My Boss, My Babydaddy

Chapter 105

Zayden's POV

Landon calls while I'm reviewing the foundation's quarterly projections at my desk—numbers that look less catastrophic since the impact campaign launched but still bleed red in too many columns.

"I have the PI photos," he says without preamble. "You're not going to like this."

"Just tell me."

"Vivienne Vance and Trevor Marsh. Three days ago, café Lalo on the Upper West Side. Forty-three minutes of conversation captured on telephoto."

My grip tightens on the phone. "Send them."

The photos load in high resolution. Clear shots through the café window—Vivienne leaning forward, intense expression, the body language of someone delivering instructions rather than making conversation.

Trevor across from her with a folder open between them, pointing at documents with the focused energy of a man who knows what he's been asked to do.

"Can you make out what's in the folder?" I ask.

"Enhancing now, but the PI got close enough for partial identification." Landon's keyboard clicks. "Foundation financial reports. Donor lists. Board meeting minutes from the period before Trevor was voted off."

"How would Vivienne have foundation board minutes?"

"She wouldn't. Unless someone gave them to her. Someone with insider access who kept copies after being removed." A pause. "There's something else in the folder. Bottom page, partially visible."

The next photo loads. I zoom in, enhance, squint at pixels until the image resolves into something that makes my blood go cold.

A genealogy chart. Our family tree—Harrison, my mother, me, Aiden. Names connected by lines showing relationships. And Aiden's name circled in red, with handwritten notes in the margin too small to read at this resolution.

"Vivienne doesn't have access to Wolfe family genealogy," I say quietly. "That information came from someone with inside family knowledge."

"Which narrows the source to one person." Landon's voice is grim. "Aiden gave Trevor the family documents. Trevor gave them to Vivienne. The chain is visible now."

I stare at the photos with two of Aiden's pawns.

"What about direct communication between Aiden and Trevor?" I ask. "Emails, calls, anything?"

"Aiden's too smart for digital trails—probably burner phones, face-to-face meetings, encrypted channels that disappear." Landon pauses. "But he made one mistake."

"What?"

"He compartmentalized too well. Kept Trevor and Vivienne separate for weeks—different channels, different objectives, no overlap. Until now."

The satisfaction in Landon's voice is unmistakable.

"Whatever they're planning next required coordination his pawns couldn't manage remotely. So he sent them to the same café with the same documents, and our PI was watching."

I almost smile despite everything. "What can we prove?"

"That Vivienne and Trevor are coordinating. That they possess foundation documents Trevor shouldn't have retained after being voted off the board. That those documents include family genealogy information that could only come from someone with inside Wolfe family knowledge."

Landon's voice shifts to lawyer mode.

"Individually, each piece is circumstantial. Combined with Trevor's CelebGossip role, Marcus's documented security violations, the overheard hallway conversation, and Aiden's pattern of proxy manipulation—we're building something that looks like organized conspiracy."

"Is it enough for criminal charges?"

"Against Aiden directly? Not yet." A pause. "But against Trevor? Absolutely. Unauthorized retention of confidential foundation documents, dissemination of proprietary information through a media platform, potential defamation. That's actionable today."

"And if we squeeze Trevor?"

"Then we find out how sloppy he really is. People who keep foundation board minutes after being voted off tend to keep other things too—emails, messages, instructions from whoever recruited them."

Landon's tone sharpens. "If Trevor has any direct communication from Aiden, even a single text, the entire conspiracy case crystallizes."

I forward everything to Jocelyn. No filtering, no delay, no "I'll tell her when the time is right." The photos, the analysis, the family tree with Aiden's name circled—all of it is waiting for her response.

***

I find Jocelyn at the standing desk later, iPad propped against framed photos of the foundation, evidence spread across the screen in organized tiles.

She's been busy in the fourteen minutes since I sent the files—already cross-referencing the café photos with Trevor's CelebGossip article dates, looking for timing correlations.

"Three articles published within forty-eight hours of documented Trevor-Vivienne meetings," she says without looking up. "He meets her, gets instructions or material, goes home and writes. The turnaround is consistent."

"You mapped it already?"

"Modified bed rest means I have time to be thorough." She turns the iPad toward me. "Look at this timeline."

A color-coded chart fills the screen. Red dots for Trevor's articles. Blue dots for Vivienne's social media posts. Green dots for Aiden's documented appearances at the foundation. Yellow dots for Marcus's security violations.

Laid out chronologically, the coordination is undeniable. Clusters of activity in tight windows—Trevor publishes, Vivienne posts, Aiden shows up, Marcus facilitates access. Never simultaneous, always sequential. Each move creating cover for the next, each channel reinforcing the others.

"He orchestrated it like a symphony," Jocelyn says. "Different instruments, different sections, but one conductor controlling the tempo."

"A conductor who never picks up a baton where anyone can see."

"Until his musicians started meeting without him." She points at the café photos. "Trevor and Vivienne in the same room with documents they shouldn't have. That's the first time any two channels have visibly intersected."

"Because whatever comes next requires coordination his compartmentalization can't handle."

She nods slowly. "The gala. That's what they're building toward. Maximum audience, documentary cameras rolling, every donor and board member in one room. Whatever Aiden's planning, it's designed for that stage."

"We have three weeks."

"Three weeks to turn their coordination evidence into a criminal case." She pulls up Landon's analysis. "If we move on Trevor now—subpoena his devices, search his records—we might find the direct link to Aiden that makes the whole thing prosecutable."

"Landon says we have enough for charges against Trevor today."

"Then file today."

Her voice is firm despite her position on modified bed rest, despite the blood pressure monitor on the desk beside her iPad.

"Squeeze Trevor. Make him choose between protecting Aiden and protecting himself. People who keep unauthorized board minutes are hoarders—they keep everything. If there's a single message from Aiden on his phone, we have our case."

"And if he's loyal?"

"Trevor Marsh was never loyal. He was leveraged." She closes the timeline. "People who work for leverage fold when the leverage reverses. Aiden offered him something—money, position, revenge for being voted off the board. We offer him something better."

"Like what?"

"Like not spending the next several years defending criminal conspiracy charges." She meets my eyes. "Aiden built his network out of people who had something to lose. That means every one of them has a price for switching sides. We just need to find Trevor's."

I look at my wife—barefoot at her standing desk, blood pressure cuff on the counter, baby growing beneath the shirt she keeps tugging down. Running a legal counteroffensive from our bedroom while her body fights a war of its own.

"You're terrifying when you're strategic," I say.

"I'm effective when I'm strategic." She almost smiles. "Terrifying is what I am when someone threatens my family."

I kiss her forehead. "I'll call Landon. We file on Trevor today."

"And Zay?" She catches my hand before I can leave. "Thank you for sending the photos immediately. For not filtering."

"We promised."

"I know. But promises are easy. Following through when the information is scary—that's the hard part." She squeezes my fingers. "You did the hard part."

I carry that with me down the hallway, phone already dialing Landon.

"File on Trevor," I say when he answers. "Today. Everything we have."

"You're sure?"

"Jocelyn's sure. And she's the strategist in this marriage."

Landon pauses. Then: "I'll have papers filed by five. And Zayden—once we move on Trevor, Aiden will know we're closing in. He'll accelerate whatever he's planning."

"Then we'd better move faster than he does."

The race is on. Three weeks to the gala. Three weeks to dismantle a conspiracy built by a man who thought his shadows were permanent.

But shadows don't survive when someone starts turning on the lights.

And we just found the switch.