When an Outsider Trustee Discovers Her Corporate Neighbor Poisoned a $40 Million Heiress's Corgi to Steal Estate Control, an African Grey Parrot and an Accidentally Found Document Expose the Gaslig...
I clutched the courier receipt tightly, the crinkled paper feeling sharp against my palm. The discovery burned within me. I needed to act, but confronting Eleanor directly without more leverage felt reckless, especially with her propensity for twisting narratives. My eyes fell on Julian Dax’s name, scrawled on the edge of a different, innocuous memo. Eleanor’s personal assistant, always hovering, always efficient. He’d been present during her initial, venomous accusations against Chloe. He had seen the manipulation firsthand.
I found Julian in his small, meticulously organized office, tucked away behind the main reception area. He was hunched over a laptop, his brow furrowed, a half-eaten sandwich sitting untouched beside a stack of reports. He looked up, his polite smile faltering as he saw my face.
“Ms. Lin,” he said, his voice flat. “Is everything all right?”
I closed the door behind me, the soft click echoing in the quiet room. “Julian, we need to talk. Privately.”
He straightened, a flicker of apprehension in his eyes. His gaze dropped to the hand where I still held the receipt. I unfolded the document and slid it across his desk.
“Do you recognize this?” I asked, my voice low.
Julian leaned forward. His eyes scanned the paper, first casually, then with increasing intensity. His face, usually a mask of professional composure, began to drain of color. His fingers, which had been resting confidently on his keyboard, began to tremble, curling into a tight fist.
He pushed back from the desk, knocking his chair slightly. “What is this? This… this can’t be right.”
“It’s a requisition form, Julian,” I said, my voice cutting through his protest. “For an organophosphate insecticide. Ordered by Eleanor. Delivered directly to her study two weeks before Barnaby got sick.”
He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, a muscle ticking in his jaw. When he opened them, they were filled with a raw, undeniable guilt. “She… she told me it was a special cleaning agent for a rare plant blight. She had me sign off on a dummy corporate invoice. Evergreen Gardens Corp., an old shell company for an unused land parcel.”
“She gaslighted you too, Julian,” I stated, watching him. “Just like Chloe.”
He shook his head slowly, a deep tremor running through his body. “It’s worse than you know, Ms. Lin. Much worse.” He glanced at the door, then back at me. “Eleanor… she’s in deep. Really deep.”
He leaned in, his voice barely a whisper. “The $40 million trust. It’s not just about control for her. She owes millions. To a syndicate. Victor Kozlov’s syndicate. They don’t play by corporate rules.”
My breath hitched. “What are you talking about?”
“She overextended. Bad investments, high-stakes gambling in offshore accounts, and then she used Albright Holdings’ phantom stock options as collateral for the loans. She thought she could recoup it, but it backfired. They’re circling, Ms. Lin. They gave her an ultimatum. She needed a quick influx of capital.”
He gestured vaguely. “Liquidating Chloe’s trust, claiming Chloe was a danger to herself, mentally unstable… that was her plan. To trigger a forced sale of assets, get the cash, pay them off. Barnaby… that was just the beginning. A cruel, calculated way to demonstrate Chloe’s ‘instability’ to the board.”
He looked at me, his eyes pleading. “I tried to leave breadcrumbs. Little things. This receipt… I knew she’d be careless with the physical ones. I knew you, as the new trustee, would be thorough. I couldn’t let her hurt Chloe like that. Not a child.” His voice broke, ragged with remorse. “Please, Ms. Lin. We have to stop her.”
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