In the fifth month, the call came: a fully matched stem-cell donor, found through the national registry.

The transplant was set for two weeks out.

Ifeoma wept when Dr.

Ngozi told her.

So did Emeka.

But three days before the procedure, Obadiah invoked an emergency clause in the bylaws and called an extraordinary shareholder meeting to vote Ifeoma out — scheduled for the exact morning of her pre-transplant conditioning chemotherapy, when he knew she could not leave the isolation ward.