The sound of the gavel striking the mahogany echoed through the Los Angeles Superior Court like a dry gunshot.
It wasn’t just a noise. It was a full stop. A this is as far as you go.
The air in Department 104 froze, heavy with the smell of floor wax, old sweat, and fear.
At the center of that vast, intimidating room, seated at the defendant’s table, Mariana Hernández looked less like a criminal and more like a lost child in a world of adults wearing expensive shoes. She sat on the edge of the chair, her posture rigid, trying to take up as little space as possible.
She wasn’t wearing a suit. She wasn’t wearing a nice blouse or slacks like the other defendants waiting their turn.
She was still dressed in the uniform she had used that very morning to clean the holding cells before being transferred: a cheap, synthetic navy-blue dress with a stiff white collar.
And—worst of all—she was wearing bright yellow rubber gloves.
Loud. Ridiculous. Humiliating.
The police officers at the precinct had rushed her transport. “No time to change,” they had said. They had left the gloves on her wrists, dangling like a mark of shame, a neon sign screaming to the judge, the jury, and the gallery that Mariana wasn’t a person. She was “the help.” She was the one who scrubbed the toilets.
Now, those gloves rested on the noble wood of the defense table, a stark contrast to the grandeur of the law.
Across the room, separated by an aisle that felt like an ocean, stood Santiago de la Vega.
He was impeccable. A vision of the American Dream. A custom-tailored navy suit that fit his broad shoulders perfectly, a Swiss watch on his wrist worth more than everything Mariana had earned in her entire thirty years of life. His jaw was clenched, his dark eyes fixed straight ahead.
He wasn’t looking at her. He was looking at the judge, the way a CEO looks at a spreadsheet he wants finalized.
Beside him, in the front row, seated as if she were attending a Broadway premiere, was Renata Montemayor.
Santiago’s fiancée.
She was stunning, in a predatory way. Her blonde hair was blown out to perfection, her lipstick a precise shade of crimson. She played idly with the massive diamond ring on her finger, twisting it back and forth, catching the courtroom lights. She looked at Mariana not with anger, but with the detached amusement of a child watching an ant burn under a magnifying glass.
“Mrs. Mariana Hernández,” the Honorable Judge Wallace intoned, his voice deep and weary. “Your public defender has failed to appear. Again.”
The Judge peered over his spectacles. “The court cannot wait. The docket is full. You are charged with grand theft, aggravated by abuse of trust. The plaintiff, Mr. Santiago de la Vega, presents compelling evidence regarding the theft of the antique emerald necklace. Do you understand the seriousness of what is happening?”
Mariana looked up. Her eyes were red, the capillaries burst from crying all night in a holding cell.
She searched the room. She looked for a friend. A neighbor. Anyone.
But there was no one.
She looked at Santiago. She wanted to scream at him with her eyes.
Look at me, Mr. Santiago. It’s me. I’m the woman who made your coffee exactly the way you liked it—black, two sugars—without you ever having to ask. I’m the one who stayed late when you had board meetings. I’m the one who held your children when they had nightmares because you were in Tokyo or London. How can you believe I’m a thief?
But Santiago remained ice-cold. He didn’t blink. To him, this was just a transaction. A removal of a defective asset.
“Your Honor… I…” Mariana began, but her voice broke. It was a dry, rasping sound.
“Choose your words carefully,” the prosecutor interrupted.
He was a bald man with the face of a hungry dog, leaning against the railing. He didn’t care about justice; he cared about his conviction rate.
“If you plead guilty right now, Mrs. Hernández,” the prosecutor said, checking his fingernails, “Mr. de la Vega has graciously requested a reduced sentence. Five years in state prison. Eligible for parole in two.”
He paused for dramatic effect.
“If you insist on going to trial and wasting the court’s time? I will ask for the maximum. Ten years. And looking at the evidence… you will lose.”
Five years.
Or ten years.
Mariana swallowed hard. The lump in her throat tasted like bile.
She closed her eyes and saw them.
Emiliano and Gael. Her own children. Her twin boys.
They were seven years old. They were currently sitting at her neighbor Mrs. Gomez’s apartment in East LA. They were probably sitting by the window, wearing their worn-out backpacks, clutching their pencils like little swords, waiting for Mom to come home.
She had promised them pizza tonight. She had left a pot of beans on the stove.
