Chapter 5 - The Accomplice
Clearing my name with the military was only the first battle. Julian was still free on bail, and my mother was still in danger. I moved Eleanor out of her condo and into secure, restricted-access officer housing on base at Fort Belvoir, protected 24/7 by armed military police.
But I knew Julian wasn't acting alone. A man who forged complex trust deeds and offshore wire transfers needed an insider—a financial professional with keys to my father's estate.
Major Lin and I began digging into the management firm handling my mother's trust: Thorne & Associates. The head manager was Richard Thorne, a long-time family friend who had attended my wedding fifteen years ago.
I scheduled an unannounced meeting at Thorne's luxurious high-rise office in downtown Tysons Corner.
When I walked into his glass office wearing my full dress uniform, Thorne visibly flinched.
"Valerie! What a surprise," Thorne said, nervously adjusting his silk tie. "I heard about the awful situation with Julian. Terrible, simply terrible..."
I didn't sit down. I walked to his floor-to-ceiling window, looking out over the city, before turning back to him.
"Richard, I'm going to give you exactly one chance to save yourself from federal prison," I said evenly.
Thorne forced a laugh. "Valerie, what are you talking about?"
I threw a document onto his desk. It was a subpoenaed record of a wire transfer: $150,000 sent from Eleanor's trust account to a shell company registered in the Cayman Islands, co-signed by Richard Thorne and Julian Vance.
"You helped him forge the trust amendments," I said. "You gave him the layout of my mother's house, her schedule, and the security codes. You split the stolen funds with him."
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Thorne's face turned ash-gray. "Valerie... he threatened me! He had leverage on my firm—"
"I don't care about your excuses, Richard," I interrupted coldly. "In forty-eight hours, the FBI is executing a warrant on this firm. If you want to avoid twenty years in federal penitentiary for conspiracy to commit murder and wire fraud, you are going to help me trap Julian tonight."
