BOOK 2
PART 31: THE MESSAGE FROM THE DEAD
Three months passed.
For the first time in years, life felt normal.
Patricia was in prison.
Victoria was awaiting trial.
The company was stable.
Gabriel was rebuilding his life.
And Julian was finally smiling again.
I should have been happy.
Instead, I felt restless.
Maybe because peace felt unfamiliar.
Or maybe because some part of me knew the story wasn’t truly over.
The call came on a rainy Tuesday.
Mr. Morris sounded shaken.
“Mrs. Elena…”
“What happened?”
“I think you should come to the office.”
His voice worried me.
By the time Julian and I arrived, everyone looked pale.
Nobody spoke.
Nobody moved.
A laptop sat on the conference table.
Its screen displayed a bank transfer.
A transfer made twelve hours earlier.
The authorization code belonged to only one person.
Ernesto.
Julian frowned.
“That’s impossible.”
“I know,” Mr. Morris replied.
“Because Ernesto has been dead for six years.”
The room fell silent.
Then another discovery appeared.
The money hadn’t gone to a criminal account.
It had gone somewhere else.
A private account in Switzerland.
The account holder’s name made my knees weaken.
ERNESTO MARTINEZ.
For a moment, nobody breathed.
Then the screen refreshed.
A new message appeared.
Just four words.
HELLO, ELENA.
I’M ALIVE.
PART 32: THE VOICE
Nobody spoke.
The message remained on the screen.
HELLO, ELENA.
I’M ALIVE.
Julian looked ready to faint.
“No.”
Mr. Morris replayed the security logs.
The message had been uploaded through a secure channel.
Impossible to fake.
Impossible to trace.
Then the phone rang.
The office landline.
A number appeared.
International.
Switzerland.
Nobody wanted to answer.
Finally, I picked up.
“Hello?”
Silence.
Then breathing.
Slow.
Steady.
Familiar.
My heart stopped.
Because I knew that breathing.
After thirty-seven years of marriage, I would recognize it anywhere.
Then a voice spoke.
Softly.
Carefully.
As if afraid I would hang up.
“Elena.”
The phone slipped from my fingers.
Julian caught it.
His face had gone white.
Because he recognized the voice too.
It sounded exactly like Ernesto.
Exactly.
The call ended.
And for the first time since Ernesto’s funeral, I wondered whether we had buried the wrong man.
PART 33: THE EMPTY GRAVE
The next morning we went to the cemetery.
I didn’t tell anyone.
Not even Gabriel.
Something felt wrong.
The grave looked normal.
Fresh flowers.
Clean stone.
Nothing unusual.
Then Julian noticed something.
A scratch near the base.
A recent scratch.
Someone had moved the stone.
Recently.
Very recently.
The cemetery manager was furious when we demanded records.
But eventually he gave them to us.
Three weeks earlier, someone had accessed Ernesto’s burial site.
Legally.
With signed authorization.
The signature froze my blood.
ERNESTO MARTINEZ.
Julian stared at it.
“No.”
The manager handed us surveillance footage.
A man in a dark coat entered the cemetery after midnight.
The camera never captured his face.
But it captured something else.
His walk.
Slow.
Steady.
Familiar.
I grabbed Julian’s arm.
Because I had seen that walk for decades.
It was Ernesto’s.
And according to every record in existence…
That should have been impossible.
PART 34: THE WATCH
I couldn’t sleep.
Every time I closed my eyes, I heard Ernesto’s voice.
“Elena.”
Six years.
Six years of grief.
Six years of believing I had buried my husband.
And now a phone call was destroying everything.
The next morning, another package arrived.
No return address.
No fingerprints.
Inside was a small wooden box.
My hands trembled as I opened it.
A watch lay inside.
Old.
Silver.
Scratched.
My breath caught.
It was Ernesto’s watch.
The one I had given him on our tenth anniversary.
The one he wore every day.
The one buried with him.
Julian stared at it.
“Mom…”
I turned the watch over.
An engraving covered the back.
Forever Yours, Elena.
There was no mistake.
This was Ernesto’s watch.
But something else was inside the box.
A folded note.
Three words.
LOOK INSIDE IT.
Mr. Morris carefully opened the watch casing.
Hidden inside was a tiny memory card.
And whatever was on it had been hidden for years.
PART 35: THE SAFE HOUSE
The memory card contained only one video.
The image was blurry.
Dark.
Shaking.
As if recorded in secret.
Then a familiar face appeared.
Ernesto.
Older than the last video.
Alive.
Very much alive.
Julian grabbed the edge of the table.
“That’s impossible.”
Ernesto looked directly into the camera.
“If you’re watching this, then I finally had no choice.”
My heart pounded.
“No choice?”
“I know you hate me.”
His voice sounded tired.
Broken.
“I would hate me too.”
The room became silent.
Then Ernesto revealed something unbelievable.
The night he supposedly died, someone warned him.
Someone inside the conspiracy.
Someone who told him that Elena and Julian would be murdered if he stayed.
So he disappeared.
Not to save himself.
To save us.
Julian shook his head.
“No.”
But Ernesto wasn’t finished.
“There is a safe house.”
The screen switched to a photograph.
A small cabin beside a lake.
Then coordinates appeared.
Along with one final message.
DO NOT GO ALONE.
The video ended.
And for the first time, I wondered if my husband had spent six years hiding from something far worse than Victoria.
PART 36: THE CABIN
The cabin sat deep in the mountains.
Far from roads.
Far from people.
Far from civilization.
Exactly the kind of place someone would hide.
Julian wanted to bring police.
Mr. Morris wanted surveillance first.
But I wanted answers.
We arrived just before sunset.
The cabin looked abandoned.
Dust covered the porch.
Broken leaves covered the steps.
No signs of life.
Then Julian noticed something.
Fresh tire tracks.
Recent.
Very recent.
Someone had been there.
The front door opened easily.
Inside, the furniture remained untouched.
A bed.
A table.
A fireplace.
And dozens of photographs.
Photographs of us.
Julian through the years.
Gabriel.
Sofia.
Me.
Even Ernesto’s grave.
Someone had been watching us.
For years.
Then I found a notebook.
The final entry had been written only three days earlier.
My hands shook as I read it.
If they find this cabin, then they found me.
The notebook was signed:
Ernesto.
Suddenly a floorboard creaked upstairs.
Everyone froze.
We weren’t alone.
Slow footsteps echoed above us.
One step.
Then another.
Then another.
Julian slowly looked toward the staircase.
And a shadow appeared at the top………
