Chapter 10 - THE NIGHT THE MASK CAME OFF
Beatriz stopped breathing.
I ended the call.
Then we moved.
Spanish police had already been notified through Gabriel after the digital fraud attempts were documented.
I did not enter first.
That mattered.
I had spent enough of my life believing power meant walking through doors before everyone else.
That night, power meant letting professionals do their jobs.
Officers entered through the front.
Mateo tried to leave through the kitchen.
He was stopped near the pool.
Carlos Vega remained in the study with his hands visible.
Victor Álvarez immediately demanded an attorney.
Beatriz ran upstairs.
I followed only after an officer cleared the hallway.
She was in our bedroom stuffing clothing into a suitcase.
“You lied to me.”
she said.
I almost laughed.
“That is what you want to discuss?”
“You set me up.”
“No.”
“You set yourself up.”
She turned.
For the first time, elegance disappeared completely.
“You think Isabella is innocent?”
My expression hardened.
“Be very careful.”
“She stole my phone.”
“She watched me.”
“She went through my things.”
“She is a child.”
“She knew exactly what she was doing.”
“Yes.”
“She was trying to survive you.”
Beatriz threw a dress into the suitcase.
“You left me here with her.”
I stared.
“I left you with my daughter because you were my wife.”
“You wanted me to become her mother overnight.”
“It had been two years.”
“She never wanted me.”
“She wanted Elena.”
There it was.
The dead woman Beatriz could never compete with.
My first wife.
Isabella’s mother.
A woman who had never been Beatriz’s enemy because she had been gone before they met.
But Beatriz had fought her anyway.
Through photographs.
Memories.
A child.
“You punished Isabella because she missed her mother.”
I said.
“I tried.”
Beatriz’s voice cracked.
“I tried to love her.”
“No.”
“You tried to make her stop loving Elena.”
“That is not the same thing.”
She stared at me.
Then her face hardened again.
“You loved Elena more than you ever loved me.”
“This is not about Elena.”
“It always was.”
She pointed toward the hallway.
“That girl made sure she was always in the room.”
I suddenly understood something.
Beatriz had not become cruel in three months.
The cruelty had simply become visible when I left.
My absence removed the witness.
Police entered the bedroom.
An officer informed Beatriz that she was being questioned regarding financial fraud, document forgery, and suspected child mistreatment.
She looked at me.
“You’re going to let them take your wife?”
I thought of Isabella kneeling in garbage.
“Yes.”
May you like
I said.
“I am.”
