Chapter 7 - The Water Breaks
A collective cry rose from the boardroom as Evelyn slumped forward, her face turning ashen.
"Mrs. Vance!" Arthur shouted, abandoning his seat and rushing around the perimeter of the table.
A dark, wet puddle had begun spreading across the ivory silk of Evelyn’s dress, pooling onto the hardwood flooring beneath her flats. Her water had broken.
The extreme stress, the adrenaline, the emotional confrontation had triggered full, precipitous labor.
"Call nine-one-one!" Arthur bellowed at the security guards. "Get an ambulance to the private executive entrance immediately! Clear the service elevator!"
Evelyn gripped Arthur’s forearm with such force that her knuckles turned bone-white. She dropped to one knee, her breath coming in ragged, shallow gasps. A visceral, primal contraction tore through her lower abdomen, far stronger than anything she had prepared for during her Lamaze classes.
"Arthur..." she gasped through gritted teeth, sweat beading across her forehead. "The... the merger..."
"To hell with the merger, Evelyn!" the old man said, kneeling beside her on the floor, holding her shoulders to keep her upright. "You are having this child right now!"
"No," Evelyn hissed, the fire in her eyes refusing to dim even amidst the blinding pain. She forced herself to look up at the remaining forty-five board members, who stood around her in a wide, panicked circle. "The foreign delegation... from Vane-Holt... they are on the fifty-third floor. If we don't ratify the restructuring agreement before noon... the stock defaults... and fifteen thousand factory workers lose their pensions."
The executives looked at one another in stunned disbelief.
Here was a woman, eight months pregnant, actively in labor on a boardroom floor, who had just systematically dismantled a multi-million-dollar criminal conspiracy against her life—and her immediate concern was the retirement funds of blue-collar factory employees.
"Arthur," Evelyn breathed, clutching the old lawyer's suit lapel. "The emergency proxy document... in the front pocket of the briefcase... give it to me."
"Evelyn, you need an emergency room!" Arthur protested.
"BRING ME THE PEN!" she roared.
The sheer, maternal authority in her voice shook the room. The CFO scrambled across the table, grabbed the Montblanc pen Grant had tried to force upon her twenty minutes earlier, and practically fell to his knees beside her.
Arthur yanked the document from the briefcase and placed it flat against the floor.
Another violent wave of contractions hit Evelyn. She screamed, her body bowing backward, her veins bulging against her neck. But she didn't let go of the pen.
With shaking, sweat-slicked fingers, Evelyn pressed the nib to the signature line. She didn't sign her married name. She signed the name she was born with:
*Evelyn Sterling. Sole Trustee & Executive Chairwoman.*
The moment the ink met the parchment, she dropped the pen and slumped against Arthur’s chest, panting heavily.
"It's done," Arthur whispered, his eyes misting with tears as he looked down at the daughter of his oldest friend. "You saved the company, Evelyn. You saved all of us."
The heavy doors banged open once more.
Four paramedics rushed into the boardroom, carrying an emergency trauma kit and an obstetric stretcher. Behind them, the building manager was clearing the hallways, shouting orders into a two-way radio.
"Paramedics! Stand back, please!" the lead medic yelled, dropping to his knees beside Evelyn. He quickly checked her vitals, placing a firm hand on her abdomen. "Contractions are two minutes apart! Crown is descending! We don't have time to make it to St. Jude’s! She's delivering within fifteen minutes!"
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"Then prepare the room," Arthur Vance said, standing up and towering over the forty-five executives. "Gentlemen, the meeting is adjourned. Clear the floor. Our Chairwoman has a daughter to welcome into the world."
***
