Chapter 15 - The Priest They TookFather Anselmo’s wheelchair was found in the hospital chapel.
Empty.
One wheel still turned slowly when Mateo arrived, squeaking softly against the marble floor as if the chair itself were trying to speak. The priest’s rosary lay broken near the altar. Three beads had rolled beneath a pew. His leather satchel was gone.
On the altar, arranged with careful cruelty, was a single white orchid.
Sofía stared at the photograph Mateo showed them and felt something inside her go very still.
Carmen crossed herself.
Diego did not speak. That was how Sofía knew his fury had gone beyond language.
“He’s eighty-two,” Carmen whispered. “He can barely stand.”
Mateo’s voice was grim. “That’s why they took him. He is fragile, recognizable, and tied to the evidence. Also, he may know where additional copies are hidden.”
“Alonso Vega,” Diego said.
Elena nodded. “Likely.”
Sofía sat on the edge of her hospital bed, dressed now despite doctors objecting. “What does he want?”
The answer came twenty minutes later.
A video arrived on Diego’s private phone.
Father Anselmo sat in a wooden chair under harsh light. His face was bruised. His hands were bound loosely, perhaps because even his captors felt ridiculous tying an old priest too tightly. Behind him hung a faded shipping banner with a silver falcon.
Alonso Vega stepped into frame.
He was handsome in a polished, unpleasant way. Late forties. Silver at the temples. A smile built for negotiations and funerals.
“Diego,” he said. “You have become emotional. It is damaging.”
Diego’s hand tightened around the phone.
Alonso continued.
“The priest will remain alive as long as Lucía Ortega’s materials remain private. You will issue a clarification stating that grief and stress led you to make premature allegations. You will also place Sofía López in my custody for questioning regarding stolen property.”
Carmen made a strangled sound.
Diego’s eyes became lethal.
On the video, Alonso smiled.
“I know. Dramatic. But the public likes drama now, doesn’t it? Give them a better ending. The maid lied. The billionaire was wounded. The family heals. Everyone applauds.”
Sofía felt cold rage spread through her.
Father Anselmo lifted his head.
His voice was weak but clear.
“Do not trade truth for an old man.”
Alonso struck him.
Carmen cried out.
The video ended.
For a moment, only the hospital machines made sound.
Then Diego turned and drove his fist into the wall.
The crack made everyone jump.
Blood appeared across his knuckles.
Sofía stood. “That helped no one.”
He laughed once, broken and furious.
“No. It did not.”
“Good. Now think.”
He looked at her.
She walked closer, ignoring Carmen’s protest.
“Alonso wants me because the public story depends on making me dirty. He wants the priest because the legal story depends on making evidence disappear. He wants you to retract because the financial story depends on making investors calm.”
Mateo nodded slowly. “She’s right.”
Elena looked at Sofía with professional focus. “You have a proposal.”
“I have bait.”
Carmen’s face went white. “No.”
Sofía turned to her mother. “Mamá—”
“No. I know that voice. That is the voice you used when you crawled into the vault vent.”
“And it worked.”
“You could have died.”
“But I didn’t.”
Carmen slapped the bed rail with both hands. “That is not an argument!”
The room went silent.
Sofía softened.
“I am not trying to be brave. I am trying to end this before they take someone else.”
Diego’s voice was low. “I will not hand you to Alonso Vega.”
“I’m not asking you to.”
She looked at Elena.
“I’m asking you to make him believe you did.”
By afternoon, the trap was in motion.
Diego’s legal team leaked controlled panic. Anonymous sources suggested Mendoza advisers were pressuring him to retract. A message was sent through an old Vega contact: Diego was willing to exchange Sofía for Father Anselmo, but only off-books, before police involvement made compromise impossible.
Alonso chose the location.
Of course he did.
An abandoned shipping warehouse outside Valencia, once operated through a Vega subsidiary.
Mateo objected. Elena objected. Carmen threatened to lock Sofía in a bathroom. Diego said nothing for a long time.
Then he found Sofía alone in the hospital garden.
“You realize,” he said, “that every instinct I have is telling me to prevent this.”
She looked at the orange trees lining the path.
“My mother spent seventeen years preventing things. It kept me alive. It did not make us free.”
Diego stood beside her.
“I don’t know what I am allowed to feel for you.”
The honesty hurt.
Sofía looked at him. “Allowed by whom?”
He smiled sadly. “Ghosts. Cameras. Prosecutors. Your mother.”
That almost made her laugh.
Almost.
“You are allowed to feel whatever is true,” she said. “You are not allowed to use it to decide for me.”
He nodded.
“I can do that.”
“Can you?”
“I am learning.”
They stood in silence.
Then Diego said, “When this ends, I want to ask you to dinner.”
Sofía looked at him.
“That is absurd timing.”
“Yes.”
“And possibly terrible judgment.”
“Yes.”
“And I may say no.”
His smile was small and real.
“I know.”
For one peaceful second, amid scandals and kidnappings and orchids sent like death notices, Sofía saw what Lucía had seen before power buried it.
Not a prince.
A person.
Night fell as they drove toward Valencia.
Sofía wore a hidden transmitter beneath her blouse. Elena’s team followed from a distance. Mateo rode with tactical police who trusted him just enough to dislike the plan privately. Diego sat beside Sofía in the back of the armored car, silent.
Carmen had stayed behind only because Sofía begged her with tears and because Elena placed two guards at the door.
At the warehouse, fog rolled in from the port.
Alonso’s men took Sofía at the entrance.
Diego let them.
That was the hardest part.
Sofía saw it almost kill him.
Inside, the warehouse smelled of salt, rust, and oil. Father Anselmo sat bound beneath a hanging light.
Alive.
Sofía exhaled.
Alonso Vega stepped from the shadows.
“Little maid,” he said. “You have caused expensive problems.”
Sofía lifted her chin.
“Then you should have paid your criminals better.”
His smile vanished.
Outside, somewhere in the fog, Diego waited.
Inside, Sofía López stood alone before the man who had helped bury Lucía Ortega.
And the transmitter beneath her blouse blinked red.
Not green.
May you like
Red.
No signal.
