True Heiress: Middle School Grad

1
The day they found long-lost daughter Isabella, she walked into my office and demanded my job—she wanted to be CEO.
Given her middle-school education and zero corporate experience, I refused.
Isabella took it as a grave insult. She stormed out with her adoptive parents and vanished without a trace.
Under my leadership, Vance Enterprises went public. My adoptive parents, Richard and Carol Vance, became the city’s wealthiest couple.
Then on my thirtieth birthday, they and my fiancé Ethan got me drunk and sold me to a human trafficking ring in the lawless eastern bloc.
As I was dragged away, I saw them standing by the ringleader, faces twisted with hatred.
“Take this black-hearted bitch,” they snarled. “She’s all yours.”
I screamed, begging for answers.
Ethan kicked me hard in the stomach. Richard and Carol each slapped me, the blows echoing.
“If you hadn’t been so greedy, clinging to a fortune that never belonged to you,” they spat, “our Bella wouldn’t have been tricked, trafficked, and tortured to death.”
The torment that followed was unbearable. In the end, I bit off my tongue and bled out.
When I opened my eyes, I was back—on the exact day Isabella demanded I hand over the company.
…
“Ellie,” Isabella said, her voice cloyingly sweet, “now that I’m home, don’t you think you should give the company back to me? I want to take on my rightful responsibilities.”
The familiar words sent a jolt of ice through my veins. My eyes shot to the clock on the wall. I was back. I had been reborn.
Carol Vance, my adoptive mother, was hugging Isabella, her eyes red-rimmed as she looked at me.
“Elara, you’ve worked so hard taking care of the company all these years,” she said, her tone syrupy but firm. “But Bella is our real daughter. I need you to draw up the papers. Transfer your shares to her.”
In my past life, I had refused. I explained that the company was on the verge of its IPO; a sudden change in leadership would cause chaos. I told them Isabella, with no experience or understanding of the business, wasn't ready. I suggested she start as my assistant, learn the ropes, and then take over when she was prepared.
My adoptive parents had actually agreed.
But Isabella had exploded. She shrieked that being my assistant was the same as being my slave, that I was deliberately humiliating her. She stormed out, disappeared with her adoptive family, and was never heard from again until news of her death reached us.
After her disappearance, I took the company public, making the Vance family dynastically wealthy. On my thirtieth birthday, they took me on a celebratory trip abroad, where they drugged me. I woke up in a hellhole, my hands and feet bound, my body brutalized, while they stood by and watched.
Ethan kicked me in my three-month-pregnant stomach. Carol and Richard slapped me until my face was numb.
“This is what you owe her,” they’d hissed. “If you hadn't shamed her, she never would have run away. She never would have died. This is all your fault.”
So, they’d blamed me. They’d traded my life for their twisted sense of justice.
Remembering the agony, the sheer, soul-crushing despair, my hands clenched into fists.
I fixed Isabella with an icy glare and let out a cold laugh.
“So, you just get back and you already want the company.”
Isabella’s eyes immediately filled with tears. “Ellie, I… I just wanted to do something for the family,” she sobbed. “I shouldn’t have come back. Please don’t be angry. I’ll leave right now. I won’t disturb your family anymore.”
With that, she made a show of pushing Carol away, pretending to run for the door.
Carol immediately wrapped her arms around Isabella, clutching her tight. “Bella, darling, this is your home,” she cooed, her face a mask of pain. “You’re not the one who should be leaving.”
The next second, the back of her hand cracked across my face. She pointed a trembling finger at me, her voice shrill.
“Elara! After we were kind enough to take you in, to raise you, this is how you repay us? By trying to steal our family’s fortune and drive our real daughter away? How could you be so venomous?”
Richard Vance, my adoptive father, chimed in, his face a thundercloud of disapproval. “Elara, this is a Vance company. It belongs to our daughter by birthright. What gives you the authority to tell her to leave?”
I laughed, a bitter, ragged sound. They seemed to have forgotten. It was Grandpa Vance who adopted me. Before he died, he put the company in my hands. At the time, it was on the brink of bankruptcy, drowning in over a hundred million dollars of debt. I was the one who begged and clawed and fought to save it, wrecking my own health in the process.
