The Merger Behind the Pregnancy
Chapter 08 - The Merger Behind the Pregnancy
Westbridge Health Partners offered Evelyn a permanent executive chair if she delivered Sterling Medical’s controlling vote.
Its acquisition plan divided the company.
Profitable urban hospitals would remain open.
Rural trauma centers, maternity clinics and rehabilitation programs would be sold or closed. Medical patents would move into private licensing companies.
The unborn child’s trust blocked the plan.
Claire, as guardian, could vote only with the independent trustees. All three opposed the merger after seeing the closures.
Evelyn needed one of three outcomes.
Claire could sign away guardianship.
She could be declared incapable.
Or the pregnancy could end, returning the controlling vote temporarily to Evelyn under an older trust clause.
The drugs served all three possibilities.
Mild doses created confusion.
A stronger dose might cause a fall.
The trust amendment beside Claire’s recliner declared that Evelyn would assume control if Claire experienced “pregnancy-related cognitive impairment.”
The language had been drafted by Westbridge attorneys before Claire’s first symptom.
Investigators recovered a message from Evelyn.
If the child survives, I need guardianship. If not, the trust resolves itself.
Westbridge executives claimed the sentence referred to legal uncertainty.
The prosecutor called it motive.
The merger was frozen.
Sterling Medical’s board placed the company under independent oversight. Gabriel recused himself from every decision involving the trust.
Evelyn called his recusal cowardice.
He answered through counsel.
“For the first time, I am refusing to let family relationship substitute for qualification.”
May you like
Arthur’s lesson had arrived late.
It arrived before the final vote.
