Chapter 248: Chapter 246: Leona Grant, We’re Even…

After Annabelle Linton carved out the piece of flesh, her face instantly turned deathly pale from the pain.

But she grit her teeth against the pain, her brow furrowed. She didn’t utter a single word, nor did she cry.

The three of them looked on, unable to bear the sight.

’How could a woman be this strong?’

The snake’s venom was potent; the infected flesh had to be cut out completely.

Annabelle took the knife and cut again, making sure the wound was clean.

But the venom was still spreading through her veins.

A wave of dizziness washed over her, and she collapsed.

With quick reflexes, Leona Grant caught Annabelle, his voice tight with anxiety. “Annabelle, are you alright?”

ROAR—

Just then, a powerful gust of wind swept through as a helicopter circling overhead began its descent.

Leona Grant was overjoyed. He scooped Annabelle into his arms and ran. “Annabelle, we’re saved! I won’t let anything happen to you. There’s antivenom on the helicopter. We can cure the poison. It’s okay, just hold on. You have to hold on…”

Leona Grant muttered to himself as he held Annabelle, running toward the helicopter’s landing spot.

“We’re even…”

Leona Grant froze.

Annabelle was already unconscious. Running on sheer willpower, her eyes remained shut as she murmured, a faint smile playing on her lips, “Leona Grant… we’re even…”

Seeing her ashen face, hearing her utter those words even in unconsciousness, a swift and violent pain pierced his heart.

’We’re even…’

’So that’s why. She only saved me because she didn’t want to owe me anything.’

’So, she would rather die than be indebted to me in the slightest.’

’So, she wanted to draw a line between us!’

Scenes from their past flashed before Leona Grant’s eyes.

If that was her only reason for saving him, he would rather be the one who was poisoned right now.

Leona Grant could almost see all the sacrifices she had made for him in the past.

Taking a bullet for him, giving him her blood, even selling her blood to buy him gifts…

Every one had been a life-threatening sacrifice, yet she had made them without a single complaint or regret.

But now… she had saved him only because he had saved her first.

For a moment, his heart ached so fiercely it felt as if it had been hollowed out.

It was only in this moment, it seemed, that he was forced to admit it: she no longer had any feelings for him at all.

Any concern she showed him was purely because he’d gotten hurt saving her.

Twenty-some years of affection, all of it could vanish so cleanly, so completely.

Leona Grant’s heart felt as if it were being pierced by countless, tiny, venom-tipped needles.

The stinging pain and corrosion assaulted him simultaneously, relentlessly attacking the very heart that kept him alive, threatening to tear it from his chest.

And it was in that very moment he realized he had fallen in love with Annabelle Linton.

He was in deep. So deep there was no going deeper.

But at the same time, he felt the agony of unrequited love.

His world was in chaos. He was going mad. It was all over.

Leona Grant felt as if he had plunged into a bottomless abyss.

…

On a massive bank of monitors, a dozen different feeds were playing.

The screens showed it all: Annabelle and the others fighting off wolves, her standing between a wolf and a tiger, her knocking over the medicine, her killing a bear with a hay cutter, and the moment she sliced into her own flesh without even blinking to remove the snake venom, and more…

Nearby, Chase Lynch observed his adoptive father’s inscrutable expression and said softly, “Father, I’ve dealt with this woman before. She’s not to be underestimated.”

Julian Valerius said nothing, merely continuing to smoke his cigar in silence.

Scene after scene from the past flashed before his eyes.

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