Chapter 5 - Helena’s Second Prisoner
The rehabilitation center was called Lakehaven.
Expensive.
Private.
No public patient directory.
Matteo’s attorneys obtained emergency access.
We found Lucia DeLuca under another name.
Lauren Diaz.
Age fifty-eight.
She had lived there for seventeen years.
Not as a patient recovering from an accident.
As a woman diagnosed with severe cognitive impairment.
Except her records were inconsistent.
Different medications.
Different signatures.
Different doctors.
One constant.
Dr. Marianne Cole.
I was still hospitalized, so Matteo went.
Gabriel too.
I watched through secure video.
They entered Room 214.
An elderly woman sat beside the window knitting.
Matteo stopped.
For the first time, I saw him cry.
“Lucia.”
She looked up.
Nothing.
Then Gabriel stepped forward.
Her hands froze.
“Gabriel?”
He collapsed beside her.
My mother remembered him.
Not Matteo.
Not me.
Then Gabriel showed her my photograph.
She touched the screen.
“Elena.”
My heart shattered.
She remembered.
Matteo asked:
“Who kept you here?”
Lucia began shaking.
“Helena.”
That one name.
Then:
“She said my daughter was dead.”
I covered my mouth.
For twenty-two years, my mother believed I died in the crash.
For twenty-two years, I believed she did.
Helena had buried us alive in separate lives.
Lucia described what happened.
After the crash, Dr. Cole stabilized her.
Helena arrived.
She offered Lucia a choice.
Sign away her trust interests and leave Chicago forever—
or Gabriel and six-year-old Elena would die.
Lucia signed.
Then Helena drugged her anyway.
The forged cognitive diagnosis came later.
Why keep her alive?
Because the trust required Lucia’s biological confirmation for certain transfers.
Helena periodically used her fingerprints and signatures.
My mother had become a living key.
I felt physically sick.
Then Matteo found something inside Lakehaven’s records.
A recent authorization.
Transfer scheduled tomorrow.
Destination:
Serrano Family Medical Estate, Wisconsin.
Helena planned moving Lucia.
Probably because our confrontation exposed too much.
Police arrested Dr. Cole before she could leave the state.
Helena disappeared.
Raul remained at home under guard.
Victor was still in custody.
Nora started cooperating.
Families collapse quickly once everyone realizes loyalty won’t save them.
Then Nora revealed something unexpected.
“She wasn’t filming for fun.”
I stared.
“What?”
Her lawyer had arranged an interview.
Nora cried almost constantly.
I remained unmoved.
“Why record me?”
“Mom made me.”
“Why?”
“She said Victor needed proof you were unstable.”
“What?”
Helena wanted videos of me crying.
Collapsing.
Defending myself.
Anything edited into a narrative of emotional instability.
Why?
Custody.
Not of my current baby.
Of the trust.
If I was deemed incompetent after childbirth, Victor could become guardian of my assets.
Nora started crying harder.
“I didn’t know he’d go that far.”
“You laughed.”
She looked down.
“I was afraid if I stopped, Mom would turn on me.”
“Did she?”
Nora’s silence became strange.
Then she rolled up her sleeve.
Old scars.
Non-graphic.
My anger shifted.
Not forgiveness.
Understanding.
Helena had controlled everyone.
Victor.
Nora.
Raul.
Maybe even Dr. Cole.
But choices still mattered.
Nora made bad ones.
Then she gave me something.
A cloud password.
“Mom had me upload every video to a hidden account.”
We opened it.
Hundreds of clips.
Family dinners.
Arguments.
Private meetings.
Then one folder:
E.
Inside was a video from seven months earlier.
Before my pregnancy was public.
Helena speaking with someone off camera.
“You guarantee the embryo is viable?”
My skin turned cold.
Embryo?
Another voice answered:
“Yes.”
Male.
Unknown.
Helena continued:
“And Elena will never know?”
“She already believes conception was natural.”
I stopped breathing.
My baby.
My pregnancy.
The man said:
“By the time she learns otherwise, it won’t matter.”
Then he stepped into frame.
May you like
Gabriel.
My father.
