ENTANGLED WITH THE NEW CHAIRMAN

Arabella had been unconscious for over four hours. Then gradually she opened her eyes, not remembering where she was, she looked around and realised she was still in the hospital. Without thinking, she placed both palms on her stomach and it was flat. Her heart leaped for joy. She had had her baby. Their baby. Or so she thought. But, the baby is nowhere to be found. Her fiance is also nowhere to be found. No one in sight. “Oh, he could be with the doctor.” she thought. Just then, a notification popped on her phone which was on the bedside table. She reached for it, with smiles on her face, wanting to call her fiance. But then, “Everett Quinn posted,” says the notification. She clicked straight away without thinking. She had expected the post would be him announcing that they were now parents. What she saw could’ve sent her straight into a coma... She saw roses. A man kneeling. A woman’s hand stretched toward a ring. And Everett, her own Everett, was the man, looking up at the woman as though she was his entire world. Her throat tightened. Her fingers shook around the phone. “What… what am I looking at?” her voice trembled. The timestamp reveals the post was made two hours ago. While she was still unconscious after having their child. She zoomed in, desperate for an explanation. Lilian. She called him. Once. Twice. Five times. Each ring louder than the last, each silence heavier, each unanswered call a slap she wasn’t prepared for. As if on cue. The door opened. “Evere…” She stopped halfway. Yea, it was Everett, except that he looked like a stranger. He looked mean, cold and his expression… empty. “Take this and disappear, without a trace.” he said, stretching an envelope between two fingers like it was trash. “What…? Everett…” Arabella managed to say, her voice breaking off, her eyes went wide. “You heard me right, this is a cheque. Payment for your time and trouble.” The words didn’t even make sense. Her fingers curled, nails digging into her palm. “Everett, what are you talking about?” She tried to steady her breathing, but panic was already rising up her chest. “We’re getting married. We just had a baby, our baby. What are you talking about?” She tried to force herself off the bed, holding onto the edges of the bed for balance. “Please look at me. What happened? Did I do something? Why are you doing this to me, today of all days?” Her voice trembled. “I just gave birth. I thought you were going to walk in smiling… holding our child…” She reached out, fingers trembling, wanting to touch his cheek, needing to feel the warmth she knew. “Don’t. Touch. Him.” Lilian’s voice sliced through the room like a knife dipped in poison. Arabella froze. The same Lilian from the picture she had seen minutes earlier. The same Lilian smiling while Everett knelt with a ring. His cousin. Lilian walked in like she owned the room. Her heels clicked against the tiles. She went straight to Everett and wrapped her arm around him. Arabella’s heart dropped to her stomach. “What’s going on…?” Arabella whispered, her voice barely audible. She looked between them, her hand pressed against her chest as if holding her heart in place. “Everett, say something. Please. And why are you two like this? Where is my baby?” “Enough,” Everett said sharply. Arabella flinched. He slipped the envelope onto the bedside table as if that ended everything. She stared at it. Then at him. Then at the woman by his side. Lilian said, stepping closer with a wicked smile on her lips. “What is going on, darling, is that you should never come near my man ever again. You were a tool. You carried my child, our child. The baby is not yours. Get that into your thick skull.” Arabella froze. “What… what do you mean?” she whispered. Looking confused. Then, The door burst open again. Her father, Richard, walked in. Behind him were Patricia, her stepmother, and Vanessa, her stepsister. All three of them were smiling like they were entering a party. “Good, you’re awake,” Richard said, brushing imaginary dust off his suit. “We came to finish this.” “Finish… what?” Arabella whispered, staring at them like she’d never seen them before. Everett stepped forward. “Lilian and I have been together for five years. She's an actress, you know, her body needs to stay perfect, so we needed someone who can carry and birth our child. And you were just so perfect for the job. Trust me, it's actually a privilege for you to birth our child. And I am paying you handsomely, way more than what most surrogates get.” Arabella covered her mouth as tears spilled. “Surrogate…? Everett. No. We loved each other. YOU LOVED ME. You told me Lilian was your distant cousin. You…” “You were nothing, you fool. You were just too dumb to see what was right in front of you. We were never cousins… don't you still get it? Why are you so slow?” Lilian snapped, looking irritated. Arabella looked up at her father, expecting him to say it was all a misunderstanding. But her father was smiling ear to ear. "Wait dad, you... you knew? You knew what Everett was doing?" The floor tilted beneath Arabella’s feet. Vanessa laughed. "Knew? Oh, you poor, stupid girl. Whose idea do you think it was? We needed someone to get close to you, someone you'd fall in love with and trust completely, so much that you’d do anything for him, even sign anything. And behold, Everett!" "Let me help you Arabella, because you still don't seem to get it.” Everett said. “Look, you were useful in more ways than one, you helped us get what we really wanted; your mother's inheritance. The money, properties and everything that was willed to you. You signed everything over, remember? Out of love." He said the last word mockingly. "You did the paperwork without even reading it properly. You gave access to everything. And as a bonus, you carried and birthed our baby." Arabella's mind flashed back to the documents Everett had brought her months ago. He'd said it was for their wedding planning, for joint accounts, for their future together. She'd signed everything he put in front of her because she trusted him completely. Because she loved him. "No… " Arabella breathed, taking a step backward. Her eyes found her father's. "Dad? Tell me they're lying. Please." But Richard's face was hard, his jaw set. "Your mother never trusted me," he said, his voice thick with resentment. "Twenty-five years of marriage, and she never trusted me. She put everything, her family's estate, her money, her properties, all of it in a trust for you. To be released to you when you turned twenty-five or got married, whichever came first." He took a step toward her, and Arabella instinctively stepped back. "Do you know how that felt? To be married to a woman who thought so little of me that she'd rather give everything to a child than to her own husband?" he said, through gritted teeth. "Maybe because she had good reason not to trust you!" The words burst out of Arabella before she could stop them, anger finally breaking through the shock. "You were a womanizer, Dad! You spent money like it grew on trees! You never worked, never contributed anything! You were lazy and unfaithful, you made her life miserable until the day she died!" The slap came so fast and so hard that Arabella didn't see it coming. Her head snapped to the side, her cheek exploding in pain. “Oops… that was beautiful to watch.” Vanessa mocked. "How dare you speak to me like that!" Richard roared, his face was red with fury. "I am your father!" "You were never a father to me," Arabella said, tears streamed down her face, mixed with the stinging pain of the slap. "A real father wouldn't do this. Wouldn't conspire to steal from his own daughter." Arabella lifted her face slowly. Tears and pain blurred her vision, but her voice came out steady. “You all planned this,” she whispered. “You stole from me. You stole my baby. You stole everything.” Everett crossed his arms. “You were nothing but a womb to us.” Arabella’s heart shattered. Her legs trembled, but she stood tall. “Where is my baby?” she screamed suddenly, her voice echoing off the walls. “WHERE IS MY BABY?!” Lilian smirked. “Safe. With us. Forever. You will never see that child again.” Arabella’s whole body shook as she whispered, “You all are evil.”