Chapter 8: Sofia’s Bargain

Sofia Rivera contacted Mariana the next morning.

She asked to meet inside a church.

No police.

No recording devices.

Mariana agreed to the location, but not the conditions.

Beckett waited outside.

Priya monitored the microphone hidden beneath Mariana’s collar.

Sofia sat in the last pew.

She wore dark glasses and a scarf around her hair.

“You look like your grandmother,” she said when Mariana approached.

“Where is Lucia?”

“I don’t know.”

“You’re her mother.”

“I haven’t seen her in three weeks.”

“You were in my father’s office before he tried to kill us.”

Sofia’s shoulders tightened.

“I thought he intended to frighten you.”

“He said I wouldn’t survive.”

“I believed he was speaking metaphorically.”

Mariana almost laughed.

“The Salcedos have been using that excuse for years. Everyone hears the threat. No one admits what it means.”

Sofia removed her glasses.

She looked exhausted.

“Rodrigo controlled Lucia from the day she was born. He paid for everything. Her education. Her home. Her medical care.”

“And in return?”

“She signed documents. Opened accounts. Carried messages.”

“She helped him steal.”

“She was a child when it started.”

“So was I when my family taught me silence.”

Sofia looked toward the altar.

“Rodrigo promised to acknowledge her publicly one day.”

“He never planned to.”

“I know that now.”

Mariana sat beside her.

“What happened to Lucia?”

“She discovered the archive was being moved. Rodrigo planned to destroy it after your death.”

“Why didn’t he?”

“Because the arrests came first.”

“Where is the archive key?”

Sofia hesitated.

“Lucia has it.”

“Then why is Rodrigo looking for her?”

“Because the archive contains evidence of more than financial crimes.”

“What else?”

Sofia lowered her voice.

“Twenty years ago, a journalist named Daniel Cortez investigated Rodrigo’s first major development project. He disappeared before publishing.”

Mariana remembered the story.

Cortez’s abandoned car had been found near the border.

Police claimed he fled the country.

“He didn’t run,” Sofia said.

“What did my father do?”

“I never saw it. But I heard Rodrigo tell the police commissioner that Cortez would never cause another problem.”

Mariana felt the air leave the room.

The conspiracy was older and darker than she had imagined.

Sofia reached into her coat and removed a small silver key.

“Lucia mailed this to me.”

“Why?”

“She said if anything happened to her, I should give it to you.”

Mariana took the key.

A shadow moved near the church entrance.

Sofia saw it first.

Her face went pale.

“He found me.”

A man in a dark coat turned and ran.

Beckett chased him into the street.

Agents caught him two blocks away.

He was a former Salcedo security officer.

In his pocket was a photograph of Sofia entering the church.

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