Chapter 10
Chapter 10: The Warmest Home
Seeing her son deciding to throw away his marriage just to protect her, Doña Rosario panicked. She desperately reached out, gripping Gabriel's hand tightly, hot tears rolling down onto the back of his hand.
"Gabriel, my child! You can't!" she sobbed, begging him. "Don't do this because of me. Marriage is for a lifetime. I am just an old country woman, living day to day, sick today, gone tomorrow. Don't lose your home, lose your family over a useless old woman like me. I'm so sorry, I should never have come here..."
Gabriel knelt beside his mother's chair once again. He buried his face in her lap, inhaling the cheap but deeply familiar and warm scent of laundry soap that had nurtured him as he grew up. For the first time that night, the iron-willed billionaire of the corporate world wept aloud like a child.
He hugged her thin waist tightly, lifting his tear-streaked face to smile at her.
"Mom, please don't say that. No matter how big a house is, no matter if it's plated in gold or silver, if there is no love and respect, it is just an empty prison. You are my actual family. Mom, wherever you are, that is my warmest home."
That night, the lavish birthday party ended before midnight. There was no dancing, no cutting of the 5-tier cake. The guests left the Herrera mansion in reverent silence; no one discussed contracts or business projects. They took with them a story, a profound lesson about filial piety and the true price of humanity—a story that Madrid's elite would repeat with deep admiration for years to come.
Isabel and Patricia left the mansion that very night, packing their bags in absolute, crushing humiliation. The divorce proceedings were executed swiftly and decisively by Gabriel's lawyers the very next morning. Isabel left with nothing, carrying a permanent stain on her reputation that could never be washed away.
But the most important thing was not the departure of the fakes.
From that birthday night onward, Doña Rosario Herrera never had to eat alone in a cold kitchen or anywhere else ever again.
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For the rest of her life, whether it was a simple everyday family meal, or a grand banquet hosting world-class international business partners at the mansion, the most luxurious velvet chair at the very head of the table always, without exception, belonged to her. And Gabriel, the powerful billionaire, was always proudly pulling out that chair and serving food to his mother under the admiring eyes of everyone.
Because he understood that no glory in this world shines brighter than the happy smile of the mother who gave him life.
