Chapter 8 - THE PROXY FORM
We replaced every medical consent in my hospital file.
Only Sebastian, Rachel, and my sister Nora could receive information.
Eleanor was explicitly barred.
Hospital security created an alias for my delivery admission.
The precautions felt excessive until someone called Dr. Lee’s office pretending to be me.
The caller asked whether an earlier induction could be scheduled.
Reception staff requested the new password.
The caller disconnected.
Phone tracing led to New Dawn Maternal Care.
Its director denied placing the call.
An employee said Eleanor’s assistant used the office that morning.
The no-contact order prevented direct communication with me.
It did not stop her from trying to move the birth.
The police investigation expanded from coercion and privacy violations toward attempted medical fraud.
Still, Eleanor remained free.
Prosecutors needed precise evidence tying her to each action.
She continued chairing Vance Meridian Hospitality because the board had not yet received enough information about the trust or sale.
Sebastian requested her suspension.
Four directors refused.
They called the family conflict private.
One was Patricia.
She abstained after beginning cooperation.
The resort sale moved forward.
Michael Trent claimed delay would trigger lender penalties.
Sebastian demanded the full data room.
Several schedules were missing.
One showed future voting rights.
Another showed a “continuity adjustment” activating at the birth of a male descendant.
I read the phrase twice.
“What changes when our son is born?”
Sebastian had no answer.
His father, Charles Vance, died four years earlier. He created several trusts but never discussed details with me.
Eleanor controlled the estate files.
Sebastian believed he would inherit voting authority gradually.
Rachel subpoenaed the missing schedules.
Eleanor’s attorneys said they were stored with a Swiss bank.
The same bank Sebastian had visited during his unexpected London return.
His trip had included a private meeting arranged by his father’s former attorney.
The attorney, Helen Ward, had sent him a message:
Your mother’s resort transaction conflicts with the continuity instrument. Retrieve the sealed packet before the first male birth.
Sebastian had not shown me because he did not yet understand it.
“You went searching for papers while she was preparing to take our baby.”
“I didn’t know.”
“You knew something changed at his birth.”
“I knew enough to ask. Not enough to frighten you without facts.”
“You decided ignorance was protection.”
He accepted the accusation.
Helen Ward arrived with a certified index.
One schedule governed the first grandchild born to Sebastian.
The schedule itself had been removed from her copy after Charles died.
A backup existed in Zurich.
Sebastian had collected it.
He placed it inside his suitcase.
The suitcase remained at Eleanor’s estate after I was taken to the hospital.
May you like
Police had secured it.
When they opened it under warrant, the document envelope was empty.
