Chapter 5 - The Chilling Secret Exposed
Alejandro spent the next three hours inside the gallery office, reading through the documents while his security guards kept Marcela locked in the room with him. As he turned the pages, the horrifying truth of his family’s wealth was laid bare.
Twenty-five years ago, his mother, Doña Esther, and his late father had built their real estate empire by illegally seizing lands belonging to local artisans in Coyoacán. Valeria’s father had been the lead investigator trying to stop them. To silence him, the Arandas had framed him for a massive art forgery scandal, ruining his reputation and driving him to a stressful, early grave.
But Valeria’s father had hidden the ultimate proof—the original land deeds and bank transcripts proving the Aranda fraud—inside a piece of art that Valeria had unknowingly inherited.
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Three days ago, Valeria had accidentally discovered the documents while restoring the piece at home. Doña Esther and Marcela had caught her with them. To keep her from telling Alejandro—who they knew possessed a strict sense of justice despite his cold business mind—they dragged her to the basement, dousing her legs with industrial cleaning chemicals during the struggle, and chained her up. They planned to force her to sign a divorce and NDA under the threat of taking her unborn child away forever.
Alejandro sat back, tears of rage and disgust streaming down his face. His entire life, his prestige, his empire—it was all built on a foundation of blood, theft, and cruelty executed by the woman who raised him.
