Felipe confronted him in a parking garage.
“You know this stinks,” Felipe said. “You either go down with him or help bury him.”
Javier handed over emails, transfers… and damning voice notes of Elijah dictating incriminating plans as casually as grocery lists.
With that, the plan crystallized.
The night before the engagement party—Elías distracted, guards watching football, and me strong enough to stand—we would escape.
CHAPTER 4 — THE ESCAPE
Storm clouds ripped across the Madrid mountains. Thunder. Rain. Perfect cover.
At 2:00 a.m., the lights flickered out. Miriam had triggered a fa:ke circuit failure.
She slipped into my room with a wheelchair and an oversized nurse uniform.
“It’s time.”
My legs shook as she lifted me. The uniform strained over my belly.
We slipped down the corridor, its emergency lights casting everything in red.
We reached the elevator. The doors slid open.
Dr. Valladares was inside.
His eyes narrowed. “Where are you taking patient 405?”
He stepped forward. “Answer me. Security!”
No time to think.
Desperation fueled me—I shoved myself upright and lurched into him. He stumbled, shocked that his “vegetable” could move.
Miriam whipped a syringe from her pocket and jabbed it into his thigh.
He gasped. Collapsed.
We dragged him into a cleaning closet and slammed the door.
We rode the elevator down.
A private ambulance waited in the basement. Felipe behind the wheel. My mother beside him.
When the doors opened and my mother saw me—alive, pregnant—she broke into sobs.
“My girl… my brave, brave girl.”
They helped me inside. The ambulance sped into the stormy night.
“Hospital? Police?” Felipe asked.
“No,” I said, touching my belly. “He’ll twist everything. He’ll claim I’m unstable. He’ll bury the truth in court.”
“So what do we do?” my mother asked.
“Tomorrow is his engagement party, right?”
“At Finca El Paraíso,” Beatriz spat. “He invited half of Madrid.”
Perfect.
