Chapter 18: The Unlikely Ally
The pressure was a constant, low hum in the background of Elias's life. He moved through his days with a hyper-awareness, cataloging every strange look, every whispered conversation. The attack on his father had been a masterstroke, a reminder that the Millers could strike anywhere, at any time. The fortress walls were holding, but the psychological toll was mounting.
It was in this state of heightened alert that Leo Lasky, of all people, found him. The lanky boy from the pottery studio approached him not at his locker, but after school, near the bleachers, his posture radiating a nervous energy.
"Thorne. Can we talk?"
Elias regarded him warily. "What about, Lasky?"
Leo shuffled his feet, looking over his shoulder as if expecting to be watched. "It's about Jason. And his dad."
Every sense Elias possessed went on full alert. He gave a curt nod. "Walk with me."
They walked a loop around the deserted track, the crisp air feeling charged. Leo didn't speak for a moment, gathering his courage.
"Jason's been… different," Leo began, his voice low. "After you shut him down in the cafeteria, he stopped bragging. He got quiet. And he's been hanging out with this guy, a college friend of his brother's. A real piece of work. I heard them talking in the weight room yesterday."
Elias remained silent, letting him talk.
"They were laughing about your girlfriend's college application. Jason said his dad 'took care of it.' Then the other guy, his name's Vince, he said…" Leo swallowed hard. "He said the next step was to 'trash the brand.' Make it so no one would trust you with their computers. He was talking about… about planting stuff. Child pornography. On a client's machine and tipping off the cops."
A cold, pure fury, colder than anything he had felt before, crystallized in Elias's chest. This wasn't just sabotage; this was nuclear. This was a permanent, life-destroying strike. Robert Miller was willing to destroy a seventeen-year-old's entire life to protect his son's ego.
"Why are you telling me this, Leo?" Elias asked, his voice dangerously calm.
Leo looked down at his shoes. "Because it's not right. What they did to your girlfriend was slimy, but this? This is evil. And… and I liked the way you handled our deal. You were straight with me. You didn't cheat me. Jason would have just taken my cards and laughed." He finally met Elias's gaze. "I'm not a brave guy. But I don't want to be on the side that does this."
An unlikely ally. A conscience in the enemy's camp. Elias processed the information with lightning speed. This was a gift. A warning from the inside.
"You've done the right thing," Elias said. "Thank you, Leo. This is more valuable than you know."
"What are you going to do?" Leo asked, his eyes wide.
"I'm going to make sure their plan fails," Elias said. He stopped walking and turned to face Leo fully. "Can you do one more thing for me? Without taking any risks?"
Leo nodded, a soldier accepting a mission.
"If you hear anything else—a name, a place, a time—you tell me. Immediately. Use this." Elias scribbled the number of his burner phone on a scrap of paper and handed it over. "Don't ever call me on a regular line."
Leo pocketed the number like it was a live grenade. "Okay."
As Leo hurried away, Elias stood alone on the track, the wind whipping around him. The game had just changed. Robert Miller had escalated to existential threats, and in doing so, he had created a vulnerability: he was relying on people who had a capacity for guilt.
Elias pulled out his own burner phone and called Eleanor. He relayed Leo's information, his voice stripped of all emotion.
He heard her sharp intake of breath on the other end. "Eli… they can't… they can't do that. They can't."
"They can," he said flatly. "And they will. Unless we stop them."
"How? We can't watch every client!"
"We don't have to," Elias said, a new, ruthless plan forming in his mind. "We just have to set a trap."
He spent the night not on stock charts or business plans, but on constructing a digital fortress. He created a hidden, encrypted partition on his laptop—a clean room. He developed a rigorous pre- and post-inspection protocol for every client's machine, a digital chain of custody that would be his alibi. He would record hashes of system files before and after every job. Any tampering would be instantly detectable.
But that was defense. He needed offense.
He remembered Vince. The college friend. In his previous life, Vince had been a minor scandal—arrested for selling prescription drugs on campus. The arrest happened later, in the spring.
Elias began digging. He used his knowledge of future events to guide his search through public records and nascent online forums. He was looking for a pattern, a connection, a thread he could pull.
He found it. A post on a niche music forum, complaining about a dealer named "Vince" who had sold fake OxyContin at a local club. The date of the post was two weeks from now.
He had his weapon.
He wouldn't plant evidence. He wouldn't frame an innocent man. He would simply ensure that a guilty man faced the consequences of his actions a little earlier than scheduled. It was justice, expedited.
The next day, he anonymously forwarded the details—Vince's full name, his car description, his dealing location—to the local police tip line from a public computer at the library. It was a stone, cast blindly into a pond, but he knew exactly where the ripples would land.
He was no longer just building a foundation or fighting a war. He was now playing a deeper, darker game. The king had been forced to look into the abyss, and he had not blinked. He had simply started calculating the depth.