Chapter 4 - The Inscription in the Dark
Valeria gasped, spinning around, her back slamming against the cold iron gate of the north wing.
Standing over her in the dim emergency lighting was Alejandro. He was wearing a dark velvet dressing gown, a tumbler half-filled with amber scotch in his right hand. His eyes were dark, bloodshot, and heavy with alcohol and exhaustion.
"What did I tell you about this wing, Valeria?" he asked, his voice dangerously low, vibrating with an edge that sent sheer terror straight down her spine.
Valeria pressed her palms against the iron bars behind her, forcing herself not to break eye contact, despite her instinct screaming at her to drop to her knees and beg for forgiveness.
"I heard a noise, Mr. Ríos," she said, her voice shaking slightly despite her best efforts to remain calm.
"A noise?" Alejandro sneered softly, taking a slow sip of his drink. "It's a storm. Old houses make noise. The wind rattles the shutters."
"No," Valeria insisted, stepping forward despite his imposing shadow. "It wasn't the wind. It was tapping. Three taps, a pause, then three more. It came from inside that wing."
Alejandro’s expression hardened into pure granite. "You are paid to care for my son, Valeria. You are not paid to investigate my house. If you value your brother’s medical care and your family’s safety, you will return to your room and never walk down this corridor again."
"Why are you hiding from it?!" Valeria suddenly shouted, her courage flaring up against the injustice of the situation.
Alejandro paused, staring at her as if she had just slapped him across the face. No one in the state of Nuevo León spoke to him in that tone. No one lived to do so twice.
"What did you say?" he whispered, his eyes narrowing into deadly slits.
"You are throwing millions of pesos at doctors, therapists, and nannies, trying to figure out why your four-year-old son won't speak!" Valeria cried out, tears of frustration welling in her eyes. "You think he's broken by grief! But he isn't just grieving, Mr. Ríos! He is terrified! He draws pictures of this wing every single day! He draws a man with a red face and a key, locking someone inside!"
Alejandro dropped his scotch glass. It shattered against the hard tiled floor, amber liquid spraying across his leather slippers.
He stepped forward, grabbing Valeria’s shoulders with sudden, desperate force, shaking her. "What pictures?! What are you talking about?!"
"Mateo gave me a drawing yesterday!" Valeria choked out, refusing to back down. "He pointed right at this wall! He tried to tell me that someone is locked behind this gate! He's not mute because he watched his mother die, Mr. Ríos... he's mute because someone threatened to kill him if he ever told you what he saw in this house!"
Alejandro let go of her as if he had just touched white-hot iron. He stumbled backward two steps, his breath coming in fast, ragged gasps.
"No..." he muttered, shaking his head frantically. "No... Sofia died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital... I saw her body... I buried my wife..."
"Then who is in the north wing?" Valeria demanded softly, pointing at the dark corridor behind the iron gate. "Why is it locked? Who holds the key?"
Alejandro stood frozen in the middle of the dark corridor, his face completely drained of color. The cold, ruthless cartel boss had vanished, replaced by a man coming face-to-face with a terrifying realization that threatened to shatter his entire world.
Slowly, deliberately, Alejandro reached into the pocket of his velvet gown and pulled out a heavy brass key card along with a slip of paper containing a six-digit security code.
He turned toward the digital keypad mounted on the iron gate.
His hands were trembling so violently that it took him three attempts to enter the numbers.
BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. BEEP.
A heavy hydraulic click echoed through the corridor, followed by the deep groan of the iron chains sliding free. The heavy gate swung open, revealing the dark, dusty hallway of the north wing.
Alejandro pulled a small flashlight from a nearby emergency box on the wall, shining its bright white beam down the abandoned corridor.
"Follow me," he commanded, his voice barely audible over the sound of thunder shaking the house.
Valeria followed him closely, her heart pounding in her throat as they stepped into the forbidden territory.
The air in the north wing was thick with dust, stale air, and the scent of old lavender perfume. High white sheets covered grand sofas, grand pianos, and portraits hanging on the walls. It was a frozen monument to a dead woman.
They walked past several closed doors until they reached the master suite at the very end of the hall—the room where Alejandro and his late wife had lived before the tragedy.
The heavy mahogany door to the suite was unlocked. Alejandro pushed it open.
The flashlight beam swept across a massive bedroom. Everything was untouched—the unmade silk sheets on the bed, the vanity table filled with crystal perfume bottles, the large walk-in closet.
"There's no one here," Alejandro whispered, a faint sense of relief mixing with deep exhaustion in his voice. "You see, Valeria? It's just an empty room—"
"Look at the mirror," Valeria interrupted, her voice trembling.
Alejandro turned the flashlight beam toward the grand full-length vanity mirror sitting in the corner of the room.
The dust on the glass surface had been scraped away recently by hand.
Scratched deeply into the glass using what looked like the sharp edge of a diamond ring were four words written in frantic, hurried handwriting:
May you like
ROBERTO TOOK THE REAL
Beneath the inscription lay a small, discarded silver key—the exact duplicate of the master key that unlocked the private subterranean vault beneath the mansion's foundation.
