She was at war with her father and Natalie again, and this time she wasn’t relenting. She had meant what she said about never forgiving him if he sold the hotel. And Brad had never seen her so determined. She didn’t talk to anyone but Brad about it, but he understood what it meant to her. Her father no longer did. And she refused to discuss it with anyone else. She was too upset.

She was in her room after work one afternoon, and she and her father were living now on separate floors like strangers. She hadn’t spoken to him or Natalie since the day Mike had told her the news that her father might be selling. And she had no desire to speak to either of them again until she knew what he was going to do. Which made it surprising when she got a call from Natalie that afternoon, on her cell phone. She sounded like she was being strangled.

“What’s wrong with you? Are you sick?” Heloise asked her coldly. “You sound terrible.”

“Can you come up? Are you in the hotel?”

“I’m in my apartment.” Heloise’s tone was as cold as she felt. Once again they had betrayed her. Or they were hoping to, if the consortium paid them enough money. She didn’t want the money. She wanted to live and work at the Vendôme forever. “Is something wrong?” Heloise asked Natalie, and she made a terrible groaning sound in answer.

“I’m in a lot of pain… I’m bleeding… I can’t reach your father.”

“Oh shit,” Heloise said as she ran out the door of the apartment and tore up the back stairs with her phone still in her hand. She didn’t want to waste time waiting for the elevator. And luckily, she had her passkey in her pocket. She let herself into the apartment and ran into the bedroom and found Natalie lying on the bed, writhing in pain. “Should I call an ambulance? How much are you bleeding?” She had taken advanced first aid as part of her training. She approached Natalie and could see there was blood on the bed where she was lying, and she didn’t want to frighten her. “I think you’ll be more comfortable going to the hospital in an ambulance, Nat,” she said gently, their battle over the sale of the hotel instantly forgotten.

She went into the other room and dialed 911 from the landline. She explained to them clearly and precisely that one of the guests was hemorrhaging, and she was four months pregnant with triplets. They promised to send paramedics and an ambulance immediately. She gave them the room number, and then she called the front desk and told them, and told them to find her father. They called her back immediately and told her that her father was out of the hotel at a meeting, and his phone was still on voice mail.

“Keep trying him, and get the paramedics up here immediately when they get here.” She went back to Natalie then, sat down on the bed next to her, and stroked her hair.

“I don’t want to lose my babies,” she was crying, and then Heloise remembered to get the name of her doctor and called her. She said she would meet them at the hospital as soon as they arrived. Natalie was sobbing; she knew that at four months they couldn’t save them, while Heloise did all she could to reassure her.

The paramedics were there in less than ten minutes, and they asked if her husband was around or if someone would go with her. Without hesitating for an instant, Heloise said she was her daughter. And as soon as they put her on a gurney and covered her with a blanket, Heloise followed them into the freight elevator, holding tightly to her stepmother’s hand.

“It’s going to be okay, Nat. I promise,” she told her blindly, with no idea what would happen. They took her out the service entrance so as not to frighten people in the lobby, and Natalie was sobbing loudly, while one of the paramedics asked her questions. And they started an IV as soon as they got in the ambulance, turned the sirens on, and took off for the hospital at full speed. There was an obstetrical team already waiting for her, and her own obstetrician arrived twenty minutes later. They wouldn’t let Heloise stay with her. And it was a full hour before they found Hugues, and he called Heloise on her cell phone.

“What happened?” he asked, sounding panicked. He was already in a cab and had come straight from the meeting.

“I don’t know. She called me in my room, she said she was in pain and that she was bleeding. I called nine-one-one immediately, and they’re working on her now.”

His voice was hoarse when he asked, “Did she lose the babies?”

“I don’t know,” Heloise told him honestly, “they haven’t told me anything, but she was bleeding pretty heavily when we left.” It didn’t look hopeful to her. “Her doctor is with her.”

“I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

“I’m in the waiting room outside obstetrics.” They had moved her up from the emergency room in case she delivered. But at eighteen weeks there was very little chance the babies would survive, and if they did, not in decent condition.

