Chapter 383: The House of Lies
The salvaged prototype felt like a cursed object. It was perfect, better than before, its code now fortified with Ethan’s emergency patches, a silent monument to the terrifying depth of his hidden skills. But for Ana Lucía, every line of that code was a question she was afraid to ask. The awe had solidified into a cold, hard knot of suspicion in her stomach. Who "was" he? The gentle, hesitant boy from the café and the digital savant who could resurrect a murdered project in an hour could not coexist. One of them was a lie.
She avoided him for the rest of the day, claiming a migraine. She needed to think, to process the chilling certainty that she was entangled with someone living a double life. She was sitting alone in the most remote corner of the library, trying and failing to focus on a sociology text, when a shadow fell over her table.
It was Daniela.
Ana Lucía looked up, bracing for another round of veiled insults or manipulative sympathy. But the girl standing before her was a ghost of the confident, sharp-tongued person she knew. Daniela’s face was pale, her eyes red-rimmed and shadowed with a profound exhaustion. She wasn’t wearing any makeup, and her hands were trembling.
—Can I sit? — Daniela’s voice was a raw scrape, devoid of its usual calculated warmth.
Ana Lucía gave a curt, wary nod.
Daniela sank into the chair opposite, her gaze fixed on the grain of the wooden table. She didn’t speak for a long time, as if gathering the courage for a leap from a great height.
—I have to tell you something, — she finally whispered, her voice breaking. —And you’re not going to want to believe me, but it’s the truth. For once, it’s the truth.
Ana Lucía remained silent, her heart beginning to pound a slow, heavy rhythm of dread.
—Everything I told you… — Daniela choked out, —…was a lie. All of it. Ethan never pitied you. He never thought of you as a project. The photo of him and Julia… I lied about when it was taken. It was from the first week of school, before he even met you. He hasn’t looked at her since. The note… that was me too.
The confession came not as a torrent, but as a slow, painful bleed. Each sentence was a stab, unraveling the entire tapestry of pain and doubt that had defined Ana Lucía’s last few weeks.
—Why? — was all Ana Lucía could manage, her own voice a stunned whisper.
—Andrés, — Daniela said, the name a curse. —He wanted to hurt Ethan. For the debate, for… just for existing. And I… I went along with it. I thought it was a game. I thought you were… fragile. An easy target. — She finally looked up, and her eyes were swimming with genuine, gut-wrenching tears. —But you’re not. And he’s not. What I did… it was monstrous. I saw you, after, and I… I can’t live with it anymore.
She detailed the entire conspiracy. Andrés’s rage, their plan to sow discord, her role as the friendly informant. She told her about Andrés discovering that Blackwell Industries was evaluating the projects, how it had fueled his vendetta into an obsession, and how he had threatened to ruin her if she didn’t help him sabotage their work.
—The prototype… that was him, — Daniela confessed, her shoulders slumping under the weight of the admission. —He accessed the server. I… I knew about it, and I did nothing. I am so sorry, Ana Lucía. So, so sorry. There is no excuse. Ethan… he cares about you. Really. I saw the way he looked at you, even when I was poisoning you against him. It was the only real thing in this whole, ugly mess.
The solution, the fact that their project was not only saved but now stronger, felt insignificant. The truth Daniela unspooled was a nuclear bomb detonating in the center of Ana Lucía’s reality. She sat in her chair, utterly motionless, as the world she thought she knew was dismantled piece by piece.
The coldness from Ethan? A reaction to Daniela’s lies whispered in his own ear. His withdrawal? A defense against her own, manipulated distrust. The constant, gnawing fear that she was a charity case, a temporary distraction? A carefully manufactured fiction.
The relief was so immense it was physically painful, a searing heat that warred with the ice-cold shock. All the pain, the sleepless nights, the tears shed into her pillow—it had all been for nothing. It was a phantom pain from a wound that never existed, inflicted by a surgeon she had mistakenly trusted.
She stared at Daniela, but she didn’t see her. She saw the library, the café, all the places tainted by the lies. She saw Ethan’s face, the times he had tried to reach out, the promises he had made, all while she was pushing him away, believing him to be the villain.
—All this time… — Ana Lucía’s voice was a hollow echo. —…it was you.
Daniela could only nod, fresh tears streaming down her face. —It was me.
Ana Lucía stood up, her legs feeling like they were made of water. The problem was no longer Ethan’s secrets or a sabotaged project. The problem was that the very foundation of her recent life had been a house of lies, and it had just collapsed in on itself, leaving her standing in the rubble, stunned and disoriented. The truth was the solution, but it was a devastating one. She had her answer, and it was far more terrible than she could have ever imagined. Without another word, she turned and walked away, leaving a sobbing Daniela behind, the weight of the confessed truth now hers alone to carry.