Chapter 7: Buried Alive
Alejandro rushed toward the vault door.
It would not open.
Victor stood near the control panel, one hand pressed to his wound.
Vivian stared at him.
“You locked us in.”
Victor’s face had lost all warmth.
“I’m sorry.”
Alejandro moved between him and Elena.
“You arranged this.”
Victor nodded.
“The bracelet does not control the chapel explosives.”
Vivian looked down at her wrist.
“What?”
“It was designed to control you.”
Victor pressed a button on a small device hidden inside his sleeve.
Vivian’s bracelet tightened violently.
She gasped and dropped to her knees.
Alejandro grabbed Victor by the collar.
“Release her.”
“She has outlived her usefulness.”
“You’re killing your own daughter.”
Victor looked at Vivian without emotion.
“She was never capable of restraint.”
Vivian clawed at the bracelet.
“You said we would reclaim everything.”
“I said what you needed to hear.”
Elena searched the vault walls.
“There has to be another exit.”
Rafael’s recording continued.
“Victor believes blood makes people loyal. He is wrong. Fear makes people predictable, but never loyal.”
Elena looked beneath the steel desk.
A small red lever was hidden near the floor.
She pulled it.
A narrow panel opened behind the shelves.
Alejandro dragged Vivian toward it.
Victor raised a small pistol.
“Leave her.”
Alejandro faced him.
“You took my wife. You corrupted my father’s work. You used your daughter to destroy my family.”
Victor’s hand remained steady.
“I preserved an empire you were too sentimental to control.”
Elena moved silently behind him.
She lifted a metal archive box and struck his injured shoulder.
Victor cried out.
The gun fell.
Alejandro knocked him to the floor.
Vivian’s bracelet continued tightening.
Elena grabbed a heavy paper cutter from the desk.
“Hold her arm still.”
Alejandro pinned Vivian’s wrist against the floor.
Elena forced the blade beneath the bracelet.
“If I cut it, will it trigger anything?”
Vivian’s face was turning red.
“I don’t know.”
Alejandro looked at her.
“You built it.”
“My father changed the design.”
Victor laughed weakly.
“The moment it loses contact, the chapel charges activate.”
Alejandro stared at the bracelet.
Elena noticed a small wire running beneath its inner plate.
“Not if we maintain the circuit.”
She removed her wedding ring from the evidence bag Alejandro carried.
The ring had been inside the safe for three years.
She slid its metal band beneath the bracelet contacts.
Alejandro understood.
“The ring bridges the current.”
Elena cut the strap.
The bracelet came away.
The light remained green.
Vivian collapsed, gasping.
For one second, Elena held her own wedding ring against the device keeping everyone alive.
Alejandro looked at her.
“You saved her.”
Elena’s voice was cold.
“I saved the people upstairs.”
They entered the hidden passage.
Victor tried to follow.
Alejandro blocked him.
“You’re coming with us.”
Victor smiled.
“No, I’m not.”
He reached into his pocket.
A second detonator.
Elena’s eyes widened.
Victor pressed it.
A deep explosion shook the underground chamber.
The ceiling cracked.
Dust and stone rained down.
The hidden tunnel began collapsing.
Alejandro pushed Elena and Vivian forward.
May you like
Behind them, the archive disappeared beneath falling stone.
And Victor Sanz vanished with it.
