Because Jimena was looking at me as if she knew something much worse than her disappearance was coming.
The officer wrapped a blanket around her shoulders.
“Can you tell us who did this?”
Jimena looked toward me.
Then toward Diego.
Then she whispered,
“Not here.”
The officer frowned.
“Why not?”
“Because someone inside the police knows.”
The room went silent.
I felt Diego press himself against my leg.
The officer’s expression changed.
“Jimena, you’re safe now.”
She shook her head.
“No.”
Her voice was barely audible.
“I’m not.”
“Why?”
She looked directly at me.
“Because they weren’t trying to hide me from the police.”
She swallowed.
“They were hiding me from Dad.”
My blood ran cold.
“Dad?”
“My dad.”
“My father?”
She nodded.
“Uncle Mateo.”
I stared at her.
My father.
My little sister’s father.
The man who had spent forty days putting missing-person posters across town.
The man who had barely slept.
The man who had told reporters he would never stop searching for his daughter.
The man who had stood beside me at every police briefing.
The man who had looked me in the eyes and said,
“We’re going to bring her home.”
Jimena gripped my sleeve.
“He wasn’t looking for me.”
The officer looked confused.
“What are you saying?”
Jimena lowered her voice.
“Dad knew where I was.”
My knees almost gave out.
“No.”
She looked at me.
“Paola, he knew.”
“Jimena, that’s impossible.”
“He came here.”
“When?”
“Twice.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“They told me what would happen if I did.”
“What?”
She looked toward the hallway.
“They said they would hurt Diego.”
I pulled my son closer.
The officer immediately stepped toward him.
“Who threatened your nephew?”
Jimena shook her head.
“I don’t know their names.”
“How many people?”
“Three.”
“Men?”
“Two men and a woman.”
“Did you recognize them?”
She hesitated.
“One.”
“Who?”
She looked at me.
Then she said a name that made my entire body turn cold.
“Mrs. Matilda.”
The owner of Modern Cleaners.
The woman who had smiled at me.
The woman who had told me children make things up.
The woman who had handed me Jimena’s pillowcase.
The woman who had sent me a message without realizing it.
But Jimena wasn’t finished.
“There was another person.”
“Who?”
She shook her head.
“I never saw his face.”
“Anything you remember?”
“He wore a silver watch.”
My eyes closed.
Rodrigo.
It had to be Rodrigo.
But Jimena’s next words made the room spin.
“It wasn’t Rodrigo.”
I opened my eyes.
“What?”
Jimena looked frightened.
“Rodrigo came here.”
“When?”
“The night I disappeared.”
My heart stopped.
“He came with another man.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“What did he look like?”
“Tall. Gray hair. Expensive coat.”
I stared at her.
My father had gray hair.
But that couldn’t be.
I couldn’t make myself say his name.
“Did you see his face?”
Jimena shook her head.
“He kept his back to me.”
Then she whispered,
“But I heard his voice.”
“What did he say?”
Jimena’s lips trembled.
“He said, ‘Once Mateo signs the transfer, she’s no longer our problem.’”
The officer looked at me.
“Transfer of what?”
I didn’t know.
Neither did Jimena.
But then she reached beneath the mattress.
She pulled out a small plastic bag.
Inside was a folded document.
She handed it to me.
“That’s why they kept me.”
I unfolded it.
The paper was old.
Official.
Stamped.
My eyes moved across the first page.
My father’s name was there.
So was mine.
And beneath our names was the name of a company I had never heard of.
Alvarez Community Holdings, LLC.
My hands started shaking.
“What is this?”
Jimena whispered,
“Dad owns more than you think.”
I looked at her.
“What do you mean?”
She swallowed.
“Paola…”
She looked toward the police officers.
“Dad isn’t broke.”
“I never said he was.”
“No.”
She shook her head.
“You don’t understand.”
Her voice became almost inaudible.
“He has been pretending to be broke.”
I stared at the document.
Jimena continued.
“Everything we’ve ever been told about the family business is a lie.”
The officer stepped closer.
“Jimena, what was your father planning?”
She looked at him.
Then at me.
“He was planning to sell the neighborhood.”
I frowned.
“What neighborhood?”
She pointed upward.
“At first I thought it was just this building.”
Then she said something that made me forget how to breathe.
“It’s the whole town block.”
I looked at the walls.
The dry cleaners.
The apartments.
The small grocery store.
The pharmacy.
The old bakery.
The laundromat.
The empty warehouse.
All of it.
My father owned pieces of almost everything.
Or at least, someone connected to him did.
I suddenly remembered how often my father had complained about the town.
“Too many old buildings.”
“Too many small businesses.”
“Someone needs to modernize this place.”
I had always assumed he was talking about development.
