Chapter 4 - The Hospital Room Ultimatum
While Victoria and I were dismantling my mother’s corporate stronghold downtown, a frantic phone call shattered our momentum. It was Dr. Vance, Elena’s obstetrician. Stress, combined with the trauma of the previous day, had triggered premature labor. Elena had been rushed to St. Jude Memorial Hospital, her condition critical.
I dropped everything, leaving Victoria to lock down the corporate accounts, and raced across the city, breaking every traffic law along the way. My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird. If anything happened to Elena or my son, I swore I would tear my family down to atoms, leaving not a single stone standing.
When I burst through the doors of the private maternity wing, I found my mother and Lucas already standing in the hallway outside Elena’s room. They looked like vultures waiting for carrion.
“What are you doing here?” I snarled, stepping directly into my mother’s path, my height towering over her. “You did this. Your cruelty put her in there.”
My mother didn’t look remorseful in the slightest; instead, she adjusted her diamond brooch with chilling nonchalance. “Please, Daniel. Melodramatic hysterics. The girl was always too weak for our family. She lacks resilience. But since she is currently occupying a Sterling-funded hospital room, we thought it appropriate to check in.”
“Get out,” I whispered, my voice vibrating with a lethal intensity that made Lucas take a nervous step back. “Get out of my sight before I forget you gave birth to me.”
“You can threaten me all you want, brother,” Lucas chimed in, trying to regain his swagger while holding his phone out. “But while you’re playing white knight in there, the board emergency meeting is happening. Aunt Victoria might have ambushed us this morning, but Mom still has legal leverage over your marriage certificate. Prenup clause 14, section B: if Elena is found financially liable for corporate mismanagement—which we’ve conveniently documented—she walks away with zero, and the baby’s custody defaults to the Sterling family trust.”
My blood ran ice cold. I stared at Lucas, realizing the depth of their depravity. They hadn’t just been embezzling money; they had been meticulously building a legal trap to steal my child before he was even born.
“You forged those documents,” I said, my voice dropping to a dangerous whisper.
“Prove it,” my mother smiled coldly. “Sign the custody waiver relinquishing sole paternal decision-making to me, and we’ll ensure Elena gets the best surgical team money can buy. Refuse, and let’s just say complications during childbirth are terribly unpredictable.”
Before I could lunge at my mother and wrap my hands around her throat, the heavy oak door of the delivery room clicked open. Dr. Vance stepped out, wearing blue scrubs, looking exhausted and grim.
“Mr. Sterling?” the doctor asked, looking directly at me.
“I’m here, Doctor. How is my wife? How is my son?”
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Dr. Vance sighed, wiping his forehead with a sterile gauze pad. “Your wife is fighting hard, Mr. Sterling, but her blood pressure spiked dangerously due to acute emotional distress. We had to perform an emergency C-section. Your son is in the NICU—he’s breathing, but he’s premature and fragile. As for Mrs. Sterling... she’s asking for you. But Daniel, you need to hear this right now: someone switched her prenatal vitamins in her bag with high-dose blood thinners before she arrived at the hospital. If she hadn't vomited them up yesterday morning, she wouldn't have survived the surgery.”
I slowly turned my head back toward my mother and Lucas. Their triumphant smiles had vanished, replaced by sudden, unmistakable panic.
