Chapter 6 - The Trap Begins
By forty-eight hours later, the photos were leaked.
Elias was sitting in his kitchen, feeding Leo breakfast, when his phone blew up with text messages from Julian. A link to a prominent financial tabloid led to a front-page headline: "MONTGOMERY LOGISTICS CEO IN SECRET LIASON WITH BROOKLYN BLUE-COLLAR WORKER: ARE THE HEIRS LEGITIMATE?"
The article featured high-resolution images of Elias and Camila under the West 79th Street pier, alongside an old mugshot of Elias from a minor civil dispute decade ago, framed in the most damaging light possible. Stock prices for Montgomery Logistics began to plummet in pre-market trading.
Within an hour, reporters and paparazzi swarmed Elias’s Brooklyn apartment building. Flashbulbs went off through his ground-floor windows, scaring Leo.
"Dad? Who are those people outside?" Leo asked, holding his stuffed dinosaur tightly against his chest.
"Just people who don't know how to mind their own business, buddy," Elias said, his voice calm despite the adrenaline coursing through his veins. He quickly pulled the blinds shut and locked the door.
His phone rang. It was Camila.
"Elias, don't go outside," she said frantically over the line. "I'm sending a security team to bring you and Leo to my private residence in Connecticut. It's gated and secure."
"No," Elias said firmly. "If I run now, it looks like I have something to hide. Arthur wants me isolated and intimidated."
"Elias, please!" Camila pleaded. "Arthur has called an emergency board meeting for Friday morning. He's moving to strip me of my CEO position and file for emergency custody of the trust assets on the grounds of maternal negligence and fraud!"
"Then we fight him at the board meeting," Elias said. "Julian is already digging into Arthur's personal finances. A guy like Arthur doesn't pull a stunt like this without having his own dirty laundry."
"You don't understand corporate law, Elias," Camila said softly. "The board cares about stability and stock prices. If they think the girls' status threatens the family trust, they will vote against me just to save their own shares."
"Then let me come to the board meeting," Elias said. "Let me stand there as their father. No more hiding, Camila."
There was a long pause on the line. Elias could hear Camila catching her breath. "If you do this, Elias, your whole life will be dissected under a microscope. They will tear down your past, your reputation, everything."
"Let them try," Elias said, looking down at Leo, who was quietly playing on the rug. "I've built things from scratch my whole life. A little mud isn't going to break me."
That afternoon, Julian arrived through the alley entrance of Elias’s building, helping Elias and Leo slip past the reporters undetected. They drove to Julian’s secure office in DUMBO, where Julian laid out several manila folders on a large table.
"Your ex-uncle-in-law is dirtier than a subway track," Julian said, tossing a document across the table. "Arthur’s private investment firm has been quietly shorting Montgomery Logistics stock for the past three months. He wanted this scandal to hit so the stock would tank, allowing him to buy up controlling shares at a discount while framing Camila for the drop."
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Elias eyes narrowed as he looked at the financial signatures. "Can we prove it?"
"We have the paper trail," Julian said with a grin. "But we need one more thing to nail him to the wall: the identity of the two men who tried to snatch the kids at the school. If we can link them directly to Arthur’s payroll, that's not just corporate drama—that's attempted kidnapping."
