Chapter 2
That unsettling feeling in my gut grew stronger. I went straight to the surveillance room and reviewed the footage from the surgery.
The recording showed Zach and Amber arriving late. The patient was already anesthetized
with a sterile drape covering her face when they finally strolled into the OR, acting completely casual.
Zach was the lead surgeon, with Amber assisting as the instrument nurse.
But these two idiots weren’t focused on the operation at all–just making eyes at each other
the entire time.
The head nurse cleared her throat and began verifying the patient information.
“October 17th, Operating Room 1, first procedure of the day. Patient-”
“Yeah, yeah, enough with the time–wasting. What does the patient’s name have to do with
the surgery? This is the only thyroid removal today, so it’s not like we could mix it up,” Zach interrupted, immediately starting the procedure.
Amber smugly bumped the head nurse, signaling her to move away from Zach’s side.
The head nurse, who already disliked Zach, stepped aside.
Not long into the surgery, Amber carelessly handed over the wrong size of vascular clamp.
The head nurse immediately spoke up. “Amber, that’s the wrong one.”
Instead of acknowledging her mistake, Amber rolled her eyes dramatically at the senior nurse. “God, so I made a mistake! Why are you yelling? You’re freaking me out!”
“This is an operating table! Lives are at stake! You hand over the wrong instrument and still
have an attitude?”
Amber’s face fell, tears welling up in her eyes.
Zach immediately went ballistic, slamming the scalpel into the tray with a loud clang and
The Deadly Maternal Trap My Husband Built for Himself
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Chapter 2
pointing his finger at the head nurse’s face.
“I’m the fucking surgeon here and I didn’t say shit! Who do you think you are to boss us
around?!”
After his outburst, Zach grabbed Amber by the arm, and they both stormed out of the
operating room–abandoning their patient mid–surgery!
The OR erupted into chaos. A young nurse rushed after them while the head nurse directed
the others to continue and called administration to report the situation.
I fast–forwarded through the footage. A full forty minutes passed before Zach and Amber, the two culprits, reappeared on screen.
Their faces showed no trace of urgency–just arrogance, like they’d been begged to return and were annoyed about it.
At that moment, the heartbeat on the monitor grew weaker and weaker until it flatlined with a long “beeeeep,” the alarm blaring throughout the operating room.
Zách sauntered to the table, performed a half–assed chest compression routine that was clearly just for show.
“It’s over. We can’t bring her back.”
Throughout the entire process, he didn’t even bother to lift the drape to look at the patient’s face! Not a shred of remorse in his eyes!
Even if he didn’t know it was his own mother lying there, his disregard for human life and responsibility made me want to punch him in the face. My stomach churned with disgust.
Just as I left the surveillance room, I bumped into Jenny, a new nurse in our department.
When she saw me, she immediately approached with a cautious yet eager–to–show–concern expression. “E–Ellie… about your mom… I’m so sorry for your loss.”
“The deceased was my mother–in–law,” I corrected calmly. “Not my mom. But thank you anyway.”
“What?!” Jenny’s eyes widened with embarrassment. “I’m so sorry, Ellie! I misunderstood.
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She came looking for you that day, said she was your mother, so I assumed…”
I knew my mother–in–law, Linda, had caused a scene during her last visit to the hospital, and I wasn’t surprised she’d become gossip among the nursing staff. I shook my head to
show I wasn’t offended.
Jenny still looked regretful.
“When I was scheduling surgeries yesterday, I specifically went to Dr. Collins to tell him
today’s patient was your mom. He heard me clearly and agreed focus on doing this surgery well… How did this end so badly…”
“What did you just say?!” I cut her off. “You told Zach the patient was MY mother?!”
Jenny jumped, startled by my reaction. “Y–yes…”
Jenny was new and had no idea Zach and I were married, nor that my mother–in–law was Zach’s own mother. She was looking at me with complete confusion.
I took a deep breath, the irony hitting me hard.
No wonder! This explained why that monster was forcing me to sign a waiver for his own mother’s death! Why he’d said my mother’s funeral was bad luck!
Because he thought it was MY mother on that operating table!
Suddenly, my blood ran cold. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up.
Zach knew before entering the OR that he thought the patient was ‘my‘ mother, so those forty minutes he and Amber disappeared… was it really just a temper tantrum, or was it deliberate?
A medical accident and premeditated murder are two entirely different crimes.
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