Love Reduced to Zero, No Need to Meet Again novel · Chapter 21 of 24

Chapter 21: Eli's POV: The Vote

Eli's POV

The boardroom at Draper Tower has a table for fourteen and a view of the harbor.

At nine that morning every chair was full.

Frederick Ellsworth sat at the far end in a charcoal suit, because his firm holds fifteen percent of my company and one seat.

Joyce Fairbank sat beside him in her pearls with a folder in her lap.

Cora's father sat behind her against the wall, not at the table, with his eyes on his shoes.

Cora walked in on my arm.

She wore a plain navy dress and no jewelry, and her notebooks were under her other arm.

Her hand on my sleeve was steady.

I had not slept, and neither had she.

At three in the morning I had asked her whether she wanted me to fight for her.

She said, "No. Sit down and let me speak."

I intended to do exactly that.

The board chair, an old woman who had known my father, called the meeting to order.

"We are here on a petition from a director," she said. "Mr. Ellsworth, you have the floor."

Frederick did not rise.

"Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll be brief, because I dislike unpleasantness."

"I'm sure."

"Dr. Fairbank is a talented woman who is going through a crisis. She is pregnant, hospitalized this week for bleeding, and by every public account distressed. She has left her husband. She has stood on a stage and accused her own sister of fraud."

"I accused her of nothing," Cora said, quietly. "I played the video."

"She is not thinking clearly. And Draper Biotech has handed its flagship program to her."

"It's a concern, I think, for any shareholder."

A man at the table cleared his throat.

"What does Mr. Ellsworth propose?"

"That she be suspended pending a medical review. That a guardian be named for her work, her patents and her health."

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