Chapter 8: The Sister Who Was Never a Sister
Alejandro watched the final seconds of the video without moving.
Sofia handed one of the newborn boys to Teresa.
Then the recording cut to black.
Elena remained beside him, silent.
The name hung between them.
Vivian.
Not Sofia’s sister.
Sofia’s daughter.
Alejandro’s older sister.
The woman who had imprisoned Elena.
The woman who had helped steal Lucía.
The woman who had called him nephew while standing on the staircase.
“She lied about everything,” Alejandro said.
Elena shook her head.
“Not everything.”
He looked at her.
“She is a Moretti by blood.”
“But not Sofia’s sister.”
“No.”
“Why would Sofia’s parents raise Vivian as their daughter?”
“To hide the birth.”
“From whom?”
Elena closed the laptop.
“Isabella.”
Alejandro’s face tightened.
“That makes no sense. Isabella clearly knew.”
“She may not have known at first.”
A memory moved across Elena’s expression.
“When Vivian was angry, she used to say Isabella stole her childhood.”
Alejandro gave a humorless laugh.
“She stole ours too.”
He picked up the tablet and called the security chief.
“Change of plan.”
“Sir?”
“Bring Vivian back alive.”
There was a pause.
“That was already the intention.”
“No matter what happens, she survives.”
Elena studied him.
“You want answers.”
“I want the truth from someone who can no longer hide behind a false identity.”
They left the courtyard room minutes later.
The mansion had become a command center.
Security personnel moved through hallways carrying equipment.
Doors were sealed.
Servers were copied.
Every employee was questioned and relocated to a safe wing.
For years, the Castillo estate had represented power.
Now it looked like a crime scene.
Alejandro stopped in the entrance hall.
The overturned bucket still lay on the marble.
Water had spread into a thin reflective pool.
Elena stared at it.
Alejandro noticed.
“We can leave through another door.”
“No.”
She walked toward the bucket.
Slowly.
Her bare feet touched the cold water.
For a moment, she stood exactly where he had first seen her.
Then she bent and lifted the bucket upright.
Alejandro watched.
Elena placed it beside the wall.
“They always made me clean up before I was allowed to sleep,” she said.
His chest tightened.
She straightened.
“Tonight, they can clean up after themselves.”
Then she walked toward the front doors.
Alejandro followed.
Outside, the storm had weakened but not stopped.
A dark convoy waited beneath the portico.
Elena hesitated at the first vehicle.
The driver opened the rear door.
She stared inside.
Alejandro understood.
The last car she had entered before disappearing had become a prison.
“I’ll drive,” he said.
She looked at him.
“No guards in the vehicle?”
“Only us.”
He took the keys.
They left the mansion with two security vehicles following at a distance.
For the first ten minutes, neither spoke.
Elena watched the road.
Alejandro kept both hands visible on the steering wheel.
Finally, she said, “You still drive too fast.”
He almost smiled.
Almost.
“You used to complain that I drove too slowly.”
“That was before you bought the sports car.”
“You hated that car.”
“I hated that you loved it more than furniture.”
“It was more comfortable than our furniture.”
Elena looked at him.
For one second, the woman he remembered appeared.
Not the frightened servant.
Not the prisoner.
His wife.
Then the moment vanished.
But it had existed.
Alejandro held onto it.
His phone rang through the dashboard.
Mateo.
Alejandro answered.
“Status?”
“Your personal holdings are being moved into a legal protection structure.”
“I told you to liquidate them.”
“I know.”
“Then why are you moving them?”
“Because someone has already filed an injunction to stop the sale.”
Alejandro’s jaw tightened.
“Who?”
“Sebastian Vale.”
Elena looked over.
“On what grounds?”
Mateo exhaled.
“He claims you are mentally unfit and acting under coercion.”
Alejandro gave a cold laugh.
“He moved quickly.”
“There’s more. The Castillo board has called an emergency meeting in forty minutes.”
“Without me?”
“They intend to suspend your authority.”
“Who called it?”
Mateo hesitated.
“Your mother.”
Alejandro looked at the road.
“Isabella?”
“A live video appeared on the board’s private system ten minutes ago.”
“So they know she’s alive.”
“Yes.”
“And they’re following her orders.”
“Not all of them. But enough.”
Alejandro’s voice turned calm.
“Send every board member the recording of Isabella ordering Elena’s death.”
“That recording alone may not prove—”
“Then send the cellar footage.”
Elena looked at him.
The footage would expose everything.
Her imprisonment.
Her condition.
Her pain.
Alejandro noticed her expression.
He covered the microphone.
“Only with your permission.”
Elena stared through the windshield.
“They’ll see me in that room.”
“Yes.”
“They’ll know what happened.”
“Yes.”
She was silent for several seconds.
Then she looked at him.
“Show them.”
Alejandro returned to the call.
“Send it all.”
Mateo said quietly, “Understood.”
“And Mateo?”
“Yes?”
“Find out which board members already knew.”
The call ended.
They continued toward Toledo.
Thirty kilometers later, a security vehicle flashed its lights behind them.
Alejandro answered the convoy channel.
“Report.”
“We have movement at the airfield,” the security chief said. “The helicopter landed. Vivian and Romero were transferred to two separate vehicles.”
“And Rosa?”
“Still in the helicopter.”
Elena looked at Alejandro.
“Why separate them?”
“To prevent them from coordinating.”
