Chapter 3: What Eleanor Knew
Eleanor sat down.
Not because anyone invited her to.
She simply lowered herself into the nearest chair as though her legs had made the decision without her.
Julian remained standing, but the posture had gone out of him.
He looked like a man waiting for a sentence to be read.
Darcy placed her pen on the notepad.
"Take your time, Mrs.
Eleanor.
But I do need you to answer."
Eleanor looked at her son.
Something passed between them — a question, or maybe a warning.
Julian gave her nothing back.
"He told me," Eleanor began carefully, "that the house was jointly held.
That if Sloan became difficult, we could use that as a negotiating position."
"Difficult," I repeated.
"His word." She smoothed the front of her jacket.
"He said you had been unreasonable about money for months.
That you were planning to cut us off entirely."
"Cut you off." I kept my voice level.
"I've paid for everything in this family for seven years."
"He said you were threatening to stop."
"I said no to one trip."
Eleanor's jaw tightened.
"He told me it was more than that."
Darcy leaned forward slightly.
"Mrs.
Eleanor, when did Julian first tell you about this plan?
The leverage, as you called it."
A pause.
Eleanor's hands folded in her lap.
"Three weeks ago," she said.
Three weeks.
Two weeks before I had found the bank statements.
One week before Julian had started pushing harder for the Europe money.
I looked at Julian.
"You were already planning this before I found out about the withdrawals."
He said nothing.
"Julian." My voice was quieter now, which was worse.
"You knew I was going to find those statements eventually.
So you decided to move first."
Still nothing.
"Answer her," Darcy said.
Julian's eyes came up slowly.
"I needed time to sort things out."
"Sort what out?" I asked.
"The forty thousand you took?
The hotel suite?
The jewelry receipts with a name on them that isn't mine?"
Eleanor's head turned sharply toward her son.
"What jewelry?" she said.
Julian's mouth opened.
Closed.
"There's a name on three of the receipts," I said.
I reached into the blue folder and placed a single page on the table between them.
"Her name is Petra.
She's been receiving gifts from our joint account for fourteen months."
Eleanor stared at the page.
Then she looked at Julian with an expression I had never seen on her face before — not anger, not shock.
Something colder than either.
"You told me this was about the money," she said.
"You told me Sloan was the problem."
"Mom—"
"You used me." Her voice was very quiet.
"You brought me into this.
You sat me in that kitchen.
You let me say those things to her." She stopped.
"How long?"
Julian looked at the ceiling.
"How long, Julian?"
"Fourteen months," Darcy said, her pen moving.
"Based on the statements."
Eleanor stood up from the chair.
She did not look at her son again.
She looked at me.
"I didn't know about the other woman," she said.
"I want you to know that."
"I believe you," I said.
And I did — not because Eleanor had ever been kind to me, but because the look on her face was not the look of someone performing surprise.
It was the look of someone realizing they had been a prop in a plan they never fully understood.
Darcy gathered the page and returned it to the folder.
"We'll need formal statements from both of you.
Julian, I'd strongly recommend you contact your own attorney before this goes any further."
Julian finally spoke.
"You're not going to do anything with that.
This is a private family matter."
Darcy looked at him.
"The forty thousand dollars withdrawn from a jointly held emergency fund without documented consent is not a private family matter.
Neither is the fraudulent representation of property ownership.
Neither—" she tapped the folder — "is fourteen months of financial transfers to a third party from a shared account."
Julian's face changed again.
This time there was only one expression.
He had not expected Darcy to have all of it.
"I want to speak to Sloan alone," he said.
"That's not going to happen today," Darcy said.
Julian looked at me past her shoulder.
"Sloan.
Please.
We can fix this."
I picked up my bag from the chair beside me.
"You told me to leave, Julian.
So I left."
I walked to the door.
Darcy followed.
Behind us, I heard Eleanor's voice — low, controlled, directed at her son.
"You had better hope," she said, "that she decides to be generous."
I didn't turn around.
But I heard Julian's reply, and it stopped me with my hand on the door frame.
May you like
"She won't," he said.
"She doesn't know about the will yet."
