Chapter 3 - The Broken Altar
The next morning, the smell of burnt chorizo and expensive coffee filled the high-ceilinged kitchen of the Zapopan house. Doña Elvira sat at the head of the marble island, her reading glasses perched on her nose as she flipped through a real estate brochure. She didn't look up when Mariana entered, supporting her mother by the elbow.
Doña Rosario looked frail, her skin pale against the black mourning shawl she wore. Her hands clutched the white rebozo like a shield.
"Sit," Elvira commanded, waving her hand toward the lower end of the table without making eye contact. "The lawyer will be here at nine. I want the old lady dressed in something less... depressing. It looks terrible for the neighbors if she's sitting on the porch looking like a beggar."
Mariana guided her mother into a chair, her jaw locked tightly. "My mother is not a beggar, Elvira. She is a woman whose husband was murdered five days ago."
Elvira’s coffee cup froze halfway to her mouth. She lowered it slowly, her sharp eyes boring into Mariana. "Murdered? Watch your tongue, Mariana. The fire department said it was an old wiring issue in the kitchen. Your father was a stubborn peasant who didn't want to pay for modern maintenance. Don't go creating tragedies out of simple poverty."
"My father was an engineer, Elvira," Mariana said, her voice dropping into a dangerous, quiet register that made Rodrigo look up from his tablet across the room. "He knew exactly how the wiring in that house worked."
Rodrigo cleared his throat, casting a warning look at his mother before turning to Mariana. "Let's not do this now, Mariana. The stress is making you paranoid. Look, the lawyer from Avant-Garde Holdings, Licenciado Mora, is outside now. He just needs Rosario’s fingerprint and signature on the property release form so we can process the emergency stipend."
A sleek, silver-haired man in a bespoke gray suit stepped into the kitchen, carrying a leather briefcase. Licenciado Mora smiled smoothly, unfolding a thick set of documents on the marble countertop.
"Señora Rosario," Mora said, his voice dripping with professional empathy. "I am so sorry for your loss. If you could just sign here, on line twelve, we can begin the asset transfer and ensure you have a comfortable place to live out your golden years."
Mariana stepped between the lawyer and her mother. She pulled the document toward herself, her eyes skimming the text with corporate precision. Her years as a commercial director had given her the ability to read legal jargon like a map.
It wasn't an insurance release. It was an absolute quitclaim deed, transferring the Tlaquepaque property to Avant-Garde Holdings for a poultry sum of fifty thousand pesos—barely three thousand dollars—under the guise of "demolition and environmental hazard clearance costs."
"This is a theft," Mariana said, slamming the document back onto the marble. "My mother is not signing this."
Rodrigo stood up, his face hardening, the mask of the loving husband completely slipping away. "Mariana, don't be stupid. The land is useless now. It's covered in ash and toxic debris."
"The land sits on the main artery of the state transit project, Rodrigo," Mariana said clearly, watching the blood instantly drain from the lawyer’s face. "The commercial appraisal for that block is thirty million pesos. You thought because my mother was old and I was grieving, you could flush my father’s life down the drain just like your mother did with his ashes."
Doña Elvira stood up so fast her chair screeched against the tile floor. "You ungrateful little bitch! You live under my son's roof, you eat his food—"
"I paid for this house!" Mariana shouted, her voice echoing off the high walls, shattering the carefully curated silence of the mansion. "Every brick, every tile, every payment on your luxury SUV came from my corporate accounts! You are parasites living off my labor while you planned to murder my father and rob my mother!"
Rodrigo grabbed her arm, his fingers digging into her skin with a violence he had never shown before. "You need to shut up right now, Mariana. You don't know what you’re playing with."
"Let go of her," a voice whispered from the table.
Everyone turned. Doña Rosario was standing up, her hands no longer shaking. She reached into her rebozo and pulled out a small, old metallic object—a digital memory drive with a rusted keyring.
"Aurelio didn't keep his backups in the house," Rosario said, her voice cracking but steady with old, indigenous iron. "He kept them in my sewing box. I had it in my pocket when the kitchen caught fire. I know what you did, Rodrigo. I know what your uncle did."
The kitchen went dead silent. Licenciado Mora immediately began packing his briefcase, his hands trembling. "This... this is outside the scope of my representation. Good day, Salazar."
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"Mora, stay!" Rodrigo yelled, but the lawyer was already sprinting through the service entrance.
Rodrigo turned back to Mariana, his face twisted in a desperate, animal snarl. "Give me the drive, Mariana. Give it to me right now, or I swear to God, neither you nor your mother will leave this house alive."