Richard and Carol, knowing they had no clue how to run a business, had washed their hands of it, leaving me to clean up their mess. In return, I gave them a lavish monthly allowance to fund their endless parties and vacations. I was the one who personally bought back the majority of the company shares. The only reason I hadn’t changed the name from Vance Enterprises was out of respect for Grandpa Vance’s memory. And now they had the audacity to demand it back?
I turned to Richard, my voice dripping with scorn. “Three years ago, when this company was collapsing, you threw me to the loan sharks. You told them I was the boss and they should come after me for the debt. Now that we’re about to go public, you want to hand it all to your daughter? Where do you get the nerve?”
Richard’s face flushed a deep, ugly red. He raised a fist to strike me. “You ungrateful stray! We raised you! Managing this company was your duty, your way of paying us back! It belongs to my daughter! You were just keeping her seat warm.”
I caught his wrist, twisted his arm back, and he howled in pain. The boardroom is a battlefield of its own; I’d spent three years learning Krav Maga to survive it. A pampered fool like Richard was no match for me.
Carol charged at me, her hand raised to slap me again. I blocked her arm and shoved her, sending her stumbling to the floor.
Her whole body trembled with rage. “Elara, you ungrateful monster! You dare to lay hands on us? You have no soul!”
Isabella rushed to help them up, then knelt dramatically at my feet. “Ellie, this is all my fault. I shouldn’t have come back and disrupted your family. Please, don’t hurt Mom and Dad anymore. I’ll leave. I’ll disappear, I promise.”
Richard and Carol clung to her, their eyes shooting daggers at me. “Elara, you’re the one who needs to get out.”
I rolled my eyes and looked down at Isabella. “Fine. I wouldn’t want to interrupt your happy family reunion. I’ll have my lawyer draw up the papers to formally sever our ties.”
Without waiting for a response, I turned and walked out of the Vance mansion for the last time.
Three days later, I was in a board meeting when my assistant burst in.
“Ms. Vance, uh, Mr. and Mrs. Vance are downstairs with your sister. They’re causing a scene and demanding to see you.”
I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose, and went downstairs.
The moment Richard saw me, he started shouting. “Elara, this is the Vance family company! On what grounds are you barring us from entry?”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “If you’d bothered to show your faces here more than once a decade, the security guards might actually recognize you.”
Carol stepped forward, adopting a tone of magnanimous condescension. “Elara, in recognition of your years of hard work, we’ve decided you can stay on. But Bella will be the new CEO.”
Richard shoved me aside and pulled Isabella into the center of the lobby. “From this day forward, my daughter, Isabella Vance, is in charge! Elara will assist her.”
Isabella glided to my side. “You’ve worked so hard, sister. From now on, we’ll run the company together.”
I scoffed. “You? You’re nothing. Do you really think being CEO is a title you can just claim? By company bylaws, the CEO must hold a majority of the voting shares.”
Their faces darkened. They started screaming.
“Shameless! After we raised you from nothing, you’re trying to steal our legacy and bully our daughter! You’re not fit to lead this company!”
Just then, my fiancé, Ethan, appeared.
“Elara, the Vances gave you everything. You can’t be this selfish,” he said, his voice laced with disappointment. “Give the company back to Bella. Once we’re married, you can be a stay-at-home wife. I’ll take care of you.”
A humorless smile touched my lips. “Ethan, your engagement was to the Vance heiress. Well, she’s back. That makes Bella your fiancée. You and I are nothing. So who the hell do you think you are to lecture me? Do you even have the right?”
Ethan’s face turned crimson with rage.
Isabella immediately dropped to her knees again. “Ellie, I swear I never wanted to take Ethan from you! I just want what’s rightfully mine!”
Ethan’s heart clearly melted. He rushed to pull her into his arms, then glared at me. “Elara, you’re a monster. Disowning your family just to hold onto power. You don’t deserve to marry me. If you don’t give this company back to Bella, the engagement is off.”
I was tired of their theatrics. “You want the company? Fine. You can have it. But I have two conditions.”
Ethan smirked, thinking he’d broken me. “As long as you give the company to Bella, we can get married immediately. Isn’t that what you’ve always wanted?”
I fought the urge to hit him and turned to Richard and Carol. “First, you sign the severance agreement. From this day forward, I have nothing to do with the Vance family. Second, the shares I hold were bought with my own money after you sold them off during the bankruptcy. If you want them, you’ll buy them from me. At current market value.”
Their faces fell. “This is our family’s company! You want us to pay you for it?”
