He Chose Mistress, I Chose Empire novel · Chapter 17 of 32
Chapter 17: The Vote
I had four days. Wilma had a phone list.
By Tuesday night the council chamber was so full they opened the overflow room.
My six movers sat in the front row in their red shirts. Behind them sat the parents.
Not all thirty-one families. Nineteen.
Some had babies home in car seats. Some had babies still upstairs on the new floor and came anyway.
The twins' mother sat on the aisle with a double stroller.
The charge nurse came in her scrubs, straight off a shift.
The church choir took the whole back row.
Jubal sat beside me. His daughter sat on his knee with a sheet of paper rolled up tight in both fists.
"What's that?" I whispered.
"It's a secret," she whispered back. "It's for the old man with the cane."
Brantley's side of the room had his lawyer, his rendering, and three investors who didn't sit together.
He spoke first again. He had a new slide for Phase 2.
He didn't say relic this time.
He said tax base eight times. I counted. The twins' mother counted along with me on her fingers.
When the chair called my name, I stood up but didn't go to the podium.
"I'd like to give my time to some people who know my company better than I do," I said.
The chair looked at the clock and sighed. "Two minutes each."
The hospital CEO went first.
He told them about my father carrying his desk down six flights in 1989.
Then he told them about the night his NICU moved.
"Every baby went into a ready room," he said. "Every single one. I've practiced medicine for almost forty years, and I've never been prouder to sign a check."
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