CHAPTER 6 — THE BROTHER WHO STOPPED LAUGHING
Tomás’s apartment was empty.
By dawn, investigators had located his abandoned car near the southern edge of the city. His phone lay beneath the driver’s seat, wiped clean.
Evangelina immediately told the family that Renata had manipulated him.
“She has been poisoning Alonso against us for years,” she said during an emergency video conference. “Now she has stolen company records and forced Tomás to move money.”
Octavio sat silently at the head of the mansion’s conference table.
Alonso stood near the windows, his shirt wrinkled from the previous night.
“You know that isn’t true,” he told his mother.
Evangelina turned toward him.
“Do I?”
“Tomás would never take seventeen million pesos for Renata.”
“Then perhaps he took it for himself.”
Alonso looked at his father.
Octavio had barely spoken since seeing Elena Cruz’s share certificate.
“Did you know about the trust?” Alonso asked.
Octavio’s eyes remained on the table.
“I knew Elena created one.”
“And you allowed Mother to tell us the shares were dissolved?”
“I was told Renata had died.”
Evangelina’s expression hardened.
“You were recovering from surgery. The company was collapsing. I handled what you were too weak to handle.”
“You told me a four-year-old child was dead.”
“I protected this family.”
Octavio looked at her as though he were seeing a stranger.
Meanwhile, across the city, Renata sat inside Lucía’s secured apartment while Daniel analyzed the final transfer.
“The money was not sent directly to Tomás,” he explained. “His company received it, then divided it into twelve equal payments.”
“To whom?”
“Twelve former employees of the Ibarra Housing Initiative.”
Renata leaned forward.
“The families whose pensions disappeared.”
Daniel nodded.
“Tomás returned the money.”
“Then why run?”
“Because he knew someone would stop him.”
Lucía entered carrying a sealed package.
“This was delivered downstairs.”
There was no return address.
Inside was the phone Tomás had used during the anniversary dinner.
The video of Renata being humiliated was still on it.
But it continued beyond the moment everyone assumed he had stopped recording.
After lowering the phone, Tomás had left the camera running beneath the table.
The audio captured Evangelina whispering to Alonso.
Get the red envelope before midnight. If she reaches October fourteenth with the documents, we lose everything.
Alonso had replied:
She doesn’t know what she owns.
Then Evangelina had said something colder.
Neither did her mother until it was too late.
Renata replayed the sentence.
Lucía’s phone rang.
She answered and activated the speaker.
A distorted male voice filled the room.
“Renata?”
“Tomás?”
“I don’t have much time.”
“Where are you?”
“I moved the money back to the people it belonged to. But Account 407 was only a distraction.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The real money never passed through the foundation.”
Daniel began recording the call.
“Where did it go?” he asked.
Tomás breathed heavily.
“There is a second ledger. Alonso knows where it is.”
Renata looked at Lucía.
“Why would Alonso know?”
“Because he helped create it.”
A loud sound interrupted the call.
Tomás whispered quickly.
“Do not trust the evidence from his office. Your husband wanted you to find it.”
The line went dead.
Seconds later, a photograph arrived from Tomás’s number.
It showed Alonso entering a hotel room with a woman wearing Evangelina’s emerald necklace.
The woman was Camila Serrano, the Ibarra family’s attorney.
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The timestamp was from three nights earlier.
And in Camila’s hand was the original red envelope.
