Charlotte's outburst, the story of her sleeping with the wrong person became widely known.
Her father David, without considering the truth, angrily slapped her...
A knock on the door brought Isabella back to reality from her memories.
She subconsciously thought it was still Andrew, so she got out of bed, opened the door in frustration, and growled, "What do you want now!"
"You're quite fiery!" Outside the door, Emily took off her black sunglasses, revealing an exquisitely made-up face, and she smiled brightly and confidently.