They Loved Me At Death’s Door Chapter 07
Third person’s POV
By the time the Marquez family found Cecilia, her eyes were already closed. Her face was streaked with blood, and she lay curled on the ground, looking small and fragile.
Her mother, Esther Marquez, crumpled instantly, scrambling to Cecilia’s side.
“Cece, we found a doctor. We can fix this. Please, baby, just open your eyes. Look at me…”
Her father, Keenan Marquez, forced his legs to move, determined to carry her out on his back.
“It’s cold out here. I’m taking you home.”
Cecilia barely weighed 50 kilos, yet when Keenan tried to lift her, his strength failed him.
He tried again, stumbling under the weight of his own grief.
Gabriella rushed forward. “Dad, let me-”
“Get back! Don’t touch my daughter!”
Keenan slapped her hand away. “If you hadn’t lied to us, she wouldn’t have been wandering the streets for ten years. She wouldn’t have leukemia!
“You did this to her!”
Cecilia’s parents had found a target for their pain.
The same hands that had once cared for Gabriella now struck her.
“What did Cece do wrong? She just wanted to come home! Why didn’t you tell us the truth?
“Give us back our daughter! You’re a curse! Give her back!”
Watching them, Vincent was hit with a sudden, sickening sense of déjà vu, followed by a splitting headache.
Ever since Cecilia’s return, strange images had been flashing through his mind.
In some, she was crying in his arms.
In others, she was begging him.
But in every vision, his expression was cold, detached.
He couldn’t explain it, but a crushing guilt had taken hold of him-a guilt that drove him to protect her from everyone.
That was why he’d lied about the bag.
Why his first instinct after seeing her kill Jacob was to help her run.
Why he’d panicked when he realized she was going after Phillip.
He simply couldn’t bear to watch her die.
Knowing the hospital had no marrow matches and their parents were too weak to donate, he had even tested himself.
But there was no miracle.
He wasn’t a match.
So he had searched everywhere, desperate to keep her alive.
He hadn’t understood the depth of that desperation until now.
In a past life, he owed Cecilia a life.
12 Mothers
Cecilia’s parents aged years in a matter of days, their hair turning gray as they arranged for her cremation.
While they wept, the police arrived.
The investigation revealed that Phillip the orphanage director, had been molesting children. Although Cecilia had stopped him, her attack was legally considered premeditated assault.
However, since the suspect was deceased, the case was closed.
Gabriella left the Marquez family, taking nothing but the kitten Cecilia had rescued.
Following a note found in Cecilia’s pocket, Vincent donated all her money to a children’s charity.
When it came time to order the headstone, Vincent stopped Esther.
“Don’t write Cecilia Marquez,” he said. “Write Cecilia Weyland.
“That’s her name.”
Vincent remembered asking Cecilia about it when they first met.
“I heard you were adopted, but your foster parents weren’t named Weyland,” he’d asked. “Where did that come from?”
Cecilia had rubbed the back of her head, sheepish.
“Because the weekend is the best time. The restaurant gets busy, the boss makes money, and I get a raise.
“More delivery orders mean more tips.
“Everyone loves the weekend.”
She had smiled shyly, “But spelling it Weekend’ seemed weird, so I changed it to Weyland.
“I don’t share a name with anyone. I named myself.”
So, her tombstone had to read Cecilia Weyland.
After the burial, her parents’ health fell apart, leaving them dependent on daily medication.
Vincent didn’t step in to help.
Instead, he went to the apartment where he and Cecilia had lived in his past life.
Deep down, he knew Gabriella’s death in that timeline had nothing to do with Cecilia.
He just hadn’t been able to face it.
He had fallen for someone his adoptive parents hated-someone he blamed for the loss of the sister he’d watched grow up.
Hatred had blinded him.
It wasn’t until Cecilia jumped from that building that he realized how wrong he was.
He was the one who owed Cecilia.
The Marquez family, Gabriella-they all owed her.
She had been innocent from the start.
So…
Vincent slid the window open.
From the seventeenth floor, he jumped
“Don’t be afraid, Cece,” he whispered.
“I’m coming with you.”
The end.