If she fought this and lost—which she would, because who believes the maid in yellow gloves over the billionaire in the Italian suit?—she would be gone for ten years. She would miss their first crushes, their graduations, their voices changing. She would come out a stranger.
If she surrendered now… five years. Maybe two with good behavior.
Two years was an eternity. But ten was a life sentence.
The logic of poverty wrapped around her like a noose: better a short defeat than endless torture.
“Mrs. Hernández?” The Judge sighed, checking his watch. “We need an answer.”
Renata, in the front row, smirked. She whispered something to Santiago, leaning close to his ear. He didn’t react, but he didn’t pull away either.
Mariana looked down at her yellow gloves. They smelled of bleach.
She was tired. She was so, so tired of fighting a world that didn’t want her.
“I…” Mariana whispered.
“Speak up,” the Judge commanded.
Mariana took a breath. She let the air fill her lungs to form the word that would kill her soul.
“I… I ple—”
“NO!”
The shout struck the room like lightning.
It didn’t come from Mariana.
It didn’t come from a lawyer.
It came from a child’s voice. High-pitched, terrified, and fierce.
The heavy oak doors at the back of the courtroom burst open, slamming violently against the walls. BANG.
Heads turned. The bailiff reached for his belt.
Two small figures ran down the center aisle as if the building were on fire.
A boy and a girl. About eight and six years old. They were wearing expensive private school uniforms, but their hair was messy, their faces flushed from running.
Behind them, panting and terrified, was the elderly security guard from the De la Vega estate, trying to catch up.
“Leo? Mia?”
Santiago de la Vega stood up, his chair scraping loudly against the floor. His mask of icy indifference cracked instantly.
“Dad! Stop!” the boy, Leo, screamed. He didn’t run to his father.
He ran to the defendant’s table.
He ran to the woman in the yellow gloves.
“Don’t let them take her!” Mia, the little girl, sobbed, hurling herself at Mariana’s legs, hugging the cheap navy polyester as if it were a life raft.
“Order! Order in this court!” The Judge banged his gavel, but he looked more stunned than angry.
“Leo, what are you doing here?” Santiago stepped into the aisle, his face a mix of confusion and parental authority. “Renata, get them.”
Renata stood up, her smile gone. “You brats! You’re supposed to be at school! Officer, remove them!”
“No!” Leo turned around. He stood between the police officers and Mariana. He was small, shaking, but he held his chin up—a gesture that looked exactly like his father.
“She didn’t do it, Dad,” Leo shouted, his voice echoing off the high ceilings. “Mariana didn’t steal Grandma’s necklace!”
“Leo, stop this,” Santiago said, walking forward. “We have evidence. We found it in her bag. Now come here.”
“You found it because she put it there!” Leo pointed a shaking finger directly at the front row.
At Renata.
The courtroom went deadly silent.
Chapter 2: The House of Glass
To understand why a billionaire’s children would run away from school to save their maid, you have to understand the De la Vega household.
It was a mansion made of glass and steel in the hills of Bel Air. It had an infinity pool, a home theater, and six bedrooms.
But for Leo and Mia, it was a museum. Cold. Quiet. Empty.
Their mother had died three years ago. Since then, their father, Santiago, had buried himself in his work. He built skyscrapers. He expanded his empire. He bought them toys, ponies, and video games.
But he didn’t buy them time.
The person who made the house a home was Mariana.
She had started working there a month after the funeral. She wasn’t just a cleaner. She became the gravity holding the family together.
When Mia scraped her knee, she didn’t call her father’s assistant; she ran to Mariana. Mariana would clean the wound, kiss it, and give her a cookie she had “smuggled” from the pantry.
When Leo was struggling with math, Mariana sat with him at the kitchen island while she chopped vegetables, helping him memorize his multiplication tables using dried beans.
She taught them Spanish. She taught them how to make arepas. She taught them that they were loved, not for their last name, but for who they were.
Then came Renata.
Renata Montemayor was a socialite. Beautiful, ambitious, and calculating. She met Santiago at a charity gala and sunk her claws in. She saw the De la Vega fortune as her ticket to the ultimate lifestyle.
But there was a problem.
The children didn’t like her. And worse, they loved the maid.
Renata was jealous. Not romantically—she knew Santiago viewed Mariana as staff—but she was jealous of the influence. She hated that when she entered a room, the kids stiffened, but when Mariana entered, they relaxed.
