Chapter 8 - The Matriarch's Altar
Tomás coughed weakly, pointing a trembling, bloodstained finger toward the northern exit of the garage.
"Doña Rebeca arrived with four tactical operators..." the old driver choked out in pain.
"They took Mrs. Valeria and the little master toward the mountain estate... Hacienda Los Laureles."
Sebastián quickly applied a tourniquet to Tomás's arm, his eyes blazing with a terrifying, unyielding rage.
"You did everything you could, Tomás," Sebastián said softly.
"Rest now. I am going to end this tonight."
Sebastián and Luciana climbed into an abandoned security patrol truck parked near the bank exit.
Sebastián floored the throttle, the four-wheel-drive vehicle tearing up the winding mountain pass toward the private enclave of San Pedro Garza García.
High atop the mist-shrouded cliffs stood Hacienda Los Laureles, the ancestral fortress of the Alcázar dynasty.
The massive wrought-iron gates were sealed, with armed guards patrolling the perimeter walls with guard dogs.
Sebastián did not stop to negotiate or search for a key.
He accelerated to seventy miles per hour, driving the heavy steel bumper of the patrol truck straight through the reinforced iron gates.
The gates collapsed with a deafening screech of twisted metal, sending the truck sliding across the cobblestone courtyard.
Two guards raised their rifles, but Sebastián opened fire with a captured shotgun, disabling them before they could chamber a round.
Sebastián and Luciana burst through the towering double doors into the grand hall of the hacienda.
Inside the cavernous, chandelier-lit room, Doña Rebeca sat on a high-backed velvet throne beneath a massive portrait of her late husband.
She was holding newborn baby Mateo in her arms, rocking him with cold, methodical rhythm.
On the marble floor at her feet knelt Valeria, her hands bound tightly with coarse nylon rope and her face bruised and pale.
Beside Rebeca stood a notary public with a trembling pen, holding a final surrender of parental rights document.
"Sign the final clause, Valeria," Rebeca commanded in an icy, imperious whisper.
"Or your child will have an unfortunate fall from this terrace."
"Get your filthy hands off my son, Mother!" Sebastián's voice echoed through the hall like a clap of thunder.
Rebeca looked up slowly, not showing the slightest flicker of surprise.
"You always were your father's sentimental fool, Sebastián," Rebeca sighed, rising from the throne with the infant in her arms.
"You brought a common nobody into our bloodline, thinking you could rewrite the rules of this family."
"I built this dynasty with forty years of blood and sacrifice, and I will not let a sickly street girl inherit what is mine."
Octavio stumbled into the hall behind Sebastián, holding a bloody handkerchief to his broken face and leveling a semi-automatic pistol at Valeria's head.
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"Shoot her now, Octavio!" Rebeca screamed, her regal mask finally shattering into pure, hysterical madness.
"Kill the mother and the problem disappears forever!"
