Chapter 5 - THE NAME ON THE PHONE
Rosa stayed with Isabella while I returned to the office.
I downloaded every security recording from the previous three months.
I also asked my security director to preserve the archive.
Nothing would be deleted.
Nothing would be altered.
Nothing would disappear.
Beatriz spent most of the morning upstairs.
At noon, I heard her speaking on the terrace.
Her voice was low.
I didn’t try to listen.
I didn’t need to.
The security system recorded exterior audio from the terrace microphone.
Beatriz had forgotten that.
I waited until she left.
Then I opened the live archive.
Her conversation appeared.
“You said he wouldn’t be home until September.”
A man answered through the speakerphone.
The voice was unfamiliar.
Beatriz paced.
“He saw Isabella.”
The man said something.
Beatriz snapped.
“Of course he saw the garbage.”
Another pause.
“No, I didn’t know he had remote cameras.”
My hand stopped over the keyboard.
The man spoke again.
Beatriz lowered her voice.
“If he checks the accounts, we have a problem.”
Accounts.
The conversation had just changed.
I increased the volume.
“We were supposed to have two more weeks,” she continued.
The man said something I couldn’t hear clearly.
Beatriz answered.
“The transfer isn’t finished.”
My pulse slowed.
That was always what happened when I entered business mode.
Anger disappeared.
Details became sharper.
Numbers mattered.
Timing mattered.
Words mattered.
Then the man said one sentence clearly enough for the microphone to capture.
“Lucas.”
Beatriz replied.
“Don’t say my name like I’m panicking, Lucas.”
I knew a Lucas.
Lucas Serrano.
Forty-two years old.
Financial consultant.
Former restructuring adviser.
And, until six months earlier, a contractor used by one of my holding companies.
I had personally removed him from a project after discovering undisclosed conflicts of interest.
Beatriz knew that.
I opened my corporate email.
Then I searched his name.
There were no recent messages.
I checked building access records.
Nothing.
Then I searched the villa gate log.
Three entries appeared.
Lucas Serrano.
April 11.
May 3.
June 19.
All while I was in Dubai.
Beatriz had never mentioned a single visit.
I stared at the screen.
The story was no longer only about what she had done to Isabella.
Something else had been happening inside my home.
May you like
Something involving money.
And Lucas Serrano.