But maybe he wasn’t.
Maybe he was talking about ownership.
A police officer took the document from my hands.
“We need to get this into evidence.”
Jimena grabbed my arm.
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because there’s another copy.”
“Where?”
She looked at me.
“At home.”
My heart dropped.
“Whose home?”
She whispered,
“Yours.”
I couldn’t speak.
“My house?”
She nodded.
“They put something there before I disappeared.”
“What?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then how do you know?”
“Because I heard them talking.”
“Who?”
“Rodrigo.”
My stomach twisted.
“What did he say?”
Jimena looked toward Diego.
Then back at me.
“He said the papers had to stay in your house because if anyone ever searched for them, you would be the first person they would suspect.”
I looked at my son.
Then at the officers.
Then at the open back door.
Something inside me suddenly became very clear.
This wasn’t just about finding Jimena.
It had never been.
Jimena had discovered something.
Something about our father.
Something about Rodrigo.
Something about the property.
And someone had decided that a sixteen-year-old girl was dangerous enough to disappear.
I took out my phone.
There were twelve missed calls.
All from Rodrigo.
Then a new message appeared.
Where are you?
Another message arrived seconds later.
I know you found her.
I stared at the screen.
A third message.
Don’t bring her home.
My hands went cold.
Then the final message appeared.
Because your house is already being watched.
I looked up.
Through the front window of Modern Cleaners, across the street, I could see our neighborhood.
Our house.
Our driveway.
And parked two houses away was a dark SUV.
The engine was running.
Someone was sitting inside.
Watching.
The officer followed my gaze.
“Do you know that vehicle?”
I whispered,
“No.”
Jimena did.
She grabbed my arm so hard her fingernails dug into my skin.
“I do.”
“Who is it?”
She stared through the glass.
“That was the car they used when they took me.”
The officer immediately reached for his radio.
“Unit two, we have a possible suspect vehicle—”
The SUV’s headlights turned on.
Then it slowly began moving.
The officer ran outside.
Another officer followed.
The SUV accelerated toward the end of the street.
A cruiser pulled out behind it.
But before the car disappeared around the corner, the passenger window lowered.
A hand came out.
And something small was thrown onto the pavement.
The vehicle vanished.
The officer picked it up.
It was a blue hair tie.
Jimena’s blue hair tie.
The same one she had been wearing the morning she disappeared.
She stared at it.
Then she whispered,
“They’re telling us they know where we are.”
I looked at my little boy.
For the first time since Jimena vanished, I understood something terrifying.
Finding her had not ended the nightmare.
It had only opened the door.
And whatever waited on the other side had already entered my home.
PART 4
The blue hair tie lay in the officer’s gloved hand.
Nobody spoke.
Jimena was staring at it as if it were something alive.
I couldn’t stop looking at the empty street where the SUV had disappeared.
“They want us scared,” I whispered.
Jimena shook her head.
“No.”
Her voice was different now.
Older.
Colder.
“They want you to think they’re still in control.”
The officer turned toward her.
“What does that mean?”
Jimena looked at him.
“It means they’re going to make a mistake.”
“How do you know?”
“Because they already did.”
I stared at my sister.
“What mistake?”
She looked at me.
“Keeping me alive.”
My chest tightened.
“What?”
“They needed me to sign something.”
“What?”
“A statement.”
She swallowed.
“They wanted me to say Dad had given me permission to access some financial records.”
I didn’t understand.
“Why would they need you to say that?”
“Because I’m listed on something.”
“On what?”
She looked at the officer.
“An ownership document.”
The officer’s expression changed.
“What ownership document?”
Jimena looked directly at me.
“The one they were trying to make Dad transfer.”
My mind went back to the paper she had given me.
Alvarez Community Holdings.
My name.
Her name.
Our father’s name.
I suddenly understood why Jimena had been kidnapped.
She wasn’t just a daughter.
She was an obstacle.
She was a legal heir.
And someone wanted that obstacle removed before my father signed anything.
But there was still one question.
“Why didn’t they just kill you?”
Jimena looked down.
“Because they didn’t know where the original was.”
“The original of what?”
“The trust.”
I felt my stomach drop.
“What trust?”
She looked at me.
“Grandpa’s.”
My grandfather had died eleven years earlier.
As far as I knew, his estate had been settled long ago.
He had left my father the family business, some properties, and enough money for everyone to live comfortably.
At least, that’s what we had been told.
Jimena shook her head.
“Grandpa didn’t leave Dad everything.”
The officer looked between us.
“Then who inherited it?”
Jimena’s eyes filled with tears.
“You did.”
I stared at her.
“No.”
“You did.”
“That’s impossible.”
“Grandpa created a private trust before he died.”
