Chapter 10 - Thirty-Seven Percent
The value of Aurelio Mendoza changed overnight.
Not as a person.
On paper.
Rachel explained it in a conference room while Aurelio ate cereal from a mixing bowl because he considered Mateo’s breakfast dishes “too small to trust.”
“Elena’s thirty-seven percent voting interest should have passed to you.”
Aurelio looked up.
“How much money is that?”
“That is not a simple question.”
“Rich-person answer.”
Rachel smiled.
“At current valuations, several billion dollars.”
The spoon stopped halfway to Aurelio’s mouth.
“That’s stupid.”
Mateo almost laughed.
“It often is.”
Rachel continued.
“More important than cash is control. The shares could decide who controls Vargas Meridian.”
Aurelio frowned.
“I don’t want a company.”
“You are twelve. No one expects you to run it.”
“Good.”
“There’s more. Elena’s trust owned Rivergate land independently.”
Marcus asked, “The contaminated parcels?”
“Some. Also clean waterfront parcels the city now wants for redevelopment.”
Mateo understood.
“If Aurelio survived, Sebastian never truly controlled them.”
“Correct.”
“So the development approvals could be challenged.”
“Correct.”
“And any loans secured against those properties…”
“Potentially vulnerable.”
Marcus leaned back.
“There’s the motive.”
Aurelio put down his spoon.
“I’m worth more dead.”
Nobody answered.
He looked at Mateo.
“Say it.”
Mateo did.
“To Sebastian’s scheme, yes.”
Aurelio stood.
“I hate this family.”
“So did Elena sometimes.”
“That’s supposed to make me feel better?”
“No.”
Aurelio walked away.
Mateo followed him to the garage, where the boy stared at a row of cars.
“Pick one,” Mateo said.
Aurelio looked offended.
“I don’t want your car.”
“I wasn’t offering it.”
“Then why say pick one?”
“Because I need to go somewhere and you clearly don’t want to sit beside me.”
Aurelio pointed at the oldest vehicle, a scratched green pickup used by groundskeepers.
“That.”
Mateo sighed.
“Of course.”
They drove without security inside the cab, though Marcus followed in an SUV.
Mateo took Aurelio to Blackridge.
The estate had never been rebuilt.
Only foundation stones remained among weeds.
Aurelio stepped onto the property where his parents died.
No dramatic memory returned.
He had been fourteen months old.
“I thought I’d feel something,” he said.
Mateo stood beside him.
“You don’t owe a place feelings.”
“Where was my room?”
Mateo pointed toward a section of broken foundation.
“Upstairs, southeast corner.”
Aurelio walked toward it.
“What were they like?”
Mateo spent the next hour answering.
Elena sang badly.
Javier cooked too much garlic.
They argued about books.
They had once painted Aurelio’s nursery three times because Elena changed her mind about yellow.
Aurelio listened without interrupting.
Finally he asked, “Were they happy?”
“Yes.”
“Were you?”
Mateo looked across the ruins.
“Sometimes.”
Aurelio picked up a charred fragment of brick.
“Why did Sebastian hate them?”
“He didn’t hate Elena at first.”
“What happened?”
“Our father trusted her judgment more.”
“So he killed her over a company?”
“Power makes small people feel enormous.”
Aurelio glanced at Mateo.
“Does it do that to you?”
“Sometimes.”
The honesty surprised him.
Mateo continued.
“That is why people around me stopped saying no.”
“Grandma would’ve said no.”
“To everything.”
“Good.”
Mateo looked toward the ruined house.
“She left me a better critic than I deserve.”
Aurelio almost smiled.
Marcus approached.
“We found something.”
Excavation records from the original fire investigation showed a storm-drain tunnel running beneath the rear property.
The tunnel connected Blackridge to an abandoned maintenance building half a mile away.
It had never appeared in the final police report.
They opened the rusted entrance.
Inside, beneath eleven years of dirt, Marcus found faded paint markings.
Arrows.
And one word scratched into concrete.
RUN.
Aurelio touched the letters.
“Grandma?”
Mateo shook his head.
“Elena used block capitals like that.”
Farther inside they found a corroded metal box wedged behind a pipe.
Inside was a child’s hospital bracelet.
AURELIO MENDOZA — 14 MONTHS
And a keycard.
Vargas Meridian executive security.
The identification number belonged to Edwin Kessler.
Marcus stared at it.
“Kessler was inside this escape tunnel.”
Aurelio whispered, “Following them.”
Then a voice echoed behind them.
“No.”
Everyone turned.
Calvin Cross stood at the tunnel entrance.
He looked twenty years older than the day before.
“Kessler wasn’t following Esperanza.”
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Calvin swallowed.
“He was waiting at the other end.”
