Chapter 18 - Archive C
Mateo stood at the basement entrance holding no gun.
That almost made him more frightening.
Police were upstairs.
He knew it.
He had come anyway.
Elena moved in front of Alba.
“You threatened my daughter for two years.”
“I followed instructions.”
“Whose?”
Mateo looked at Javier.
“His father’s first. Then Isabel’s. Then mine.”
That last word changed everything.
“You took control,” Javier said.
Mateo smiled. “People like Isabel think money means control. It means dependency.”
After Rafael Salcedo died, Mateo had kept Mirror Language alive because it generated money, leverage, and private information on executives across Europe.
Isabel believed she was running it.
Clara believed she was trapped by Isabel.
Arturo believed he was tracking Isabel.
Mateo had been using all of them.
“Why come here?” Álvaro asked.
Mateo nodded toward the termination packet.
“Because that contains the only original authorization tying me to Rafael.”
Elena grabbed it first.
Mateo lunged.
Álvaro blocked him.
The fight lasted seconds, ugly and close. Shelves tipped. Files spilled. Alba backed against a cabinet and screamed for police.
Mateo shoved Álvaro into a desk and reached for Elena.
Then Clara stepped from the stairwell.
She had followed investigators down.
“Enough.”
Mateo turned.
That gave police time.
Two officers hit him from the side and drove him to the floor.
The packet stayed in Elena’s hands.
Inside was a signed memorandum from Rafael Salcedo authorizing Mateo to use “reputational, legal, and personal pressure” to contain threats to the Mirror Language system.
Attached were handwritten additions from years later.
One name had been circled twice.
ELENA MARTÍN.
Below it:
DAUGHTER - EFFECTIVE PRESSURE POINT.
Alba read the line over her mother’s arm.
Elena tried to cover it too late.
Alba’s face went still.
Mateo, handcuffed on the floor, looked at her.
“You were never special,” he said. “You were useful.”
Alba wiped her eyes.
Then she looked at him and said quietly,
“So were you.”
A detective opened the final folder in the cabinet.
Inside was a document dated for 8:00 a.m.
Altamar board emergency vote.
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Agenda item one:
REMOVE JAVIER SALCEDO AS CEO.
