He walked over to the desk and tapped a finger on the ledger.

“The transfers from the Sterling estate to the private accounts in Panama didn’t make sense,” he continued.

“Those are private family investments,” Miranda said quickly, her face turning pale.

“They were payments meant for the Cross family,” Julian corrected.

He turned to Elias, his expression solemn.

“I found the original agreements signed by my grandfather, Arthur Sterling,” Julian said. “He had set aside forty percent of the land holdings for Elias and his descendants.”

“Arthur was senile when he signed those,” Miranda snapped, her knuckles turning white.

“He was perfectly lucid,” Nathaniel Vale intervened, stepping forward.

Nathaniel unbuckled his briefcase and laid it on the small reading table.

“I witnessed the signing myself, Miranda,” the attorney said. “And you knew it.”

Julian looked at me, a mixture of regret and resolve in his gray eyes.

“When I realized what my mother had done, I couldn’t sit by,” Julian said.

“So you went behind my back?” Miranda whispered, her voice shaking with rage.

“I contacted Elias,” Julian said. “We have been working together for three months to trace the missing capital.”