I shrugged. “The shares I own are mine, legally and financially. They have nothing to do with you. You don’t have to buy them. The company is about to go public. The stock price will skyrocket. Plenty of other people will be lining up to buy them from me.”
They gritted their teeth, huddled with Ethan, and after a long, whispered conference, they agreed. One billion dollars for my shares.
The moment the papers were signed, Ethan wrapped an arm around Isabella, his eyes full of scorn. “Well, Elara, since you’ve chosen to burn every bridge, you can get the hell out of this building. This is Bella’s company now.”
Isabella nestled against him, looking at me with undisguised triumph. “I hear the company is about to partner with the Dorff Corporation, the biggest conglomerate in the country. The stock value is going to increase tenfold. Thank you so much for giving me such a golden opportunity, Ellie.”
My former parents looked just as smug. “You brought this on yourself, Elara. Don’t come crying to us when you regret it. But, out of the goodness of our hearts, if you want to be Bella’s assistant, we can offer you… say, fifteen hundred a month. Just so you don’t starve.”
I let out a short, sharp laugh. Fifteen hundred a month to be their slave? They really thought I was an idiot.
“No, thank you. As of today, this company and all of you are nothing to me.”
I turned to leave. Ethan shouted after me, “Don’t come crawling back to us when you’re broke and starving on the street!”
I couldn't help but roll my eyes. What kind of moron thinks someone with a billion dollars in cash is in any danger of starving?
As soon as I was out of the building, I made a call.
“Aunt Eleanor? It’s me. The partnership between Dorff and Vance Enterprises? Cancel it.”
After I got her confirmation, I made another round of calls to the remaining shareholders I knew. I told them to dump every last share of Vance stock they owned. A massive sell-off would trigger panic. The stock would plummet. And that was just the beginning.
Finally, I posted a public announcement on my social media accounts: I was officially resigning from Vance Enterprises.
Then I went back to my private apartment, sank onto the couch, and began to plan. My debt of gratitude to Grandpa Vance was paid in my last life. This life was for revenge. The Vances and Ethan made me suffer a fate worse than death. Now, it was their turn.
That evening, my aunt called.
Richard and Carol probably never knew that a year ago, I’d found my biological family. My father’s sister, Eleanor Vance, was the Chairwoman of the Dorff Corporation and the wealthiest woman in the country. It was with her quiet backing that Vance Enterprises had grown from a struggling firm into a billion-dollar company on the verge of an IPO.
Aunt Eleanor had no children and had been searching for me for years. When she found me and learned how I’d saved the Vance company, she’d wanted me to join Dorff Corp and eventually become her heir. I had refused, feeling bound by my duty to Grandpa Vance. Now, hearing that I’d finally cut ties, she made the offer again.
I thought for a moment. “Aunt Eleanor, I want to build something of my own first. When I’ve proven myself, I’ll come back.”
I didn’t want to be anyone’s heir. I wanted to be a founder.
Understanding my resolve, she didn't push. “Alright, Ellie. But if you need anything, you call me.”
After we hung up, I dug up a business plan I’d written five years ago. It was my original dream, to build my own empire from the ground up, a dream I had sacrificed for the Vances. Now, I could finally begin.
A month later, I posted job openings and my new company’s mission statement online.
My phone immediately exploded.
The first call was from Richard and Carol. I answered, and their smug, condescending voices filled my ear.
“Elara, starting your own business, are you? It’s not as easy as it looks. If you come back now, apologize to Bella, and beg for her forgiveness, we’ll consider letting you have a job again.”
The sheer arrogance was breathtaking. I hung up and blocked their numbers.
Moments later, messages and résumés started pouring in from the core team at Vance Enterprises, my former employees. They all wanted to join my new venture. I was deeply moved, but I warned them: I was a startup. My initial capital was just over a billion dollars. It was a risk.
They didn’t care. They said if I could rescue a dying company like Vance, I could build a new one into a powerhouse. They believed in me. I was grateful. A skilled, loyal team was exactly what I needed. I promised them all better salaries than they’d ever gotten at Vance.
Within a week, my company was fully staffed and operational. As for clients, that was the easy part. I’d just take them from Vance Enterprises. After all, I was the one who had secured most of their major contracts in the first place. My new company was small, but I knew my own capabilities.
Three nights later, I found myself across the table from one of Vance Enterprises’ most crucial partners, ready to make my first move.

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