Chapter 12 - Evelyn’s Last Notebook
Investigators searched Evelyn’s former home.
Most personal belongings had been boxed after her death.
Anna remembered one object that had never been found.
Her mother’s blue notebook.
Evelyn wrote financial reminders, property repairs, and family birthdays inside it.
Dererick claimed the notebook did not exist.
Police found it hidden behind a loose panel beneath Evelyn’s kitchen sink.
The final pages changed the investigation.
Evelyn had documented unusual fatigue after taking “vitamin drops” provided by Dererick.
She wrote that Dererick pressured her to sign a new trust amendment.
The amendment would grant him authority to manage the rental properties.
Evelyn refused.
Three days later, she became disoriented and fell in her bathroom.
Vale evaluated her at home and told the family she was developing cognitive decline.
Evelyn did not believe him.
Her final entry read:
Anna was right to distrust Dererick. I am calling Rebecca Sloan tomorrow.
Rebecca Sloan was an estate attorney.
She never received the call.
Evelyn died that night.
Phone records showed Dererick called Vale six times.
Melissa arrived at the house at 11:40 p.m.
Emergency services were not contacted until 1:17 a.m.
More than ninety minutes were unaccounted for.
When questioned, Melissa said Evelyn was already unresponsive when she arrived.
Dererick told her not to call an ambulance immediately.
“He said she had a do-not-resuscitate order.”
No such order existed.
Vale arrived before paramedics.
He pronounced Evelyn dead using emergency credentials he was not authorized to use outside his practice.
Then he helped Dererick arrange the scene.
The amber bottle was placed beside Evelyn.
The medication inside was hers, but toxicology showed another sedative in her system.
The same compound found in Anna’s blood.
Prosecutors now had evidence of a coordinated cover-up.
But they still had to prove whether Evelyn’s death was intentional.
Then Rebecca Sloan produced an unopened voicemail.
Evelyn had called her office at 10:58 p.m.
May you like
Her frightened voice said:
“Dererick put something in my tea.”
