Chương 7
I nodded.
“She was exhausted.”
“She doesn’t sleep easily.”
I looked at her.
“Why?”
Isabella touched the edge of the blanket.
“Because every time she closes her eyes, she thinks she’ll wake up somewhere else.”
The answer stayed with me.
I knew what fear did to adults.
I knew what it did to businesses, governments, and people with power.
But watching a child carry it felt different.
“You said my father looked at security records.”
Isabella nodded.
“He was afraid someone inside his life was helping them.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because it’s true.”
Her frustration showed.
Not anger.
Exhaustion.
“Your father trusted very few people.”
“My father trusted Victor.”
She looked at me.
“I know.”
The room became still.
“How?”
“He told me.”
“When?”
“The night before he died.”
I felt my chest tighten.
“You were there.”
She nodded.
“Your father came to my home.”
“Why?”
“He thought I was connected to them.”
The answer surprised me.
“Were you?”
“Yes.”
She did not avoid it.
“I worked for a company that moved money for them.”
“And he knew?”
“He suspected.”
“Then why would he come to you?”
“Because he believed people trapped inside the system could help expose it.”
I looked at Sofia.
“You were trapped?”
Isabella gave a small, bitter smile.
“People think being involved means having power.”
She shook her head.
“Sometimes it just means you know enough to become afraid.”
That sounded too familiar.
“How did my father die?”
She looked at the ceiling.
“He left my house after midnight.”
“And?”
“He called me thirty minutes later.”
“What did he say?”
Her fingers tightened around the blanket.
“He said he finally understood who had betrayed him.”
“Who?”
She looked at me.
“He didn’t tell me.”
“Why?”
“Because he said if he was wrong, one person would die.”
She paused.
“And if he was right, many people would.”
I felt the old anger return.
Fifteen years of unanswered questions.
Fifteen years of people telling me to accept something I never believed.
“Then he was killed.”
Isabella looked away.
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“I know what I saw.”
“What did you see?”
Her voice became quiet.
“The next morning, I saw the news.”
“That’s all?”
“Yes.”
“Then why did you say he was killed?”
“Because before he left my house, he told me something.”
“What?”
She looked toward Sofia.
Then back at me.
“He said, ‘If anything happens to me, don’t let my son become the kind of man they want him to become.’”
I did not speak.
Because suddenly the question was not only who killed my father.
It was whether I had spent fifteen years becoming exactly what he feared.
A man who trusted power.
A man who controlled everything.
A man who built walls so high that nobody could reach him.
My phone vibrated.
Another message.
I opened it.
This time there was no photograph.
Only a location.
An address.
And three words.
Come alone, Ramon.
I stared at the screen.
Isabella saw my face.
“What did they send?”
I locked the phone.
“Nothing.”
She shook her head.
“Don’t lie.”
The words surprised me.
Not because they were rude.
Because they sounded like my father.
I looked at the address again.
It was a place I knew.
A place I had not visited since I was seventeen.
My old family home.
The one sold after my mother died.
The one where my father took his last breath.
Victor stepped into the room.
He saw the message in my hand.
His expression changed.
“Where is it?”
I looked at him.
“The house.”
His face went pale.
“Ramon.”
“What?”
“That house burned down three years after your father died.”
I looked back at the address.
The message showed a recent photograph attached.
The old house was standing.
And someone was waiting inside.
And someone was waiting inside.
For a few seconds, nobody spoke.
The message remained open on my phone.
A photograph of my childhood home.
A place that should have existed only in memory.
A place where my father had died.
A place that had supposedly burned to the ground years ago.
Victor looked at the screen again.
“Where did you get this?”
“Unknown number.”
He shook his head.
“That’s not possible.”
I looked at him.
“You’ve said that three times tonight.”
“Because three times tonight something impossible happened.”
The anger in his voice was not directed at me.
It was directed at himself.
That bothered me more.
Victor was rarely emotional.
He was the person who checked exits before entering rooms.
The person who noticed a missing button on someone’s jacket because it meant they had changed clothes too quickly.
Seeing him unsettled meant the situation was worse than I wanted to admit.
Elena stepped closer.
“You’re not going there.”
I looked at her.
“That wasn’t a suggestion.”
“No.”
She held my gaze.
“It was a warning.”
I almost smiled.
“Elena.”
“You have that look.”
“What look?”
“The one you get when you’ve already decided and are just waiting for everyone else to stop arguing.”
She knew me too well.
That was both comforting and irritating.
“I need answers.”
“You need to stay alive.”
“I can do both.”
She shook her head.
“That sentence is why people who care about you are tired.”
I looked away.
The comment landed because it was true.
I had always treated survival like a responsibility.
As if staying alive was the only thing that mattered.
I had forgotten that people around me carried the consequences of my choices.
Victor stepped forward.
“You’re not going alone.”
The message said alone.
Of course it did.
People who wanted control always wanted isolation first.
“No.”
Victor frowned.
“Ramon.”
“If they want me alone, there’s a reason.”
“Exactly.”
“Which means bringing everyone makes them change their plan.”
“That’s the point.”
I looked at him.
“You don’t understand.”
“No.”
His voice was quiet.
“I understand too well.”
The room went silent.
May you like
Victor looked at Isabella.
Then at Sofia.
