Chapter 6 - The Doctor Who Signed Twice
Dr. Alan Reeves lived in Palm Beach.
He had retired from clinical medicine three years earlier.
Yet six months ago, he had somehow referred Isabella for a psychiatric assessment she never attended.
Grace examined the report.
“This is designed for litigation.”
Isabella stared.
“Why prepare it six months ago?”
“Because the murder plan may be newer than the control plan.”
Maria nodded.
“They wanted a backup.”
If Isabella survived an attempt, discredit her.
If she refused the Orion sale, call her unstable.
If she reached thirty-five, challenge her capacity to serve as trustee.
Julian and Charles had built multiple exits.
Isabella looked at Maria.
“My father said trust incentives.”
“Yes.”
“This is what he meant.”
Agent Ruiz’s team contacted the psychiatrist.
Dr. Melissa Brandt.
She immediately retained counsel.
Her attorney stated that Brandt had been given extensive medical records and believed she was performing a retrospective consultation for a trust.
She had never personally examined Isabella.
The report’s language had later been edited.
By whom?
Metadata pointed to Cross Strategic Partners.
Julian’s firm.
Isabella felt physically sick.
The man who slept beside her had been preparing a dossier to declare her mentally incompetent.
Grace asked, “Did Julian ever encourage therapy?”
Isabella laughed bitterly.
“After Dad died.”
“Did he attend appointments?”
“No.”
“Did he ask about medication?”
“Yes.”
Maria looked at her.
“What did you tell him?”
“Everything.”
Julian knew her grief.
Her panic attacks after Victor’s death.
Her insomnia.
He had turned intimacy into evidence.
“I gave him my medical passwords once.”
Ruiz looked up.
“When?”
“Last year. I was in Paris. I needed him to download an insurance form.”
Maria closed her eyes.
“He had access.”
“Yes.”
Another betrayal built from convenience.
At 1:00 a.m., Isabella finally slept.
She dreamed of the flooded cabin.
Only this time Julian stood outside the porthole wearing her father’s face.
She woke screaming.
Maria was beside her.
Isabella immediately looked at Maria’s legs.
“You’re standing.”
Maria smiled faintly.
“I’m still standing.”
“I don’t know why that keeps shocking me.”
“Because for ten years your brain organized me around the chair.”
Isabella sat up.
“Did you hate us?”
“The family?”
“Yes.”
“Sometimes.”
“For believing you couldn’t walk?”
“No.”
“For what?”
“For how quickly everyone learned to talk around me.”
Isabella frowned.
Maria continued.
“When people believe you are damaged, they discuss things in front of you.”
“Charles?”
“Constantly.”
“Camille?”
Maria hesitated.
“What?”
“Camille was kind to me.”
Isabella laughed bitterly.
“She helped murder me.”
“Yes.”
“Then she wasn’t kind.”
“Both things can be true.”
Isabella hated that answer.
Maria continued.
“Camille pushed my chair when ramps were steep. Sat with me through your father’s funeral. Brought me food when I was sick.”
“And handed Julian the strap.”
“Yes.”
“How do you hold both?”
“Badly.”
Silence.
At dawn, Grace received records from Victor’s old private investigator.
One report concerned Reeves.
Victor had discovered Reeves owed $1.8 million after failed real-estate investments.
Three months later, Meridian Crest Holdings paid $1.9 million to a medical consulting company controlled by Reeves’s wife.
Isabella whispered, “Charles bought him.”
“Likely.”
The independent toxicology report became more important.
If authenticated, it could support reopening Victor’s death investigation.
Rhode Island authorities agreed to review.
Then Maria remembered something.
“The medicine cabinet.”
“What?”
“Victor changed his medication after the independent test.”
“Yes.”
“He gave me the old bottles.”
“Where are they?”
Maria’s face changed.
“Bellhaven.”
Isabella stood.
“You kept poisoned medication inside the house?”
“I hid it.”
“Where?”
“Behind the false back of my bedroom closet.”
“Charles lives there.”
“Yes.”
“So does Julian.”
Maria nodded.
The physical evidence linking Victor’s poisoning could still be inside Bellhaven.
Or already destroyed.
Isabella looked toward Agent Ruiz.
“We need it.”
“You are not going there.”
“I know.”
That surprised everyone.
“I’m learning.”
Ruiz almost smiled.
A search warrant required probable cause tying the house to Victor’s possible poisoning.
The toxicology report, payments, and Maria’s statement might be enough, but prosecutors needed review.
Time mattered.
At 9:00 a.m., the trust hearing began remotely under seal.
Charles’s attorneys challenged Isabella’s competence.
Grace attacked the forged psychiatric report.
The judge refused to transfer voting authority.
Temporary status quo.
No Orion sale without Isabella’s consent or further court order.
Charles lost.
For now.
Isabella exhaled.
Then Grace received another corporate notice.
Charles had called a board meeting anyway.
Not to approve the Orion sale.
To remove Isabella as chief executive officer of Laurent Oceanic.
Her trust voting rights could not protect her operational job if enough independent directors turned.
The meeting was in twenty-four hours.
May you like
Julian’s smear campaign had changed targets.
If they could not steal Isabella’s shares, they would take away her authority.
