Seraphina Diaz sat across from me, her usual sharp posture a little slouched. The small conference room felt tight, even though it was just the two of us. I had a printout of the fuzzy “Chen Family Trust” document laid out between us.
“He’s using Ryder,” she said, her voice barely a whisper.
My breath caught. “Using him how?”
“As a frontman. A billboard, basically.”
She explained that Marcus had been leveraging Ryder Stone’s immense popularity, not just for Aura’s legitimate deals, but to pitch Phoenix Ascendant’s “exclusive investment opportunities” to other high-net-worth clients. Ryder, trusting Marcus completely, had no idea he was promoting a fraudulent scheme.
“He talks it up at parties, at industry events,” Seraphina continued. “Marcus sets up these private meetings, and Ryder, without thinking, vouches for Phoenix, talks about how much he’s ‘investing’ in it. It’s all a show to draw in more capital.”
The blood drained from my face. Ryder, our biggest client, a person I genuinely liked, was unknowingly a pawn in Marcus’s elaborate fraud. He was an innocent accomplice, his clean image providing a veneer of legitimacy to Marcus’s lies.
“He has no clue,” Seraphina insisted. “Ryder just sees Marcus as this genius, this visionary who’s giving him ‘early access’ to the next big thing.”
My stomach twisted. This wasn’t just about money anymore. This was about destroying careers, reputations. Ryder’s, and by extension, Aura’s.
“Does he talk about what these investments are?” I asked.
Seraphina nodded slowly. “They’re always vague. ‘Cutting-edge tech startups.’ ‘Undervalued media properties.’ ‘Exclusive real estate portfolios.’ Sounded good enough to anyone who didn’t ask too many questions. And Ryder, he just echoed Marcus.”
I slammed my fist softly on the table, a dull thud. “Marcus is a monster.”
“He’s desperate, Ellie,” Seraphina countered, her gaze softening slightly. “And I think… I think he’s trying to finish something his father started.”
That was the opening I needed. I pushed the blurry image of the “Chen Family Trust” across the table towards her.
“Do you know anything about this?” I asked.
Seraphina picked up the paper, her eyes scanning the faded text. “A Chen Family Trust? With Arthur Finch’s name on it?”
“That’s my family name,” I admitted, feeling a raw vulnerability I rarely showed. “My mother’s family.”
Seraphina’s eyebrows shot up. “Wow. I mean… Arthur Finch had a reputation for this kind of thing, but I never heard about it going this far back, or involving a family name like yours.”
“What kind of thing?” I pressed.
“Secretive trusts. Complex financial arrangements. He was known for setting up these… benevolent funds, I guess you’d call them, for struggling artists, for families he felt had been wronged by the industry. Especially after some of his big, ambitious projects didn’t pan out the way he expected. He was a very private man about his charity, but the stories were always there, circulating among the older guard.”
She paused, considering the implications. “It was almost like an atonement for him sometimes. Like he felt a personal responsibility to make things right. But always through these incredibly convoluted, hush-hush methods. Never just a straightforward donation.”
A knot tightened in my chest. My family, struggling in poverty for so long, connected to the legendary Arthur Finch? It seemed impossible. And yet, here was his faded signature.
“So you’re saying this trust might have been one of those arrangements?” I asked, my voice barely steady.
“It fits the pattern,” Seraphina confirmed. “But why would Marcus be involved now? And why is it tied to Phoenix Ascendant? His father died years ago.”
“That’s what I need to find out,” I replied, my gaze fixed on the document. “This changes everything. It’s not just about Marcus’s greed anymore. There’s a history here, a hidden connection.”
The idea that my family’s name, synonymous with hardship in my own memory, could be linked to such a grand, secretive legacy was disorienting. It felt like uncovering a forgotten chapter in my own life story, one that directly intersected with the very man trying to destroy my future. The scale of Marcus’s manipulation, intertwined with a decades-old secret, suddenly felt vast and deeply personal. I had always assumed my success was purely my own making, a clean break from a painful past. Now, it felt like the past was reaching out, pulling me back into a narrative I didn’t even know existed.
Seraphina’s phone buzzed. She glanced at it, then back at me. “More news on Phoenix. Marcus just convinced Ryder to push another ‘exclusive’ opportunity at the industry gala next week. He’s doubling down.”
My jaw tightened. “The gala? The one where Ryder’s getting that Lifetime Achievement Award?”
“The very one. It’s perfect for Marcus. All eyes on Ryder, all the right people in the room, easy to spread the word quietly.”
The sheer audacity of it left me speechless. Marcus was not only manipulating Ryder but using the most high-profile event of the year to further his scam. He was risking everything, including Ryder’s career and Aura’s reputation, to prop up his failing shell company. He was acting with a reckless abandon that felt less like calculated greed and more like desperation.
“We need to warn Ryder,” I stated, my voice firm.
Seraphina shook her head. “You can’t. Not yet. If you tell him now, Marcus will just spin it. Say you’re jealous, that you’re trying to undermine his deals. Ryder trusts him too much. He’d believe Marcus over you.”
She was right, and it stung. My history with Ryder was purely professional, while Marcus had cultivated a personal bond, becoming Ryder’s confidante and financial advisor. Ryder saw me as the pragmatic business partner, Marcus as the visionary friend.
“So what do we do?” I asked, leaning forward.
“We get more evidence,” Seraphina replied, her eyes resolute. “Specifically on this trust. And on Phoenix Ascendant’s actual finances. I can keep digging. I have access to some of Marcus’s old files, things his father kept that Marcus hasn’t looked at in years.”
I thought about the enormous risk Seraphina was taking. She was still Marcus’s assistant, deeply embedded in his operations. If he found out she was helping me, her career would be over.
“Are you sure about this, Sera?” I asked, using her nickname for the first time.
She met my gaze directly. “I can’t stand by and watch him do this, Ellie. What he’s doing to Ryder… it’s wrong. And the way he’s been talking about Aura lately, like it’s just his personal piggy bank. It’s not right.”
A faint tremor ran through her hands, betraying her outward calm. Her desire for truth, her sense of professional integrity, was overcoming her fear. She was an unlikely ally, but a fierce one.
“Okay,” I said, a plan starting to form in my mind. “Brenda Holloway is working on the legal angle. She’s probably the best entertainment lawyer in the city. I’ll bring her up to speed on this new information about Arthur Finch and the trust. You keep digging for anything that connects Phoenix Ascendant directly to this trust, or anything that shows Marcus’s personal financial troubles. The more we have, the harder it will be for him to lie his way out of it.”
Seraphina nodded, already pulling out her phone and making a mental note. “I’ll start with the archives in the old office basement. Marcus rarely goes down there. His father kept meticulous records.”
We sat in silence for a moment, the weight of the revelations pressing down on us. The thought of my own family being a part of this secret history, somehow linked to Marcus’s desperate schemes, was overwhelming. My drive to save Aura had just found a new, deeply personal layer. This wasn’t just about my agency; it was about unraveling a decades-old mystery that touched my own lineage, and protecting innocent people like Ryder from Marcus’s web of deceit.
My past, the one I had tried so hard to outrun, was not only catching up, but was inextricably tangled with the very future I was fighting to reclaim. The scale of Marcus’s manipulation was far grander, and far more sinister, than I had ever imagined.
+ There are no comments
Add yours