Chapter 4 - The Truck
Lucy remembered fragments.
Rain.
Broken concrete.
Headlights.
Rafael Torres shouting.
Victor Hale dragging something.
Isabella crying.
Then Lucy herself waking inside a vehicle.
Dr. Carter warned everyone not to pressure her.
Memory after severe trauma could be fragmented and inaccurate.
Mariana listened.
Evidence first.
That would become her rule.
No more accepting stories simply because someone she loved told them confidently.
Alejandro contacted Detective Rachel Monroe, a retired homicide investigator he had secretly hired after receiving the photograph of Lucy.
Mariana exploded again.
“You already had an investigator?”
“Yes.”
“How many secrets are you planning to reveal today?”
Alejandro looked ashamed.
“Probably more than you deserve.”
Rachel Monroe arrived with records.
The construction site incident had been reported twenty years earlier.
Official version:
Elena Ruiz and Isabella Torres disappeared voluntarily after stealing financial documents and cash from Rafael Torres Construction.
Mariana stared.
“They made them criminals.”
Rachel nodded.
“No bodies. No prosecution.”
“Who filed the report?”
“Victor Hale.”
Of course.
Then another record.
A traffic camera caught Rafael’s company truck leaving the site at 1:43 a.m.
Driver impossible to identify.
But the truck entered a private salvage yard owned by one of Rafael’s associates.
It left forty minutes later.
Mariana felt sick.
“What was inside?”
Unknown.
The yard burned down six months later.
Convenient.
Lucy suddenly asked:
“What color was the truck?”
Rachel showed an archival photograph.
White cab.
Red company stripe.
Lucy began shaking.
“That one.”
Mariana sat beside her.
“What do you remember?”
“Metal walls.”
“A cargo compartment?”
Lucy nodded.
“Isabella was there.”
Alejandro gripped the back of a chair.
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
He closed his eyes.
“What did she say?”
Lucy began crying.
“She kept telling me not to sleep.”
Mariana’s heart broke.
“Why?”
“I was bleeding.”
Lucy touched the back of her skull.
“And then?”
“A man opened the door.”
“Rafael?”
Lucy shook her head.
“No.”
“Hale?”
“No.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
She looked at Alejandro.
“But he called your father ‘boss.’”
Alejandro frowned.
Rafael had employed dozens of men.
Then Lucy remembered something else.
“He had a ring.”
“What kind?”
“A black stone.”
Alejandro’s face changed.
Mariana noticed.
“You know it.”
Alejandro walked toward his office.
He returned holding an old family photograph.
Rafael stood beside three men at a company groundbreaking.
One wore a thick black onyx ring.
Mariana pointed.
“Him?”
Lucy stared.
Then screamed.
Dr. Carter moved quickly to calm her.
Alejandro identified the man.
“Samuel Ortiz.”
Mariana had heard the name.
Samuel was Alejandro’s godfather.
He had attended their wedding.
He had held baby nieces at Christmas.
He still sat on the board of Alejandro’s company.
Mariana whispered:
“He works for you.”
“He does.”
Rachel Monroe’s expression hardened.
“Then we don’t contact him.”
But Alejandro was already looking at his phone.
A new message had arrived.
From Samuel.
Beautiful reunion.
Mariana went cold.
Attached was a photograph taken through the mansion’s upstairs window.
Lucy sitting in the bathroom.
Someone outside the house was watching them.
Then another message:
Ask Elena what happened to Isabella after the truck stopped.
Alejandro’s face emptied.
May you like
Samuel knew Lucy was Elena.
And he knew she was remembering.
