Chapter 10 - THE POWER PLAY"You don't have the right to forbid me!" I stepped forward, confronting my mother.
Eleanor held up a stack of legal documents. "I do! The Board of Directors held an emergency meeting an hour ago. Given your breach of the engagement with Amelia, the severe damage to the company’s stock, and your emotionally unstable behavior, the Board voted to temporarily suspend you as Chairman!"
I narrowed my eyes. "You forced them to vote."
"I did it to save you and this corporation!" Eleanor said sternly. "All your personal accounts and access to financial funds have been temporarily frozen pending a formal psychiatric evaluation. You currently do not have a single dollar to pay for that expensive experimental surgery!"
Grace looked at Eleanor in disbelief. "You are the grandmother of these children! How can you be cruel enough to block a procedure that could save your own granddaughter?"
Eleanor glanced at Grace with disdain. "Let me tell you, Ms. Miller: that child carries the disease-ridden recessive genes of the Brooks family. Her survival brings nothing but a stain upon our name. Ryan, if you walk into that operating room, you lose everything—your fortune, your position, and the Brooks name!"
A suffocating silence filled the room. Eleanor believed that by stripping away my wealth and power—the very things I had spent my life building—she would force me to yield.
I looked at the mother who had raised me, then turned to Grace, and finally toward the window where little Chloe lay fragile in the ICU.
A faint smile touched my lips.
"You know, Eleanor..." I unbuttoned my expensive suit jacket and tossed it to the floor at her feet. "My whole life I lived according to your script. I thought money and power were everything. But last night, when I saw those three little children standing in the Chicago rain, I realized I was the poorest man on earth."
I pulled out my corporate ID, my luxury car keys, and my watch, placing them neatly on the desk.
"You keep the corporation, the fortune, and your grand Brooks name," my voice rang out clear and unburdened. "I don't need any of it anymore. I resign."
Eleanor’s composure shattered into sheer disbelief. She had never imagined that the son who had always obeyed her would throw away a multi-billion-dollar empire without blinking.
I turned to Dr. Vance. "Doctor, we won't need Brooks Group funds. My private estate in Lake Forest was titled under my personal name before I joined the corporate board. I signed a bank mortgage on it this morning for $10 million in cash. That transfer has already reached the hospital account. Prepare my marrow harvesting procedure for tonight!"
Dr. Vance looked at me with profound respect. "Understood, Mr. Brooks. We will prepare the procedure for 8:00 PM."
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Eleanor trembled, pointing a finger at my face. "You... you will regret this, Ryan Brooks! You will die on that operating table!"
"If I die saving my daughter, it will be the most meaningful thing I've ever done," I replied coldly, taking Grace’s hand as we walked past Eleanor without looking back once.
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