Chapter 10 - THE SECRET MY FATHER BURIED
I didn’t move after Diego hung up.
The room was silent.
But inside my head, everything was screaming.
“Ask your father what really happened the night your mother died.”
Those words kept repeating.
Again.
Again.
Again.
I looked at my father.
And for the first time in my life…
I wondered if I truly knew him.
“Dad.”
He looked at me.
His eyes already told me he understood.
“You heard him.”
“Yes.”
A long silence followed.
Then I asked the question I had carried since I was a little girl.
“What happened that night?”
My father sat down.
The strongest man I knew suddenly looked exhausted.
“I never wanted you to know this.”
“Why?”
“Because you were six years old.”
“I’m not six anymore.”
My voice cracked.
“I deserve the truth.”
He closed his eyes.
Then he started talking.
“Your mother discovered Victor had been moving money out of the company.”
I listened carefully.
“She collected proof. She was going to report him.”
“Then what happened?”
“Your mother called me that night.”
My heart stopped.
“She told me she was scared.”
My father’s hands tightened.
“She said someone had been following her.”
“Who?”
He looked at me.
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“No.”
His voice became painful.
“When I arrived at the house, the car was already gone.”
I froze.
“What?”
“She wasn’t in the house.”
My father looked down.
“An hour later, we received the call.”
My breathing became shallow.
“The accident.”
“Yes.”
I stared at him.
“So you’re telling me Mom’s death might not have been an accident?”
“I’m telling you I never stopped wondering.”
I wiped my tears.
“All these years you carried this alone?”
“I thought I was protecting you.”
“No.”
My voice became sharper.
“You were protecting a secret.”
He didn’t argue.
Because he knew I was right.
Before anyone could say anything else, Rachel’s phone rang.
She answered.
Then her face changed.
“What?”
She listened.
“Are you sure?”
A pause.
Then she looked at us.
“We found the person who signed the marriage agreement.”
My father stood.
“Who?”
Rachel slowly lowered the phone.
“It’s someone none of us expected.”
My stomach tightened.
“Who?”
She looked at me.
“Your mother.”
The room went completely still.
I laughed once.
A confused, broken laugh.
“That’s impossible.”
Rachel shook her head.
“The signature is dated six months before she died.”
My father walked closer.
“Let me see.”
Rachel handed him the file.
He stared.
And all color disappeared from his face.
Because he recognized it.
Not the signature.
The handwriting.
“No…”
I looked at him.
“What?”
My father whispered:
“Your mother knew.”
“Knew what?”
He looked at me.
“That someone would come after you.”
A cold feeling moved through my body.
My mother had known.
She had predicted this.
She had tried to protect me.
May you like
And now, twenty years later…
Her warning had finally arrived.
