Chapter 4 - Rats in a Trap
Three weeks had passed. For Mariana, it was a renaissance. She had officially taken over as CEO. Under her direct leadership, the Alvarado Group’s stock had stabilized, and employee morale had skyrocketed. The "invisible wife" had shed her disguise, revealing a brilliant, fierce businesswoman who had absorbed every lesson her father had ever taught her.
For Arturo, the descent into hell was rapid.
He was currently living in a cramped, two-bedroom apartment in a bad part of town, paid for by the only friend who hadn't blocked his number. Camila was still with him, but the champagne-and-roses illusion had shattered.
"We're out of coffee," Camila snapped, slamming the cheap cabinet doors in the tiny kitchen. She was wearing sweatpants, her hair messy, a far cry from the glamorous girl in the Presidential Suite. "And my car payment bounced. Arturo, what are we going to do?"
"I'm working on it!" Arturo barked from the sofa, staring at a laptop screen filled with legal documents he barely understood. "If you hadn't left a paper trail in the company servers, we wouldn't be in this mess!"
"Excuse me?!" Camila spun around, tears of rage in her eyes. "You told me you were untouchable! You told me she was stupid! You dragged me into this, and now I'm blacklisted from every marketing agency in the city because of you!"
"Then leave!" Arturo screamed, standing up. "Go! See if anyone else wants to buy you Chanel bags now that you're a pariah!"
Camila stared at him, her lip trembling. The illusion was entirely gone. She saw him for what he really was: a weak, pathetic man who only had power when he was stealing it from a woman.
Without a word, she walked into the bedroom, packed a single duffel bag, and walked out the front door. She didn't look back.
Left alone in the silence of the dingy apartment, Arturo’s panic morphed into a dark, toxic hatred. Mariana had taken everything from him. His money, his reputation, his mistress, his pride. He wasn't going to let her win. He just needed one piece of leverage.
He picked up a burner phone he had bought the day before and dialed a number.
"Salazar," Arturo muttered into the receiver when a gruff voice answered. "It's Ledesma. You told me you could get dirt on anyone. I need you to find something on my wife. A lover. A tax loophole. A skeleton in her father's closet. Anything. I don't care what it costs."
"It'll cost you fifty grand, upfront," the private investigator rasped.
May you like
Arturo looked at his father’s vintage Rolex, the only valuable thing he had managed to smuggle out of the house. "I have collateral. Just get it done before the Alvarado Foundation Gala on Saturday. I'm going to burn her empire to the ground."
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