She hated that Mariana knew Santiago’s schedule better than she did.
She hated that Mariana was the one thing standing between Renata and total control of the household.
So, Renata made a plan.
Chapter 3: The Setup
It happened on the night of the engagement party.
The house was full of guests. Waiters with champagne trays, soft jazz, diamonds everywhere.
Mariana was working double time, managing the catering staff, checking coats, keeping the kids calm upstairs.
Renata had gone into Santiago’s safe. She took the antique emerald necklace—an heirloom from Santiago’s mother, worth half a million dollars.
She didn’t steal it to sell it. She stole it to move it.
While Mariana was distracted helping a guest with a spilled drink, Renata slipped into the staff room. She opened Mariana’s worn leather tote bag—the one with the photo of Mariana’s twins on the zipper.
She shoved the necklace inside, wrapped in a napkin.
Then, the performance began.
An hour later, Renata screamed. Tears. Hysterics. “The necklace! It’s gone!”
Santiago ordered a lockdown. The police were called.
“It has to be staff,” Renata insisted, wiping fake tears. “Check their bags. All of them.”
When the officer pulled the sparkling emeralds out of Mariana’s bag, Santiago’s face turned into stone.
He looked at Mariana with a betrayal that cut deeper than a knife.
“Mr. Santiago, please,” Mariana had begged, crying as they handcuffed her in the kitchen. “I swear on my children, I didn’t take it!”
“Don’t speak about your children,” Santiago had snarled. “You stole from my mother. Get her out of my sight.”
He didn’t see Leo and Mia watching from the top of the stairs.
He didn’t see the look on Renata’s face—a momentary flash of triumphant smirk—before she buried her face in Santiago’s chest.
But Leo saw it.
And Leo saw something else, too.
Chapter 4: The Truth in HD
Back in the courtroom, the silence stretched thin.
Renata laughed. It was a nervous, high-pitched sound.
“Oh, this is ridiculous,” she said, standing up and smoothing her skirt. “Santiago, the boy is confused. He’s traumatized. He’s making up stories because he misses his nanny. It’s sweet, really, but we need to finish this.”
She turned to the Judge. “Your Honor, please remove the children.”
“Wait,” Santiago said.
He was looking at his son. He saw the desperation in Leo’s eyes. He saw the way Mia was clinging to Mariana’s yellow gloves, getting grease on her uniform, not caring at all.
“Leo,” Santiago said, his voice softer. “Why do you say Renata put it there?”
“Because I have proof!” Leo shouted.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a smartphone. It wasn’t his phone. It was an old iPhone that Santiago used to use as a monitor for the security cameras.
“I set up a camera,” Leo said, his voice trembling. “In the staff room.”
Renata froze. Her skin went pale beneath her makeup.
“What?” she whispered.
“I set it up because she,” Leo pointed at Renata, “kept stealing my candy and blaming Mariana! I wanted to catch her eating my chocolate so I could show you.”
The court was captivated. Even the prosecutor stopped looking at his fingernails.
“I checked the video this morning,” Leo said, tears streaming down his face. “I saw her. I saw Renata go into Mariana’s bag.”
He held the phone up to his father.
“Look, Dad. Look at it!”
Santiago walked over to the wooden railing. He took the phone from his son’s small hand.
He pressed play.
The screen was small, but the image was clear.
The timestamp: 8:14 PM, the night of the party.
The angle showed the staff lockers.
Renata walked into the frame. She looked over her shoulder. She was holding the emerald necklace. She opened Mariana’s bag. She shoved it deep inside. She zipped it up.
Then, she looked at her reflection in the mirror, fixed her hair, and smiled.
It was the smile of a predator.
Santiago watched the video. Then he watched it again.
His breathing changed. His chest heaved. The vein in his temple began to throb.
He slowly turned around.
He looked at Renata.
It wasn’t the look of a fiancé. It was the look of a man who realized he had invited a viper into his bed.
“Santiago,” Renata stammered, backing away. “It’s… it’s a deep fake! You know how good kids are with computers these days! He edited it!”
“He’s eight years old, Renata,” Santiago said. His voice was terrifyingly quiet.
“It’s a prank!” Renata shrieked, looking around for support. “He hates me! He’s trying to ruin us!”
Santiago turned to the prosecutor. He held out the phone.
“I believe,” Santiago said, his voice ringing with authority, “that this is exonerating evidence.”