Five minutes later she saw her father fly past her and disappear into the treatment area beyond where she was sitting. He waved as he went by but didn’t stop to talk to her, and for the next two hours Heloise had no idea what had happened. She didn’t know who to ask, and it was six o’clock when her father came to find her.

“How is she?” She didn’t dare ask him if she’d lost the triplets. He looked worse than Natalie had when she came in, and Heloise could see then how much they mattered to him, and even more how much Natalie did, and she felt sorry for him.

“She’s okay. And so are the triplets for now. They did a sonogram, and she didn’t lose them. She may have placenta previa or some other condition. But she’s hanging on to the babies. They’re going to keep her overnight, and if nothing else happens, they’re going to send her home with a monitor and keep her on bedrest. She’ll probably be in bed for the rest of the pregnancy, but if she can keep them for another month or two, they might make it.” It sounded like it was the most important thing in the world to him, and Heloise reached out and hugged him. “Do you want to come in and see her?” Heloise nodded and followed him through two sets of double doors, down more hallways, and finally to her room, where there were monitors all over her, and Natalie looked terrified and traumatized by everything that had happened.

“How do you feel?” Heloise asked her gently.

“Scared shitless,” she said honestly with a weak smile. “I just don’t want to lose them.”

“I hope you don’t,” Heloise said and leaned over to kiss her hand. “You’re going to have to take it very easy.” Natalie nodded. It was worth it to her. She was willing to do anything to save their babies.

Heloise didn’t want to wear her out, and she left a few minutes later. Her father was going to stay with Natalie, and he promised to call her if anything happened. And Heloise thought about it on the way uptown, that no matter how angry she got at him about the sale, or Natalie, or the triplets, in the end they were a family, and the only thing that mattered was being there for each other and being loving and forgiving. She really did hope that Natalie didn’t lose the babies.

And miraculously, she didn’t. Natalie came back to the hotel the following day, in an ambulance. They put her straight to bed. She was on full bedrest for the rest of the pregnancy, with a bedpan. She couldn’t even get up to go to the bathroom. Her feet weren’t allowed to touch the floor, and she looked terrified as she lay there. Hugues was with her, and he told her to ring for the maid or call him on his cell phone if she needed anything. And Heloise told her to call her or anyone at the front desk as well. Natalie promised not to move, and she looked pale and frightened when Heloise went back to the front desk and Hugues to his office.

They rode down in the elevator together. He didn’t tell her that he had had the offer from the Dutch the day before and had been meeting with their bankers. The offer was a good one and would be hard to refuse. He didn’t know if he would ever get an offer like that for the hotel again. He had told them he would get back to them in a few days. And then Jennifer had called, and he had rushed to the hospital. He thanked Heloise again for her help as they parted in the lobby. Things were still tense between them, and he knew they would be until he made his decision.

For the next several days Natalie managed not to lose the babies. Heloise checked on her, Jennifer came up to see her, the maids visited her. Ernesta brought her little treats and chocolates. The concierge sent up all the newest magazines. Room service brought her anything she wanted. And Natalie lay there, still panicked that she would lose them. She had delegated all of her projects at the office. Her life was on hold. And the day after she came home from the hospital, the unions that controlled their maintenance men provided a new distraction. They had given Hugues notice of a strike that morning. It was a rogue strike and was supposed to serve him as a warning. He had notified them that he was going to let go two employees, without replacing them, and they had told him that he couldn’t. He had followed all the appropriate procedures, and they had put a picket line in front of the hotel to annoy the guests. And the men on the picket line were pounding on pots and pans with soup ladles and causing a terrible racket to disturb the guests. You could hear it for blocks.

Heloise went into her father’s office to talk to him, and he was talking to his labor lawyer on the phone. The union wanted him to reinstate the two men, even though he had followed all the proper procedures. He called the union office then and told them to get their goddamn picket line away from the front of his hotel. And the man he spoke to said that if he didn’t rehire the two men, there would be trouble. Hugues hung up in a fury and looked up at his daughter.