Chapter 7 - The Trust Money Had Been Leaving Through Fake Expenses
My independent accountant reconstructed the trust disbursements.
The pattern was embarrassingly simple once we stopped assuming the invoices were legitimate.
Logan’s company submitted bills for services supposedly benefiting Lucy.
Private educational consulting.
Summer-program deposits.
Child-security upgrades.
Specialized transportation.
Family wellness coordination.
Some services existed but cost far less than billed.
Others never happened.
Cassandra assembled the packets.
I approved them.
The trust paid Logan’s company.
Then money moved from his business account into accounts he and Cassandra controlled.
Over eighteen months, approximately $312,000 left Lucy’s trust through questionable or fraudulent reimbursements.
I sat across from the accountant staring at my own electronic approvals.
No forged signature required.
That was almost worse.
Cassandra had learned how to make theft look like work I had already agreed to.
She relied on me being busy.
Grieving.
Trusting.
Every approval carried my name.
Legally, that made the investigation more complicated.
Morally, it made my own failure impossible to avoid.
I had been entrusted with protecting Natalie’s child.
And I had treated trustee review like another stack of administrative paperwork.
Cassandra stole.
Logan helped.
But I gave their invoices the authority they needed.
May you like
That truth belonged in the story too.
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