The prosecutor took the phone. He watched it. He frowned. He looked at Renata.
“Your Honor,” the prosecutor said, standing up straight. “The State… uh… the State moves to dismiss all charges against Mrs. Hernández immediately.”
The Judge banged the gavel.
“Case dismissed!”
Chapter 5: The End of the Gloves
The courtroom erupted.
Mia screamed with joy and buried her face in Mariana’s neck. Mariana, weeping uncontrollably, wrapped her yellow-gloved hands around the little girl, rocking her back and forth.
“Thank you, thank you,” Mariana sobbed into Mia’s hair.
Santiago didn’t move toward them yet. He walked toward Renata.
Renata was backed against the railing. “Santiago, baby, listen. I did it for us! She was getting in the way! She was disrespectful!”
Santiago reached out and took her left hand.
“Santiago?” she smiled hopefully.
He gripped the diamond engagement ring.
“Ow! You’re hurting me!”
He slid the ring off her finger. It was rough. It was final.
“Get out,” he said.
“But—”
“Get. Out.” Santiago roared. “Before I have you arrested for filing a false police report and perjury.”
Renata looked at him. She looked at the ring in his hand. She looked at the angry faces in the courtroom.
She turned and ran. Her heels clicked frantically as she fled, the door slamming behind her.
Santiago took a deep breath. He turned toward the defendant’s table.
Mariana was standing up now, holding both Leo and Mia. She looked exhausted. Her dress was wrinkled. The gloves were ridiculous.
But she looked dignified.
Santiago walked through the gate. He stopped in front of her.
He looked at his children, clinging to this woman. He realized that while he had been building buildings, she had been building his family.
“Mariana,” Santiago said.
Mariana flinched, expecting to be fired, or scolded for hugging the kids.
“Mr. Santiago,” she whispered. “I’m sorry about the uniform. I didn’t mean to—”
“Take them off,” Santiago said gently.
“Sir?”
Santiago reached out. With his own hands, he took hold of the dirty, yellow rubber glove on her left hand.
He peeled it off.
Then he took the right one. He peeled it off.
He took the gloves, balled them up, and tossed them into the trash can by the bailiff’s desk.
He took Mariana’s bare hands—rough, calloused, shaking—in his own.
“I am so sorry,” Santiago said. His voice cracked. “I failed you. I failed to protect the person who protects my children.”
“It’s okay,” Mariana wept. “I just… I just want to go home to my boys. They are waiting for pizza.”
Santiago nodded. He wiped a tear from his own eye.
“Your boys,” Santiago said. “Emiliano and Gael, right?”
“Yes.”
“Go get them,” Santiago said. “Bring them to the house.”
“Sir?”
“You’re not working today, Mariana. You’re not working for a long time. I’m giving you a paid sabbatical. A year. Five years. Whatever you need.”
He looked at Leo.
“But tonight? We are all having pizza. You, me, Leo, Mia, Emiliano, and Gael. At the house. As a family.”
“But… I’m just the maid,” Mariana whispered.
Santiago shook his head. He looked at how his daughter was looking at her.
“No,” Santiago said. “You are the only mother they have.”
Epilogue
They walked out of the courthouse together.
Not as employer and employee. But as a strange, patchwork unit.
Santiago drove them to East LA in his Bentley. The neighbors stared as the luxury car pulled up to the crumbling apartment complex.
When Mariana opened the door, her twins, Emiliano and Gael, screamed “MAMA!” and tackled her.
Santiago watched from the doorway, holding a stack of pizza boxes.
That night, in the small apartment in East LA, a billionaire sat on a mismatched sofa, eating pepperoni pizza off a paper plate.
He watched Mariana laugh with her kids. He watched his own children, Leo and Mia, playing with Emiliano and Gael, building a fort out of cushions.
There were no diamonds. There were no waiters.
But for the first time in three years, Santiago de la Vega felt like he was home.
He looked at Mariana. She wasn’t wearing gloves. Her hands were free.
And finally, so was he.
Part 2: The Glass Castle Cracks
Chapter 1: The Honeymoon Period (That Wasn’t)
For exactly three weeks, life in the De la Vega mansion was something it had never been before: loud, messy, and real.
The “Pizza Pact,” as Santiago called it, had changed the rules.
