Chapter 5 - The Father I Was Told to ForgetFor a moment, I forgot how to breathe.
The garden.
The mansion.
The people watching.
Everything disappeared.
There was only one sentence repeating inside my head.
Your father is awake.
A man I had spent my entire life believing was gone.
A man whose face existed only in a few old photographs my mother kept hidden at the bottom of a locked drawer.
A man whose name was never spoken.
A man I had mourned without ever knowing if I was supposed to miss him.
I stared at my mother.
"He's alive?"
The question came out smaller than I expected.
My mother looked away.
And that hurt more than the answer.
Because if she had said yes immediately, maybe I could have understood.
But hesitation meant there was a story behind it.
A story she had been carrying alone.
"Mom."
My voice shook.
"Is he alive?"
She finally looked at me.
"Yes."
One word.
A word that changed twenty-eight years of my life.
Behind us, Carmela was silent.
That was almost more disturbing than her cruelty.
Because for the first time, she wasn't enjoying someone's pain.
She was thinking.
Calculating.
Mateo looked completely lost.
"Mariana..."
He looked at my mother.
"Who is your father?"
Nobody answered him.
My mother turned toward the bodyguards.
"We need to leave."
Carmela immediately stepped forward.
"Leaving now?"
My mother looked at her.
"Yes."
Carmela laughed.
"After causing this scene?"
My mother's expression didn't move.
"You caused the scene when you attacked my daughter."
The words landed heavily.
Carmela's face tightened.
"You think this is over?"
My mother didn't respond.
She simply looked at me.
And I knew something had changed.
The woman who arrived at that mansion ready to fight was suddenly protecting me from something much bigger.
"Mariana."
She touched my arm gently.
"We need to go."
I nodded.
But before I moved, I looked at Mateo.
I don't know what I expected.
An apology.
A confession.
A promise.
Anything.
He stood there between his family and me.
Again.
Always between.
"I'm sorry," he whispered.
The words came too late.
I stared at him.
"Are you?"
His eyes filled with shame.
"Yes."
I looked around the garden.
At the people who watched me fall.
At the people who laughed.
At the woman who almost destroyed my life.
Then back at him.
"You're sorry because my mother came."
His expression changed.
"That's not true."
"Isn't it?"
He opened his mouth.
Nothing came out.
Because we both knew the answer.
My mother placed a protective hand on my back.
"Come on."
We walked toward the driveway.
Nobody stopped us.
Not even Carmela.
That scared me.
Because I knew someone like her didn't surrender.
She waited.
And people who waited were usually more dangerous.
The ride away from the mansion was silent.
I sat in the back seat beside my mother.
The city passed outside the window, but I barely noticed it.
My mind was stuck on one thing.
My father.
Alive.
After all these years.
I watched my mother's reflection in the glass.
She looked older than she had that morning.
Not physically.
Something deeper.
Like a wall she had spent decades building had finally cracked.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
My voice broke the silence.
She didn't pretend not to understand.
"I wanted to."
"But you didn't."
"No."
"Why?"
She closed her eyes.
For a few seconds, she said nothing.
Then:
"Because I was afraid."
That answer surprised me.
My mother was never afraid.
Not the woman who raised me alone.
Not the woman who worked until midnight.
Not the woman who fought every battle life gave her.
"Afraid of what?"
She looked at me.
"Of losing you."
I frowned.
"How would telling me about my father make you lose me?"
Her hands tightened together.
"Because if you knew who he was, you would search for him."
I looked away.
Maybe she was right.
Maybe some part of me always wanted answers.
"But I deserved to know."
A tear slipped down her cheek.
"Yes."
The honesty hurt.
"I know."
The car became quiet again.
After a moment, she reached into her bag.
She pulled out a small envelope.
Old.
Worn.
The edges were damaged from years of being handled.
She placed it in my hands.
"I kept this for you."
I stared at it.
"What is it?"
"Something your father wrote before everything happened."
My fingers touched the envelope.
"Why didn't you give it to me?"
Her voice became quiet.
"Because I wasn't sure if it was a goodbye letter..."
She paused.
"Or a warning."
I looked at her.
"A warning?"
My mother nodded.
"Your father was not just a businessman, Mariana."
The way she said it made my stomach tighten.
"He was involved with powerful people."
"Powerful how?"
She looked out the window.
"The kind of people who don't like losing."
I swallowed.
"Was he dangerous?"
My mother looked back at me.
"No."
A pause.
"But the people around him were."
The car continued moving.
The envelope felt heavier in my hand.
I wanted to open it.
I wanted answers.
But another part of me was terrified.
Because sometimes the truth doesn't free you.
Sometimes it changes everything you thought you knew.
My mother seemed to read my thoughts.
"You don't have to read it today."
I looked down.
"I think I do."
She didn't argue.
She just nodded.
Two hours later, I sat in my mother's living room.
A place I hadn't visited in years.
It was smaller than the Villalobos mansion.
No marble floors.
No crystal decorations.
No expensive furniture.
But it felt like home.
The kind of home where nobody measured your worth by what you owned.
I held the envelope for ten minutes before opening it.
Finally, I broke the seal.
Inside was one piece of paper.
The handwriting was unfamiliar.
But the first line made my entire body freeze.
My dearest Mariana,
I stopped.
My father knew my name.
Of course he did.
But seeing it written by him felt impossible.
I continued reading.
If you are reading this, then your mother has finally decided that you are strong enough to know the truth.
I looked up.
My mother was sitting across from me.
She looked away.
I kept reading.
I need you to understand something first. I never left because I stopped loving you.
My vision blurred.
The words became harder to see.
The day I disappeared was the day I learned someone close to me had betrayed our family.
My heart started beating faster.
Someone close.
I trusted a person who knew everything about us. Someone who had access to our home, our finances, and our lives.
I swallowed.
If anything happens to me, protect Mariana from the Villalobos family.
The room went cold.
I stopped reading.
Slowly.
Very slowly.
I looked at my mother.
She already knew.
"Villalobos."
The word barely left my mouth.
Her face changed.
"Mom..."
She stood immediately.
"Mariana."
"Why did he write their name?"
She didn't answer.
"Why did my father warn me about Mateo's family?"
My mother walked toward me.
"Because I was hoping you would never have to find out."
My hands shook as I looked back at the letter.
There was one final sentence at the bottom.
One sentence I hadn't noticed before.
The ink looked darker there.
Like it had been written later.
Like it had been added in a hurry.
The person who destroyed our family is still protecting the Villalobos name.
I stopped breathing.
Because suddenly everything connected.
Carmela's fear.
My mother's silence.
My father's warning.
And the one question I couldn't escape.
If Mateo's family had been involved in my father's disappearance...
Why had Mateo married me?
My phone suddenly rang.
I looked at the screen.
Unknown number.
I almost ignored it.
Then a message appeared.
One sentence.
My blood turned cold.
You need to leave your mother's house before they find you.
I stared at the screen.
A second message appeared.
This time with a name.
May you like
A name that made my hands go numb.
—From someone who knows what the Villalobos family did to your father.
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