“Or because they’re going to kill Teresa.”
Alejandro turned the car onto a side road.
“I’m going to the airfield.”
“Elena, the monastery—”
“Lucía needs us. Teresa needs us too.”
He made a decision.
“Team One continues to the monastery. We take the airfield.”
The convoy split at the next intersection.
Alejandro’s vehicle followed an unmarked security SUV down a narrow industrial road.
The abandoned airfield appeared beyond rusted fencing.
Its runway glistened beneath the rain.
The helicopter sat near a crumbling hangar.
No guards were visible.
Too quiet.
Alejandro stopped fifty meters away.
He reached beneath the seat and removed a pistol.
Elena stared at it.
“Do you know how to use that?”
“Yes.”
“Have you ever shot anyone?”
“No.”
“Then don’t start tonight.”
He looked at her.
“They tried to kill you twice.”
“And they want you angry.”
“What do you suggest?”
“Think like Isabella.”
Alejandro lowered the weapon slightly.
“She expects us to rush in.”
“Yes.”
“So the helicopter is bait.”
Elena examined the hangar.
A small red light blinked near the roof.
“Camera.”
Alejandro followed her gaze.
Another light blinked beneath the helicopter’s landing gear.
“Explosive?” he asked.
“Maybe.”
He contacted the security chief.
“Thermal scan.”
The response came seconds later.
“Three heat signatures inside the hangar. One inside the helicopter.”
“Rosa.”
“Likely.”
“Any explosives?”
“Possible pressure device beneath the aircraft.”
Elena studied the building.
“There.”
She pointed toward a drainage tunnel beside the runway.
“River runoff.”
Alejandro understood.
The old river path Rosa had mentioned might connect not only to the monastery but to the airfield.
They left the vehicle and approached the drainage channel behind the cover of a concrete wall.
Security entered first.
The tunnel smelled of mud and fuel.
They moved for nearly two hundred meters before reaching a metal grate.
Beyond it, voices echoed inside the hangar.
Vivian.
“You cannot take her there.”
A man answered.
“You no longer give orders.”
Sebastian.
Alejandro went still.
Elena’s face hardened.
They moved closer.
Through the grate, they saw Vivian tied to a chair.
Dr. Romero stood nearby with his hands restrained.
Sebastian faced them in a dark coat.
He looked calm.
Almost bored.
Vivian glared at him.
“You told me Isabella would release Lucía.”
“She will.”
“When?”
“When Elena delivers the ledger.”
“And then?”
Sebastian smiled.
“Then there will be no reason to keep Elena alive.”
Alejandro’s hand tightened around the pistol.
Elena touched his arm.
Wait.
Inside the hangar, Romero spoke.
“You promised me immunity.”
Sebastian looked at him.
“I promised you an opportunity.”
“For what?”
“To correct your oldest mistake.”
Romero’s face went pale.
Sebastian opened a medical case.
Inside were two syringes.
“One for Vivian,” he said.
“And one for Elena.”
Vivian laughed bitterly.
“You think Isabella will let you inherit after this?”
“I do not need her permission.”
“You still don’t understand her.”
“No,” Sebastian said. “You never understood me.”
He leaned toward Vivian.
“For thirty years, you believed you were Sofia’s sister.”
Vivian froze.
Sebastian smiled.
“You were her daughter.”
Vivian stared at him.
The cruelty vanished from her face.
For once, she looked genuinely lost.
“That’s a lie.”
“I watched the video.”
“What video?”
“The one Elena hid.”
Vivian’s breathing changed.
Sebastian continued.
“Isabella raised you to hate Sofia because she feared what you would become if you knew the truth.”
Vivian shook her head.
“Sofia abandoned me.”
“No. Isabella took you.”
Vivian’s eyes filled with disbelief.
“She told me Sofia chose the twins.”
“She chose all three of us.”
Vivian looked away.
Sebastian’s voice softened.
“But Isabella only needed one angry child. So she made you believe you had been rejected.”
For the first time, Alejandro saw a crack in Vivian’s armor.
Not remorse.
Something older.
A wound hidden beneath decades of cruelty.
Sebastian lifted one syringe.
“It worked remarkably well.”
Vivian looked at him.
“What are you going to do?”
“End the family dispute.”
He inserted the needle into a vial.
Elena stepped back from the grate.
“We have to move.”
Alejandro nodded.
Security prepared to cut through the metal.
Then a phone rang inside the hangar.
Sebastian answered.
Isabella’s voice came through the speaker.
“Do you have Vivian?”
“Yes.”
“And Romero?”
“Yes.”
“Kill them both.”
Vivian’s face went white.
Sebastian smiled.
“As you wish.”
Alejandro raised the pistol.
Before security could breach the grate, another gunshot thundered inside the hangar.
Sebastian spun sideways.
The syringe flew from his hand.
Dr. Romero stood behind him, holding a small pistol he had taken from the medical case.
Sebastian collapsed to one knee.
Vivian stared.
Romero kept the weapon aimed.
“I have spent three years following orders,” he said.
His hand shook.
“Not tonight.”
Then the helicopter exploded.
The blast ripped through the hangar.
The metal grate tore open.
Alejandro threw himself over Elena as fire rolled across the runway.
The roof began collapsing.
May you like
Through smoke and debris, he heard Vivian screaming.
And somewhere inside the burning helicopter, Rosa was still trapped.
