Chapter 36
The Montoya estate looked so peaceful from above. Too peaceful. I stood at the balcony of my penthouse a hand rested lightly against the cold railings as my gaze swept over the vast property beneath me.
From this height, everything appeared controlled and orderly. Exactly the way I preferred it. The West wing lights glowed softly against the night darkness in contrasts to the East wing's deadness. Security moved along assigned routes below with disciplined precision.
The gardens stretched elegantly around the estate like carefully arranged camouflage which hid the violence the place was built upon. Power was disguised as beauty.
My eyes narrowed slightly and I commended myself of having built most of this myself. Not the walls nor the architecture. Anyone with money could buy those things easily. But the structure behind it all? The discipline? The loyalty? The fear?
That had been my work. Every corner of the estate functioned because I wanted it to, just the way I wanted it to. Every person inside it were in the very least supposed to understand the hierarchy involved.
A slow breath left me.
My thoughts shifted towards the business that demanded my attention. They ranged from shipments to investments to meetings postponed twice already because I remained here longer than intended. There were ports that awaited authorization and workers that awaited instructions.
There were deals that awaited either success or collapse as they were dependent on a single conversation with me. Normally, none of that unsettled me. I trusted efficiency and systems. More importantly I trusted the people I personally selected to maintain those systems.
Every man placed in power under me had earned their position through years of loyalty, competence or fear. In some cases it were all three.
Up until recently, I'd never questioned that structure. I felt my jaw tighten slightly. Alice Ramírez, the break-in, then Fernando Alcázar. It had as an irritation. Then suspicion. It had become something far more dangerous because the suspicion had spread.
Once doubt entered a system, it infected everything. My gaze lowered towards the guards stationed near the south gate. Could they be informants? The thoughts settled heavily in my mind. That wasn't impossible.
Fernando had influence in places people underestimated. I knew that better than most. The man smiled too easily for someone capable of calculated destruction.
And as for Alice, I willed the expression on my face to harden faintly at the mere thought of her name. She had become a complication I had not anticipated. At first she had simply been an amusing employee. Very quiet, nervous and unremarkable.
Then men broke into my home in search for her. And somehow despite pressure, restriction, and humiliation, she'd refused to break. That irritated me more than it should have.
I leaned back slightly away from the railings. My eyes fixed somewhere beyond the estate walls. After the punishment in the dining hall, I had expected something. Anything between fear and desperation. A confession would have been most appropriate. Most people cracked under far less.
I had watched her movement that evening. Her every shift in expression. I'd waited for the exact moment humiliation finally crushed whatever resistance she carried inside her. It never came.
Instead she worked calmly while the other servants and maids whispered around her. Afterwards, she'd looked me directly in the eye so defiantly and controlled. Almost–
My thoughts cut off sharply.
A brutal force had slammed into my back. I reacted instantly. Years of instinct moved faster than conscious thought. I turned sharply, my body already prepared for attack. I reached automatically towards the weapon holstered beneath my jacket.
Before I could lift the weapon out of its hostler–
Crack.
A blinding slap landed across my right cheek. The sound echoed violently through the balcony. Silence followed. My head turned slightly from the impact before it snapped back slowly.
My eyes darkened in confusion immediately.
"Mother?!," I exclaimed in a surprised tone as I was unable to grasp the word.
"Yes. In the flesh," she said as if to ascertain that she was real for the touch.
"What are you fucking doing here? How'd you get here? And why'd you fucking hit me?," the questions tumbled out.
"You arrogant child, mind your language," she hissed.
It had been some years since I'd physically seen my mother and that was shortly after my father had retired from the seat at the Lex Talionis. Then they'd both began their tour round the world. Occasionally, they came to stay at their villa in Mexico to host parties and receive visits from their grand kids.
My mother and I had preferred communication through messages, voice calls and video chats.
As I looked at her my shocked expression turned slowly into admiration of my mother's beauty. She had an athletic body and was some inches shorter than me.
She was dressed in a long fitted red sequin cheongsam gown. It was designed with elegant gold embroidery details which ran down the front. The dress was a high collar neckline with short sleeves. Its upper part of it hugged her body and its lower part flowed outward.
Her hairstyle was made into a sleek low bun with the front softly side-parted and neatly pinned back. In all, my mother looked truly elegant, refined and regal.
The look on her face though.
"Mother," I said cautiously.
"What is wrong with you? Have you completely lost your senses? Here? Right here?," she struggled to keep her tone low as she gestured to the expanse of my estate.
I didn't pretend like I knew what she was talking about. She was furious alright. But where had she materialized from?
"You hit me," I said as an attempt to begin a meaningful conversation.
"Yes," she snapped immediately. "And I'd do it again."
My cheek still burned slightly from the strike. Not because she hit hard but because she was the only human present who could attempt such and live.
"I had to threaten your father to tell me what had been said in the meeting the Lex Talionis summoned you all to. He was reluctant of course, but I prevailed over him. When he did tell me, I left China and came as soon as possible," my mother finally admitted.
"I can only imagine," I said dryly. She continued talking anyway.
"You men are so full of yourselves. If the Lex Talionis hadn't forbidden women from participating, I would've been there myself and given you a proper spanking," she said with a certain cloudiness over her features.
"What was the meeting about?," she asked, and I widened my eyes slightly, surprised at the question.
"Didn't you say father told you after you threatened him?," I asked.
"Of course I did," she spat out. "And of course he told me. I wanted to hear it from you," she replied with a scoff.
I sighed quietly and leaned back slightly against the railing.
"The Pontifex initially called us to address our unmarried state," I explained. "Then the business with the break-in by some men sent by Fernando was also addressed. They came in to abduct a maid."
My mother's face remained unreadable, so still it almost looked carved from stone.
"On the agreement that she would be brought back, I allowed her to be taken. When she came back, she explained that they'd talked about her father."
My mother's expressionless face cracked into visible astonishment.
"And what about her father?," she asked sharply.
"Her father worked for me once. It's a long story," I explained.
"A long story that put my grandchildren in danger? Are you insane? The last time you had a confrontation on your estate was eight years ago. Even that wasn't as severe as this one. What exactly were you thinking?," she asked, trying and failing to steady her voice.
She was dangerously close to tears, though she disguised it well beneath anger and criticism.
"And all this for a maid, no less," she said disdainfully.
"Mother, these things happen in our kind of world," I said, attempting to soothe her frustration.
"And I did not raise you to leave anything to chance," she retorted immediately.
Silence stretched briefly between us. The wind shifted through the balcony, cold against my skin.
Her eyes studied me carefully then. Not like a mother admiring her son. But like a woman trying to understand when exactly something in him had shifted.
"She matters to you more than you're admitting," she said quietly.
I didn't answer.
That alone was enough to answer.
She gave me one last hard look before turning away.
"I'm going to check on my grandchildren," she said finally.
I looked at her retreating back till she disappeared through the doors. I turned my gaze over the railings and caught a movement. The figure in question was hesitant. It's head looked around and I could see it's form illuminated by a meagre light.
In a minute the figure wasn't there anymore. The swiftness made me question if I really saw anything. Instinctively I proceeded to move to the ground floor to follow the image.