“Ma’am,” a voice rumbled from the other side—it was her chief of security, his tone laced with urgency. “The perimeter’s been breached. They know he’s here.”
Celia’s face paled. She swept the keys and the thick envelope into my hands, shoving me toward a heavy tapestry on the north wall. She pulled it aside to reveal a hidden steel door concealed within the stone work.
“Your father—the man you thought was your father—he sold you out to them,” Celia said rapidly, her hands frantic as she keyed a code into a digital keypad. “He was never wounded by your decision to marry me, Efraín. He was terrified because he knew who I was! He’s been on their payroll for twenty years!”
Everything I had ever known about my life was burning to ash in a matter of seconds. My family’s disgust, my aunt’s warnings, my father’s fake heartbreak—it wasn’t judgment. It was fear that the truth would expose their betrayal.
“I’m not leaving you,” I said, grabbing her hands. “If you’re my mother’s sister, if you did all this for me… I’m not running away.”
“You have to!” she yelled, her voice breaking. “They don’t want me, Efraín! They want you! Your biological mother didn’t just steal you when she ran—she stole the encryption key to the family’s entire fortune. She hid it in you!”
A deafening explosion rocked the lower floor of the hacienda. The chandeliers rattled overhead, showering us with fine plaster dust. Gunfire echoed through the halls below.
