Chapter 6 - IF BEATRIZ WINSWe were at the school before eight.
Isabella remained at the villa with Teresa and a child protection specialist.
I hated leaving her.
But when I explained why, she surprised me.
"Get the envelope."
"You remember it?"
She nodded.
"Do you want me to read it?"
"Yes."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
Then she added:
"Before they find it."
That sentence drove me to the school faster than anything else could have.
The principal met us privately.
She looked devastated.
"We should have insisted on speaking directly with you."
"Yes."
There was no point pretending otherwise.
She lowered her eyes.
"We believed the documentation."
Sofia replied before I could.
"That's why forged documentation is effective."
The envelope arrived sealed inside a plastic folder.
My name was written across the front in Isabella's handwriting.
DADDY.
IF BEATRIZ WINS.
My hands shook opening it.
Inside were nine folded pages.
Not a letter.
A diary.
Dates.
Times.
Short descriptions.
April 14 — no dinner because towel wrong.
April 18 — downstairs.
April 19 — downstairs again because cried.
April 23 — B. took phone.
May 2 — Javier came. They talked about papers.
May 6 — B. said Daddy does not want calls.
May 11 — signed papers.
May 13 — no breakfast.
May 18 — told teacher. B. knew when I got home.
I stopped.
"Read that again," Sofia said.
I did.
Told teacher. B. knew when I got home.
I flipped the page.
Underneath Isabella had written:
THERE IS SOMETHING IN MY BAG.
"What bag?"
The principal immediately called Isabella's teacher.
Minutes later, they brought us her backpack.
Inside were schoolbooks.
Pencils.
A sweater.
At the bottom, hidden beneath the lining, we found a tiny red object.
A voice recorder.
Sofia stared at it.
"Where would she get this?"
The teacher covered her mouth.
"We gave those to students for a media project in March."
I felt simultaneously proud and devastated.
My daughter had built an evidence system because every adult around her had failed.
The investigator was called.
We didn't play the recordings ourselves.
Hours later, we received confirmation.
There were more than forty audio files.
One contained a conversation between Beatriz and Javier.
The investigator allowed us to hear a short excerpt.
Beatriz's voice came first.
"You said he wouldn't be back until June."
Javier replied:
"He won't."
"What if Dubai finishes early?"
"It won't."
"You'd better be certain."
"I control the reporting he receives."
I looked at Sofia.
She looked equally stunned.
The recording continued.
Beatriz:
"And the trust?"
Javier:
"The documents are moving."
Beatriz:
"What about the girl?"
Javier lowered his voice.
"Stop pushing her. If Mateo sees marks, he'll go insane."
Beatriz laughed.
"Then he'll blame himself."
The recording ended.
Nobody spoke.
I felt physically sick.
This was not only cruelty.
It was strategy.
They knew exactly what they were doing.
And Javier had known.
He knew Isabella was being hurt.
His concern was not stopping it.
His concern was hiding the evidence from me.
The next recording was worse.
Beatriz:
"She told someone at school."
Javier:
"Then change the emergency contact."
Beatriz:
"I already did."
Javier:
"And convince the counselor she's unstable."
Beatriz:
"That's easy."
Javier:
"Beatriz."
"What?"
"Don't underestimate Mateo."
She laughed.
"You're the one who taught me how predictable he is."
The words hit harder than I expected.
Predictable.
Was I?
Maybe.
Work.
Travel.
Meetings.
Deals.
Provide money.
Solve problems from a distance.
I had built routines so stable that people could weaponize them against my daughter.
"Play the next one."
The investigator shook his head.
"Not yet."
"Why?"
"Because there is an active inquiry now involving financial crimes as well. These recordings need to be processed properly."
"Financial crimes?"
Sofia nodded.
"The transaction review came back."
She opened her folder.
"Over the past eighteen months, approximately €11.4 million has moved through contractors linked directly or indirectly to Raúl Navarro."
"Eleven million?"
"Potential overbilling, false change orders, duplicated invoices."
"And Javier approved them."
"Yes."
"Where did the money go?"
"Multiple jurisdictions."
I laughed once.
Not because anything was funny.
Because the scale was almost unbelievable.
"All this for money."
Sofia shook her head.
"Not only money."
"What else?"
"Control."
She slid another document toward me.
It was a draft announcement.
My engagement.
A wedding.
A date three months away.
I had never approved it.
"Where did you find this?"
"Beatriz's email cache."
I stared at the page.
Below the wedding announcement was a private note Javier had sent.
Once married, accelerate incapacity strategy only if necessary.
I read the sentence three times.
"What does that mean?"
Sofia's jaw tightened.
"They may have planned to portray you as incapable of managing some personal or corporate affairs."
"How?"
"Stress. Mental instability. Medication. Whatever they could establish."
I looked at her.
"Using Isabella?"
"Possibly."
The pieces shifted.
My daughter portrayed as troubled.
Me portrayed as absent, overwhelmed, perhaps unstable.
Beatriz positioned as the responsible partner.
Javier controlling financial paperwork.
Raúl receiving the money.
The entire thing was beginning to look less like fraud and more like a takeover.
Then my phone rang.
It was Andrés.
"You need to come home."
"Why?"
"Beatriz is here."
My pulse spiked.
"What?"
"She arrived with two attorneys."
"Don't let her inside."
"That's not the problem."
"What is?"
Andrés hesitated.
"She has a court filing."
"For what?"
"Temporary access to the villa."
I stared at Sofia.
"And?"
"There's something else."
"What?"
"She's alleging you're emotionally unstable and unsafe around Isabella."
I almost smiled at the audacity.
Then Andrés finished.
"And she included photographs."
"What photographs?"
"Pictures of you grabbing Beatriz during an argument."
I went cold.
"I never grabbed her."
"Mateo."
"What?"
"The photos look real."
Sofia took the phone.
"Send them."
Seconds later, the images arrived.
There I was.
My face.
My clothes.
My study.
My hand wrapped around Beatriz's wrist.
Another showed her recoiling from me.
Another showed what appeared to be a bruise on her arm.
I had never seen any of those moments because they had never happened.
Sofia zoomed in.
"These may be manipulated."
"May?"
"We need experts."
Then another message arrived from Beatriz's attorney.
A video.
My own voice played.
Angry.
Threatening.
"If you ever go against me, I will destroy you."
I stared at the screen.
I had said those words.
But not to Beatriz.
I had said them during a heated business call eighteen months earlier about a fraudulent contractor.
Someone had taken my voice.
Changed the context.
Built a narrative.
Beatriz hadn't run away.
May you like
She had changed strategies.
And while I had spent the night uncovering what she'd done to my daughter, she had spent the night preparing to make the world believe I was the monster.
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