Chapter 45 The man behind the silence
Rafael
The sirens grew louder.
I looked at Marco. "Did you call them?"
"No, boss," Marco said, his hand moving to his gun. "I thought you did."
My blood ran cold.
"Then who?"
Catherine's head snapped up. Her face went pale. "No. No, no, no."
"What?" I demanded. "Catherine, what's happening?"
"They're here," she whispered. "They found us."
"Who found us?" Flora asked.
Before Catherine could answer, the warehouse doors burst open.
Armed men in tactical gear flooded in. There was at least twenty of them.
My men raised their weapons.
"Stand down!" I ordered. We were outnumbered.
The tactical team surrounded us, pointing theyr guns at our heads.
Then, from behind them, a figure emerged.
A woman. In her mid-fifties. She was elegantly dressed in an expensive suit despite the late hour.
She looked familiar somehow.
"Hello, Rafael," the woman said. Her voice was cultured and refined. "It's been a long time."
I stared at her. "Who are you?"
"You don't remember me?" The woman smiled sadly. "I suppose you wouldn't. You only met me once. At your wedding to Eva."
My mind raced through memories of that day. Hundreds of guests were there. I barely registered their faces.
"I'm Dr. Helena Vasquez," the woman said. "Irina's older sister."
My stomach dropped. "Dr. Irina Vasquez is dead."
"Yes," Helena said. "She was murdered three months ago. And I've spent every day since trying to find out who killed her."
"It wasn't us," Marco said quickly.
"I know," Helena replied. "It was her." She pointed at Catherine. "Wasn't it, Catherine? You killed my sister to keep her quiet."
"No!" Catherine scrambled to her feet. "I didn't kill Irina! I swear!"
"Liar!" Helena's composure cracked. "Irina called me the night before she died. She said she was meeting you. And you'd threatened her if she didn't help you with your revenge plan. And then she turned up dead!"
"I threatened her, yes," Catherine admitted. "But I didn't kill her! She was alive when I left!"
"Convenient," Helena said coldly.
I stepped forward. "Dr. Vasquez, if you're here for justice…"
"Justice?" Helena laughed bitterly. "There's no justice in this world, Mr. Valserro. Only revenge. And right now, I want revenge for my sister."
She pulled out a gun and pointed it at Catherine.
"Wait!" Flora moved between them. "Please, just wait. Let her explain."
"Explain what?" Helena demanded. "How she manipulated my sister? Used her research for personal vendetta? And got her killed?"
"I didn't kill Irina," Catherine said desperately. "Yes, I threatened her. Yes, I forced her to help me activate Lucia. But I didn't kill her!"
"Then who did?" Helena asked.
"I don't know!" Catherine cried. "But when I left her that night, she was alive. She said she had one more confession to make. One more secret to reveal. And then she'd be done with all of this."
Helena's gun wavered slightly. "What secret?"
"She didn't tell me," Catherine said. "She said it was too dangerous. That if the wrong people found out, everyone involved would die."
"My sister was paranoid," Helena said. "She always thought someone was watching and following her. I thought it was just the guilt eating at her."
"What if it wasn't?" I asked. "What if someone really was watching her? Someone who didn't want her secrets getting out?"
Helena looked at me. "What are you suggesting?"
"That maybe there's more to this than we know," I said. "That maybe someone else has been involved all along. Someone who wanted both Irina and Eva dead."
"Why would anyone want Eva dead?" Catherine asked.
"Because she knew something," Marco said quietly. He'd been silent until now, watching everything. "Boss, what if Eva discovered something before she died? Something dangerous enough to get her killed?"
"But Eva killed herself," I said. "The ballistics proved it."
"Did they?" Helena asked. "Or did they prove what someone wanted them to prove?"
My chest tightened. "What are you talking about?"
"My sister kept records," Helena said. "Everything. Every experiment. Every payment. Every conversation. And three weeks before she died, she told me something strange."
"What?" Flora asked.
"She said the ballistics reports on Eva's death were falsified," Helena said. "She said someone paid the medical examiner to make it look like suicide when it wasn't."
The room spun.
"That's impossible," I said. "I saw the reports myself."
"You saw what someone wanted you to see," Helena said. "But my sister kept the original reports. The real ones. Before they were altered."
"Where are they?" I demanded.
"Safe," Helena said. "But I'll tell you what they say. Eva didn't shoot herself. She was shot by someone else."
Catherine let out a sob.
"Someone murdered Eva," Helena continued. "Made it look like suicide, paid off everyone involved to keep it quiet. And when my sister threatened to expose the truth, they killed her too."
"Who?" I asked. "Who has that kind of power?"
"I don't know," Helena admitted. "But whoever it is, they're still out there, waiting."
"For what?" Flora asked.
"For you," Helena said, looking at Flora. "My sister's notes mentioned you specifically. She said that Lucia was the end game. The final piece of the puzzle."
"What does that mean?" Flora's voice shook.
"I was hoping you could tell me," Helena said.
Before Flora could respond, the lights went out, plunging the room into complete darkness.
Then out of nowhere, gunfire erupted.
I grabbed Flora and pulled her down behind a crate that had been in from of me all the while.
"Marco!" I shouted.
"I'm here, boss!" He shouted through the chaos.
More gunfire erupted. I heard screams across the room. I held foira tightly behind the crates.
When the emergency lights flickered on seconds later, the scene had changed completely.
Helena's men were down. All of them were dead or unconscious.
Catherine was gone.
And standing in the center of the warehouse, surrounded by bodies, was someone I never expected to see.
Antonio Martinez.
But he wasn't alone.
He had a gun pressed to Helena's temple. And he was smiling.
"Hello, Rafael," Antonio said. "We need to talk."