CHAPTER 28: CONFERENCE ROOM II

The room went still, a collective breath held as eyes ping-ponged between the two men. Rachel Kent’s fingers froze on her agenda, her brow creasing with the weight of the brewing clash. Elias smirked, sensing a showdown, while Miriam crossed her arms seemingly intrigued.

Devon turned slowly, his expression one of amused pity, like a maestro facing a heckler in the cheap seats. He paused, letting the silence stretch until it was almost comedic, then flicked to a hidden slide bursting with cost analyses and rollout schedules so detailed they made Gregory’s complaints look like a child’s scribble. "Gregory," he began, his tone light but laced with a razor’s edge, "your passion for red tape is... endearing. But let’s ground this in reality."

He zoomed in on a chart, his voice carrying the gentle cadence of a teacher correcting a wayward student. "Costs? Sliced by 60% through phased rollouts, cheaper than your last budget proposal, by the way. Retraining? Modular, bite-sized, done in half the time of standard programs. And admin hurdles? Already cleared with regulatory boards, pre-approvals in hand. I didn’t just plan this, I lived it, in trauma bays and boardrooms, while some were still pushing paper."

The room erupted in stifled gasps and chuckles, Elias let out a bark of laughter, Miriam’s smirk widened, and even Croft coughed to hide a grin. Gregory’s face collapsed into a pale, sweaty mess, his mouth flapping uselessly. "I—that’s not what I—"

Devon waved him off with a theatrical flourish, turning to the room. "Here’s the thing, colleagues. You’re all masters, giants in your fields. But trauma care? It’s a beast that demands more than mastery, it demands reinvention. These protocols don’t just work, they rewrite what’s possible. You know your craft, but this? This is the edge you didn’t see coming."

He clicked to his final slide, a bold blueprint of implementation timelines, and let his words land like a closing argument. "Any more doubts? No? Then let’s move, lives are waiting." The projector dimmed, and the room broke into applause, it was first hesitant, then swelling into a wave of genuine admiration. Elias clapped with gusto, Miriam joined with a slow, deliberate nod, Nadia’s hands met in a crisp rhythm, and even Leonard and Croft added their grudging approval. Serena’s applause was eager, her eyes bright with awe. Gregory, still shell-shocked, managed a weak clap, his pride in tatters.

The applause lingered in the air like the final notes of a symphony, a rare harmony in a room accustomed to discord. But as it began to fade, a new voice sliced through the murmur, a voice like liquid silk, resonant and poised, carrying an authority that demanded silence without raising its volume. It wasn’t Elias’s gravelly timbre, nor Miriam’s crisp precision, nor even Gregory’s lingering bitterness.

Devon paused mid-stride, his confident swagger faltering for the first time that day. Confusion flickered across his face, he scanned the room, eyes darting from face to face, searching for the source among the familiar crowd. No one met his gaze, they were all staring at Rachel Kent’s laptop, perched innocently on the table like a portal to another world.

Rachel, the ever composed administrator, swiveled the screen toward him with a subtle nod, her expression a mix of deference and quiet amusement. The video feed came into view, and in that instant, the room transformed. Chairs scraped against the floor in unison as Elias, Miriam, Nadia, Leonard, Serena, and the others rose to their feet like soldiers at attention. They bowed their heads in a synchronized gesture of respect, the air thick with unspoken protocol. Even Julian Croft, who fiddled with his cufflinks as if the world bored him, inclined his head deeply.

The woman on the screen regarded them with a serene smile, her voice flowing again like a gentle command: "Please, be seated. We’re all colleagues here." Only then did they comply, sinking back into their seats with the precision of a well-rehearsed ritual.

Devon’s breath caught as his eyes locked onto the screen. There she was, the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, a vision that shattered the boundaries of reality, defying logic, genetics, and every standard of human allure. It was as if she had been sculpted by the gods themselves, her features an impossible symphony of perfection that made the world around her fade into insignificance. Her skin glowed with an ethereal luminescence, flawless and porcelain-smooth, as if kissed by moonlight and untouched by the sun’s harsh rays. High cheekbones arched like the curves of a Renaissance masterpiece, framing eyes that were twin pools of sapphire blue, deep and infinite, flecked with specks of gold that seemed to dance like stars in a midnight sky. Her lips, full and naturally rose-tinted, curved in a subtle smile that promised both wisdom and mystery, while waves of raven-black hair cascaded over her shoulders in silky tendrils, each strand catching the light as if woven from shadows and silk. Her presence exuded an otherworldly purity, a radiance so pristine that everyone else in the room, Devon included appeared as mere smudges on a canvas, stained by the ordinary grind of life. She was beauty incarnate, transcending the mundane, no makeup could mimic this, no surgery could forge it. It stunned him, this prodigy of medicine and innovation, leaving him momentarily speechless, his mind racing to reconcile how such perfection could exist in the flesh.

She met his gaze without flinching, her expression one of quiet understanding, as if this reaction was as predictable as the tide. Leaning back in her chair with the effortless grace of someone born to command empires, she spoke once more, her voice a melodic caress that wrapped around the room. "I see I’ve caught you off guard, Dr Aldridge. Allow me to introduce myself properly. I am Yvonne Sinclair."

The name hit Devon like a thunderclap, igniting a cascade of realizations. Sinclair, the surname alone evoked empires. The Sinclair family was a colossus straddling the globe, their influence woven into the fabric of society like invisible threads. Politics? They had senators, ambassadors, and whispers in every White House ear. Medicine?