Chapter 158: Celeste's Proxy War
Celeste launched the proxy campaign from a hotel ballroom paid for by her personal committee.
She appeared beneath the words KEEP STERLING IN THE FAMILY.
Her suspension barred executive action, not lawful use of her shares. She could contact shareholders, hire outside advisers, and argue against charter reform. She could not command employees, use company mailing lists, or spend Sterling funds.
The independent election monitor checked every boundary.
All campaign vendors had to certify their funding source and return company data they received by mistake. Shareholder debate remained lawful; covert use of executive systems did not.
Celeste promised to protect founder control from "Evelyn and the Mercer machine." She said the failed chairman limit proved directors still believed family leadership mattered.
Then she showed a photograph of Julian and me leaving the same conflict-review building on different sides.
The image proved location.
It did not prove a relationship, secret license, or joint plan.
Her speech called me Mercer's chief scientist and asked whether shareholders wanted one competitor's executive controlling another. That conflict was real enough to require an answer.
I issued the answer through the governance filing.
I remained recused from Mercer-Sterling negotiations. Julian remained recused. Payment sat in escrow. I had refused Sterling's CEO offer. Any future executive role would require a separate resolution of my Mercer management position.
I did not call her jealous.
I did not mention the suspended wedding.
The proxy question concerned rules and authority.
Celeste's campaign sought proxies to defeat permanent limits on Conrad and remove two independent directors. It also proposed restoring the CEO's communication control once her suspension ended.
Her proposal did not say how the old authorization could return. It promised a new application while calling the current findings politically motivated. No regulator had endorsed that plan.
Her filing described the FBRA revocation as a temporary setback.
The board correction said the old authorization was revoked, not paused. No proxy vote could revive it.
Conrad endorsed her campaign while remaining chairman under existing restrictions. He called outside audit an attack on founder judgment and said the company needed unified leadership.
Mara reminded managers that attendance at either side's campaign events had to occur off duty and without company pressure. Employees could support Celeste, support reform, support neither, or refuse to disclose a view.
The election monitor found one campaign vendor had used an outdated Sterling contact file. Celeste's team quarantined the list and denied requesting company data. The monitor preserved the incident without attributing intent.
Affected recipients received a correction explaining how to opt out. Their response to an unauthorized message could not count as a valid proxy without separate verification.
That was the local result.
The proxy campaign could continue, but the disputed list could not.
Celeste raised money through private commitments and disclosed lenders to the election monitor under seal. The filing said collateral arrangements existed, but the public summary did not identify assets. No evidence then available to the board showed company property had moved.
The monitor checked amounts and lender identities for election compliance, not ownership of every pledged item. Rhea requested the underlying representations through the proper review rather than guessing from the summary.
Rhea requested preservation of every financing representation.
She did not claim misconduct without the documents.
The campaign became louder.
Ads accused me of planning to hand the Trust patent to Julian. The Trust answered that its independent trustees controlled licensing and that I held no vote capable of transferring the patent.
No Sterling proxy result could amend the Trust instrument. Shareholder control over a company was not control over a separate owner.
Northstar stayed silent.
Mercer stayed outside the proxy fight.
I spoke once at a shareholder forum.
"Do not vote for me," I said. "Vote on whether any leader should control safety reports, attribution, audits, and the board record."
Celeste called the sentence false modesty.
Perhaps some shareholders did too.
But the next intervention did not come from me, Julian, or the Trust.
More than four hundred Sterling employees submitted their own statement.
Its first line refused to endorse either sister.