Chapter 5 - Mr. Voss Had Never Decided Who His Client Was
Franklin Voss did not look ruthless in deposition.
He looked tired.
That almost made Ava angrier.
People expected wrongdoing to look confident.
Sometimes it looked like a man who had spent twenty years avoiding one uncomfortable professional decision.
Who do you represent?
Voss’s answer changed depending on year.
Originally:
Jonathan Mercer.
Then:
Mercer Recovery & Living.
Then:
Mercer Family Office.
Then:
the “Mercer family collectively.”
There was the problem.
A family was not a legal entity simply because everyone shared a Christmas card.
After Jonathan and Katherine divorced, Voss remained involved with both sides in limited governance matters.
They signed waivers.
Reasonable then.
As Katherine’s interests diverged more sharply from Eleanor’s, the waivers became less sensible.
Voss kept going.
Why?
History.
Fees.
Convenience.
And ego.
He believed he was the one person capable of keeping the Mercers from destroying each other.
That belief made him dangerous.
Rachel asked:
“Who authorized you to prepare the hospital agreement?”
Voss answered:
“Eleanor requested it.”
“As her lawyer?”
“As continuity administrator.”
“Did you represent Ava?”
“No.”
“Did you tell Ava that?”
Voss hesitated.
“No.”
There.
Then:
“Did you represent Katherine’s estate?”
“No.”
“Why use the phrase ‘family settlement’?”
“Because it affected family governance.”
Rachel looked at him.
“That phrase implied neutrality you did not have.”
Voss looked down.
“Yes.”
Then the hospital.
Why bring the papers there?
“Eleanor said Ava was improving and wanted matters settled.”
Ava had said no such thing.
Did Voss verify?
No.
Then:
“Did you know St. Catherine had a restricted-signing protocol?”
He had received an email that afternoon from Rachel stating:
No estate, trust, or voting documents are to be presented for execution while Ava remains hospitalized without my involvement.
He read it.
Then went anyway.
Why?
“Eleanor said Rachel only represented Katherine’s estate and had no authority to restrict Ava personally.”
Technically plausible.
Still reckless.
Then the oxygen incident.
Did Voss see Eleanor step on the tubing?
“Yes.”
“Did you tell her to stop?”
“I said her name.”
“Did you move her?”
“No.”
“Call staff?”
“No.”
Why?
Voss stared at his hands.
“I froze.”
Ava heard that phrase too often from adults with power.
Then he said:
“I should have left the moment she touched the tubing.”
Yes.
Then the financial motive.
Voss’s firm stood to earn between $700,000 and $1.2 million in legal fees if the Graystone transaction and continuity trust closed.
Large.
Not unusual for a complex transaction.
Still incentive.
Did Voss push Graystone because of fees?
He denied.
Accounting emails largely supported him.
He had raised conflicts internally.
But he did not withdraw when he should have.
That was the core.
Then Rachel asked about Katherine’s final instructions.
Voss produced a memo.
Katherine did not want Eleanor controlling Ava’s shares.
Clear.
But Katherine also wanted Mercer family voting fragmentation minimized for two years after her death.
A contradiction?
Not exactly.
Katherine proposed an independent voting trustee for disputed transactions during that period.
Not Ava automatically.
Not Eleanor.
Why?
She feared grief would make both women reactive.
Ava had never seen that memo.
“Why?”
Voss looked at Rachel.
Then Ava.
“Katherine asked me to hold it until her estate documents were formalized.”
“Why wasn’t it attached to the will?”
“It was a governance recommendation. Not binding.”
“Then why hide it after she died?”
“I didn’t hide it.”
“You didn’t send it.”
“No.”
Why?
Voss believed Ava would reject independent voting trustees once she learned she inherited the block.
Maybe.
Again:
managing other adults through selective disclosure.
Then Ava asked:
“Did my mother trust me?”
Voss looked uncomfortable.
“Katherine trusted your intelligence.”
“That wasn’t the question.”
Long silence.
“She worried you and Eleanor would turn the company into a continuation of your personal conflict.”
That hurt.
Because mother was right enough.
Then another historical document appeared.
Four years earlier, during Katherine’s first major heart hospitalization, Ava had proposed simplifying the family voting process.
Her comments:
If a shareholder is medically unavailable, we should not need three institutions and two lawyers to hold a time-sensitive vote. Give the continuity administrator a narrow temporary lane.
Continuity administrator.
At that time:
Eleanor.
Voss had warned:
Could create interested-party control if administrator has personal economics.
Ava responded:
Then manage conflicts transaction by transaction. Do not make the whole system unusable.
There.
The major twist had roots.
Not full revelation yet.
Then Voss agreed to withdraw from representing the family office in all disputes involving Ava and Eleanor.
His firm opened an internal ethics review.
State bar consequences would come later if warranted.
No instant disbarment.
Process.
Good.
Before leaving, Voss looked at Ava.
“I’m sorry.”
She asked:
“For what?”
“Thinking keeping the family together was my job.”
That was the first useful sentence he had said.
May you like
Voss’s failure was not a secret conspiracy but years of blurred loyalty, selective disclosure, and belief that he could manage the Mercer family better than its members could manage themselves. Part 6 would show that Ava’s current illness was entirely natural—and why Eleanor still saw it as the perfect moment to turn temporary weakness into permanent control.
---
