Chapter 4 - JÚLIA’S LETTER
I stopped reading.
The room around me blurred.
Lorenzo whispered, “Give me that.”
I looked up.
“No.”
“Júlia was unstable.”
“Funny. You said she was a thief.”
“She was both.”
Tomás flinched.
I folded the letter against my chest.
“You don’t get to talk about his mother.”
Lorenzo glanced at the guests.
“People are watching.”
“Good.”
His voice dropped.
“You’re going to destroy everything.”
That line would become his favorite defense.
Everything.
The foundation.
The company.
Our reputation.
Our marriage.
Anything except the child standing five feet away.
I took Eduardo and Tomás into a private conference room.
The hotel doctor joined us.
Two security guards remained outside.
Sergio was being held in another room.
Lorenzo tried to follow.
I locked the door.
The doctor examined Tomás in silence.
Then his face changed.
“How long has your wrist hurt?”
Tomás looked at the floor.
“A while.”
“How long?”
“Maybe six weeks.”
The doctor gently rotated his arm.
Tomás sucked in a breath.
“Was it injured?”
“Sergio pushed me.”
“Against what?”
“A wall.”
Eduardo started crying.
Tomás looked embarrassed.
“Don’t.”
“Don’t what?”
“Cry.”
“Why?”
“It makes things worse.”
The room went silent.
The doctor looked at me.
“The wrist was likely fractured. It healed badly.”
I sat down.
He continued.
“Several bruises are older than the others. He’s dehydrated. Underweight too.”
“How underweight?”
“Enough that I want him at the hospital tonight.”
Tomás immediately panicked.
“No.”
“You need medical care.”
“No hospitals.”
“Why?”
“Sergio said hospitals ask questions.”
I closed my eyes.
Of course they did.
That was the point.
I opened Júlia’s letter again.
She wrote that she had discovered money disappearing from the foundation.
Small amounts at first.
Then larger transfers.
Donations meant for foster children and emergency housing were routed through companies controlled by Lorenzo and Sergio.
Júlia copied records.
She planned to take them to an attorney.
Then Lorenzo discovered what she had done.
According to the letter, he threatened to take Tomás away.
Júlia kept investigating anyway.
The final paragraph was worse.
Lorenzo knows I’m meeting Attorney Daniel Mercer on Thursday. If I do not reach him, ask why. Sergio has been following me. I am afraid, but I cannot let them keep stealing from children who have nothing.
The letter ended there.
I remembered the accident.
Thursday night.
Heavy rain.
Júlia’s car went through a guardrail.
Police called it driver error.
Lorenzo told me she had been running away because we were about to expose her theft.
I believed him.
I hated myself for that now.
Someone knocked hard on the door.
“Beatriz.”
Lorenzo.
I didn’t answer.
He knocked again.
“This has gone far enough.”
Tomás went completely still.
Then he whispered something.
“What?”
He pointed toward the letter.
“There’s more.”
“Where?”
“My mom said the paper wasn’t the real proof.”
I stared at him.
“Then what is?”
May you like
Tomás looked toward the hallway where Sergio was being held.
“The proof is in Sergio’s house.”
