CHAPTER 11 — The Tunnel Beneath the Altar
Officer Reyes climbed through the opening.
He had been hiding inside the tunnel beneath the chapel.
His face was bruised, and he carried a police radio and a handgun.
“Drop everything,” Reyes ordered.
Even Esteban looked surprised.
“You’re late,” Camila said.
“I’m done taking orders from your family.”
Reyes wanted the ledger for himself.
He had spent years protecting Esteban’s properties, redirecting investigations, and warning him about raids. Now he planned to sell the records to every person named inside them.
“No evidence,” Reyes said. “No loyalty. Only leverage.”
He aimed at Esteban.
The chapel became a circle of weapons and threats.
Daniel watched Patricia.
Her right hand had worked partially free from the rope.
Mariana saw it too.
She shifted her weight.
Camila glanced down for one second.
Mariana drove her elbow backward.
The knife moved away from her throat.
Daniel lunged toward Esteban.
A gunshot exploded through the chapel.
The bullet struck the stone altar.
Patricia threw herself against Esteban, knocking his arm upward.
Valdés and her officers rushed through the front doors.
Reyes fired toward them and disappeared into the tunnel.
Camila grabbed the metal case and followed him.
Esteban tried to run, but Daniel tackled him between the pews.
Police surrounded them.
Patricia lay beside the altar, blood spreading across her sleeve.
The bullet had grazed her shoulder.
“Go,” she told Daniel. “They have the ledger.”
Daniel followed Valdés into the tunnel.
The passage descended beneath the ranch and split in two directions.
Fresh blood marked the left path.
Footprints led right.
“They separated,” Valdés said.
Daniel heard Camila calling from deeper underground.
“Daniel!”
Her voice echoed from both tunnels.
“Choose carefully.”
A phone lit up on the ground between the two passages.
The screen showed a live video of Leo and Inés sleeping in the protected apartment.
A digital timer appeared beneath the image.
Five minutes.
Camila’s voice came through the phone.
“One tunnel leads to the ledger.”
May you like
The timer began counting down.
“The other leads to your children.”
