Chapter 12 - The Iron RegentThree hours later, the private medical wing of the Velasco estate was operational. Two neurosurgeons from the ABC Medical Center, brought in at gunpoint by Nicolás’s men, had just finished stitching the deep laceration on Sofía’s skull. She lay under plain cotton sheets, an IV drip running into her arm, her breathing shallow but stable.
Nicolás stood outside the glass partition, staring at her through the reflection of his own haggard appearance. He hadn't changed his clothes. The blood on his shirt had dried into a dark, rusty brown.
Valeria sat in the corner of the waiting room, handcuffed to a iron chair, her face swollen from hours of continuous weeping.
Nicolás turned his gaze to her. It was the look of a judge passing a final, irreversible sentence.
"I didn't want them to kill him, Nicolás," Valeria begged, her voice a broken rattle. "Leonor said... she said she just wanted custody. They had my aunt. They had my cousin."
"You traded my son to the men who killed my sister, Valeria," Nicolás said, his voice dropping into a register that was lower and more terrifying than any shout. "Your aunt and cousin are already dead. Javier Mendoza had them executed the moment you entered the security bypass codes. They were dead before you even turned off the lights."
Valeria let out a strangled sound and fainted, her head dropping against her chest as the handcuffs clinked against the iron frame.
Nicolás didn't look at her again. He turned to his chief security officer, who was waiting with a tactical map of the state of Mexico. "Where is Javier’s primary transit point?"
"An abandoned railway depot near Toluca, Boss. Our scouts report heavy Mendoza activity there. They are preparing a private helicopter to move the child to the north."
Nicolás reached onto the table and picked up his silver Beretta, checking the magazine with a loud, mechanical snap. He didn't look like a CEO anymore. He looked like the iron regent of the Mexican underworld, a man who had stripped away every law, every boundary, and every shred of mercy to reclaim what was his.
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He walked into Sofía’s room, stepping softly to the side of her bed. He bent down, his lips gently brushing her pale, cool forehead.
"I am going to bring him back, Sofía," he whispered against her skin. "And when I do, I will build a world where you never have to bleed for us again."