Mariana Hernández was technically still on “sabbatical,” but she was at the house every day—not to scrub floors, but to be a parent. Her twins, Emiliano and Gael, had been enrolled in a better school nearby, paid for by Santiago. The four children—Leo, Mia, Emiliano, and Gael—moved through the house like a pack of wild puppies, leaving trails of LEGOs and laughter in rooms that used to be museums.
Santiago, the man of steel, had softened. He started coming home at 5:00 PM. He learned that eating tacos on the terrace was infinitely better than eating steak alone in the dining room.
And between him and Mariana, there was a quiet, tentative dance.
It wasn’t a romance. Not yet. It was a deep, terrified respect. They would catch each other’s eyes across the kitchen island—him pouring wine, her chopping cilantro—and quickly look away, blushing. They were two people from different planets who had crash-landed on the same island.
But peace is a fragile thing when you are a billionaire who has publicly humiliated a narcissist.
It started on a Tuesday morning.
Mariana was in the kitchen, making breakfast for the army of children. Santiago walked in, tie loosened, looking pale.
He was holding a tablet.
“Don’t look at the TV,” he said, his voice tight.
“Why?” Mariana asked, flipping a pancake. “Is it the weather?”
“No,” Santiago said. “It’s Renata.”
Mariana froze. She wiped her hands on her apron—a habit she couldn’t break.
Santiago placed the tablet on the counter.
It was a clip from the country’s biggest morning talk show.
There sat Renata. She wasn’t the frantic, screaming woman from the courtroom. She was poised. She was crying delicate, perfect tears. She was wearing white—the color of innocence.
“I was the victim,” Renata sobbed to the host. “Santiago is a powerful man. He controls the cameras. He controls the police. That video of me? Deepfake technology. He wanted to get rid of me because… because of her.”
A photo of Mariana appeared on the screen. It was a paparazzi shot taken yesterday, showing Mariana laughing in the passenger seat of Santiago’s car.
“The maid,” Renata whispered with disgust. “She seduced him. She turned his children against me. It was a plot, pure and simple. I am suing Santiago de la Vega for fifty million dollars for defamation, breach of promise, and emotional distress. And I will expose the truth about his ‘happy family’.”
Mariana stared at the screen. The pancake on the griddle began to burn.
“She is lying,” Mariana whispered. “Everyone knows she is lying.”
“The truth doesn’t matter, Mariana,” Santiago said grimly. ” The narrative matters. And right now, she’s painting you as the homewrecker and me as the abusive tycoon.”
Chapter 2: The Siege
By noon, the mansion was under siege.
News vans lined the street outside the gates. Photographers climbed the trees to get shots of the “Seductress Maid.”
When Mariana tried to leave to pick up the kids from school, security stopped her.
“You can’t go out there, Ms. Hernández,” the head of security said. “They will eat you alive.”
Santiago had to send armored cars to pick up the children.
When the kids got home, they were confused and scared.
“Why are those people screaming your name, Mariana?” Leo asked, looking out the window. “They have signs that say ‘Gold Digger’.”
Mariana felt her heart shatter. She could handle insults. She could handle rubber gloves. But she couldn’t handle her children—and Santiago’s children—seeing her treated like a criminal again.
That night, the atmosphere in the house changed. The laughter was gone.
Santiago spent hours in his study on conference calls. Mariana could hear him shouting.
“I don’t care what the shareholders think! I am not settling with her! She is a thief!”
Mariana stood outside the door, holding a tray of tea she didn’t dare deliver. She heard the other voice on the speakerphone—Santiago’s business partner.
“Santiago, the stock dropped 12% today. The board is panicking. Renata has photos. She has emails. She says she has proof that you used company funds to pay off the maid. You need to cut ties. Send the woman away. Issue a public apology to Renata.”
“Never,” Santiago roared.
Mariana walked away. She went to the guest room where she had been staying.
She looked at her reflection. She saw the same woman she had always been. But the world saw a problem. A liability.
She began to pack.
Chapter 3: The Goodbye
At 2:00 AM, the house was silent.
Mariana dragged her suitcase to the front door. She had left a note on the kitchen counter. It was simple: Thank you for defending me. But I cannot destroy your life. I am going back to East LA. Please take care of the children.
She reached for the handle.
“You didn’t lock the side gate properly.”
The voice made her jump.
Santiago was standing on the stairs, in the dark. He wasn’t wearing a suit. He was wearing t-shirt and sweatpants, looking exhausted.
