CHAPTER 9 The Man Who Opened the Door Sofía stared at Octavio.
Mateo cried in his arms.
Valeria saw the conflict in her face.
A mother’s terror.
A hostage’s desperation.
A woman being offered the one thing she wanted at the price of becoming the monster her enemies needed her to be.
“Give me my baby,” Sofía whispered.
Octavio adjusted Mateo against his chest.
“After.”
Sebastián moved between Valeria and the gun.
“You’ll have to shoot me first.”
Octavio laughed.
“You still think sacrifice makes you brave.”
“How did you get free?”
“You should ask the officer who accepted two hundred thousand dollars.”
One of the officers near the chapel entrance lowered his weapon.
Everyone turned toward him.
That second of distraction was enough.
Sofía lunged.
She grabbed Mateo from Octavio’s arms and dropped the gun.
Natalia ran forward.
Octavio pulled a second weapon from his jacket.
A shot cracked through the chapel.
Candles fell.
Glass shattered.
Sebastián hit the floor with Valeria beneath him.
When she looked up, Octavio was gone.
The corrupt officer had disappeared with him.
Sofía knelt near the altar, clutching Mateo and sobbing.
Natalia stood several feet away.
She wanted to take the child.
But she stopped herself.
“He knows your heartbeat,” Natalia said quietly.
Sofía looked at her.
“What?”
“He stopped crying when you held him.”
Sofía pressed her face against Mateo’s head.
The police arrested her anyway.
She had kidnapped Nicolás.
She had entered the hospital under false credentials.
She had threatened Valeria with a firearm.
But before they placed her in the patrol car, she gave Valeria a key.
“Locker 317 at the central bus station.”
“What’s inside?”
“Everything Octavio made me steal.”
Sebastián carried Nicolás out of the chapel.
For the first time since his birth, Valeria held her son without someone trying to take him away.
He was warm.
Smaller than she imagined.
His tiny fingers closed around hers.
She cried silently.
Sebastián placed one hand against the baby’s back.
For several seconds, they were simply parents.
Then Valeria looked at him.
“You hesitated twice.”
He knew what she meant.
The paternity test.
The revelation about her first pregnancy.
“I’m sorry.”
“That doesn’t change it.”
“I was shocked.”
“So was I.”
“I still chose you.”
“After looking at me like I might be lying.”
His face tightened.
“I am trying to understand ten impossible things at once.”
“And I am trying to survive them.”
He took a step back.
The distance between them was small.
It felt enormous.
At the bus station, the locker contained three flash drives, a stack of passports, and a black notebook.
The notebook listed payments to judges, doctors, nurses, police officers, adoption agencies, and journalists.
Some names belonged to people currently in office.
Others belonged to respected charities.
One name appeared repeatedly.
Elena Serrano.
Valeria’s mother.
Payments had begun fifteen years earlier and continued every year.
The most recent transfer had been made only three days before Valeria entered labor.
Valeria stared at the page.
“My mother is dead.”
Natalia looked at her.
“Are you sure?”
Valeria had attended the funeral six years earlier.
She had identified the body after a house fire.
The face was badly damaged.
The identification came from dental records.
Records provided by a clinic connected to Rebeca.
Sebastián closed the notebook.
“We find out who received the money.”
They returned to the hospital under federal protection.
Mateo was placed in temporary state care while Sofía’s claim was investigated.
Natalia sat outside the nursery for hours.
She did not ask to take him.
She only watched.
Near midnight, the laboratory completed the DNA test.
Mateo was Octavio’s biological son.
Sofía was his biological mother.
The infant found in Nicolás’s place had not been part of a random switch.
He was a planned Alcázar heir.
A backup.
A child created to preserve the bloodline if Sebastián failed.
Rebeca denied knowing Octavio planned to use Mateo in the exchange.
Octavio remained missing.
The corrupt officer was found unconscious beside an abandoned vehicle.
He claimed Octavio had forced him to help.
Nobody believed him.
At two in the morning, Valeria received a call from an unknown number.
She answered without speaking.
A woman’s voice said, “You should not have opened that locker.”
Valeria felt the room tilt.
She knew the voice.
It had comforted her after nightmares.
It had taught her how to braid her hair.
It had told her that her first baby was dead.
“Mom?”
Silence.
Then Elena Serrano whispered, “If you want Emilia to stay alive, stop looking for me.”
The call ended.
Valeria stood frozen beside Nicolás’s crib.
A message appeared on her phone.
It contained a photograph taken minutes earlier.
A teenage girl sat tied to a chair.
Dark hair.
Serious eyes.
The same girl from the photograph in Unit Seven.
Emilia.
May you like
Valeria’s first daughter.
Behind her stood Octavio.