“Mr. Santiago,” Mariana stammered. “I… I have to go.”
“Why?” He walked down the stairs, not turning on the lights.
“Because I am sinking your ship,” Mariana said, tears welling up. “I heard the phone call. Your company. Your reputation. Renata will not stop until she destroys you. But if I leave… if I disappear… she will lose interest. You can make a deal.”
Santiago stopped in front of her. He put his hand on her suitcase handle.
“Let go,” he said.
“No.”
“Mariana,” he said, his voice soft but firm. “Do you think I built this empire by running away from bullies?”
“This is not business,” she argued. “This is your life.”
“You are my life,” Santiago said.
The silence that followed was louder than the screaming crowds outside.
He stepped closer. “Not in the way the papers say. But you… you brought the light back. If you leave, this house goes dark again. I would rather lose the company. I would rather lose every dollar in the bank than lose the respect of my children. And if I let you walk out that door to save my stock price? My children will never forgive me. And I will never forgive myself.”
“But what do we do?” Mariana wept. “She has expensive lawyers. She has the media. I have nothing. I am just…”
“You are not just anything,” Santiago said. “You are the one person who saw through her before I did.”
He looked at her intensely.
“Think, Mariana. You lived here with her for six months. You cleaned her room. You picked up her trash. You heard her phone calls when I was at work. Renata is not a genius. She is arrogant. Arrogant people make mistakes. Did you ever see anything? Anything odd?”
Mariana wiped her eyes. She tried to think back.
She remembered cleaning Renata’s guest suite. Renata was messy. She left clothes everywhere. She treated Mariana like a piece of furniture, talking openly on the phone while Mariana dusted.
“She was always on the phone,” Mariana whispered. “With a man. Not you.”
“A lover?” Santiago asked.
“No… it sounded like business. But shady business. She spoke in code. She mentioned ‘The Cayman Account’ and ‘The shipment’.”
Santiago frowned. “Renata doesn’t have a job. She’s a socialite.”
Mariana closed her eyes, visualizing the room. The mess. The trash can.
“Wait,” Mariana said. Her eyes snapped open. “The shredder.”
“What?”
“Two days before the engagement party,” Mariana said, speaking faster. “She jammed the paper shredder in her office. She called me in to fix it. She was screaming, furious. She said, ‘Fix it, you idiot, or I’ll have you fired’.”
“Did you fix it?”
“Yes,” Mariana said. “But I had to pull the paper out. It was jammed tight. I cleared the machine.”
“And the paper?” Santiago asked.
“I put it in the recycling bag,” Mariana said. “But… I kept one piece. Not on purpose. It fell into my apron pocket. I found it later when I was doing laundry. I thought it was trash, but it looked… official. I put it in the back of the junk drawer in the kitchen, meaning to ask you about it, but then the necklace happened and I forgot.”
Santiago grabbed her shoulders. “The junk drawer? Is it still there?”
“I don’t know. It’s been a month.”
They ran to the kitchen.
Chapter 4: The Junk Drawer
The kitchen was dark. Santiago turned on his flashlight. Mariana ripped open the infamous “junk drawer”—the graveyard of batteries, rubber bands, and takeout menus.
She dug through the chaos.
“Come on, come on,” she whispered.
Her fingers brushed against something stiff. A crumpled ball of heavy, cream-colored paper.
She pulled it out.
It was torn, crinkled, and stained with a drop of coffee. But it was readable.
Santiago shone the light on it.
It was a bank transfer receipt. But not a normal one. It was a transfer of $200,000.
From: Santiago de la Vega (Joint Account) To: Viper Holdings, LLC.
“Viper Holdings?” Santiago frowned. “I never authorized this. I don’t know this company.”
“Look at the bottom,” Mariana pointed. “There is a handwritten note. In her handwriting.”
Scrawled in red ink on the margin of the receipt were three words: Silence money – Dad.
Santiago stared at it. “Her dad? Her dad died ten years ago.”
“Maybe not her dad,” Mariana said. “Maybe the father of…”
She didn’t finish the sentence.
Santiago pulled out his phone. “I’m calling my private investigator. I want to know who owns Viper Holdings.”
Chapter 5: The Sting
It took 24 hours.
The investigator found it. Viper Holdings was a shell company registered in Panama. The beneficiary?
A man named Carlos Montemayor.
Renata’s “dead” father.
He wasn’t dead. He was very much alive, and he was a known con artist wanted in three countries for fraud. Renata hadn’t just been dating Santiago for his money; she had been funneling money out of his accounts into her father’s laundering scheme for months, using small, unnoticeable transfers.
Until the big one. The one she tried to shred.
“She’s not a socialite,” Santiago said, looking at the dossier on his desk. “She’s a grifter. A professional con woman.”
“So we go to the police?” Mariana asked.
“No,” Santiago said, his eyes cold. “Not yet. She wants a show? Let’s give her a show.”
Chapter 6: The Live Broadcast
Two days later, Santiago agreed to a “Settlement Meeting” with Renata. But he insisted it be done publicly, to “clear the air.” He invited the same news crew that Renata had cried to.
Renata arrived at the mansion looking triumphant. She thought she had won. She thought Santiago was going to cut her a check for $50 million to make her go away.
They sat in the living room. Cameras rolling.
“I’m glad you came to your senses, Santiago,” Renata said for the cameras, holding her lawyer’s hand. “I just want to move on from this trauma.”
“I agree,” Santiago said. He was sitting next to Mariana. Mariana wasn’t wearing a uniform. She was wearing a red dress Santiago had bought her. She looked regal.
“We have a settlement offer,” Santiago said. He slid a folder across the table.
Renata smiled greedily. She opened the folder.
Her smile vanished.
It wasn’t a check.
It was a photo of her father, Carlos, in his Panama hideout. And a copy of the crumpled receipt from the junk drawer.
“What is this?” she whispered.
“That,” Santiago said, loud enough for the microphones to pick up, “is proof of wire fraud, embezzlement, and identity theft. We know about Viper Holdings, Renata. Or should I call you by your real name… Brenda?”
The cameras zoomed in. Renata’s face went white.
“We also found the rest of the records,” Santiago continued. “Mariana—the woman you called stupid—saved the evidence you were too careless to destroy. The police are waiting at the gate. Not for Mariana. For you.”
Renata stood up, knocking her chair over. “Cut the feed! Turn off the cameras!”
“I don’t think so,” Santiago said calmly.
Renata looked at the door. Then she looked at Mariana.
For the first time, there was no arrogance. Only fear.
“You,” Renata hissed at Mariana. “You ruined everything. You were just the help!”
Mariana stood up. She walked around the table until she was face to face with the woman who had tried to send her to prison.
“I was never just the help,” Mariana said, her voice steady and strong. “I was the one watching. And you forgot the most important rule of this house.”
“What rule?” Renata spat.
“You don’t mess with the mother,” Mariana said. “Even the one who wears gloves.”
Chapter 7: The Aftermath
Renata was arrested live on national television. It was the highest-rated segment of the year.
The “scandal” evaporated instantly. The Board of Directors sent Santiago apology baskets. The stock price hit an all-time high.
But none of that mattered to the people inside the mansion.
That evening, the house was quiet again.
Santiago and Mariana sat on the terrace, watching the four kids play soccer in the yard.
“So,” Santiago said, swirling his wine. “The sabbatical.”
“Yes?” Mariana smiled.
“It’s over.”
“Oh,” Mariana said. “So I should get back to work? The bathrooms are probably dirty.”
“No,” Santiago shook his head. “I’m firing you.”
Mariana’s heart dropped. “What?”
“I can’t have my girlfriend cleaning my toilets,” Santiago said. He didn’t look at her. He looked at the sunset, his ears turning pink. “It would be inappropriate.”
Mariana stared at him. “Girlfriend?”
Santiago turned to her. He looked terrified. “If… if you’re interested. Ideally, we take it slow. Dinner. A movie. No pizza for a while.”
Mariana laughed. It was a bright, beautiful sound.
She reached out and took his hand. His hand was soft, manicured. Hers was rough, hardworking. They fit perfectly.
“I would like that,” she said. “But I have one condition.”
“Anything,” Santiago said.
“I still make the coffee,” she said. “You never make it right.”
Santiago smiled. He leaned in and kissed her. It wasn’t a movie kiss. It was a real kiss. A promise.
“Deal,” he said.
Down on the grass, Leo looked up and nudged Emiliano.
“Hey,” Leo whispered. “I think they’re kissing.”
Emiliano rolled his eyes and kicked the soccer ball. “Finally. Adults are so slow.”
THE END.
